Militia men turn up for training at Stirling Castle

Militia men turning up for training at Stirling Castle were in for no easy time, the Observer of August 1939, reported.

Recruits had been responding across the country to the introduction by the Government of the Military Training Act in April of that year.

It was a response to the gathering of war clouds over Europe brought about by German aggression and threats by its leader, Adolf Hitler, to annexe territory adjacent to the Reich.

All British men aged 20 and 21 who were fit and able were required to take six months’ military training

There were suggestions in the press that the militia men were being given too many privileges but that was scotched by Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders Scottish Command press officer Col Sprott.

As the latest batch of recruits were began their training at Stirling Castle, the Colonel told the Observer: `We don’t want to breed an army of cissies’.

There was to be no `mollycoddling’ as the normal ordinary 18-week recruits course was, for the militia men, being squeezed into an eightweek training block.

Most of the latest batch of recruits at the castle came from Stirling, Dumbarton and Paisley areas and following their two-month stint in Stirling they would be heading to Newton Abbot, Devon, for postrecruit training and elementary field craft followed by work to mould them into an actual fighting unit.

Although the militia men were receiving instruction at the castle, plans were underway for the erection of huts at Back o’ Hill where future training was to take place.

This would allow the castle to return to its role as a recruiting depot for the regular army.

The latest recruits were issued with a new two-piece uniform – `with practically no buttons to polish’ – although it was expected that A&SH militia would wear kilts like their regular Army comrades.

For training, the militia men were split into five squads of 30 and their daily schedule – split into eight periods – featured drill, gym, work, rifle shooting and bren gun training.

The Observer said: `A chat with several of the militia men showed most of them were taking their new life of soldiering very philosophically, along the lines of “What’s to be done has got to be done”. Very few would venture anything about their impressions of army life but it was obvious they were making a brave show of re-adjusting themselves quickly.’

The paper also reported that to improve recreational facilities for soldiers additional land had been procured between Stirling Castle and Dumbarton Road.

Old soldiers would have doubtless surprised to read that the new recruits were being spared `fatigue duty’ (non-military labour such as cleaning or digging), and also that cold water shaving on an icy winter’s day was a thing of the past as a hot water system had been installed at the castle.