ROSS NICHOLLSLance Corporal Ross Nicholls, who died on 1 August, 2006, aged 27, had volunteered to serve in Afghanistan with the Blues and Royals.He was a highly skilled officer with a wealth of experience. It was his second tour to Afghanistan and was due to be his final mission before leaving the service.The enthusiastic Lance Corporal had only seen his newborn baby daughter for two weeks before leaving for Afghanistan .L/CplNicholls was born in Glasgow where he was a pupil at John Street High School in Bridgeton. His father Andrew served with the Scots Guards for 14 years and his young son had wanted to follow him into the military.When the family moved to Edinburgh , L/Cpl Nicholls completed his schooling at Liberton High School before joining the Army. His first posting was to the Royal Corps of Signals in Edinburgh in August, 1995.He served with 216 Signals Squadron, part of 16 Air Assault Brigade, and completed several operational tours, serving in both Afghanistan and Iraq as well as western Canada.L/Cpl Nicholls moved to the Windsor base of the Household Cavalry Regiment, the Blues and Royals, in July, 2004.He was due to leave the forces in February, 2007, when his 12-year term would have finished, but decided to volunteer for one final mission to Afghanistan. He deployed in June, 2006.In the early hours of 1 August, 2006, L/Cpl Nicholls wasin the back ofa tracked Spartan armoured reconnaissance vehicle on patrol in northern Helmand Province when insurgent forces ambushed the patrol with rocket propelled grenades and heavy machine guns.Despite being in an enhanced protection vehicle, L/Cpl Nicholls, who was the radio operator,was killed in the attack. Two of his colleagues, Lt Johnson and Capt Eida, also died in the incident.L/Cpl Nicholls leaves behind his wife, Angela, who he met in his Regiment, their two-year-old son, Cameron, and their daughter Erin who was born two weeks before he deployed to Afghanistan.He was looking forward to devoting more time to his young family when he left the Forces in February.L/Cpl Nicholls is survived by his parents Rosslyn and Andrew, his sister Samantha and half-brother Neil. His brother Andrew is also in the Army.His grandparents expressed their anger at the British government. His grandmother, Janet Nicholls, said: "Tony Blair should know how it feels. I wouldn't like to see his boys getting killed, just to send them out there to see how it feels. It's just too raw and it's just too soon."I saw him just before he went away, I went down after Erin was born and I spoke to him on the phone the day before he was going away. He didn't sound worried at all, he just saw it as part of the job. The Army was all he wanted to do."His Commanding Officer Lieutenant Colonel Edward Smyth-Osbourne said: "He embraced life with the Household Cavalry with gusto and enthusiasm serving with D Squadron on the Prairie in Western Canada and picking up his armoured trades with alacrity."Indeed his previous experience stood him in good stead and he established himself as a bright, professional and effective operator whose presence was a real asset to the Squadron."
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