The Wartime Memories Project - The Second War

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251778 L.Sea. Wilfred Charles Mildenhall Royal Navy Gunner HMS Victory,Excellent,Queen Elizabeth,Phoebe,Seabe from:Kingston, Surrey My father, Bill Mildenhall, always wanted to join the Royal Navy. As a school boy at the prestigous Grammar school Tiffins in Kingston, all boys were required to become either Naval or Army cadets, the Navy was his passion. He left school in 1939 and enlisted as a boy in 1938 and then as an adult. He was one of those who didn't wait for National Service, the Navy was something he always wanted to join. His service record shows some but not much of the details in service and conduct until 1947. I'm almost sure he was on HMS Kimberley, and HMS Hotspur, but there are pages missing. Not sure after the war but he stayed on a while. He had a Gunner's manual for training, and someone told me he was actually a Gunnery trainer. The last sheet says enrolled PO RFR B23/96 Lg sea LR2 22 Dec 1947 -16 May 1951 RFR engagement expired. Paid RFR Jan 1948. So I am not certain for sure when he actually left the Royal Navy. He rarely spoke about his service, but he was a member of the Royal Naval Club where we lived, and he had many friends in the organisation and at the Star & Garter Home in Richmond Surrey. When he died in 1977, his funeral was attended by the RNA, British Legion, Burma Star Association & Rats of Tobruk. I have never seen such a hugely attended funeral for an ordinary person since. He was such a humble man he would have been very proud. Sadly, his medals went missing. They were on his coffin for his funeral, that was the last time we saw them and never really thought about them until some years later. Stephanie Stewart Add to this record.  Related Content: HMS Victory HMS Queen Elizabeth HMS Phoebe Can you help us to add to our records? Add a record to our website. The names and stories on this website have been submitted by their relatives and friends. If your relations are not listed please add their names so that others can read about them Did you or your relatives live through the Second World War? Do you have any photos, newspaper clippings, postcards or letters from that period? Have you researched the names on your local or war memorial? Were you or your relative evacuated? Did an air raid affect your area? If so please let us know. Help us to build a database of information on those who served both at home and abroad so that future generations may learn of their sacrifice. Contact us. Celebrate your own Family History Celebrate by honouring members of your family who served in the Secomd World War both in the forces and at home. We love to hear about the soldiers, but also remember the many who served in support roles, nurses, doctors, land army, muntions workers etc. Please use our Family History resources to find out more about your relatives. Then please send in a short article, with a photo if possible, so that they can be remembered on these pages.

The free section of the Wartime Memories Project website is run by volunteers. We have been helping people find out more about their relatives wartime experiences since 1999 by recording and preserving recollections, documents, photographs and small items. The website is paid for out of our own pockets, library subscriptions and from donations made by visitors. The popularity of the site means that it is far exceeding available resources and we currently have a huge backlog of submissions. If you are enjoying the site, please consider making a donation, however small to help with the costs of keeping the site running. Hosted by: The Wartime Memories Project Website is archived for preservation by the British Library Copyright MCMXCIX - MMXXIV - All Rights Reserved We do not permit the use of any content from this website for the training of LLMs or for use in Generative AI, it also may not be scraped for the purpose of creating other websites.