HMS Defender leads weekend of commemorations marking victory in the Atlantic. A link to the article is Here

Andrew McMillan PM and Wing Commander John Chappell were privileged to attend a reception for the opening of the new Bomber Command Display at the RAF Museum Hendon.

The Lancaster from the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight flew over at the start of the reception to commemorate the 80^th Anniversary of the Dams raid by 617 Sqn, which was as you can imagine very emotive.  Of note, on display for the first time was the Arthur Scarf VC which our Charity Committee gave a generous donation towards, and which ultimately helped as part of the overall campaign to raise the money to keep the medal in the UK as an important part of the history of the RAF and indeed our national heritage.   

The medals were sold at auction for a record price of £660,000 to a private overseas buyer. They were export-stopped due to their national significance and the Museum was given three months - until 30 April - to match the bid and keep them in the UK. Displaying the medal group will help the Museum to share an important but less well-known part of the RAF’s story. Only 22 Victoria Crosses were awarded to RAF personnel during the Second World War, and Scarf’s was the only one for service in the Far East, hence the medals being deemed of national importance.

On 9 December 1941, Squadron Leader Arthur Scarf led a formation of Bristol Blenheim aircraft in a daylight attack on Japanese forces occupying airfields at Singora, in what is today Thailand. As Scarf became airborne, a formation of Japanese bombers swept over the airfield. This attack destroyed every British aircraft that had been on the ground.   Realising that none of his squadron’s aircraft had survived the Japanese bombing, Scarf resolved to complete his squadron’s allotted task. Flying low for some 30 miles into enemy-occupied territory, Scarf skilfully evaded several attacks by Japanese fighters. He released the bombs, while his crew manned the machine guns. Despite using great skill to evade the worst of the Japanese attacks, machine gunfire riddled the Blenheim. Scarf was mortally wounded but continued to fly the aircraft and made a controlled crash at Alor Star, where his pregnant wife had been working as a nurse. He crash-landed the aircraft, saving all his crew, but sadly he died from his wounds two hours later.   The Victoria Cross was awarded posthumously to Scarf in 1946 and was presented to his widow, Elizabeth, by King George VI at Buckingham Palace.

Andrew  McMillan PM and Wing Commander John Chappell were privileged to attend a reception for the opening of the new Bomber Command Display at the RAF Museum Hendon.

The Lancaster from the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight flew over at the start of the reception to commemorate the 80^th Anniversary of the Dams raid by 617 Sqn, which was as you can imagine very emotive.  Of note, on display for the first time was the Arthur Scarf VC which our Charity Committee gave a generous donation towards, and which ultimately helped as part of the overall campaign to raise the money to keep the medal in the UK as an important part of the history of the RAF and indeed our national heritage.   

The medals were sold at auction for a record price of £660,000 to a private overseas buyer. They were export-stopped due to their national significance and the Museum was given three months - until 30 April - to match the bid and keep them in the UK. Displaying the medal group will help the Museum to share an important but less well-known part of the RAF’s story. Only 22 Victoria Crosses were awarded to RAF personnel during the Second World War, and Scarf’s was the only one for service in the Far East, hence the medals being deemed of national importance.

On 9 December 1941, Squadron Leader Arthur Scarf led a formation of Bristol Blenheim aircraft in a daylight attack on Japanese forces occupying airfields at Singora, in what is today Thailand. As Scarf became airborne, a formation of Japanese bombers swept over the airfield. This attack destroyed every British aircraft that had been on the ground.   Realising that none of his squadron’s aircraft had survived the Japanese bombing, Scarf resolved to complete his squadron’s allotted task. Flying low for some 30 miles into enemy-occupied territory, Scarf skilfully evaded several attacks by Japanese fighters. He released the bombs, while his crew manned the machine guns. Despite using great skill to evade the worst of the Japanese attacks, machine gunfire riddled the Blenheim. Scarf was mortally wounded but continued to fly the aircraft and made a controlled crash at Alor Star, where his pregnant wife had been working as a nurse. He crash-landed the aircraft, saving all his crew, but sadly he died from his wounds two hours later.   The Victoria Cross was awarded posthumously to Scarf in 1946 and was presented to his widow, Elizabeth, by King George VI at Buckingham Palace.

Saturday 13 May saw the 2023 FDAD (Fletchers' Day for Archers with Disabilities) at the Royal Toxophilite Society.  14 Fletchers and friends thoroughly enjoyed watching a relaxed and friendly shoot, and afternoon tea, at Archers’ Lodge.

Before presenting the prizes, Master Andrew Trapnell thanked the Society members for organising the competition and for their hospitality, and also thanked all the archers and their supporters for attending to make the day a success.  He pointed out that he was the first Master Fletcher for some time to be double-badged – both as Master, and as a member himself of the Society.

Four categories were competed for this year.  Congratulations went to the following prize winners in their respective rounds: Albion Compound – Lindsay Howard; Albion Recurve – Bethany Dexter; Burntwood – Debora Wright; Fletchers – Carlene Wright.

Two other awards are made at this time of year, both of which were donated by past master Fletchers.  The Des Clarke Memorial Cup  was awarded to Piangfan Naksukpaiboon, a novice archer, for her dedicated efforts in travelling without a car to many events. 

The Frank Steiner Salver was awarded to our own Chris Brown, for his many years of dedicated service to disabled archery.  Not only has he chaired the Fletchers Trust, but has attended numerous disabled archery events, always giving great encouragement to the archers. 

Our particular thanks were given to Gemma Underwood, Match Secretary at the Royal Toxophilite Society, and other RTS members for all the hard work in organising another successful day’s competition.

As we were a contributor to the anointing screen for the coronation. The piece below provides some more details about the screen.

The king and the queen consort were anointed behind a specially created screen, held by poles hewn from an ancient windblown Windsor oak and mounted with eagles cast in bronze and gilded in gold leaf. The anointing screen was blessed at a special service at the Chapel Royal at St James’s Palace, and was used at what historically has been viewed as the most sacred moment of the coronation.

The anointing is traditionally regarded as a moment between the sovereign and God and the screen was used to give sanctity to this moment. Traditionally, the moment is not photographed or televised. This screen will allow greater privacy as the archbishop of Canterbury pours the chrism, or holy oil, which has been specially blessed in Jerusalem, from a golden ampulla into the 12th-century coronation spoon. The archbishop will then anoint the king by making a cross on the hands, breast and head, and perform the same on Camilla.

The anointing screen, including its four oak wooden poles, is 2.6 metres tall and 2.2 metres wide. The wooden framework, designed and created by Nick Gutfreund of the Worshipful Company of Carpenters, is made from a windblown tree from the Windsor estate originally planted in 1765. The poles have been limed and waxed, and at the top of each are mounted two eagles cast in bronze and gilded in gold leaf. The form of an eagle has longstanding associations with coronations. Eagles have appeared on previous coronation canopies. The ampulla used for anointing is eagle-shaped. Embroidered by the Royal School of Needlework and by Digitek Embroidery, as well as members of the Worshipful Company of Broderers, Drapers, and Weavers. The screen has been donated by the Coronation by the City of London Corporation and participating Livery Companies, the City’s ancient and modern trade guilds.

Designed by the iconographer Aidan Hart, the central design takes the form of a tree, which includes the names of the 56 Commonwealth nations, with the king’s cypher at the base, and is inspired by the stained-glass sanctuary window in the Chapel Royal at St James’s Palace, designed for the late queen’s golden jubilee. Two sides feature a cross in maroon gold, blue and red, inspired by the colours and patterning of the Cosmati pavement at Westminster Abbey. The cloth is made of wool from Australia and New Zealand, woven and finished in UK mills.

At the Coronation Service, the Anointing Screen was held by service personnel from Regiments of the Household Division holding the Freedom of the City of London. The three sides of the screen was borne by a Trooper and Guardsman from each of The Life Guards, Grenadier Guards, Coldstream Guards, Scots Guards, Irish Guards, and Welsh Guards

Photography by kind permission of the Press Association

Photo of Anne by kind permission of  Joe Little

The Charity Golf Day at the Drift Golf Club.  Organised by Court Assistant Peter Beard and Past Mast Adrian Scott Knight.  A fantastic day of friendly competition, fellowship and fun. The winners of the Golf were:

Team – Gordon Sharp, Michael Pommery, Danny Quant and Kevin Lee

Individual Event – Kevin Lee (1^st Place), Chris Dodson (2^nd Place)

Spot Prizes:

• Nearest the Pin = Steve Twilley
• Longest Drive (m)= Mark Wheelhouse
• Longest Drive (f) = Melanie Trapnell
• Putting Competition = Mark Wheelhouse
• Raffle – Grand prize = Guy Kingsbury

On Saturday 29^th April Liveryman Joslin Lewis led a group of iFletchers who embarked on a walking tour of the City in the steps of the Fletchers of old. Starting at the Royal Exchange at Bank and taking in what is now the Dutch Church in Austin Friars We stopped for lunch at the George and Vulture, being very well treated by the new Landlords (since November 2022) who included a short tour of the rather Tardis like interior.

 The G&V is of course famous for being the home of the Pickwick Club of Charles Dickens Pickwick Papers. Indeed, the City Pickwick Club (founded in 1909), whose members are characters from the book, still meet at the G&V. Melanie Trapnell’s grandfather, Joe Brown, a Past Master Fletcher was a member, and another current Past Master Fletcher, Alderman Sir David Wootton is we believe the current ‘Mr Pickwick’.

 After lunch we crossed the City taking in Grocers Hall, Postman’s Park and ending closer to our current home at St Bartholomew the Great. A fine day, in fine weather and in fine company. Many thanks go to Joslin Lewis for giving of his time free of charge and requesting a small donation from each participant to The Fletchers Trust.

Want to know more how the Trust has helped in 2021 - 2022? 

The Trust made donations totaling £41,533 to individuals and support bodies, mostly in supporting archery for the disabled. Grants were also made to support education and military affiliations.

Last year there were very few grants to individual archers, this year there were more successful applications with 12 grants being made. This is not surprising with the opening up of the sport following difficult years without practice opportunities. However, there is still a degree of cautiousness for holding events. Also, there were more grants for institutions for the disabled, up from £3645 to £17412. For example, we continued sponsoring the Fletchers National Disability Championships in Lilleshall for the fourth year, when a new prize was provided in celebration of our 650th Anniversary, courtesy of our Master, Anne Curry

During the year, the first tranche of monies was paid over to Archery GB to kick start our commitment to support the Paris package for the next Paralympic Games in 2024, all reported elsewhere, in the same way as we did for the Rio and Tokyo Games. The Lord Mayor’s Appeal received a donation, higher than in previous years, reflecting the fact that our own Fletcher, Amanda Keaveny is Lady Mayoress.

The Trust is the only Charity within Great Britain which supports disabled archery and the evidence of appreciation throughout, continues to be heartwarming.

Many of those archers who have been helped have gone on to win medals at national competitions, international and Paralympic events, providing a powerful motivational force for those trying to overcome or cope with disabilities which prevent them from enjoying more mainstream sports. For example, two grantees received medals at the Tokyo Paralympic Games, repeating the success in Rio in 2016 and before. Access to funding in this field is limited and the Trust is filling a gap which might not otherwise be the case

Andy writes Sport has always played a big part in my life. I was captain of the basketball teams in school and University and played for area, county and national teams in England, Wales and Scotland.  I also captained school and club rugby teams and also played for my University.   Suffice to say I’ve been pretty sorts mad for a long time.

I’d had various symptoms of sciatic like pain, numbness and lower back pain over many years but it wasn’t until 2002 that things came to light.

In 2002 I lost all function below the waist and received a diagnosis that I had a spinal cord tumour. I regained some limited function that enabled me to walk and continue working but by 2010 I had several rounds of surgery and was confined to a wheelchair.  I knew that ultimately I would become completely paraplegic but I was keen to keep active so I took up kayaking. I was the first paraplegic paddler to complete the three lakes challenge in 2018 (we made a short film about this find it on https://vimeo.com/312176655 )

 I took up Archery in 2021 and started with a recurve bow at Thirsk Bowmen.  By 2022 I needed major surgery to remove the tumour that was threatening my hands and upper body function but that involved removing spinal cord and part of several vertebrae. As a result I lost everything below my shoulder blades.  When I got back to the indoor range it became very obvious I couldn’t shoot a recurve bow as I didn’t have the core strength to remain upright.  I was heart broken, archery had given me a focus and means of staying competitive.  All seemed lost,  then  Lindsay Howard the clubs leading lady archer and a Yorkshire champion para archer let me try her compound bow. This gave me a lifeline to continue in the sport.  I’ve made a good start and the financial assistance from the Worshipful Company of Fletchers helped me purchase my own Compound Bow and enabled me to stay in the sport I’ve grown to love.  My goals are to compete in local events and if I make enough progress then to take part in the wheelchair championships in September.