16th JUNE 2011

“Corporal Lloyd Newell was fatally wounded in Afghanistan by small arms fire while on operations”.

Thursday 16th June 2011 began just like any normal day, me on the train into London to work, a small black Americano, extra shot and caramel syrup in hand. My sister was due to find out the sex of her baby on that day. At 10 am I receive that call from her, but it's frantic and pretty much indecipherable, at first I think there's something wrong with her or the baby and when I eventually get her to calm down enough so that I can understand her, she delivers the worst and cruellest news I've been hoping that I'll never get to hear.

She's phoning me from our mothers in the presence of MoD Welfare Officers, "Lloydy has been killed by random small arms fire." I know at that point I just go numb. I collect myself as best I can and tell her I'm coming home. I put down the phone and I'm in a complete daze, life has just become as difficult to bear as it possibly could be. I'm standing at my desk trying to compose myself, trying to fight back the breakdown that I know is going to come. One of the Directors is just coming through the office and notices me and I guess must spot something that he's knows isn't right, he puts his arm around my shoulder and ushers me in an office.

Without breaking I manage to tell them what's happened or as best I can. They are shocked and saddened to hear the news and I guess go into protective mode of me. They tell the receptionist to make sure no one disturbs me. They tell me to get myself sorted and just do what I need to do. I need to phone Caz, and they sit me in the conference room, and I make that call I don't want to make, still managing somehow, to hold it together. Caz is on her way home now and will be at Milton Keynes Station to pick me up when I arrive back.

I phone my mother to tell her I'm on my way home, I speak to her partner, he gives me a few more details about what's happened or indeed repeats the details I may well have been given before but didn't hear. All the way home from London to MK I'm fighting off waves of emotion, emotion that I've never experienced before. Losing Lloydy is the one reality I hoped I'd never have to face, but as soon as I get through the ticket barriers at MK and I see Caz, I'm done. The breakdown comes and I just remember slumping into a mess in her arms, completely overcome. My darling little brother, my best friend, the one person in the world who means more to me than anyone else in the world, is not coming home alive.

My composure gone and any sense of understanding of what's going on around me has been abandoned. Caz guides me to the car, or I assume she must, because the next time I notice anything we are sitting in the car and she's consoling me. We get home and I go straight into practical mode, I go straight to my bedside cabinet and take out Lloydy's final wishes and his last will and testament. I remember thinking that's what I needed to do, that's what Lloydy needed me to do.

I read them, sobbing uncontrollably but the little sod, has decided he wants to be funny, and reading them, somehow the little bugger makes me smile in places. He's written them exactly as he's thought about it and that's him all over. But, I'm a wreck and composing myself is difficult and in all honesty I don't know how much of it has actually sunk in, other than the little sod has decided to leave me his watch, which breaks me once more. That was always a joke we shared, at my expense, he was constantly after mine. I promised myself when I first started working that when I was doing ok financially, I'd treat myself to a 'nice' watch. From the day I picked up that watch, Lloydy was after it, "when are you going to give me my watch?" One day, he was supposed to have it, but that one day is no longer coming and instead he's leaving me his, it wasn't meant to happen this way. That's my only thought, that's all my brain is capable of handling at the moment.

Caz gets our stuff together, she makes a call to friends to ask if they'd be ok to look after the kittens. We load up and get on the road and all I can think about is those that I need to tell. First I phone John, Lloydys oldest friend. I can't remember what I said to him, but I remember the news being received in pretty much the same way I had received it, complete and utter disbelief. So much so that he asks if he can call me back, he does, and somewhat more composed this time, I'm able to tell him what's happened.

The journey back to Essex is a blur, I don't remember it at all. To be honest, the whole of that Black Thursday is a memory my mind even now, seems to want to keep locked away. I remember though turning up at my mother's feeling useless, then turning up at Lloydys house and feeling even more so. I know I spent a few hours with my sister-in-law, both doing all we could to console one another. I remember that when I got there, there were a few of Lloydys old cadet and reg mates from PF there, along with a couple of troop colleagues, who were trying to sort photos of Lloydy, suitable for the MoD Press Release.

Caz and I were sat in a pub in Witham having some lunch before we went over to Lloydys and as we're sitting there Lloydy's name came rolling across the screen on Sky News as being killed and even then I felt like I was stuck in the middle of the most awful dream.

23rd JUNE 2011

Exactly a week after losing Lloydy, he is repatriated. The days before his repat were spent trying to organise as much as possible so that getting him home was made as easy as it could be. On the Monday Caz and I travelled back to Essex, I felt like I needed to be there to organise things more effectively, before travelling home again on the Tuesday night. Those few days were spent trying to get a list together of all those that wanted to attend Lloydy’s homecoming, of which there were many, and all the while the messages of sympathy continued to flow in.

At times the emotion of it all would hit me so hard, mainly at night, when I’d be lying there with my own thoughts, no longer busy with the day’s requirements. Caz would console me constantly and without her I don’t know what I would have done. I’m strong, but I’m not sure that even I would have had the strength to endure losing Lloydy without her. However, I know I had to be strong, because I knew, more than ever, that’s what Lloydy needed me to be. I needed to step up and be his big brother and I wouldn’t and couldn’t fail him.

The repat was haunting and throughout the rest of my days the majestic roar of a chinook will be synonymous with Lloydy coming home. For what seems like an age and from a distance unfathomable the emotion boils, because you know that chinook is carrying special cargo. We are all gathered under a marque directly facing the Clocktower and already his name “Tpr Lloyd Newell” is inscribed immortally at the base, he never beat the clock. As the roar of the blades get closer I feel myself stiffen, containing the emotion. I still can’t believe this is happening and as I glance to my right at my sister-in-law and niece, I’m heartbroken all over again. This is not how this is meant to be. The roar continues to grow louder until it’s overhead, the noise is deafening and it hits me harder than ever that this is really happening, that in a few moments, that, that chinook is going to be grounded and my little brother is going to be carried out by six.

All the while the six have been standing to attention, patiently waiting Lloydys arrival and as the chinook touches down and the tailgate opens the RSM ushers them forward. From the marque we all just watch and as the six emerge with Lloydy from the tailgate, we are ushered forward to the chapel. His coffin is lowered carefully onto A-frames, it is draped with the Union Jack and his sandy beret sits on top. I keep telling myself this isn't real, I keep looking at my sister-in-law and niece hoping this isn't real, but I know that in that coffin my little brothers body lies peacefully. It is without doubt the hardest thought to get my head around, the hardest to believe and no amount of hoping or pinching myself is going to render this nothing more than a horrible nightmare that I'll soon wake from. This is the brutal, painful, heart breaking reality of conflict and my little brother has paid the ultimate price.

After the short service Lloydy is carried out to the waiting Herse and is driven away, the reality of what is happening, as we are once again assembled around the Clocktower, is difficult to comprehend, my brother is gone and that is a reality I'm not ready for.

A week later Caz and I visited the funeral parlour where Lloydys body was being prepared for burial, we're ushered in to the room and there I am, standing next to his body in the Chapel of Rest, staring at him in complete and utter disbelief. The last time I was stood next to him was the Easter before he deployed, we had so much fun that weekend. But there he was, laying perfectly still and peaceful, resplendent in his No.2's and all I can think about is "what the fuck have they done to his hair!" Lloydy had honed the skill, reminiscent of a mental parrot nodding frantically, getting gel through his hair and on to everything within a 1 mile radius!

His hair had no gel in it and was just a soft blonde mop, which he would have been doing his pieces about. I remember at one point turning away to sit at the small table in the room and writing some words for him, as daft as it sounds I knew he'd be watching me and I wanted to remain strong. Caz had left me alone by this point just so I could be alone with him. On the Easter weekend when we were last together I'd given him his birthday present, a Superdry jacket, the one with the three zips on the front. I'd bought myself one a few years before when they first came out, he was with me when I bought it, and from that moment on, would try and nick it. When we left the parlour that day, I left my jacket with him, placing it with the words I had written, with him in his coffin, it was either that or the Rolex he'd always tried to nick and I thought to be honest he would have been doing his nut had I put that in there!

On leaving I placed my lips on his ice cold forehead and kissed him goodbye for the very last time and utter the words "blue skies little brother." The reality was finally beginning to sink in.

16th JUNE 2017

6 years after Lloydy was killed in action on his third tour of Afghanistan, I along with my teammates made the final ascent of The 100 Peaks Challenge on to the summit of Pen Y Fan (in the Brecon Beacons) via Jacobs Ladder, in that moment, 25 days of emotion hit me like a train. Nearly two and half years of planning and 25 days of gruelling endurance had been realised in that moment, not to mention the significance of the occasion and the reason why we were making that climb in the first place, to celebrate Lloydy and the life he led. My little brother was a giant among men, I looked up to him as much as he looked up to me and for 2 and half years I tried to create a fitting tribute to the man he was, I hope, come the end of this, if you're reading this, you believe that we did.