Has Prince William Lost the Sword of Honour?
It may seem strange that losing a gun can also lose you a sword, but that’s the situation Prince William finds himself in at Sandurst Military Academy, where he is almost at the end of his year-long officers’ training.
William is said to have inadvertently committed one of the worst offences for a serving soldier, especially an officer. He lost his gun out in the country and, despite spending two hours frantically searching for it, failed to find the weapon. Another soldier handed it in later.
Unhappily for the Prince, this one incident could cost him the prized Sword of Honour, which is awarded to the best cadet each year. He was said to be a strong candidate for the award.
The gun concerned was an L86 Light Support Weapon, a very powerful armament capable of firing 775 rounds a minute. It is a higher grade version of the British Army’s standard issue SA80 rifle.
A source says : “William was due to spend a day on the ranges in preparation for a major exercise in Wales this week. He was given his SA80 rifle, the weapon that is personally assigned to him throughout his time at Sandhurst, but also signed out an LSW as he needed to ensure he was fully familiarized with it.
“All of the cadets, including the Prince, were given a full briefing first thing in the morning but it seems that he mislaid it sometime after that. William was really panicking as he knew he was in serious trouble. He even borrowed one of his mate’s bikes and spent several hours frantically scouring the academy for it. Much to his embarrassment, it was handed in about two hours later by another cadet. I’m not sure where it was found, but William was still in a lot of trouble.”
The source also said: “Fortunately there wasn’t any live ammunition in the gun as cadets aren’t given any bullets until they are ready to fire on the range. But that wouldn’t have helped him much. Losing your weapon is one of the worst mistakes you can make. It’s a real shame, though, if it costs him the Sword of Honour as William is shaping up to be a superb army officer.”
A Sandhurst spokesman confirmed : “In fact Officer Cadet Wales’s weapon was picked up and used by another cadet who handed it back a couple of hours later, so it wasn’t really missing at all,” he said.
Well, either that’s a convenient escape clause or William was the victim of a prank by a fellow cadet. If it robs him of the Sword of Honour, though, it will be a very expensive prank.
It’s too bad on Prince William that he put the weapon down and did not keep up with it. His mates could have been playing a prank on him, but the story says another cadet picked up the weapon and turned it in 2 hours later.
Was the cadet who picked up the gun not aware that someone else had signed for it? The whole thing sounds suspicious to me, it’s as if the gun was picked up on purpose.
I think that Prince William should have taken care to to keep an eye on any weapon assigned to him and he deserves a reprimand for such negligence, but the officials should also take into consideration the fact that someone else did indeed take the weapon.
By Gail on November 1st, 2006 at 2:33 pm
This is really unfair because someone took his gunwithout him knowing it and hid it, as prankmost probably, so that this would happen… its just not fair…
By Ziny on November 2nd, 2006 at 1:35 pm
Gail, sorry your comment got caught in our spam trap. It sometimes happens that perfectly good comments end up there. We have first-post moderation here, so you should be OK now.
Thanks for the comment. I agree.
By John on November 3rd, 2006 at 5:15 pm