Winter Warfare

After the sunshine of last week, Scarborough was grey and blustery last Saturday. But, of course, even a grey and blustery beach is a thousand times better than no beach at all.

We had gone for the day to see some lovely old friends, George and Margaret. Old as in "my mother used to teach with Margaret over forty years ago" and also old as in "George is ninety-five".

Yes, George is indeed ninety-five, born during the Great War. Still full of wit and good humour. "Don't ask me," he says to any tricky question. "I can't be expected to know. I'm ninety-five. I'm senile."

It was a real joy to see them both.

He told us about when he was a soldier in the Second World War.

His platoon was sent to Iceland to train. It was extremely cold there: it tends to be like that in Iceland. The idea was to prepare them for fighting in cold countries. They trained for six months in Winter Warfare.

Finally, fully trained in fighting during all the extremes of cold weather, they were sent to North Africa.

"It's like that in the Army," said George, philosophically. "Things don't always go according to plan."