London Regiment Cocktail Party, Cutlers' Hall

26th January 2017

As has been mentioned in earlier postings, our Company supports the London Regiment financially, and we also compete for the Sirrah Trophy on a (more-or-less) annual basis. They organise a rather nice "do" for all their civic supporters around this time each year and this time it was in the lovely Cutlers' Hall, just by the Old Bailey and near St. Paul's Cathedral. It's a very lucky (and rare) survivor of the terrible blitz of December 29th 1940 when just about the only two structures left standing were St. Paul's and this hall. About five months later another blast took destroyed a wall, but left the building intact, and so this, the fifth-incarnation of 1888, remains complete with its lovely interior - and enough elephant ivory to make Prince William turn green! Having ridden over I was like a block of ice when I arrived a little after 6pm, and was thrilled to find a roaring fire in a beautiful drawing room to warm my hands for a minute. Once upstairs I quickly found Major Bob Brown, our main point of contact and Sirrah Trophy nemesis. Then the out-going Colonel Tim made a short speech in which he explained all the various mergers the regiment was about to undergo (yes, more cuts I think..) and presented a couple of regimental keep sakes to out-going officers. Moving around the room I found there were quite a few from the MoD present and they all seemed vert convivial. Finally I met Major General Ben Bathurst who was very interesting company, and a chap called Ash who ran a media or film company, I think! Before too long it was time to face the chill of the night again and recover my machine, handily parked around the corner at Stationers'.