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Longest Serving (Oldest) Bar Steward

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Phew the smell of death is overpowering...... Are there many Young Thick and Stupid (YTS) left in this circus .?
 
8430 Halton Feb 97..... Don't think the numbers really mean much as I seem to remember several of the older lads having a different number to me... Maybe a adminer can explain that one!
 
8430 Halton Feb 97..... Don't think the numbers really mean much as I seem to remember several of the older lads having a different number to me... Maybe a adminer can explain that one!

See post no. 62. Number sets used to depend on type of entry (appo, YTS, boy entrant (steady, MyShineyAr$e), etc.)

For the record, I discharged a Wg Cdr (ex-ranker) last year whose first 3 were 065.
 
818::P: :PDT_Xtremez_27: :PDT_Xtremez_26: :PDT_Xtremez_42: :PDT_Xtremez_40: Aug 1979. I wounder who is still left in?/Alive? Me slippers are mouldy my pipe is chared and sometimes bits of me refuse to go hard.
 
Just as an aside with the Army now finally (ok wef 1 Apr offically) coming online with JPA you will now start to find guys (and gals) who transfer between the Services or whom come out of one only to re-join at a later date will keep their old service number. The Army has already got one guy who joined up in the last few weeks by transfering with a Navy number, we will be getting two ex-pongos soon. It will however only be those entrants who come over since the other services went live (ie for the Navy Nov 06 and Army/TA Apr 07). So the system will get more confused.
 
Just as an aside with the Army now finally (ok wef 1 Apr offically) coming online with JPA you will now start to find guys (and gals) who transfer between the Services or whom come out of one only to re-join at a later date will keep their old service number. The Army has already got one guy who joined up in the last few weeks by transfering with a Navy number, we will be getting two ex-pongos soon. It will however only be those entrants who come over since the other services went live (ie for the Navy Nov 06 and Army/TA Apr 07). So the system will get more confused.

It's alright, it will only be confusing for the next 30 years or so, then everyone in the UK Defence Force will have the same style service number.

I know of one guy who was accidentally discharged in March last year. They had to create a whole new record for him which meant he lost his old service number.
 
It's alright, it will only be confusing for the next 30 years or so, then everyone in the UK Defence Force will have the same style service number.

I know of one guy who was accidentally discharged in March last year. They had to create a whole new record for him which meant he lost his old service number.

The last time I 'accidentally discharged', the judge nearly sent me down!:PDT_Xtremez_28:
 
If so, my number was 8075, joined up 11 Mar 1969 man-entry Swinderby – not the easy apprentice route (I will wait for Hue’s reply on that one!).

Did the pre 8- numbers start with 7? Or was the format totally different? Didn't there used to be 5 figure numbers?
 
Prior to 1968 when the 8 series was introduced, if I remember correctly, the following categories applied

Beginning with:

50 National Servicemen
35 ex-ATC Cadets
41/42 Regulars - Male
24 Regulars - Female
06 Engineering Apprentices
05 Admin/Craft Apprentices
07 Commonwealth recruits
19 Boy Entrants

The apprentices originally only had 6 digits but the leading zero was added when computerised pay/admin systems were introduced.

On the officers side:

60 Cranwell cadets (6 digits only) current CDS was in the last entry
26 Ex-Aux Air Force
52 University Graduates
43 Direct entry (ie, OCTU as opposed to Cranwell)
2X Females (number contained only 4 digits)

I am sure that someone will remember others - I look forward to being enlightened.

ps

Mine begins with 4286
 
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8190 Dec 79 swinditz lad............never got to keep my navy number (D160....july 76).......god job its not now as senility is setting in and numbers isnt a strong point
 
Looking forward to my 16 year point when I can say "I joined when you were born" :)

Or "When I joined, no one had a service number, we knew each other personally" :)
 
Surely I'm not the only one...?

Surely I'm not the only one...?

Mine's an 8426 number.

Joined Jun '95 on 1 flight at Halton.

I haven't seen many of my course since joining up... I'm sure they've all left!:raf:
 
Mine's an 8426 number.

Joined Jun '95 on 1 flight at Halton.

I haven't seen many of my course since joining up... I'm sure they've all left!:raf:

Would be interesting to track down the members of your recruit intake at the 9, 12, 22 (etc) year points and find out who is in, who is out, and who you outrank :)
 
That exercise was done for 213 entry which was one of the biggest Halton had seen for a long time. The normal advancement from J/T to Cpl was 3 years, Cpl to Sgt 4 years and Sgt to C/T 5 years so by the 12 year point if you got it right you would be a chief.
I cannot remember how the entry did as a whole, maybe there are some out there who have these kind of stats to hand.
 
Would be interesting to track down the members of your recruit intake at the 9, 12, 22 (etc) year points and find out who is in, who is out, and who you outrank :)

I was able to do that close to my 9 year point, and found that fewer than half of the 70-odd people I had joined up with had stayed even to finish their initial engagement.

I had a good play on JPA last year and found that there are fewer than 20 of us left. 2 have been commissioned, one is NCA, 3 are Sgts and the remaining 10-12 are Cpls. Not counting the nurses (none of whom are still in) I was the 5th person from my intake to get my tapes - not bad considering I was lucky to get out of Swinderby alive!
 
I was able to do that close to my 9 year point, and found that fewer than half of the 70-odd people I had joined up with had stayed even to finish their initial engagement.

I had a good play on JPA last year and found that there are fewer than 20 of us left. 2 have been commissioned, one is NCA, 3 are Sgts and the remaining 10-12 are Cpls. Not counting the nurses (none of whom are still in) I was the 5th person from my intake to get my tapes - not bad considering I was lucky to get out of Swinderby alive!

How do you do that? Or is it because you're a shiney, you have the power?
 
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