And so the scene was set for the General's upbringing. Mrs Shavings Preparatory Boarding School at Bexhill-on-Sea at the tender age of six, where young Charles excelled in the Prep Army Training Corp (PATC). Thence to Fortingham, a minor public school which had a high pass rate in sadism and entry to Sandhurst, it was here that the pubescent Charles excelled in the Public Schools Officer Training Corp (We recommend the film IF, director Lindsey Anderson, for a general sense of both public schools and the OTC. It has been suggested that this film, appearing as it did in the late 1960's was instrumental in the humanizing of the British public school system.)

EDITOR'S NOTE: This could be allowed to go on for a very long time, as indeed it does in the General's autobiography "Show Me The Whites", privately published in 1980 and now exceedingly rare although you might try emailing the General at barking@barkinghall.com for a copy. (It is rumoured that the General's library contains 77 of the original edition of 100.)


Major General Barking - Barking writes: "But for the hunting and my cacti I'm not sure that life would be worth living and if it were not for the fact that I live in Wymsey I'd have gone years ago. Forty years in the army was more than enough for one lifetime but fighting is in my blood and there is always something to fight about in the village. Right now it is those damned vegetarians - the Nails. The good lady wife says it's bad for my health to think about that pair of commie agitators but someone has to stop them destroying a way of life. It was a vegetarian that did for the Raj, by god. These days they are everywhere, interfering with the natural order of things, saving this and that. There was even one at the Bridge Club last month.

I remember a water carrier in Ajikarkistan, she was no vegetarian I can tell you - wild, wild days! Naturally there were no helicopters in those days and a man depended on his horse, his mess mates and gins at six.