General   (General discussion, talk about anything.)

I registered when I was 18,as was your obligation,but because I was serving an apprenticeship I was deemed to be in a reserve occupation.I duly turned up at the Labour Exchange each year to renew my registration or whatever but as National Service ended before my apprenticeship I missed out and anyway with my medical history they would probably have rejected me.A lot of my friends at my age or even younger got called up because I started serving my time,as it known then,at 17 so I was a year behind them,I remember one bloke who cried when he got his papers,his mother reckoned he was too delicate but they put in the RAF.There were quite a few anomalies for the conscripts,for example my mate was a fitter and turner so they put in communications,my brother-in-law was a carpenter,he finished up in the catering corps.Two of my older brothers-in-law were "Bevan Boys",they didn't want go into the armed services so they opted for the coalpits,but to me it didn't seem much of an alternative,just as dangerous either way.