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John Cotterill is a self employed battlefield guide for families ,military groups, veterans, civilian clubs, individuals and schools. He was a founder member of the Guild of Battlefield Guides in 2003, was badged in 2004 (Badge 10) and was a Guild validator for 15 years. He became a Fellow of the Guild in 2025. John served as a regular officer in the Worcestershire and Sherwood Foresters Regiment and their successors the Mercian Regiment for 37 years. He saw active service in Ulster, the Balkans, Iraq and Afghanistan and inactive service on four continents. He lives in Nottingham and is an active member of the Western Front Association, the Soldiers, Sailors and Airmans Families Association (SSAFA) and his Regimental Association. John’s particular specialities are taking families to retrace the steps of their Great War or WW2 ancestors and, for military groups, writing and delivering problem solving exercises that allow participants to “re-fight” battles of the past. He has guided groups on battlefields from Tanzania to Tunisia and from Stalingrad to Singapore.

I am a retired Army Quartermaster (Logistics) and have been guiding professionally since 2009.

My interest in battlefields began as a boy when I caused uproar in his father’s garden by digging trenches and having battles with model soldiers in my father’s flower/vegetable beds. I joined the Army, aged 15 as a Junior Leader in 1961. Since then, my Regular Army career has been with many different Regiments and Corps (Middlesex, Queens, Royal Army Medical Corps and the Intelligence Corps), spanned 47 years, with operational experience in Northern Ireland and The Former Republic of Yugoslavia. In June 2002 I was awarded an MBE for my service.

I have had an extensive career serving across the globe. my infantry experience, both tactical and administrative gives me a soldier’s eye for ground with its impact on various weapon systems and the logistic support needed to maintain armies in the field.

I have an interest in medieval battles such as the Battle of Lewes and Wolverhampton, as well as the English Civil War. I have researched and led a Tour of the Battle of Waterloo in the past and have added this to my list of tours. Another area I am researching is the various Battles of the Hundred Years War with France and anticipate being qualified to take Tours in these battles.

I am also well qualified to lead tours on many of the battlefields of both World Wars.

John has been interested in military history since childhood. He comes from an extended military family and his early hobbies – modelmaking, wargaming and re-enacting – all allowed him to pursue his interest.

His involvement in re-enacting has taken him to battlefields across the UK, western Europe and the USA, and he has spoken to audiences of varying types, numbering up to 10,000 in one instance, about all aspects of conflict.

After a full-time career in Royal Mail, John took early retirement in 2012. His role as a senior manager with commercial and financial responsibilities gave him a keen awareness of the importance of customer satisfaction and ideas of value for money, concepts that are a key part of his touring offerings.

He has a BA (with First-Class Honours) in War Studies, completed part-time at the University of Birmingham and then the University of Kent while he was working.

Battlefield tour guiding has long been an ambition and John joined the Guild in 2015. He undertook training on the theory and practise of all aspects of guiding – the tour management side as well as engaging audiences in historic locations. He is proud to be a member of the Guild and to have been awarded Badge Number 82 in June 2017. In progressing towards the Badge, John was delighted to receive the Guild’s David Chandler Award for work he did on sources relating to the engagements of Lexington and Concord at the start of the American War of Independence.

John is a freelance guide and a keen motorbike rider. He specialises in set and bespoke motorbike tours of First World War and Second World War sites, the former including Ypres and the Somme, the latter relating to the May 1940 campaign, Normandy and the Battle of the Bulge. He is equally happy to guide those who prefer to travel on more than two wheels.

As well as the World Wars, John has a keen interest in eighteenth- and early nineteenth- century warfare, particularly during the Seven Years’ War, American War of Independence and Waterloo campaigns.

I come from a family that saw service in both the World Wars. My mother’s father was in France during the First World War and her two brothers fought in the Second War – one in the Royal Air Force, successfully evading capture at Dunkirk in 1940, and another with the Royal Navy in the Atlantic. On my father’s side of the family, my grandfather saw service in the Royal Army Medical Corps in the First War and later became an Air Raid Warden in Burton on Trent in World War II, whilst his brother was with the Royal Air Force in the Far East.

Talking to them sparked my own interest in military history which then developed to reading about battles and military campaigns – it was the part of the history lessons at school I liked most! When I had some pocket money I would buy books about battles and would always be scouring ‘junk shops’ for military cap badges, medals and the like.

Medal collecting led to me undertaking research into the lives of the individuals that had won them and in turn to research the battles in which they had fought. The next logical step was visiting some of those battlefields. Initially alone but later with friends and family, the visits developed into small guided tours with an emphasis on the human side of war and its effect on the people involved, not just the combatants but those back home or in the countries where the campaigns and battles were fought.

As well as general tours of the Western Front battlefields I also have a particular interest and knowledge in the involvement of the Canadian and Australian forces in both World Wars and have led a number of tours to the European battlefields where they fought as well as in the UK where they trained.

I also particularly enjoy taking small groups on family pilgrimages and undertaking the research that is involved in developing these tours. In particular, I have led a number of American groups and families to the Normandy battlefields of World War II. This led to the development of tours around particular American units including the 29th Division in the drive from the Normandy beachhead to St Lo and the Division’s battle to capture Brest in Brittany. In the UK I have also researched and developed tours around the US forces in the West Country in the run up to D Day including the Slapton Sands disaster and the development of the Woolacombe Infantry Training Centre in Devon.

I have significant experience of working with school groups and  was recently part of the guide team that delivered the Government initiative to take two students and a teacher from every English state school to the battlefields of France and Belgium between 2014 and 2019. I am currently a volunteer speaker for the Commonwealth War Graves Commission and also help to clean and maintain CWGC headstones in local churchyards.

“Once again you’ve made our battlefields trip and amazing experience. Thank you for all the extra special investigations you do. We can’t imagine these trips without you!”
Teacher – School group

“Our trip has been the trip of a lifetime experience – your part made it absolutely awesome!”
Guest – Canadian Adult group