Army Life As A Child

I too lived in Larkhill at the end of the fifties. My Dad taught at the County Primary school there, and we lived at Fargo Lodge East across the other side of Durrington Down. I remember at one time we had army transport to take my sister and I to school. Usually it was a jeep, packed with children from the outlying houses like ours. Sometimes the transport was the 'dinner lorry', I think it was a 10 ton lorry and we all bounced about loose in the back. The game was to run from one side to the other without falling over while the lorry was rattling along. Even better was the'champ'. It was a sort of low slung jeep, two kids (usually my sister and I) in the front passenger seat, no door, and an enthusiastic young army driver! I remember my Dad teaching cycling proficiency on one of the parade grounds, the curry powder they sold in huge tins at the NAAFI, and lying on the 'altar' stone at Stonehenge pretending to be human sacrifices. It was such an exciting place to be when we were primary age, during the holidays we just ran wild all over Fargo.

My parents lived at Lark hill in married quarters from 1951 to around 1956/1957, with me being born at Devizes Hospital in 1952 and my brothers in 1953 and 1954, I used to toddle off into camp to visit the soldiers and my father who was an RSM, and was nicknamed Charlie-girl by the lads.
Such simpler times back then