Duff Hart-Davis column

On Wednesday an exhibition opened at the Soldiers of Gloucestershire Museum to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the start of National Service. The show concentrates on the experiences of men from the county, but it will evoke vivid memories, horrendous or hilarious, in anyone who was caught for two years' compulsory call-up. (By 1951 the number of National Servicemen - more than 220,000 - exceeded those in the regular Army.)

My own recollections are mostly rural. After a violent introduction to Brigade of Guards methods - basic training at Caterham - I went to the Duke of Westminster's estate, Eaton Hall, near Chester. In 1956 the colossal Gothic house still stood, and it was the custom for officer-cadets to celebrate passing-out by driving sheep up the stairs to the first-floor landing.

Most of us lived in barrack huts, and we were allowed to keep shotguns in our lockers, for rough shooting on the estate. One night I woke to find that our hut was being raided by drunken revellers. Instinctively I snatched up my gun, loaded it and fired both barrels through the open window. The effect was excellent: the rioters vanished like mist. But seconds later, in burst a military policeman yelling "WHO FIRED THOSE SHOTS?"

As smoke was curling from my barrels, I realised I was in a tight corner. But with a flash of inspiration I said, "I dunno. One of those bastards got hold of my gun." Miraculously, the man believed me, and rushed out.

After joining my battalion in London, I was posted to Germany, and again landed in the country, near the Rhineland city of Dusseldorf. There in winter we went out with farmers on hare shoots, and guardsmen acting as beaters had a high old time, for the locals were inclined to drop not merely their aitches, but word endings as well. Whenever a hare got up, instead of shouting the two-syllable "Hase! Hase!", they would yell "Arse! Arse!", provoking a riot of imitations.

Yet all memories pale beside that of my first outing on a German horse. At that stage I had ridden very little, but one afternoon I agreed to accompany a colleague - and did quite well until my horse apparently took leave of its senses.

What I did not know was that it had been trained for dressage. As we were passing a field of cabbages I must have inadvertently given it some signal, for it went into a high, mincing, sideways gait which carried both of us into the middle of the crop.

On the far side stood the farmer, at first speechless with incredulity, then roaring. "Raus!" he yelled. "Weg!" Both of us turned purple in the face, he with rage, I with embarrassment. I heaved on the reins, then let them go. I kicked and squeezed and shouted "Whoa!" Whatever I did, the horse pranced ever higher and more stylishly, shredding cabbage after cabbage into muddy coleslaw. I saluted. I raised my hat. I tried, in faltering German, to apologise. "Raus!" roared the farmer. "Ganz grosse Scheisse!"

The farce ended abruptly when, at no signal from me, the horse shot forward and galloped under a tree, by whose branches, Absalom-like, I was swept off. So the brute sped back to barracks with nobody in the plate.

I cannot say that during my two years in the Army I did much for my country. But the experience toughened me, widened my vocabulary and left me well enough trained to defend the realm, had the need arisen.

The exhibition is open daily, 10am-5pm, at the Custom House, Gloucester Docks, until the end of this year.