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Finished display boards for this weekends Education /Open Hiouse/ WWII Re-enactment at MUSEUM OF THE AMERICAN GI, starting on Friday. It's s pleasure tobhelp em out and show & talk to the kids especially about my favorite subject. Anywho, Wanted to show y'all.

Yes, he's a good ol' boy is Bruce Crompton! Hope you enjoyed your visit to Duxford

OH GAWD, not more Scots, My wifes a Scot, her mothers A Scot, her aunts and Uncles are Scots, her brothers and sisters are Scots, its a bloody invasion I tell yer, we,ll have another come on here from the wilds of Barra, calling himself Frasier,,,, Were Doomed, Doomed I,ll tell ye

I didn't know where to post this, so opted for here, this is my lad Zacs living autograph album he has started to remember the men and regts of d day, so far only 2 signatures, fred from 9th bn parachute regt and reg from the ox and bucks LI. He wants to add cloth shoulder titles as he goes, so if anyone has either of the already mentioned regts you would part with, hes interested, but not to pricey as he insists on doing this from his pocket money

Revolver Chamelot Delvigne Mod. 1873 Navy Manufacture d’ Armes de St Etienne Navy issue ( anchor on butt by lanyard ring) + P.P stamped on barrel ( re-issued to prefecture of police) M in circle: Colonel Maignien, director MAS 1873-1882 J in circle: Jeuffroy. Controleur principal MAS from 1864 Manufactured 1878 marked S1878 ( total manufactured 3340, serial nr 1097) 1.18kg Cal. 11mm 6rnds Barrel 114mm rifled 4 right. L 242 mm

Hi guys, Any opinions on this Lufty Denim Reed Green Tunic? Collar is cut away. Trying to work out a value, but hard with removed collar.

Cheers @Libertesoe I abs loved it, especially Land Warfare!!!

To be honest I dont think its either, I reckon its a sailors carving made for a son, its elaborate because the guy was good with wood carving, quite a lot of sailors did these to pass their spare time on board, some were even of battleships, I think this guy might have been a submariner

Why not,Lenny?

Just realised i've not introduced myself....sorry guys. Well, I'm almost 60, and have been researching my uncles carreer in the RAFVR flying Mosquitos for the last 15 years, and by god, it's been fun. Have found out some amazing facts, and still not nearly finished yet. Also doing his bros time in the paras, end of WW2 to 1948, after Palestine,.plus my paternal Grandfathers time in the RA during the Blitz in London, Scapa Flow and the South Coast. Loving all of it...;) I'm collecting mainly items to do with the time the family members served, but pick up odd things at car boots and junk shops, just cant help myself. When I'm not doing that, I go hunting for deer and fox, I shoot three calibres of centre fire , on my syndicate place, and farms I have permission to shoot on. I do a wee bit shotgun stuff too. I also go sea angling, on my mates boat, mainly for Tope and Common Skate, the biggest was 13lbs over the UK record, which is 227lbs...:) It's all gone downhill from there...:) Up till recently, i had my own wee boat, a seahog shortie, with a 50hp four stroke, but sold it due to lack of use...:) Anyway, a great place this, I've been on the FB page for a good while, but this site is amazing.

Woof woof!

There was no precise order as to the eagle being removed from tunics and caps.The "offending symbol" HAD to be removed but many POWs simply unstitched the swastikas and tucked them underneath the eagle. In this case the insigna seems badly enbroydered but untouched,perhaps it came out like that from the factory but IMO nothing has to fo with the flaps being removed! There are thousands of pictures showing POWs with collars,insigna,pocket flaps and all tha jazz,I just mentioned something I had read about CERTAIN Allied units doing that to their POWs,and that was confirmad by other sources! Lenny's tunic looks like it was a perfectly good one and butchering it to repair another would merge into the criminally insane!We'll never know about its story but once I owned a pair of Sturmartuillerie trousers without the reinforcing patch on the right "cheek" and a BIG repair on the left knee!The owner was a former gunner on a Stug III and those trousers had been his ONLY pair of trousers for nearly one year after the end of the War...food for thought! If I were Lenny I'd leave that tunic alone until a better one will surface! My 0.02 RM! Manu

Suuuuuuppppperb Tim.. well done, id say one of the best displays I've seen

Model 1917 Stielhandgranate with its equivalent Ub version for training.

I,m a part time Viking Cockney Irish Scot then,In other words I,m a mongrel

Bruce Crompton from combat dealers, A pal and I hope to visit him in the near future, as he was ex Para and so is my pal, he,s got a pretty good little museum at his place and you never know a ride in his little tank might be in the offing

Love it...

You HAVE won, you have Scottish ancestory..

Don't believe this beauty and I have been properly introduced. I'm jealous, pleased to meet ya.

I found out at an early age just how inhuman Japanese soldiers could be, I had just started to work at an abrasives factory at 15 years old, my dad had worked there before and after the war, so there were a lot of ex soldiers who had served almost every where, one such guy was the gate security man, Old Alf we called him., he was always a bit strange,as if he was vacant every now and then. Anyway I got talking to him one day and he was saying what a great gent my dad was and how he had got his job through my dad. He then went on to say especially because of his troubles during the war. He had been captured by the Japanese, tortured, ,beaten daily, bound up and beaten on his feet, he also had toe nails and finger nails pulled out and he showed me his fingers,to be honest I was nearly sick, not only did he not have finger nails, his fingers were all crooked. He had had every finger broken and they were never set correctly. When the Japanese surrendered the camp was taken over by the prisoners, as far as they could anyway, most were extremely ill and some local people came and helped out with looking after them. There were reprisals despite the senior officers trying to keep order. There were three very brutal guards who mainly carried out the beatings, Alf, who was a tough old bugger killed all three with a bayonet before collapsing with malaria and dysentry and he nearly died. He woke up on the back of a lorry with a load of other very ill soldiers, but all the beatings and torture did something to him and he was never the same person, even his wife left him when he eventually got home, and the only job he could do was something like a gate guard because of his hands and feet. A few years later, after I joined the police my dad told me he had committed suicide.He never really told anyone else what happened to him, i dont know why he told me, perhaps because of my dad. But he hated Japanese people with a passion and got into trouble a few times after spitting on any he met in the street. A tragedy really

I thought I saw pins in those flaps, nice to know I,m not going barmy

I watched it as well, Its an interesting film and historically accurate. I worked with Martin Shaw once on Judge John Deed, he,s a nice chap, I was interested in his flying and his Stearman aircraft, that was before it crashed, i think it cost him a fortune to rebuild it

It was built to keep the celts out , but it did,nt work, and look what happened, I married into a whole tribe of them, when the mother in law goes up there to visit relatives I cant understand a word she says on her return, and to top it all I FOUND OUT TODAY THAT I HAVE SCOTTISH ANCESTRY , I just cant win

Oh gosh!!!! I haven't seen that movie since I was a kid! I'll be sure to get a dvd copy as soon as possible and watch it

...and I please to aim...

What can I say!!!!!! except if I could meet the guy that built Hadrians Wall, I,d give him a damn good thrashing, bloody cowboy builders!!!

Hello Nick, Thanks for your reply, I think it is a Practise Grenade as the WW1 I have sold....had the holes in it, all the same weight etc as the "Live" ones, but used by the recruits and infantry to throw in the correct manner, hit the planned target, practise pulling the ceramic ball---then count and throw (Quick) I hope I am right...anyone else know? Best to you and All on this website and Good ol Lenny.

As a footnote A friend of mine ,who sadly is no longer with us, made it his hobby to research and create models on the whole Rourkes Drift episode, he even visited the areas at the Drift, The models were all hand painted by him and stood about 3 1/2 inches high, he even made a scale model of the Drift including Zulus , I think his wife later sold all his collection that numbered about 300 figures, they were fantastic and colourful, I ,ve never seen another collection like it

Hook was badly portrayed as a malingerer in the film and quite a few complaints were received from family ancestors, but like any other soldier you had training in fieldcraft and weapons, if you had a trade you went that way, His VC was rightly deserved, but he looked nothing like the actor Booth who portrayed him, in fact he was,nt a patient, he was assigned, among a few others, to protect the patients in the hospital,which he did, he had received good conduct pay a few days before Rourkes Drift. I believe he left the army 18 months afterwards and died in the 1900s and his grave depicts the care and respect attributed to this hero

Yeah 8mm would decimate that coin.