First Impressions at Harrogate: Juicy Lucy, Dirty Ears, and My First Fight
It must have been our second day at the Army Apprentices College Harrogate. We were lined up outside the MRS – the Medical Reception Station – for our compulsory medical checks, all nervous excitement and teenage bravado.
That's where we first saw the legendary "Juicy Lucy."
The Nurse Who Launched a Thousand Fantasies
The nickname came from Leslie Thomas's novel The Virgin Soldiers, lifted from a vivacious prostitute character in his story about National Service in Malaya. That book was practically required reading among us lads at Harrogate, dog-eared copies passed hand-to-hand until they literally fell apart.
Our real-life Juicy Lucy was a nurse, probably from Hong Kong, and she was every bit as gorgeous and exotic as her fictional namesake. She became the constant object of lust and teenage fantasy for hundreds of boy soldiers. In my two years there, I don't think I ever exchanged a word with her, but she certainly featured prominently in my daydreams and those of countless other boys.
A Diplomatic Intervention
Before the medicals began, an orderly walked down our line, peering into each boy's ears. A few of us, myself included, were singled out and led to a separate room for what he diplomatically called "ear cleaning."
I'd come from Trapp, where personal hygiene wasn't exactly a top priority. The orderly handled it without fuss or public humiliation, though he did strongly advise us to cultivate better hygiene habits in future. Fair enough. I was mortified, but at least he'd spared me the embarrassment of having my waxy ears announced to the entire queue.
The Fight
While we shuffled in that queue, caught between medical anxiety and adolescent fantasies about nurses, I had my very first fight at Harrogate.
I can't say if it was my Welsh accent that provoked him, or if the boy was just naturally a complete twat. He turned to his mate with a smirk and delivered what he thought was a punchline – a vicious joke about Aberfan, the 1966 disaster where a coal tip collapsed onto a school, killing 116 children.
The nervous excitement vanished instantly, replaced by pure rage. I grabbed him, swearing, trying to head-butt him. Other boys quickly intervened, dragging me away while I threatened to "get him later."
Even at thirteen when Aberfan happened, it had hit me hard. I remembered my Nan crying as we watched the television coverage, those images of parents frantically digging through black slurry with their bare hands. This wasn't ancient history – it was four years ago. Fresh. Raw.
That boy's casual cruelty didn't just anger me – it told me something about the kind of people I'd be living alongside. Some of them would become mates. Others would remain twats.
Welcome to Army Life
So that was my second day at Harrogate: lusting after an unattainable nurse, getting my ears cleaned like a five-year-old, and nearly getting into a punch-up over a dead kids joke.
It was a hell of an introduction to Army life – equal parts humiliation, hormones, and barely-controlled rage.
I was fifteen years old, hundreds of miles from home, and learning fast that this new world had its own rules, its own cruelties, and its own strange hierarchy.
The boy who made the joke? I never did "get him later." We just avoided each other for two years, which was probably for the best.
But I never forgot what he said. And I never will.