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I am a freelance guide, historian and heritage professional. After retiring following ten years in the army as a Royal Artillery Officer, I became increasingly involved in interpreting and presenting battlefield heritage for the Battlefields Trust and The Royal British Legion. My interest in battlefield touring was triggered by noticing that the part of Germany in which we were training in the 1980s had been a battlefield in 1757. I had always been interested in military history and both my father and grandfather had fought in the world wars.

As a guide, my clients include  small and large groups, businesses as well as educational and military groups. I was an early supporter of the Guild of Battlefield Guides and been part of its validation team, responsible for assessing guides’ competence, since 2008. I instruct on courses teaching battlefield guides and have been Guide Co-ordinator for the Liberation Route Europe.

In 2012 I was elected to the British Commission for Military History. My published work includes two books on D Day and Normandy, chapters in British Army Guide to the Western Front, and articles in military history journals. I write a military history blog https://theobservationpost.com

My interest and knowledge of military history stretches from Caesar to the Cold War and my guiding experience covers much of Europe. Besides the world wars and the Napoleonic era, I am also interested in the mid C19th wars between Prussia, Austria and France and the Severn Years War.

Two of my books are on artillery in Normandy and I am currently writing a battlefield guide to artillery on the First Day of the Somme in publication. The artillery story of both world wars is a little neglected and I offer battlefield tours to tell the artillery story under the brand www.gunnertours.com

One speciality is providing military background for people researching their ancestry. I have been a researcher for a company that makes a popular ancestry-based TV programme and have appeared on television myself.

I have been privileged to support some of the British Army centenary staff rides as a subject matter expert alongside academic historians. My clients include many military units and headquarters. I run a website offering advice to military units planning staff rides, battlefield studies or realities of war tours. www.staffrideservices.com

The links between military and business strategy fascinate me. I offer a service to help organisations to learn from other people’s mistakes using examples from statecraft and military history. www.businessbattlefields.com

I chaired the Battlefields Trust from 2008-2015 and was involved in many projects to preserve, interpret and present many of the Battlefields of Britain, including the re-discovery of the battlefields of Bosworth.

Simon has been interested in military history since he was a child. He first visited the battlefields on family holidays and soon became fascinated with D Day and the Normandy campaign. In his teens he developed an interest in the First World War and led his first guided tours to the former battlefields of the Western Front while still at university. After graduating with a history degree, he went on to train as a teacher and for 15 years ran annual school tours to the Western Front.

From 2014, Simon ran the prestigious and multi award-winning First World War Centenary Battlefield Tours Programme – a UK government funded initiative which saw 8,500 students and teachers visit the former battlefields of the Western Front. Simon led more than 90 of these tours and as the programme’s lead for on-site education became an internationally recognised expert in leading students and teachers on the battlefields. He has also led tours for adult organisations including universities. Simon also has a passion for historical research and is able to bring the battlefields to life with personal stories, while also placing these stories in the immediate and wider historical context.

Simon is a member of the British Commission for Military History and the Western Front Association.

Simon retired from the British Army in November 2022, and qualified as a badged guide (Badge 108) in May 2020.

He originally served in the Royal Air Force before leaving to pursue a career in the oil industry, and also serving as a reserve officer. Rather to his surprise he ended up joining the Regular Army 9 years ago.

Simon has served on operations in Gulf War 1, Kosovo, Sierra Leone, Iraq (where he ran Basrah Fire Brigade) and twice as an aviation planner in Afghanistan (including with the US Marine Corps) and has worked at battlegroup, brigade and divisional level .

He has served as the Operations Officer in the Attack Helicopter Force HQ, and as the aviation specialist in the Collective Training Group at the Land Warfare Centre. He delivered training to brigade and division HQs, particularly in the use of aviation and air land integration.

Simon has recently guided tours to Normandy, Sicily and the Western Front battlefields of World War 1.

He is particularly interested in Normandy in WW2 (particularly the British 6^th Airborne Division) and in all aspects of air power in WW1 and WW2.

He is also passionate about the American Civil War, particularly Gettysburg and the Eastern theatre battles.

Christopher Finn served in the RAF for 33 years as a navigator, primarily on the Buccaneer, and was a weapons and tactics specialist.  As a Wing Commander he was the UK’s LGB specialist in AHQ Riyadh during Operation GRANBY.  His final flying tour was as OC the Navigator & Airman Aircrew School.  A graduate of the Joint Services’ Defence College, in 2000 he gained an MPhil in International Relations from Cambridge University.  His last 5 years in the RAF were spent at Shrivenham, firstly on the Directing Staff of the Advanced Command and Staff Course and then, on promotion to Group Captain, as the RAF’s Director of Defence Studies.  In this role he lectured extensively on air power to UK and international audiences, published articles on air power and ran the RAF’s staff ride programme.

On leaving the RAF in 2005 he spent ten years as a Senior Lecturer in Air Power Studies with Kings College London, later Portsmouth University, based at the RAF College Cranwell.

Since 2003 Chris has developed and led over 30 staff rides and battlefield tours covering the subjects and battles listed below.  These have predominantly covered the influence of air power on the battlefield but also areas such as joint fires, logistics, command and control, intelligence, campaign planning, leadership at all levels and the political aspects of warfare.  However, he has also covered maritime battles (Malta & NEPTUNE) and land battles (Monte Cassino & Berlin).

 Chris also lectures on Military History to a wide range of audiences including, recently, a lecture on the role of the Royal Artillery in the Imjin River Battle of the Korean War.

He is a Fellow of both the Royal Aeronautical Society and the Higher Education Academy, and works as a volunteer Guide at the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight.

A member of the Guild since 2008, Chris gained his Badge in 2009, became the Chief Validator in 2015 and became the Director of Validation (now Accreditation Director) in 2017.  He was elected the fourth Fellow of the Guild at the 2020 Annual Conference.

Chris comes from both an RAF ( Father AC2 to Flt Lt.) and a police ( Grandfather London PC, Uncle, Met Inspector) family. Chris undertook 40 years in Radiology in the NHS as a radiographer both in clinical practice and in management.

An active member of the Western Front Association he began guiding by organising regular trips to the Western Front for his local WFA branch. Interest in developing his guiding skills led to membership of the Guild of Battlefield Guides. Chris is proud to have been accredited with Badge 32. He is also proud to have been a member of the first GBG guiding team to accompany the initial H4H Great Battlefield Bike Ride through Northern France.

The Guild has helped to widen his areas of interest to V weapon sites within the Nord Calais area.

Chris also has lately developed an interest in historic sites around his Lichfield home from the Civil War sieges of Lichfield cathedral, WW1 encampments on Cannock Chase, with the Messines Terrain model and CWGC and German cemeteries there, to the history of Castle Bromwich airfield in both world wars, with the many local burials of WW1 aviators, and their individual histories.

Chris is a regular weekly volunteer guide at the National Memorial Arboretum both for normal weekday visits and participation in the many special events held there, Armistice Day service, New name dedications, Ride to the Wall ( 5000 motorbikes on a special day), new memorial unveilings, remembrance parades and many others.

Graeme is a serving Army officer with a background in military logistics. He has served full time and part time for over 34 years in a range of command and staff appointments.

He has been a member of the Guild of Battlefield Guides since 2014 and became a badged guide in 2021. His interest in the military started at a young age as he learned of the service of his grandfathers in the Second World War, one as a Royal Engineer, the other as a Royal Electrical Mechanical Engineer in 79th Armoured Division.

He has led a number of military group tours to the WW2 sites of Normandy, Monte Cassino, Sicily, Arnhem and Berlin before developing an interest in the Western Front during WW1.

Graeme has designed and led the Commonwealth Soldier programme taking school and community groups from SE England to the battlefields of France and Belgium to study the contributions made by Commonwealth troops in WW1. He has also delivered a number of tours in the UK and overseas has had the opportunity to lead a tour to the Falkland Islands. In 2018 he supported the Army Cadet Armistice 100 programme to the Somme and the National Muslim Armistice commemorations at Woking’s Indian Army Muslim burial ground memorial.

He is particularly interested in the human aspects of conflict and bringing the personal stories of those who served to life. In addition to leading groups, Graeme also has an interest in research and has delivered a number of WW1 community research projects, presentations and events as well as delivering individual bespoke research projects for families wanting to know more about their relatives.

He is a volunteer speaker for the Commonwealth War Graves Commission and a member of the Western Front Association.

I am a serving Army officer and qualified as a badged guide in May 2020.  I have served with the Household Cavalry both operationally and as a mounted cavalryman on state ceremonial and public duties, as well as working on the staff in the wider Army.  Military experience of the Middle East, Balkans and Afghanistan.

I have been visiting battlefields for many years and have led a number of small group tours, for military personnel, veterans and members of the general public.  Very interested in all matters involving the cavalry where I like to think I have a unique insight, as well as armoured operations where I also have significant practical knowledge.  I continue to develop and learn my craft, and I am currently studying for an MA in the History of Great Britain and the First World War.

Robert Shaw MSc is the Director of Corporate Battlefields and the Director of Events of the International Guild Of Battlefield Guides. He is also Communications Co-ordinator and editor of the Guild magazine “Despatches”.  Holding accredited Badge Number 106, his battlefield guiding experience includes the Romans and Vikings in Britain, the American Civil War, the English Civil War, the battles of Wellington and Napoleon, WW1, WW2 and the Cold War.  These tours have been conducted in the UK, the USA, France, Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, Denmark, Italy, Sicily, Crete, Malta, Libya, the Baltic States, Poland and the Balkans.  Robert has over 30 years’ experience in various military, diplomatic, intelligence and corporate security fields.  He earned a Master’s degree in Global Security from Cranfield University and, in addition to running and guiding battlefield tours for schools, military units and private clients, he regularly contributes on military history, intelligence, counter proliferation and contemporary security and defence matters (including Russia, Iran, Korea and China).  Robert has taught at UCL on “network attack” and spoken as an SME on the BBC.  He has also provided historical and technical advice to Channel Four programmes such as ‘Toxic Wrecks’ and Apple’s “Masters of the Air”.

Bob has three children, enjoys mountain guiding, canoeing and teaches youth and adult groups survival and bushcraft, resistance and countering kidnap, escape and evasion, foreign culture workshops for businesses and mental resilience.

I was born and brought up in Jersey, Channel Islands and from an early age became passionate about its history as well as military history generally.

One of my grandfathers had wartime service with the Canadian Infantry on the Western Front in WW1 and the other was a career soldier with the Royal Army Service Corps from the 1920s to 1950. My paternal great-grandfather had also served with the Royal Garrison Artillery for 21 years including the whole of WW1 on the Western Front. My father, whilst not joining up, did an apprenticeship at the Royal Woolwich Arsenal in the 1950s, a very interesting time in post war weapons systems development. It is hardly surprising that military history would help form my interests and I even contemplated a military career myself. However, that didn’t happen, and I followed a career as a lawyer for 35 years.

I got into guiding accidentally as a result of our law firm entertaining some visiting conference lawyers on a coach tour. I thought that the “pre-taped” commentary was so bad that I grabbed the microphone and gave my first guided tour! I was hooked and did tours whenever I could and upon retirement from my legal career, I set up my guiding business and at the same time became a licensed public service vehicle driver so I could legally undertake driver-guiding.

I focus on providing personal service for small groups as a driver-guide, although I am happy to guide larger parties. I believe in providing a complete experience to my clients to help them get the best of their exploration of a battlefield and the local environment. I love drawing in other aspects of history, as well as introducing disciplines like archaeology and geology to better understand the topography.

Most of my guiding is in the Channel Islands, which have an incredible history of battles, military history and fortifications extending as far back as at least the Iron Age, then all the way to WW2, when the Islands were the only part of the British Isles to be occupied by Nazi German forces for 5 years. However, I also guide elsewhere in Europe, particularly in France which is only about 15 miles away at its closest and which I can see from my garden!

I particularly enjoy the educational element of battlefield guiding – be it for individual clients, a class of school children or a military unit undertaking battlefield study exercises for visiting military units. My mother was a teacher, so I suppose that is where I get that from!

Finally, whilst not yet published, my research will hopefully result in books on the Hundred Years’ War in the Channel Islands; an answer to why the Channel Islands become some of the most heavily Nazi fortified places in Europe; and the life story of an extraordinary pair of sisters who served on the Western Front as F.A.N.Y.s in WW1 and then as senior officers working with the S.O.E. in WW2!