One of the French professors at the school is also a military historian who teaches at one of the universities in Paris. Colonel Brun invited whoever was interested to join him for another tour of Les Invalides, Sunday.
Francois asked if I could join and what an experience it was! It was a small group made up of two Swiss officers, the Canadian, two Germans, one American and the Austrian professor and of course Francois and me.
Colonel Brun throughout the tour described in great detail the evolution of armour, weapons and tactics (not only how but why) from the early middle ages right through to the World Wars - of course because these are artillery reservists the focus was primarily on the evolution of the weapons . He was so animated about what he was describing and spoke so clearly I was captivated for the full (almost) four hours. Toward the end we noticed that he had also attracted several other visitors to our group – no doubt appreciating the detail of his interesting discourse.
We all met after at a Bistro for a glass of something then minus Colonel Brun and one of the Swiss we headed out for something to eat after which Francois invited ‘the guys’ back to our place for a night cap. A really fun evening all round.
