Dads army ?

Where's me longbow. It's every Englishman's duty to practice on a Sunday.
 
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Hades said:
Where's me longbow. It's every Englishman's duty to practice on a Sunday.
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That was just on a Perun video I watched the other day, it was a way for the state to offset the cost of training troops from the Crowns purse to society, they even banned other leisure activities on Sunday, like football, and made it mandatory to do archery! :D

Historical Context
From the 13th to the 16th centuries, several monarchs in England and Scotland enacted laws to ensure a ready supply of skilled longbowmen, which were crucial for military power.
  • Mandatory Archery: A series of royal decrees, most notably by King Edward III of England in 1363 and King James II of Scotland in 1457, mandated that all able-bodied men practice archery every Sunday after church services.
  • Banning "Vain Games": To prevent distractions, other popular leisure activities, including early, uncodified forms of "mob football" and golf, were expressly forbidden on Sundays. Penalties for playing football could include fines or imprisonment.
  • Military Necessity: The longbow required years of practice and immense strength to master, and this regular, mandatory training produced the formidable archers who were decisive in key battles like Crécy and Agincourt during the Hundred Years' War.
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I'll volunteer to defend the British virgin isles coast. Specifically the beach areas.
 
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I wonder if all the gammons on DM realise that they are just being constantly wound up by the paper. You can play a fun game of "how many comments will there be before Labour and Starmer are mentioned".

3. Not bad going to be fair.
 
ttaskmaster said:
Weren't most of the archers Welshmen, anyway?
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Only the good ones.

On archery, there's a 14thcentruy Coroners list that has someone who managed to shoot himself dead with a longbow. Not sure how you do that...

Edit: here it is
alphahistory.com

1552: Gent dies after looking down a loaded longbow

In 1552 Henry Pert, a gentlemen from Welbeck, Notts., died from an arrow to the eye - after looking down the barrel of his loaded longbow.
alphahistory.com alphahistory.com
 
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Its a method we've seen utilised by both Ukraine and Russia. Send in the old farts and protect the breeding stock.

I'm not sure I'd be much good to them now, never mind in the future! I'm not even that long out. My body is abused, battered and broken, add on to that its now unfit. ****... I was pretty much U/S before I got out, deployable on paper at most, knees and ankles are well past their use by date. I'm in no shape to be storming trenches but I'm more than happy to utilise my knowledge, skills and expertise! God knows its completely wasted in my current job!
 
Emlyn_Dewar said:
Feel like those over 60 are the only ones interested in fighting for this country these days. :D
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Quite a few interesting perspectives on it from younger generations but I think people will be surprised just how irrelevant their opinion becomes if things did kick off.

Emlyn_Dewar said:
Dying for absolutely nothing. What a way to go.
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Unfortunately that is the way it goes unless you can somehow convince everyone on both/every sides it isn't worth fighting, and unfortunately the unknown territory we seem to be heading towards the only chance of avoiding that is to appear so strong those opposed are deterred.
 
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Although the Home guard were largely seen as one of the more ineffective military forces the UK has ever assembled, within it were much more elite units whose purpose was to embark on a guerrilla war (sabotage, assassination etc) against German forces in the event of an invasion. They, at least, were a bit more serious.
 
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