CADETS ON PARADE FOR REMEMBRANCE SUNDAY

Remembrance Sunday for 1220 (March) Squadron Air Cadets was a busy day and the culmination of months of preparation and planning saw them parading in both March and Chatteris.

The day started at St Mary’s Church on the outskirts of March before moving to the Town Centre and then to Eastwood Cemetery. The proceedings finishing with the Remembrance Parade in Chatteris. 

Cadets assembled at the squadron at 8am where the squadron civilian committee were on hand provide them breakfast with a choice of bacon butties, porridge, toast and hot drinks to sustain the cadets for the rest of the morning. After breakfast last minute preparations are completed giving uniforms final touches and shoes a final coat of polish. The band instruments are brought out, checked and cleaned and the banner unfurled. 

At 08:50 the first group of four cadets departed for the service at St Mary’s church at Westry on the outskirts of March.  These form the Banner Party for later in the day and were escorted by Flying Officer Colin Arnold.  Accompanying the Air Cadets were several Army Cadets in one of number of joint exercises for us during the day. After the church service all returned to the Squadron. 

Just before 10 o’clock the the squadron leave the HQ to march through the town to the start of the parade.  The band marching and playing down to the starting point really signals to the town that the parade will soon take place. The Army Cadet Force marched down with us making it a great start to the day. 

At 10:30 the 1220 (March) squadron band leads the parade through the town to the church. As is tradition the band stops playing and all pay their respect to the memorial as they march past. St Peters church was packed yet again but everyone was inside  in time for the 2 minutes silence at 11 o’clock. Both the Air Training Corps and Army Cadet Force take an active part in the service. 

Following the service the band leads the parade back to the war memorial for the wreath laying and final acts of remembrance before finally marching back to HQ where lunch is provided by the Civilian Committee. This year Sergeant Matthew Wilson laid our wreath while Sergeant Daniel Lowe laid one on behalf of the RAF Boy Entrants.  

The Banner Party weren’t quite finished as they headed to a final act of remembrance at the war graves in Eastwood Cemetery and then back for lunch. 

Fully refreshed the band, and any cadets who wished to take part, made their way to Chatteris where we led the parade through the town to the memorial.  Sergeant Tim Kightly laid the Air Cadet wreath. Our day finally ended at around 4pm.  

Flt Lt Kirsty Burnham, Commanding Officer of 1220 (March) Sqn, commented “I am very proud of the effort and enthusiasm that the cadets put into this day. For the second year in a row we had 40 cadets taking part.”  

Remembrance Sunday was the final act in a week of events that saw cadets from 1220  in uniform, taking part in services at both the Neale-Wade and Crowmell Community colleges. Cadets were also present at the town’s Festival of Remembrance held at St Peter’s Church on the 28th October.