In one album there was a collection of photographs of our father taken before and during the last war, when he was a despatch rider. I had never seen the photographs before and was intrigued. There were two portraits, taken in a Cairo studio, of this striking looking, serious-faced young man, his hair neatly parted and his beret tucked in regulation fashion under his epaulette, a couple of him standing to attention by a motorbike and sidecar, a group photograph of a squad of 14 smiling soldiers in full uniform sitting straight backed and cross-legged at Catterick Camp and several of my father astride a horse.

"What's he doing on a horse?" I asked my sister. "I never knew he could ride."

"He was in the Army Equestrian Team," my sister commented casually.

"I never knew that!" I said, astounded.

It occurred to me that afternoon that I knew very little about my father's war service. He never spoke of it. Nor did my Uncle Lloyd, a sergeant in the Army Medical Corps and one of the last soldiers to be evacuated from Dunkirk, or my Uncle Alec who was a Warrant Officer in the RAF and flew bombing missions over Germany.

When I was a lad, my father, a great storyteller, amused and entertained me with the exciting exploits of the Three Musketeers and Biggles, Long John Silver and Rob Roy McGregor, Huckleberry Finn and Robinson Crusoe but he never told me anything about his time in the British Army. I guess the subject was never raised. Perhaps it was too painful for him to recall or that he just wanted to return to his home and family and get on with his life; then again, he might have considered it such an ordinary, uneventful few years of his life and therefore of not much interest to a boy keen on adventure stories.

I do remember my father's last Remembrance Sunday when I accompanied him to the war memorial with my three young sons. He was in a thoughtful, sombre mood during the service and stood a little apart from us. Richard, my eldest son, noticed as the Last Post was being played that his grandfather was in tears.

On this special Sunday we should all, especially the young, remember those who fought and those who died in defence of our freedom. My poem is dedicated to all those brave men and women, members of today's Armed Forces, who are still fighting in those "far-off lands of blistering heat and burning sand" in defence of freedom, justice and humanity.

Remembrance Sunday

On Remembrance Sunday Grandpa cried,

For his two brothers who had died

In some forgotten far-off land

Of blistering heat and burning sand.

He touched a medal on his chest

Which sparkled brighter than the rest:

"The Africa Star," he gently sighed,

A badge of honour, of those who died,

As symbol of our Ted and Jack

Who never made the journey back.

We watched old soldiers stride on by,

Straight of back and heads held high,

And we clutched our poppies of brightest red

And we wept for the brothers Jack and Ted.