He also asked me if I had anything to say to him.
"Can I say what I am thinking sir"
He said yes
"Sir I signed on at the age of 16 to be in the band I worked very hard to get to Kneller hall which also cost the army a lot of money,I did not sign on to do this kind of thing I do not want to do. And as for going back to Canterbury to do my basic training with lads who have been only in the army a few days it just is not going to happen the army have not been fair with me over this and I am not going to do it even if it means spending the whole nine years I have to do in nick."
The C.S.M. said"Matcham you need to take this up with the CO and not me and at this very time he will not see you so till that happens you will stay and do what you are told"
So it was a lot of drill on the square on my own with a cpl then after about a week I was doing it with the company using the rife as well.But as I have said before my legs were playing me up even at that age but they could not find anything wrong so I had to put up with the pain.
Then came the day I had to fire the rife for the first time .So off to the firing ranch the company went .We was down there for 3 days and must say I did not mind it first day they showed me how to fire and reload and I done firing at the targets never hit a bull but some rounds did hit the target.We also done some schooling down there the other lads had done it before so they went after a hour back to firing but I had to spend more time in school they were showing how to clean the rife how to fire standing or lieing down or even firing when running and how to look after the rife about loading the mag with so many rounds and using less rounds in the sand etc. Anyway back to the story
It was on the last day we was down there and we had to pass some tests if we passed we got more money in our wage packet .
I was doing my best knowing that I would not pass the rest of the company had been doing all this from the day they joined up but for me it was the first time.
It came to the part we had to stand in a row and they told us that there was going to be moving targets of men coming up in front of us as we were running towards them.
So there we were about 12 lads at a time all in a row behind each other.
And the sgt would shout out "GO "WHEN IT CAME TO YOUR ROW TO RUN AND FIRE AT THE SAME TIME.
I was in the row to go next so we moved up in the ready,and the sgt shouted "Go" so we was running and shoting at the targets as they came up in front of us then it happen--------