WARTIME memories came flooding back yesterday as a former major in the Green Howards was transported back to his days as a boy soldier.

Jack Riordan was the third generation of his family to serve as Regimental Sergeant Major and to be awarded the MBE.

The latest exhibition at the regimental museum in Richmond Market Place, Behind Barbed Wires, brought his early Army days vividly back to life.

Major Riordan, who now lives in Northallerton, was 14 years old when he joined the Green Howards in 1944.

Almost immediately Band Sergeant 'Chirby' Woodall gave him the task of helping to put together special parcels for PoWs in Austria, Germany, Italy and Czechoslovakia.

Sgt Woodall, who years later became Mayor of Richmond, was instrumental in setting up a special fund in the town.

The fund raised thousands of pounds to pay for extras to go with the standard Red Cross parcels.

The extras included cigarettes, thick woollen socks and gloves and chocolate.

Part of young Riordan's job was to break up the slabs of chocolate with a hammer, so that it could be put in the parcels before being sent abroad.

Major Riordan had lived in the Regimental Sergeant Major's house in Richmond from 1932 to 1934, when his father, Tom, was RSM - a position which was also held by Major Riordan's grandfather.

Major Riordan himself also served as RSM before being commissioned as an officer. All three members of the family were awarded the MBE for their service with the Green Howards.

Major Riordan said: "Sixty years ago I was hard at work sending out these parcels, knowing they were going to help men who had been taken prisoner by the enemy."

"This exhibition brings it all back to me."

The exhibition, Behind Barbed Wire, opened last month and focuses on the challenges faced by more than 2,600 Green Howards who were captured by the Germans and Italians during the war.

The display includes photographs, documents and objects from the 1940s, including an escape suit made from materials available in a PoW camp near Bologna, Italy.