A Midland soldier based with the Staffordshire Regiment has spoken of his experiences after returning from active duty in Iraq and his emotions of returning home.

Private Jack Meads is enjoying some well-earned rest and relaxation with his family after a “surreal” stint in the southern city of Basra.

The testing tour of duty was a baptism of fire for the former pupil of High Arcal School, Sedgley, who started Army training in January last year and had to wait for his 18th birthday before flying out in February.

After two months based in Basra in Saddam Hussein’s brother’s palace and the Shatt-Al-Arab hotel, Pte Meads returned safe and sound to his relieved family in Gornal. He was among more than 200 soldiers who finished their tour of duty at the weekend. 

“You have mixed emotions when you go out there – excited, nervous and frightened all rolled into one. It takes a while to sink in,” he said. 

“It’s a surreal atmosphere. Obviously, you feel the threat, but the Iraqis were pretty friendly – the children would come up to us and ask what we were doing and some people would wave at us when we were out on patrol.

“Our duties mostly included patrolling the streets around the city and looking out for any suspicious activity or anyone acting dodgy.”

He added: “We were getting mortared quite a lot with missiles aimed at the Army compound. They weren’t actually hitting where we were, but they were close enough.”

Proud dad Martin Meads admitted the family found it difficult to cope with the tension of having a son in Iraq. “It was terrible, to be honest, awful,” he said. 

“We are just so relieved he is back and we slept a bit easier knowing he was under our roof.”

l In a rare expression of public dissent, another soldier just returned from Iraq said he believed the time had come for Britain to pull out of the country altogether. Corporal Richard Bradley of the Staffordshire Regiment was reported as saying: “We are achieving nothing out there.”