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WW1 - grandfather was a stoker in the RN. His ship was involved in the battle of Jutland. He was then in the RN reserves until he aged out on Sept 1st 1939. A great uncle was KIA in the trenches in France. Another was in the Mesopotamia campaign under Townsend. He had a rough time of it, but I don't know the details.

WW2 - dad was in the RASC. In Normandy on D-Day+6, initially working on Mulberry B, but was then given a Sherman that had had its turret blown off and was clearing roads toward Caen. Later he was guarding munitions factories back in the UK, which is where he met mum, who had started the war filling jars with jam, but then was filling shells with explosive.

Malaya "emergency" - an uncle was there and hated everything about it.