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DELIGHTED AT RESPONSE: John Barrett and Dave Vaudray.
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Town rallies to help troops
by Frank Wood30/ 4/2008
OODLES of noodles — that was the immediate response to ex-para John Barrett’s appeal to send parcels out to soldiers serving in Afghanistan.
John, licensee of the Brown Cow pub in Bamford Road, says the appeal by his Rochdale Branch of the Parachute Regimental Association in last week’s Advertiser brought instant support from the people of Heywood with lots of gifts of books, noodles, biscuits and sun cream.
As well as items to make up parcels, there was also a donation of £100 to buy more items and John is now confident they will achieve their target of 200 parcels in the next month.
He said: "Some people have actually made up their own parcels and brought them to the pub, but they don’t need to do that. All they need to do is donate items and we will make them up into parcels."
John’s 19-year-old son, John jnr, is serving as a paratrooper in Afghanistan at present and helped his dad draw up a tick list of items soldiers who don’t have family and friends sending them parcels from home would like to have.
They include any kind of sweets which won’t melt, toiletries, face wipes, sun lotion, toothpaste, noodles and pasta, plain biscuits and paperback books. The parcels will be collected by 16 Air Assault Brigade and distributed among soldiers who are not receiving gifts from home.
Items can be left at any time at the Brown Cow.
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