The sacrifice and bravery of soldiers from the Royal Anglian Regiment 1st Battalion and RAF Wittering is to be honoured at a reception for heroes this September.

Today, the public is asked to rally behind the city's military on the back of RAF Wittering's decision to advise personnel not to wear their uniforms in Peterborough following reports of uniformed staff being verbally abused in the city.

Special report: RAF uniform row, March 2008.

People from all sections of the community are backing The ET's decision to launch an online petition showing support for the armed forces.

The Wear It With Pride campaign is just one way you can show your support, and September's parade will give you the chance to give Our Boys visible backing.

Join The Evening Telegraph Wear It With Pride campaign to support local service personnel.

Our offices have been flooded with messages of support for our servicemen and women and the difficult jobs they do.

We believe servicemen and women should wear their uniforms in the city and surrounding area, and that local people are proud of the job they do.

Add your support to our online petition (form will open in a new window).

You can also write to: Wear It With Pride, The Evening Telegraph, 57 Priestgate, PE1 1JW or e-mail eteditor@peterboroughtoday.co.uk.
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Peterborough City Council leader John Peach confirmed that plans for the parade, which is on a day in September yet to be announced, are being cemented at the moment, but one thing is clear – this is a day for the city to show its pride.

Soldiers who served months in the hazardous war-torn areas of Afghanistan will parade through the city centre shoulder-to-shoulder with service personnel from RAF Wittering, and other military groups.
The joint parade will march to Peterborough Cathedral for a service of remembrance, and it is expected that the historic building will be packed with people thankful for the sterling work carried out by the armed forces.

Cllr Peach said: "Both RAF Wittering and Peterborough's Royal Anglian Regiment deservedly have the Freedom of the City.

"The council fully supports a plan for soldiers to hold a parade in the city centre, and it is something we have been discussing for the last few months.

"We are negotiating how it will work at the moment, but we want to make it a big day for the city."

RAF Wittering was given the Freedom of the City in 1983. The citation from the town hall gave the base permission to "proceed at their will through the city on ceremonial occasions with bayonets fixed, colours flying, drums beating and bands playing".

When the Peterborough Territorial Army's 158 Royal Anglian Regiment received the same accolade in 2001, they waited until 2006 – their 10th anniversary – to stage a huge parade in Cathedral Square.

The city united to show its gratitude towards the regiment, and look on as Her Royal Highness Princess Anne presented 12 regiment members with medals for their service in Iraq. Part of the inspiration to stage a parade in Peterborough – mimicking a similar one held in Great Yarmouth last year – came from the Dean of Peterborough, the Very Rev Charles Taylor, who said British troops deserved more recognition.

He told the Remembrance Day congregation inside Peterborough Cathedral: "They are wounded, often permanently in the course of duty. They are casualties of war, just as much as those who stormed the beaches on D-day."

His strong words inspired city councillor David Thorpe to make an impassioned speech in the town hall urging the council to use it as a powerful public wake-up call.

Today Cllr Thorpe said: "I was absolutely disgusted to hear why RAF Wittering was advising staff not to wear uniform in public.

"I am glad that our armed forces seem to be getting a great deal of support in the last couple of days, they truly deserve it.

"A parade would be a great thing to happen."

RAF Wittering spokesman Squadron Leader Tony Walsh said the base had received backing from callers outraged at the insults hurled at its personnel.

He said: "We've had people saying, 'We support you and you should be able to walk down the street in uniform'. They are people who live in Peterborough and further afield, and they don't think we should have to have this ban.

"But everything to do with security, including this uniform policy, is reviewed constantly."

Conservative MP for North West Cambridgeshire Shailesh Vara has backed the plan for a march so that local people can show their support.

Mr Vara, whose constituency includes RAF Wittering, says that this would be the perfect way to show local airmen and soldiers that the vast majority of people support and respect them.

He said: "I know that there would be a strong turnout. I hope that an event can be arranged soon, as all our local servicemen and women deserve to know they have the backing of the British public. And when they do march, they can wear their uniforms with pride.

"We should be standing up for our armed services, not caving in to a small minority of protestors. If there are difficulties from a minority of the public the full force of the law should be used against them if they are spitting at people, using threatening behaviour or causing a disturbance."

RO is proud of her role
GROUP Captain Ro Atherton is the commander at RAF Wittering – and she is first female commander in the base's 90-year history.

She is responsible for every one of the 2,000 people who live on the sprawling air base, near Stamford.

Group Captain Atherton has a very varied work schedule.

In the morning she could be planning for the next set of supplies that is needed for our soldiers in Afghanistan, and in the afternoon she might be dealing with a resident's concern about their home.

What really is interesting about Group Captain Atherton is the fact that she has never flown an aircraft.

For too long, the RAF was a male-dominated preserve and it was not until the '80s that women were allowed to get behind the controls of an aircraft.

By then, Group Captain Atherton was already 28 – three years too old to train as a pilot. Of course, she would have loved to take to the skies, but it is no longer a pre-requisite for this job.

Put simply, she is very good at planning and organising the equipment that is needed to undertake military operations.
She is married to Squadron Leader Ian Atherton and the pair have a home near High Wycombe.

She said: "It's a great honour to command a unit with such a heritage and take it through into a new era to make it relevant to today's society."

Car attacked
THE wife of an RAF serviceman has come forward to say she was the victim of horrendous abuse after she hung her husband's military uniform in the back of her car.

The woman, who does not wish to be identified, said she broke down in tears after two men kicked her car, and spouted a torrent of verbal abuse, when she parked in Hampton's Serpentine Green shopping centre.

She was taking her husband's mess uniform – the equivalent of a formal black tie dress – to have a medal put on it ahead of a military dinner after he returned from a tour in war-torn Iraq.

Today she revealed how she had to lock herself in her car while the two men attacked after spotting the uniform hanging in the back in August last year.

She said: "At first I couldn't believe what was happening. They were calling me a murderer and were kicking the car and shouting and screaming at me.

"It wasn't until two men who managed to chase them off told me it was because of my husband's uniform that I realised why I was being targetted."

The woman, whose husband is based at RAF Cottesmore, was taking the uniform to RAF Wittering to have the medal attached to mark his service in Iraq.

When she returned to the car, parked in broad daylight at the shopping centre, in Hampton, Peterborough, the two men descended on the car.

"When I got back to the office I just broke down in tears. I then phoned my husband and he was extremely angry to find out what had happened.

"I am proud of my husband."