The Amiens Band and Henry V

James Ruddock-Broyd (G46-52) writes : I was just well enough to do four recitations at the latest Classics performance at Richmond Village Witney on 7 April 2026. There were some 30 famous extracts presented and Christine [James’s wife] read a Dickinson poem and we both did the closing words of “Gone with the Wind” ending “ …frankly my dear I don’t give a damn.” I read Sea Fever and the early lines of Chaucer’s Prologue to Canterbury Tales but the OF interest was in my Henry V ‘Band of Brothers’ speech.

That term used at the Battle of Agincourt was adopted by a group of five us on the OF Society Amiens Tour in 2014 and the other four were in the audience in the shape of: Brian Smith (S53-58) and Valerie and Clive Smith (S54-58) and Jean. It is pleasing to note that the tour of OF graves is still having editorial comment.