Impressions of National Service
'The corporals couldn't assault you, physically - although they did have the habit of hurling one's kit out of the window.' Richard Vaughan, the last National Serviceman, was released from the army 20 years ago. With his demob came the end of 18 years of peacetime conscription into the armed forces - something this country had never known before. Between 1945 and 1963, two-and-a-half million young men said good-bye to the comforts of civilian life, and spent two years in a world of battledress, barracks, bullish sergeants and rumours of bromide in the tea.
With the help of ex-National Servicemen, including Bob Monkhouse, Windsor Davies, Frank Bough, Paul Foot, Leslie Thomas, Michael Frayn, Mgr Bruce Kent , Fred Trueman, Auberon Waugh and Nicholas Harman, those National Service days are recalled, from call-up and kitting-out to demob and getting out. Introduction read by Colin Blakely.