Remembering John Wade and Harry Ogilvie Peter Grant

The interviewee has brought, on someone else's behalf, a book on John Wade's recollections about his National Service. They asked his widow if they could bring it along today and she said yes. He died last year but they published the book.

From a photograph in the book, he is wearing a REME cap badge, and the book relates that, before being called up, he was an apprentice motor mechanic. Blandford Forum is where he started and where he had a friend called P. J. Jones. He likely stayed together with him. John Wade was a very sociable man. He was the Boatman at Christ Church and taught some of the staff to row.

He did not really talk about his military experiences. He spoke a lot about rowing, etc. He did not continue in army after his service, and went to work at a boat yard, though the interviewee is not sure where.

The interviewee's uncle, Harry Ogilvie Peter Grant, was in the Dunkirk campaign. They think he died in May 1940. They went to Dunkirk with their mother and aunt to have a look at the name on the memorial; after the interview, they sent in a photograph of his name (attached).

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The interviewee sent in further information and photographs after the interview:

Harry Ogilvie Peter Grant, The Queen's Own Cameron Highlanders, was killed 21/5/1940 at Dunkirk, aged 22. There is a grave in Bruyelle Cemetery (grave 2, row A) but, from the attached scan of the article in the Inverness Courier, it is an anonymous grave.

My mother, Eileen Mary Grant (née Wileman) 30.11.1921 - 03.12.2015, was in the MTC but I don't know the dates. In the attached photo with the other two women, my mother is on the right and one of the others might be Mrs Gwyntheth (née Logan) Lawrence Jones.