Catterick’s Infantry Training Centre (ITC) has celebrated its 25th anniversary
The Duke of Gloucester was on hand to witness a variety of activities, including a Gurkha taekwondo demonstration and a jump from the Red Devils parachute display team, and took the time to praise the facility’s staff.
Taking pride of place among proceedings, however, were the 130 recruits of A Company who marched off the parade square, in front of family and friends, to begin their careers as trained infantry soldiers.
Newly-trained Rifleman Cameron Askew, 21, said: “It makes you more mature.
“The situations that they put you through in training feel so real, this is probably the best infantry training in the world. I don’t think you’ll get anything better anywhere else.”
Such is the nature of the Army, these young men and women may one day find themselves back in Catterick, training the next generation and helping them to fulfil their potential.
Some of the permanent staff spoke of their pride in seeing what their protégés had achieved and were reminded of their own time under the tutelage of the ITC.
Corporal Niall Crawford, of the 4th Battalion (The Highlanders), The Royal Regiment of Scotland, said: “It gave me more responsibility.
“It is so rewarding seeing the recruits developing. I passed out of ITC in 2011; it’s a family tradition to join the Army and I had wanted to from a young age.”
The young troops, cheered on by their loved ones, will now go on to join their units based across the country.
