It's hard to believe that we're into October. My brother Leo is 81 today. We took down a card and some presents yesterday. He really doesn't look his age and he and Marite were waiting for their daughter to come and treat them to a meal later. While there, he showed me some papers he had found in the attic. They were very interesting. One of them was of my parents 'marriage certificate in 1933 and I only then discovered that they were married on 4th January, which is also my youngest daughter's birthday. There were other documents too; death certificates, etc. However, some of the most interesting and invaluable papers concerned my father's army service. These were very old and gave his rank - sergeant major - which I never knew. He didn't look like a sergeant major - a small, quiet, unassuming man, but smart and determined nevertheless. There were papers on his army service, dates, commendations, letters on his discharge from both the regular army and the TA and he definitely was held in high esteem and he word "exemplary" was mentioned more than once. There was also correspondence from him to my mother from the front during World War II. This was in the form of a pre-printed buff postcard. Certain short sentences were printed and the sender ticked on the relevant ones. This would have been because of security. Anyhow, I will photocopy all these papers and keep them. Eventually they will be passed on down the family line and our ancestors will have a little bit of history that they might never have known. I wish I could trace back more of my family's line (on both sides). My youngest brother is doing just that at present and we have discovered already that my grandfather on my father's side was born in England. No doubt, more will follow.

Ann, Glad to hear that you have those copies of your Dad's military records.really something to treasure. I had a suitcase stolen in a place called Buffalo New York when I was waiting to join an American Lake ship, I was sleeping on a couch in the Union Hall as the ship was due in early am, however when I woke up my suitcase which had been on the floor beside me was gone and in it was my American Air Force Honorable Discharge certificate and my Royal Navy records and Royal Australian Navy service certificate,so I gave up and went back to Toronto and got a shore job. Luckly several years later the Australian Navy came out with a new fancy discharge certificate which I received so have that and my Merchant Navy discharge book which shows all the ships one worked on along with character assessment. Mauri