Early May the Grand Connaught Rooms played host to W.Bro Duncan Young, the Master of Reserve Forces Lodge of Northumbria No.2666, which meets at Fern Avenue Masonic Hall, who presented a charitable cheque for £500 to W.Bro Stephen Braden, the Master of Victoria Rifles Lodge No.822, for the Masonic Charitable Foundations Ukrainian appeal, following the Victoria Rifles meeting to welcome the 50th, 51st and 52nd members of the Circuit of Service Lodges.
Reserve Forces Lodge is a member of the Circuit of Service Lodges, which was set up in 1993 promote comradeship and fraternal contact between military masons. To qualify as a member of the circuit a lodge must have a distinguishable military culture and ethos that can only be achieved by a predominance of servicemen or veterans in its membership ranks.
The Circuit participates, as a platoon, in the annual march past the Cenotaph on Remembrance Sunday, undertakes a battlefield tour most years and also holds occasional social and other events, the most recent being a spectacular commemoration of the centenary of the Armistice at Freemasons’ Hall, London, before a full to capacity Grand Temple, followed by a luncheon for 600 in the Grand Connaught Rooms.
Victoria Rifles is the Masters Lodge of the Circuit, meeting twice a year in May and November, it’s members being Past Masters of members of the Circuit. Our own Military Lodge, Reserve Forces, currently provides 10% of the membership of Victoria Rifles, with WBro George Wady their current Charity Steward.
At the event over £12,000 was raised towards the Ukrainian appeal, a very creditable effort for the hard working Charity Steward.
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