General

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Thanks to Noah Scott for the Brotherhood Archive

After many years as our Archivist, Noah Scott has passed on the baton.

We wish to thank Noah for all his hard work and dedication in building and curating our Archive. It is based on accounts from individuals who were involved in some way in the Greek Campaign, the majority of whom are (or were) members of the Brotherhood, supplemented by information from research and other sources. 

As well as spending many hours over the last few years putting the Archive together, including thousands of pages of documents, Noah has also committed a lot of time to conducting his own research. In addition, for many veterans, Noah has personally developed their stories and acted as their author. While some veterans may only have a small record (as per the registration forms we currently show for our veterans on the website), there are also those whose ‘stories’ literally run to hundreds of pages.

Noah very carefully constructed the Archive by setting up a Folder for every single veteran (over 540 of them)  and within each folder separate files : Foreword, Pre-Greece, Greek Campaign, Post-Greece and Post Script and sometimes Last Post. This means that in whatever form content has arrived into Noah’s inbox over the years (be this photos, news cuttings, POW questionnaires, verbatim memories, books etc) Noah has deconstructed this content and then written/crafted it in order to populate each file correctly.

In developing the Archive, Noah has captured not just people’s activities as part of the Greek Campaign but, where possible, their whole stories. In order to help future researchers or family members, Noah has also pulled in content, where relevant, from other sources like Wikipedia or official accounts, in order to paint a picture and to tell the story, where possible, for many veterans.

To find out more about Noah’s approach to the Archive please click on the link below.

La Raison d’Etre by Noah Scott

As we have previously stated, Noah’s endeavours may well have gone unrecognised without the time Mary Peterkin (Sanderson) has spent this year, painstakingly taking Noah’s content and transferring the records and stories (literally piece by piece) onto the website.

This has been a major achievement, as it means not only is all of Noah’s hard work and dedication visible for all to see, but we also now have a very substantial and lasting legacy, not just for a few famous veterans who we know about or who have written books, but just as importantly many unknown and unsung heroes of this ill-fated campaign.

David and Mary Sanderson have now taken over the Archive function. Given that we are now receiving veterans’ stories from children and grandchildren, we have developed a couple of proformas which we are asking people to complete if they wish their relative to be added to the Archive. Please contact us at greekveterans@gmail.com if you wish to add a veteran to the Archive.

 

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Funding The Brotherhood activities

Funding The Brotherhood activities is not something we have talked about. As you may or may not be aware, although informal and run by members who are volunteers, The Brotherhood does have regular outgoings. These are ‘third party’ costs and expenditure relating to our annual services in Kalamata and Lichfield; the website; our newsletters as well costs involved in the upkeep of the Greek Grove at the NMA. However, we have no regular source of income. Unlike other organisations, we  do not charge a  membership fee or request annual subscriptions.

Over the years, we have  been very fortunate to have benefitted from donations from members, some of which have been very generous. However, unlike our outgoings, these donations are by their very nature ad hoc. The refurbishment of the Greek Grove in 2018 significantly depleted our funds which means we are starting to look at new and different ways to finance The Brotherhood’s activities going forward, particularly to ensure the future of our memorials. At this stage, we would welcome your views and ideas. Please email us at greekveterans@gmail.com

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A Salute to His Royal Highness The Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh

The Brotherhood of Veterans of the 1941 Greek Campaign is greatly saddened by the death of HRH Prince Philip who passed away peacefully at Windsor Castle on Friday 9 April 2021, aged 99. Our thoughts and prayers are with Queen Elizabeth II, his wife of 73 years, and the Royal family, who have lost a much beloved husband, father, grandfather and great-grandfather. Prince Philip was the longest serving royal consort in British history. He has been a constant not only in the Queen’s life, but also in all our lives.

As a wonderful example of duty first, we echo the words of the Royal British Legion: “We are immensely thankful for his lifetime of faithful service and we mourn his passing deeply.”

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Please ‘Follow’ our Website

For those of you who are new to our website, please click on the link to ‘follow’ us. This will mean that in future, new ‘posts’ can be sent  directly to your email address/inbox as soon as they are published on the website, including updates on our Kalamata and Lichfield services.

This is how to ‘follow’ us:

  • Go to the ‘Homepage’ and look in bottom right hand corner where you will find the ‘Follow’ button. Click on this and enter your email address in the box that appears.
  • You will then receive an email from WordPress (which hosts our website) asking you to confirm your ‘Subscription’ to the Greek Veterans.
  • Just to clarify, by confirming ‘Subscription’, this simply means you agree to ‘subscribe’ to receiving emails containing the ‘posts’. There is no charge or fee to pay.
  • Next, you need to click on ‘Confirm Follow’ which means you will receive an email every time we publish news or updates.
  • After you do this, you will receive an email from the ‘Greek Veterans’ to confirm that you have subscribed to receive emails from the website.

 

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Farewell President, Welcome Chairman

As you will be aware, our President Frank Gill, sadly died on 25th November 2020.  Frank, a veteran of The Greek Campaign was only our second President, following on from our first President, Edwin Horlington MBE, founder of  The Brotherhood.  It was fitting that a veteran was our President but now that can no longer be the case. Instead, we have decided to appoint a Chairman. We are very pleased to announce that our first Chairman will be David Sanderson.  David is the son of Trooper Eric Rockliff Sanderson of the 4th Hussars, PoW October 1941.