WHISPERING SMITH: A call to arms

There were stalls and exhibits – lots of guns and war toys for the youngsters, charity stalls, remote control models for us older kids, and informative stuff for those interested – especially John Helyer’s military badge collection and the Maclean plaid pipers marching band just making you want to left right, left, right across The Green.

Plenty to see and, literally above all, the stunning aerobatics performed by two single-engine, smoke-trailing planes weaving across the beach, rolling across the sky and painting a love heart for a grand finale, before performing a couple of victory rolls and disappearing off to the north from whence they came.

Stunning day! One complaint only, not a great variety of refreshments on offer, unless you wanted to boost your cholesterol with a hog roll! Organisers, well done, but I suggest for next year you learn from those who organise the refreshments at The Town Show, one always eats and drinks well there.

A ROUND IN THE CHAMBER …and what of the LA Town Show, which is probably the best one-day event the town puts on?

Well, it is now under threat from our own Conservative town councillors who, with a majority vote of one, are about to destroy it by splitting it into two separate events and moving the companion horticultural event – the Town Show – to a smaller venue from next year, thus divorcing the entertainment of the Family Fun Day from the Town Show itself.

Unbelievable just how dozy, often bitter and narrow-minded those councillors can be in their quest to toe the party line!

Councillor Joyce Bowyer is entitled to her opinion re last year’s event, but it did leave me wondering just where she was on that sunny afternoon – certainly not in the crowded marquee, where the usual high standard of shown produce was maintained.

The good councillor might also consider the fact that the wishes of 70 people who really care are more meaningful than the unstated wishes of 22,000 who may well not!

BOMBER COMMAND A total of 55,573 young volunteers, nearly half of RAF Bomber Command, had perished by the end of the Second World War, such are the cold, precise statistics of war.

Last week, I went along to Squires Garden Centre in Washington, to meet some of the last of the survivors gathered there to raise money for their charity, Bomber Command Association, by chatting to folk and signing rare photographs and books.

Looking at and talking with them, frail as most were, it was hard to imagine them as youngsters, climbing aboard a Germany-bound, bomb-loaded aeroplane, knowing that their chances of a safe landfall back home were very slim indeed.

Some of the ordered missions were, arguably, wrongly targeted, but no one can deny these men their courage, their resolute bravery in carrying out those orders, sacrificing themselves in defence of this their country. A very moving experience.