SEA Cadets from TS Canonteign, the Teign Valley unit, helped boost the fundraising effort by Newton Abbot Royal Naval Association branch in a street collection in the market place.

They helped raise £436, and a spokesman thanked all who donated.

The RNA branch is a long term sponsor of Teign Valley, with each organisation mutually supporting each other’s activities; cadets often assist the older generation of ex-RN service personnel and in return benefit from their seamanship skills and experience.

Tony Portman told cadets of his second world war experiences on the battleship HMS Nelson and how, at their age, he was at the Royal Hospital School in Holbrook, Suffolk, the foremost naval school in the country in the late 1930s.

He joined the Royal Navy in the second year of war as a 16-year-old boy sailor.

Pictured above with collection tins are, from left, Cadet Lewis Atkinson, Tony Portman, wearing a Royal Hospital Naval cap, and Cadet Euan Crago. Mr Portman took with him various mementos of his service including a photograph of him aged 14 (left).