1985

LIVE AID in London and Philadelphi, beamed around the world, Titanic wreckage found and filmed by robotic camera in July, Gorbachev becomes (the last) president of the Soviet Union

5th January 1985 (September 1919)
The British evacuate Murmansk. Charley guarding a pontoon bridge which is attacked and stolen by Red Guards. TT Sloane killed and Red Cavalry bear down on them.

12th January 1985 (September 1919)
Fight off cavalry and Charley kills Kurt Zweig, a German ex-Uhlan mercenary. Spirodonov escapes senior commissar sent to arrest him, and goes in pursuit of train.

19th January 1985 (September 1919)
The discovery of gold bullion aboard train. Spirodonov determined to take gold. Rear carriage is alight and about to explode. Charley uncouples it, but has to leap on to disappearing train.

26th January 1985 (September 1919)
Old Bill catches Charley. Spirodonov’s train slams into truck and explodes. (January 1933), Charley on the dole. Busking outside King Kong queues, he sees Old Bill, who is commissionaire. Adolf Hitler comes to power.
This was the last Charley’s War episode to be written by Pat Mills.

2nd February 1985 (1936)
Charley has nightmare about the trenches. His son, Len, is determined to join up.
Scott Goodall becomes writer of the series

9th February 1985 (Jan 1939)
Charley and Kate watch newsreel of Nazi aggression. Len has jacked in university and has joined up. A furious Charley takes some air and sees Old Bill set upon by soldiers in an alley.

16th February 1985 (Jan 1939)
Fight off soldiers who had laughed at Bill when he tried to join up. Len joins up, conscription imminent. Charley will have to go to war again.

23rd February 1985 (May 1940)
Charley and Watts have lost their comrades during Blitkrieg. Flashback to January when British arrive in France.

2nd March 1985 (May 1940)
Charley and Watts attack a panzer and knock it out. Escape to woods.

9th March 1985 (May 1940)
Sgt Nickles picks on Charley. Tubby knocked over by fleeing troops.

16th March 1985 (May 1940)
Charley saves a soldier Tubby from being crushed. Parachute watch in a wood and a sniper shoots two soldiers dead.

23rd March 1985 (May 1940)
The sniper is shot, but they are attacked by motorcycle combinations.

30th March 1985(May 1940)
Parachutists turn out to be dummies set to explode on landing.

6th April 1985 (May 1940)
Attila the Hun, aka Klaus Rimmer. Charley and Watts are trapped in town by panzer grenadiers.

13th April 1985 (May 1940)
Archie and Cyril Hordle ambush Germans from cellar. Charley and Watts shelter with them.

20th April 1985 (May 1940)
Archie’s love of long words. Panzer attack on town.

27th April 1985 (May 1940)
Charley and company sneak out of the basement by knocking a hole in the wall and getting into the shop next door. They make it out of the town and find a bren gun carrier in an old barn

4th May 1985(May 1940)
Charley and company find Bren Gun Carrier and escape ahead of panzers. Charley sees Len and group of sappers on bridge.

11th May 1985 (May 1940)
Charley and company try to make it cross bridge before RE blow it up. German bombard sappers killing them all.

18th May 1985 (May 1940)
They cross half-collapsed bridge and pursuing German half-track collapses it. Len appears to have been killed in heavy shelling.

25th May 1985
Charley is prevented from striking the abusive Sgt Nickles. Fired on by Belgian fifth-columnists.

1st June 1985 (May 1940)
Sgt Nickles kills the fifth columnists, but an arrow marker in a field points the way for German bombers.

8th June 1985
Charley appears to be shell shocked after the battle. No doubt he will soon be back on form with “Did I ever tell you about the time during war when…”

15th June 1985 (May 1940)
Charley and company use a horse to change the marker and the Luftwaffe bomb their own troops.

22nd June 1985 (May 1940)
An old woman gives soldiers her husband’s sabre from Franco-Prussian War. Meet up with armour.

29th June 1985 (May 1940)
Attack by Matilda Is on German infantry column.

6th July 1985 (May 1940)
Armoured car attacks Charley. Knocked out with Hotchkiss. Commander and Kleist prepare to fight on.

13th July 1985 (May 1940)
Officer killed. Charley saves Kleist from Nickles.

20th July 1985
Captain Dixon impresses all the platoon except Charley who start going on about how hes too keen ‘just like the officers we had in the great war….’ Charley appears to be turning into uncle Albert from only fools and horses.

27th July 1985 May 1940
Arras and Charley bore their mates about the first time he was here in the first War.

3rd August 1985

Charley and co. drive straight into halted German tanks

10th August 1985 (May 1940)
New orders to halt the British advance are lost when the dispatch rider is killed. Charley tries to persuade the Durhams’ CO to stop his attack.

17th August 1985 (May 1940)
Blitzkrieg attack and the Durhams are badly mauled. Withdrawal to new line.

24th August 1985
The platoon are in a cellar in the town. Old Nick shoots a German prisoner in the back

31st August 1985 (May 1940)
Defence of Sainte Croix

7th September 1985 (May 1940)
Attack by Panzer Commander `Attila the Hun’ at Sainte Croix

14th September 1985 (May 1940)
Nickles tries to get Charley to crash the carrier into the lead tank, but he swerves behind brick wall. Nickles prepares to murder German prisoners.

21st September 1985 (May 1940)
Charley saves Germans but the Germans attack and the cellar ceiling begins to collapse, in a strange echo of ‘Mad Mick’ (see 1979).

28th September 1985 (May 1940)
Cyril holds ceiling up as British escape.
This is exactly the same outcome as Mad Mick at the start of the strip – I wonder if this is a rip-off of Mills or a tip-of-the-cap, in joke by Scott Goodall – Neil

5th October 1985 (May 1940)
Kleist is pulled out just in time. He saves Charley from a lunatic Nickles who tries to shoot Charley. Nickles knocks out Attila the Hun’s tank and they fight.

12th October 1985 (May 1940)
Nickles and Attila fight. Young German panzer man saves Charley and co by leading them to safety through sewers. Nickles stands in their way with grenades.

19th October 1985 (May 1940)
Nickles is pulled down by a mortally wounded Attila and grenade kills them both. Charley shot in the shoulder.

26th October 1985 (May 1940)
Defence of the Canal. Charley saves Scouser, Nobby Clark from the canal.

2nd November 1985
NO CHARLEY’S WAR

9th November 1985 (May 1940)
Charley receives news that Kate has been arrested for blackmarketeering from Oiley.

16th November 1985 (May 1940)
Oiley has been stashing stolen goods in Kate’s house. She is too distraught by news of Len’s supposed death to notice.

23rd November 1985 (May 1940)
Charley leads French Moroccans into attack on German troops.

30th November 1985
Nobby Clark is hit in the head

7th December 1985 (May 1940) Charley asks for compassionate leave as the British withdraw. A sniper kills his CO.

14th December 1985 (May 1940)
Fight off German night assault across the canal.

21st December 1985 (May 1940)
Heinrich Holtz snipes two British officers. Charley given the task of hunting him down by chinless wonder, Lt Winslow-Brown. Charley takes an instant dislike to him.

28th December 1985 (May 1940) CSM Cooper shows Charley a knocked out Panzer. The Winslow Boy knocked it out single-handedly. Charley remains unimpressed.

Charley’s War created by Pat Mills and Joe Colquhoun

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