I’m on my hands and knees struggling to breathe as I crawl through a muddy field. My uniform is covered in dirt and soaking wet from the driving rain, while an angry army corporal shouts at me to run faster.
It’s 10am on Saturday morning and while my housemates back in Sheffield are still tucked up in bed, I’m in a cold, wet field in Catterick, North Yorkshire shouting “on guard!” at the top of my voice, while furiously pointing a bayonet towards a straw bale. Just like Prince Harry, James Blunt and Pike from Dad’s Army, I’m now a soldier, well for a weekend at least.
For over a hundred years, the Officer Training Corps has been a valued part of the British Army, providing military training to university students with a mission to communicate the values, ethos and career opportunities of the Army.
Having been founded in 1911, the Sheffield University Officer Training Corps now has around 150 student officer cadets, who take part in four weekend training camps each year, as well as a two-week long intensive summer camp.
However, the unit has found itself embroiled in controversy in recent years.
In October 2008, two army captains were heavily fined and kicked out of the military after admitting to using and supplying Class A drugs at a party at Sheffield OTC’s Somme Barracks.
And in April 2009, Forge Press published details from a sexually explicit magazine produced by trainee officers. The story captured local and national media attention with the Ministry of Defence launching an internal investigation.
Now a year on from the tales of sex, drink and drugs, I was off to experience an OTC training camp for myself, and see if I could rise to the challenge of a weekend with the Army.
My guide for the weekend is Peter Dobinson, or Pedro as he is known amongst his OTC comrades. Pedro is studying a Masters Degree in Town Planning at the University of Sheffield and has been involved in the OTC since his first year. He now works as part of the Community Engagement Team and is working to rebuild the OTC’s local reputation following the embarrassing newspaper stories.
As we’re heading northbound on the M1 he tells me: “In many ways the negative publicity has woken a lot of people up in the OTC. Most of the unit were shocked and disappointed by what happened, and it showed us that we need to make the organisation more transparent.
“We needed to be more professional and that whole rumour mill atmosphere has been completely stopped. People were disciplined and we’ve introduced an alcohol policy.”
All officer cadets wear standard army uniform, and at a service station on the A1 came the moment for me to change from weedy student journalist into a camouflage-clad action man. After changing into full combat gear, we headed up to road to Europe’s largest army base at Catterick Garrison, ready to join a platoon on their training exercises.
Within minutes of arriving on site, I was assigned to join Anzio Platoon, a group of 16 cadets headed by Duncan Carroll, a Mechanical Engineering student and part-time platoon commander. Having never experienced the OTC at first hand before, I was initially surprised by the 12 men and four women who would be my colleagues for the next 24 hours.
Having previously based my opinion on the OTC from rumours and stereotypes, I was expecting to meet a group of well toned, privately educated military junkies, who’d spend evenings downing bottles of whisky while discussing the inaccuracies of the latest Andy McNab novel.
Instead though, my platoon was made up of a diverse mix of normal Sheffield students. There were people of different levels of fitness and experience and students from completely different backgrounds. While one or two had plans to join the military after graduation, most just saw the OTC as a university society and a way of meeting new people.
The idea that the OTC is solely a military recruitment campaign is way off the mark, Pedro tells me.
He says: “A lot of people misunderstand our role and think that the OTC is just about getting students to join the Army after university, and that isn’t what we’re about.
“In terms of recruitment, the Army don’t get a great deal out of it as each year there will only be a few people who will go on to join afterwards. The OTC movement does give students a wider experience of the Army which is made worthwhile by the quality of people that will come out.”
Having impressed my fellow soldiers by hurling a petrol bomb at a flaming tank, it was time for me to complete my first full training exercise. After receiving health and safety clearance, I would join the platoon in bayonet training, or sword fighting as it is referred to by the pr
nstructed by two fearsome corporals from The Rifles regiment, our platoon would have to master the skill of controlled aggression, by attacking a straw target with a bayonet rifle. While bayonets may be associated more widely with conflicts like the First World War, they are still being used for close combat in Afghanistan today. They are said to require a high level of mental toughness due to the intense aggression required to kill the enemy at such close range.
In order to get this level of aggression, the corporal’s insisted that we ran several hundred meters across the field and then crawl back over the wet, muddy ground.
After struggling through this drill several times, it was time to attach a sword to my rifle. Under the intimidating instruction of the two corporals, I stood in an attack position shouting “on guard” and “attack”, before stabbing the straw target through the chest.
When the intense 30 minute session was over, it was time to tackle Catterick Garrison’s Whinny Hill confidence course, an urban assault course running through a row of semi-detached houses.
While I’ve always been reasonably fit, I wasn’t overly convinced that I’d be able to shimmy up a telegraph pole or climb a rope up a terrace house. But with the support of my team and the encouragement of the senior officers, I completed the course without a single problem, and perhaps surprisingly ahead of some of the cadets. Proof perhaps that the OTC isn’t just for the super-fit military hopefuls.
Nicole Gallagher, one of Anzio platoon’s female members tells me: “The one thing we all have in common is that everyone wants a challenge.
“Sometimes as a girl I find it hard at the time, but afterwards feel like I’ve achieved something by keeping up with the boys and doing things which my friends say they couldn’t do”.
OCT weekends are split up over two days with the Saturday spent doing training drills and exercises, while the Sunday sees cadets carry out a simulated conflict situation using blank ammunition. In order to prepare for the ‘final attack’, platoons trek outside the village to camp in the surrounding countryside and confirm attack plans after receiving orders from senior officers.
So after a hard afternoon of training, our platoon headed up to the hills to prepare for the final attack, and I began to notice a more serious atmosphere amongst my comrades.
While throughout the afternoon the atmosphere around the platoon was boisterous and lively, the thought of a disturbed nights sleep in wet and muddy combat gear seemed to have quietened down the troops.
I’ve done a fair bit of camping in the past, but our accommodation on the Moors was considerably different to my Eurocamp family holiday in 1998.
Firstly, the OTC don’t use tents, opting instead for a standard Army camouflage tarpaulin and a Gortex ‘bivvy bag’ to stop your sleeping bag from getting wet.
So after finding a suitable ditch to make my bed for the night, we set up our primitive accommodation.
After reading last year’s revelations about the OTC’s wilder side, this might be the point when you’d expect the trainee officers to crack open the lager and begin some R&R. But sadly, alcohol isn’t part of the MoD ration pack which forms the sole ingredients for our evening meal.
Rations did though include a surprisingly tasty boil-in-a-bag mutton curry, a chocolate pudding desert and enough biscuits to supply a tea party at Chatsworth House.
With food in short supply, it’s not long before a friendly face shares a bag of Harribo around the platoon or offers a share of his meal to a more hungry cadet.
And it’s this sense of comradeship and togetherness which makes OTC weekends so special.
As Pedro tells me: “Everyone learns to share on these
weekend.”
So after a wholesome dinner I was heading to bed, unlike the rest of the platoon, who were required to keep awake to carry out night patrols of our camp, watching out for an enemy attack.
With a ditch as a bed for the night, I was never going to get the best night’s kip, but come 2am I was already awake to receive orders from platoon commander Duncan Carroll regarding the morning operation.
With the help of a map made of sticks and stones, Duncan informs us that Anzio platoon will help seize control of a tower block in Whinny Hill, which has been seized by the enemy.
As an embedded reporter, I would follow the platoon as they look to suppress the enemy’s fire and take control of the platinum tower.
Our mission began early on Sunday morning, gathering silently in woods close to the village. After a signal from the platoon in front of us we began the attack, crawling underneath a barbed wire fence under the cover of a smoke bomb.
After nearly two hours of gunfire, hundreds of rounds of blank ammunition and dozens of thunderous grenades, the battle was over and the tower was secured.
After calling a cease fire, the cadets dropped their weapons and began the more ominous task of collecting rounds of ammunition from around the battlefield for recycling.
My time at Catterick Garrison had come to an end and it was time to send my uniform back to the MoD laundry and get back to my civilian life. Despite the aching bones and incredible tiredness, I had enjoyed my weekend with the OTC.
Any student group with links to the armed forces is bound to be a controversial one, as the recent Kick ’Em Off Campus campaign shows. But having seen an OTC weekend at first hand, it’s easy to see the exciting range of experiences which encourage students to join. Even if I might rest my helmet for the next training weekend and get my Army fix from Call of Duty instead.