While strolling through the local high school, I came across 2 plaques honouring those students that volunteered for the Canadian Forces during ww2. The average enrollment at Lawrence Park Collegiate numbers around 800 students. The 2 plaques attached show that 600 students volunteered during the war years. An amazing ratio. What is in your local high school? Cheers
My old school in south east London was burnt down by the students (I believe) and is now a block of flats aka A Drug Den and a petrol garage mainly used to buy lighters, Rizlars and other associated drug paraphernalia. There are some better schools in the area still going strong that have a good record but my family was too poor to send me there, plus I'm too thick. I think St.Dunstans had a student that won a VC in WW2. I've just looked at the history section of their website and there is no mention of it. St Dunstan's Edit I remember one lad who went to my school (Catford Boys) was killed in the Falklands. Marine Kenny Philips, he used to me in my Army Cadet unit before he joined the Royal Marines.
Moved from General to this section which seemed more appropriate. This is actually a project carried out by one of our local schools - World War 1 - WW1 research project - Friends School Lisburn
In Britain it was not always the case of volunteering, it was a case of being conscripted, but forces got you one way or other. When you think of it what with National Service every young man who could pass the medical [which wasn't hard] got called up until 1960. With all the small conflicts that went on Britain has been at war nearly every year since the End of WW2. The only year that no one was killed on active service was 1968, so that meant every lad that went school during the war more than likely wound up in forces.
