GENERAL NEWS

Results of the Junior Section 7 A SideFootball
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE RESULTS

Results of the West Midland District Band Contest 2010
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE RESULTS
Congratulations to Lanesfield GB/BB Band


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Art Competition Results
ANCHOR BOYS
1st Place Jack Ridgeway 1st Cheslyn Hay	2nd Place Joshua Guy 2nd Oakengates	3rd Place Alex Parry 19th Wolverhampton
COMPANY SECTION
1st Place Amy Wedge 21st Wolverhampton	2nd Place Joe Puntel 1srt Cheslyn Hay	3rd Place Laura Wedge 21st Wolverhampton
JUNIOR SECTION
1st Place Gregory Rhodes 1st Cheslyn Hay	2nd Place Molly Haynes 21st Wolverhampton	3rd = Place Joe Thomson 1st Cheslyn Hay Oliver Goodhead 1st Cheslyn Hay

Dear friends and colleagues of the Wolverhampton Battalion…  

Travelling along with you  

‘From the old I travel to the new…’ The words from that well-known hymn always come to mind at the start of a new Session. Session 2009 - 2010 lies before us, so what will it bring?  I expect, we would all like to think that the coming year will be ‘successful’, which in turn leads me to ask the question: what is ‘success’? You will know by now that I am an optimist by nature…my glass is always half full rather than half empty. This part of my make-up comes from 30 years in the classroom; you can’t teach children and not be an optimist! In fact you can’t be a BB leader without being an optimist either. Sometimes you will ask yourself ‘why am I doing this?’  However, you may never know the good that you do in sowing the seeds of faith. I recently attended the funeral of a long-standing BB friend, Mr Ken Gurney of the 78^th Birmingham Company from Smethwick . To my surprise there were, amongst the hundreds present, two fellow officers from our Battalion, husband and wife…I won’t mention names here, but if anyone asks I will be happy to reveal. It seems that it was the influence of Ken, some forty odd years ago that brought the husband into the Brigade. Ken’s influence lives on. On the day of the funeral there was widespread traffic congestion around the chapel and I had to park my car two streets away. Whilst walking to the church I was stopped by an Asian family- actually walking in the opposite direction, three ladies in Sari’s and three or four young children, the oldest – a boy of about 10 years. They asked me what was happening and who had died. When I said it was Ken Gurney the young lad said ‘I knew him’ they all joined in to say ‘he was a good man’. What a great epitaph!  

Looking back on 2008-9 fills me with much pleasure. From the day I saw a senior lad from our Battalion on the front of the Brigade Membership card and then on the cover of the Gazette…I knew we would have a good year. Our Service at Telford was a great occasion, very well attended. In fact we are to repeat the idea of having our annual service on a Saturday evening, this year on 10^th October at Cheslyn Hay although I can’t promise pyrotechnics at this one!  There was a great deal of formal success this year in our four Queen’s Badge awards from 1^st Cheslyn Hay & 10^th Lanesfield Coys. Our companies entered national competitions and again achieved much success in Band, Badminton, Football, Table-Tennis etc. The 10th band, with their GB Coys from Lanesfield & Coseley, won the District and National Contests again for the third time. After the Badminton team from 1^st Cheslyn Hay visited Bedford a letter from the Captain of that company praised the visitors for their sportsmanship and friendly attitude. We had an excellent ‘Building Your Skills’ course at Ketley in November. DofE continues to be a real strength in our Battalion and a leaders’ course we laid-on attracted participants from other Battalions. There were more entries in some of our competitions this year, such as the Swimming Gala, which is most encouraging. I particularly liked the Junior Section figure marching where the standard was excellent and the entry was up. A big ‘Thank You’ to everyone who organised Battalion events and competitions, your efforts are very much appreciated. Thanks too, to Jeff Bagnall for his work in setting up our new Battalion website, we must all now use it. Thanks and best wishes to John McIver in taking over as Training Convenor and Daniel Sharp as Table-Tennis Sec.  

I have really enjoyed seeing something of what goes on in the Battalion during the past year; from ‘Lambing’ with the 1^st Cheslyn Hay Anchor Boys, Camping with DofE, Visiting Camps and Activity weeks with Madeley and Cheslyn Hay Juniors, being ‘waited on’ at the Annual dinner prepared and organised by the 3^rd West Bromwich, and failing to guess who was the ‘murderer’ at Ketley’s mystery evening…to name but a few. Please invite me to see what you are doing.  

You are, I know, already aware that Ron Betts is standing down as Battalion Treasurer. I wish to thank him for the superb quality of service he has given to the Battalion in this role. Ron extended the excellent work done by his predecessors and continued to make the accounts refreshingly understandable as well as accessible! His term of office finished with a real burst of activity as we celebrated our 125^th year. I welcome Steve Hodgetts from the 19^th Coy. as the new Treasurer, who will take up his position in January, and I wish him well in his post.   

I regard my position in the Battalion as a great privilege (I suspect you knew this already). I really am very lucky to be involved with such a wonderful team of boys, girls, young people and leaders.  

I cannot finish without making reference to our late colleague and friend Damian Davies from Oakengates who was killed in action, with his Royal Marine unit in Afghanistan at the end of 2008. Damian’s funeral at St George’s , Oakengates, was a very sad occasion which I will never forget. In fact it brings tears to my eyes as I write this. Whenever I visit our BB Memorial Garden I say a prayer for his family and I urge you to do the same.  

As we travel into the new Session I ask you to keep travelling along with the Lord Jesus. You will then be able to work miracles, but remember, it may not always be immediately obvious!  

Rob. Bolton
Battalion President