Wayne's Keep - Cyprus

[Speedy Association Member Find all posts View Profile Close Speedy]

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/...mans-land.html

Back in 1980 I was volunteered for cemetery duty at Wayne's Keep, Nicosia. A Bedford with about twenty five of us plus some gardening kit descended to "no mans land" to tidy up the overgrown cemetery. A relative was due to visit her son's last resting place. An afternoon of hard graft got the place looking reasonably cared for. I thought at the time it was a shame this place and those lying there were being overlooked for various reasons.

The link is worth reading as things have changed since my visit and a memorial was due to be erected in Kyrenia in the Turkish North Cyprus, as the Greeks were still being a bit unpleasant about things. General Waters' comment about Northern Ireland will strike a chord as well.

[Jock2413 Association Member Find all posts View Profile Close Jock2413]

I was a 5 year old army brat on a family posting to Cyprus in 1955. We were in Famagusta which happily didn't see too much attention from the terrorists apart from the odd bomb and gun attack on patrols and police stations and the well publicised "Battle of Famagusta", but I remember the nightly rioting. Our school bus was like an armoured van and there were armed troops patrolling the married quarters and the shopping areas in town. All very exciting for a young kid who didn't understand it all at the time. It was brought home a bit when in 1956, a friend of mine in school didn't turn up any more. His father had been killed in an ambush and the family were repatriated back to UK.

[Guest Close Guest]

His father had been killed in an ambush and the family were repatriated back to UK.

[Bristol Girl Association Member Find all posts View Profile Close Bristol Girl]

[Speedy Association Member Find all posts View Profile Close Speedy]

60th Anniversary

It will be sixty years this next weekend that two members of the Horse Guards were gunned down in an attack just as nasty as any that occurred in Ulster. From the Telegraph article I linked to above:

"The deaths of Cornet Charles Stephen Fox-Strangways, of the Royal Horse Guards, and Trooper John Proctor on July 8, 1958, summed up the brutality of EOKA; they were off duty and collecting groceries from a shop in Famagusta when gunmen entered and repeatedly shot both men in the back. They were both just 20 years old. "

RIP

[bigal Association Member of WUSA Find all posts View Profile Close bigal]

[Guest Close Guest]

[Bristol Girl Association Member Find all posts View Profile Close Bristol Girl]

[Guest Close Guest]

[Speedy Association Member Find all posts View Profile Close Speedy]

65th Anniversary

65 years next weekend since Cornet Charles Stephen Fox-Strangways and Trooper John Proctor of the Royal Horse Guards were murdered in an EOKA terror attack. Cyprus became independent in 1960 but has had many years of trouble and has been divided since 1974.

[Madcalfe Association Member Find all posts View Profile Close Madcalfe]

GBNF

[bigal Association Member of WUSA Find all posts View Profile Close bigal]

[spanner Association Member & WUSA Overseas rep aka Cathie Find all posts View Profile Close spanner]

May they all rest in peace

[dillon Reserve Standard Bearer and Admin Find all posts View Profile Close dillon]

The good lady and I were fortunate enough to visit Northern Cyprus a few years back, it hasn't really prospered under the Turks..

Back on the Greek side there's a cemetery with most of the headstones marked 1974, whilst chatting to a couple of Greek Soldiers they explained that the vacant plots were for those not found yet.