'Show' honour for our Frank; POPPY PARADE: Town's old soldier fights back from surgery to lead marchers.Byline: By Steve Evans Steve Evans is a common name that can refer to different people:
BEDWORTH'S best-loved old soldier, Frank Parsons, figurehead of the town's Armistice Armistice (Nov. 11, 1918) Agreement between Germany and the Allies ending World War I. Allied representatives met with a German delegation in a railway carriage at Rethondes, France, to discuss terms. The agreement was signed on Nov. Day parade, is to have an exhibition mounted in his honour. It will open at the town's Parsonage Project heritage centre on Friday - the day 83-year-old Frank will be pushing himself through the pain barrier to lead the annual November 11 parade. John Burton, president of the Bedworth Society, which runs the centre, said: "We shall be displaying pictures taken at previous Armistice Day parades and showing videos from earlier parades as well. "We hope to have a section devoted to Frank Parsons as a token of respect for his work over the years in enhancing the scope of the parades." The exhibition will run for two days. Last year, former Royal Marines Commando Mr Parsons revealed he was facing one of the toughest battles of his life. He was diagnosed with bladder cancer bladder cancer Malignant tumour of the bladder. The most significant risk factor associated with bladder cancer is smoking. Exposure to chemicals called arylamines, which are used in the leather, rubber, printing, and textiles industries, is another risk factor. - and delayed an operation so that he could take his traditional place at the head of the ranks. He has since had the surgery, and will again be taking up the parade's figurehead role on Friday. Gil Leach, chairman of the organising committee, said: "We are a little concerned about Frank leading the parade because he has been ill, but he is determined to take part. "He will lead the parade through the town to the Coventry Road cemetery and will then ride in an Army Land Rover after the parade re-assembles to march back." Mr Parsons is a survivor of the infamous Changi Jail in Singapore as a prisoner of the Japanese. He was captured as a member of the elite Special Boat Squadron A permanent Navy echelon III major command to which two or more special boat units are assigned for some operational and all administrative purposes. The squadron is tasked with the training and deployment of these special boat units and may augment naval special warfare task groups and on a two-man submarine planting limpet limpet, marine gastropod mollusk with a simple, flattened, conical shell, found in cooler waters of the Atlantic and the Pacific oceans. Certain species creep over rocks, feeding on algae during high tides, but when the tide recedes they return instinctively to the mines on Japanese warships in Singapore harbour. The former colour sergeant took over organising the Armistice Day parade several years ago and it is now an an event that has put Bedworth on the map. He is still getting over the operation, but said defiantly: "I want to lead the parade. I am not comfortable walking and I am also having trouble with my eyes." He described the Parsonage Project exhibition featuring his involvement with the parade as "an honour." Friday's parade of veterans will move off from Church Way at 10.30am. There will be an aerial poppy drop from a Douglas Dakota DC3 at 11.05am. n War memories exhibition, Page 14 CAPTION(S): ALL READY... Frank Parsons leads last year's Armistice Day parade through Bedworth. |
|
||||||||||||||
Printer friendly
Cite/link
Email
Feedback
Reader Opinion