IT didn’t take one young Royal Inniskilling Fusilier long to blot his copybook when the regiment was posted to Worcester in 1967. Within a week of arriving at Norton Barracks, he managed to get himself and all his colleagues banned from the Saracen’s Head public house in The Tything.

After a fracas at the licensed premises, where the licensee had a particularly attractive blonde daughter if I remember, Major John Hassett, second in command of the Fusiliers, told the Evening News: “At the request of the management, the Commanding Officer has put the Saracen’s Head out of bounds. Apparently some young fusilier got himself into trouble at the pub. The fusiliers have been notified of this in battalion orders.” Which probably made the miscreant very popular. Major Hassett added that the culprit had since been punished by the Army.

Mind you he certainly wasn’t the first fighting fit young soldier to fall foul of authority and the locals after drinking several too many. The Inniskilling’s predecessors at Norton Barracks had been the Lancashire Fusiliers and many a Monday morning at Worcester Magistrate Court was spent listening to a contrite officer pleading that so-and-so was an excellent soldier and steady under fire, but a bit too exuberant for his own good when off the leash.

It’s been a very long time since Norton Barracks hosted serving soldiers of any regiment. The last to occupy the complex – officially described as having been built “in the Fortress Gothic Revival Style between 1874 and 1877” – was 14 Signals Regiment (a more sober sounding bunch than the Fusiliers) and it left in 1977.

After lying vacant for a decade, the keep was sold to developers for conversion into apartments in 1987 and the rest of the 55-acre site was gradually covered by a new housing estate, many of the roads being named after Worcestershire Regiment battle honours.

Norton Barracks had originally been designed as the depot of the 29th (Worcestershire) Regiment of Foot and the 36th (Herefordshire) Regiment of Foot and when these were amalgamated in 1881 to become the Worcestershire Regiment, the barracks became its official home.

The regiment ceased to use Norton in 1957 and when it was amalgamated with the Sherwood Foresters in 1970 to become the Worcestershire and Sherwood Foresters Regiment, it established a depot at Battlesbury Barracks in Warminster. Amalgamation also faced the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers, for after leaving Norton Barracks it too fell victim to Army reorganisation and became the 1st Battalion, Royal Irish Rangers.

RIGHT it’s hands up time and take the bullet. Last week in a Nostalgia piece about St George’s Lane football ground, home of Worcester City for 108 years, I got the christian names of two former players wrong. Several City faithful had a pop and quite justified too. There was a reason, but I won’t go into that here, so it’s a kick up the backside and don’t do it again. As my very old news editor would have said – always check, Michael, always check.

To set the record straight, it was TOMMY Skuse and KEVIN Tudor and while West Ham and Arsenal goalkeeper Jim Standen played cricket for Worcestershire, he was never officially on Worcester City’s books.

The irony is that way back in 1963, the very first job I ever covered for this paper was a Worcester City Reserves game in the days when the club had a very decent reserves side. I recall it included up and comers like Terry Awford (father of Andy) and Paddy Mullen, who later managed Malvern Town. And those names had better be right because I don’t want Paddy knocking down my front door. Or even worse, his golf star wife Sylvia with a five iron.