Boy Entrants & Apprentices Like to comment?
 

Last of the boy soldiers? Bid to end centuries of tradition by banning the Army from recruiting under-18s | Mail Online

OK not being in the Infantry meant that I wasn't cannon fodder and the nearest I came to the Army was playing rugby for Yatesbury Boys against the Army Apprentices at Arborfield.

But, I've always been thankful that I CHOOSE to enter the RAF as a 15 year old. I had wonderful training. I had 13 years service that I thoroughly enjoyed. And then used that wonderful training to have a successful career in civvy st. Where my peers were normally University educated people that I was able to hold my own with.

My only claim to fame during my service was that when when I was commissioned I was still two weeks short of my 18th birthday and was at the time the youngest officer in the British armed forces, a situation which lasted about 4 weeks until a chap on the next intake who was slightly younger than me was commissioned in his turn.

I see no problem in allowing 16 year olds to volunteer for military service. It's always seemed to me a paradox that as young men and women become physically mature earlier and earlier there is a tendency for them to remain childlike for longer and longer - witness the growing numbers of helpless twenty and thirty somethings still living at home with their parents. At least these boy (and girl) soldiers are showing a willingness to get out into the world and prove their independence at an early age.

Gave me an excellent grounding for non-commissioned and commissioned service as well as civilian life.

I can think of more than the odd scrote where a voluntary period of service in the forces would do them a power of good.

I thought I was doing well by making Cpl at 19! :cool:

And so you were. As the "hairies" on my OCTU course always assured us young direct entrants, the RAF was run by NCOs, the officers were only there to sign the leave passes!

Quite right Tanker. Some of my "30 something" colleagues are bewildered by the big world we inhabit and seem incapable of making sense of it instead relying on the virtual world of social media to help them make decisions.

I was a wizened 17 year old when I set off into the world clutching my travel warrant. By the age of 19 I was working Battle Flight at Wilders, by 30 years of age I'd started another career and have since moved on again.

An early independence is essential for creating free thinking, non-egotistic, rational all-rounders and encourages a perennially youthful outlook on life. I'm all for an early call up..., but only after I've had a cup of tea:ok:

Good Training Makes a Good Man
 

Joined as a 15 year old Boy Entrant in the RAF. 42 Years service and still working as a civilian for the Airforce. Boys service pulled me out of a deadbeat life and taught me that with loyalty and hard work you could achieve any goal. A few youths could be sorted out in this day and age by a short stint of military training.

Apprentices and Boy Entrants in both the RAF and the Army undertook quite lengthy technical training and would not normally have finished their courses before they were 17 for Boy Entrants whilst Apprentices were usually 19 before they entered adult service.

In the late '70s, there were several 16 year old FLMs on the flight lines of UK and RAFG bases. They were generally no more likely to be casualties than any other RAF tradesmen working on the same bases. However, in both the young FLM case and for young teenage soldiers, they generally had still not finished growing and their physical strength and stamina was not as high as airmen and soldiers in their 20s.

Thus I would tend to agree that entry to any branch of the armed services where physical strength and stamina was a requirement for operations should not be allowed for under 18s. However, I would support the continued recruitment of Apprentices at 16 since they would not be exposed to active service until they were 19 and in most cases rely on skill and dexterity rather than brute force to meet their tasks.

Apprentice Life
 

I was on a ground tour 69/72 and made an apprentice flight commander

It was my first experience of proper man mangement, apprentices and staff and taught me a great deal but I am convinced we did a good job for the youths we trained

They came from a variety of backgrounds and had a large spread of needs but we tried hard to meet them, mostly we succeeded but we had our failures too

My greates triumph was rec,ing one of my lads for a commision and meeting him much later as a wing commander

My worst failure was reluctantly allowing a nasty bully to pass, he later had taken a mates car and killed several others while drunk driving

Overall the apprentice system did a great deal of good to almost all our entries. There were a few who should never have been recruited and some others determined to thwart our efforts; mostly these left.

And certainly into this century I can recall some TG9 graduates from Shawbs who arrived on their first Station - as LACs - still short of their 17th birthday.

TTN - I must have been old - commissioned 3 weeks shy of my 19th birthday, and got my Wings 10 weeks after my 20th!

Will always remember a slightly surreal conversation with the Son and Heir, whilst taking him to Uni for the first time.

S&H: Dad - you didn't go to Uni did you?
Moi: No son, I didn't
S&H: So what were you doing when you were 19?
Moi: Flying jets (well - the JP counts!!)
S&H: What! :eek: Just by yourself! :eek::eek:
Moi: Sometimes - but they were very small and not very fast!
S&H: :eek::eek::eek:

Similar experience to TTH - sent my 3 sons - 41, 40 and 24, the picture of the Gnat rolling 120 deg to go round the Llyn Ogwen corner on the A5 pass - sort of thing your Dad did in his youth. To man they all went "Nah, not you, too difficult". Cheeky bu@@ers!

At the ripe old age of 16 years and ten months, my Dad was out in the Arctic as a Boy Signaller in HMS King George V (that's him on the extreme right, as he joined the Boy's Mess under the watchfull eye of PO Jenman)

http://www.culture24.org.uk/asset_ar.../v0_master.jpg

. . . and I began marching around Maitland Parade Ground six weeks after my 16th and never looked back. Our Entry will be celebrating our 50th at this year's Triennial.

Ian15th got right to the meat of the matter...

The direction he points to is the fact that for a long long time now entrants in this age group were / still are volunteers exercising freedom of choice and, often in fact, facing a lot of competition to even be considered. The days of press gangs roaming about rounding up unfortunates have been gone well before anybody around today can even remember.

I include myself as one of those fortunate enough to have slogged my way through the selection process and won myself a place to be trained as an Air Force Boy Entrant. We worked hard, played even harder and when the time came moved into the real world of Air Force life with high expectations of what lay ahead and also of ourselves.

It was a sad day when Boy Entrant training was withdrawn from the AirForce

I joined the RAF in 1959 as a Boy Entrant. I was just 16 and passed out 18 months later as a Telegraphist II. My first posting was RAF Driffield, a Thor missile site. The 18 months of training turned young boys into young men and gave them a sense of discipline and purpose that lasted for the rest of their lives. We certainly couldn't be classed as "trained killers" although we did learn to fire the .303 and the Bren.

This is a change from the 50's.

Our passing out trade test was the SAC test. If aged 17 1/2 or over, we went to our units as LAC's and were promoted to SAC after 6 months.

I passed out of Boys Service under age. As such I still held the rank of B/E, but didn't wear my 'wheel', and as a qualified tradesman in a Radio Trade, I did wear my 'sparks badge'.

So I looked like and AC1, but I was paid AC2's money :E

I could not sign a F700 until I was 17 1/2 and a LAC. I'm very surprised to hear that 16 year old's were allowed to work on a/c.

At the age of 17 1/2 I became an LAC, and a SAC 6 month from pass out.

Having failed abysmally to apply myself at the start of my A-levels, not long after my 17th birthday I joined the last entry of A/P apprentices. In the last 23+ years, I have been privileged to both work for and lead some truly amazing individuals in some amazing jobs in some great places. The skills gathered over the years helped lead to my new career outside the service as well. But without the practical skills and values instilled into us Appos at Halton (in my case) I don't think things would have turned out quite the same. Extremi Optimorum.

My father went to Dartmouth aged 13.5 in 1947, and was one of the last so to do.Of course he wasn't to wear a midshipman's uniform until he was 18 but the expectation was there from a young age. His term was joined by both 16 and 18 year olds and before long the 13 y/o entry scheme was ceased.

I recently met up with a bunch of ex Boy Entrants in Perth WA and, to a man, they all valued their time as Boys and capitalised on the training and opportunities it presented in their civilian endeavours.

Can the next generations make the same boast?

TTN,

In your alter ego of a dealer in medals and such, does a B/E or App's brass 'wheel' have any value?

I have a couple, only 60 years or so of age. One of them I don't think was ever worn. Neither of them tapped.

BOY ENTRANT
 

In Jan 1964 I signed the dotted line as a 15 yr 9 mth Boy Entrant. I was under 17 1/2 on pass-out so I was not old enough to wear my LAC badge. At the age sof 17 yr 8 mth I was on my way to Singapore for a 6 month detachment. What an experience for a young lad! I spent my 19th birthday in Aden. After 5 years I decided that the trade I was in was not for me but the RAF let me remuster to airframes. That was in 1969. At the age of 65 I am still enjoying a career with aircraft. I have had a great career and joining at the age of 15 did me nothing but good. Before joining I was in all sorts of minor trouble. I have travelled all over the world and always had a ball. Work hard - yes. Play harder - definitely. I have never met an ex Boy Entrant / Apprentice that claimed they did not benefit from their experience.