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Happy
Christmas! It has been an amazing year and I thought I would write a very brief summary of 2008 as well as a thank you and a look forward to 2009. We hope to have topped £15 million by Christmas Day. That is quite simply a phenomenal amount of money to have raised in 15 months and there are too many people to thank individually but some of the key moments have been the Princes at City Salute, our Big Battlefield Bike Ride, the amazing Hero Ball, the rugby at Twickenham and of course, X Factor. We were really delighted to receive our Platinum Disc of X Factor for the wall of the office and are able to boast that we were part of the success of the fastest selling record of the year and the biggest charity single of the decade. We are very grateful to Simon Cowell and all who worked on the single and will be announcing how much it made in the New Year when we will be able to share the proceeds with the Poppy Appeal. These ‘red letter’ events may have been highlights of the year but every event, however grand or modest, has played its part in the success of H4H to date. Children have forgone birthday presents, people have climbed mountains, run marathons, shaved their legs, parachuted, baked cakes, sold heirlooms, washed cars, eaten chocolate… too many things to even begin cataloguing but all equally valued and appreciated; thank you everyone. We are putting the money to good use, a total of £12.5million has already been allocated to build facilities at Headley Court, to provide additional treatment rooms at Combat Stress and to help SSAFA provide a ‘home from home’ for the wounded’s relatives. We are helping fund adaptive adventure training and several other simple but highly effective initiatives that will directly support our wounded and can be read about in more depth on our website pages. |
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Our appeal to the people of Great Britain to ‘do your bit’ to support the wounded has been well and truly heard and you are getting out there and making it very clear that there is wonderful support for the Armed Forces. You are not stopping there; we already have events being registered for as far ahead as October 2009 and I urge you to get inventive and ‘step up to the line in 2009’. One signature event for 2009 is our Band of Brothers Bike. We will be riding through Normandy and then on to Paris with 300 riders, including wounded servicemen and women, to raise money for the cause. We start from Portsmouth on 24th May and the places are filling fast so if you want to take part in something that you will remember for your whole life, go to our website now and register. If that doesn’t tick your box, then how about joining us as we climb Kilimanjaro or do the desert challenge in the Sahara…. See the website and sign up now! If you are looking for Christmas presents, we have a huge range of items in our on line shop and lots of Hero Bears looking for a home so please think about adopting a Hero Bear for Christmas. |
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So what next, surely its time to put our feet up in the knowledge that we have done a good job and it is time to relax?.... No, that’s not the H4H way! With the facilities at Headley Court due to benefit from our £8m and government’s £24m, our attention for 2009 will move on to helping the wounded post Headley Court. There are plans to create six Army Convalescent Centres in the major ‘super garrison’ towns of Edinburgh, Tidworth, Aldershot, Catterick, Colcester and Sennelager in Germany. These houses will provide a ‘launch pad to life’ for the wounded and give them the opportunities to learn new skills, have some breathing space and then get going on the next chapter of their lives. We would very much like to help and will be announcing a major fund raising appeal in the New Year. Finally, I just want to say something on a personal note. Emma and I are doing this for the same reason you are, we simply want to help. It was wonderful therefore to be at an event to receive a very big cheque on Monday night and to see Peter Dunning there. Nothing special about that you say? Actually yes, there was as you see, Peter lost both his legs this summer in Afghanistan and we visited him at Selly Oak shortly afterwards. To see him standing proudly on his prosthetic legs, being introduced to the Duke of Edinburgh, was a wonderful moment and makes everything we have done this year make sense. So, thank you for all you have done, you have been wonderful. So have a great Christmas and happy New Year. We very much hope that you will join us again next year and that together we will, as they say, Crack On!! With thanks and very best wishes Bryn and Emma |
| In this issue: |
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Rugby Challenge Match - Now on DVD Official H4H Mascot - Now with army uniform The Shop - Exciting new products |
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Turf
Cutting at Headley Court |
 The 11th
December was a real Red Letter Day for Help for Heroes. We assembled at
Headley Court and were delighted to invite the Secretary of State for
Defence, John Hutton MP, to dig a hole to symbolise the start of work on
the Help for Heroes Rehabilitation Complex. It was particularly poignant
and relevant to be joined by Ben Parkinson and Derek Derenalagi at the
short ceremony. Derek was in the ward at Selly Oak last August when Bryn
and Emma first visited the hospital and were so moved they decided to try
to raise funds to help the wounded and Ben is the most injured serviceman
ever to survive such terrible injuries.The complex will house a state of the art swimming pool, gymnasium and treatment centre and we are assured by Defence Estates, who will oversee the project, that it will be a ‘legacy to the nation’, a facility of which all our wonderful donors can be truly proud. Help for Heroes is very simple, it is about doing something practical to help people like Ben and Derek. We understand we are powerless to prevent war and we can not stop our blokes getting hurt but we are not helpless, we can do something, we can help and we are helping by doing all the mad things we have all done over the last few months that have helped raise £15m. You, with a bit of help from Royalty, Sportsmen, celebrities and the media, have done this, you have raised the money and you are the owners of this great new facility.... well done! This was the first task we were given when we set up H4H last year and it is great to feel that it is now underway and soon our boys and girls will have the use of such a superb facility. This is not all we are doing though, this is just the first of so many essential projects that will enhance the recovery of our brave men and women. So, thanks for helping us get to this moment, you have all helped make this possible but please keep going, keep running, collecting, cycling, selling, keep helping... Our Heroes need you. Thank you. |
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The
Military Awards |
 Prince Charles
suggested that there ought to be an award ceremony to acknowledge the Armed
Forces, The Sun has taken the idea and the first Millies are to be held at
Hampton Court on Tuesday 16th Dec with Sky One covering the event on 18th
Dec at 8 pm. Help for Heroes have been nominated under the category of ‘best support to the Armed Forces’ and Emma and Bryn have been invited to represent everyone in the team. It is a great honour to be recognised even if it is very embarrassing to be standing alongside the real Heroes of the three services. Thanks everyone who has made H4H the National Institution it now is; you all deserve an award! |
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Help for
Heroes Rugby Challenge Match - Now on DVD |
 Re-live every magic moment of the Help for Heroes Rugby Challenge Match, which took place on that gloriously sunny day at Twickenham on 20th September 2008. This superb commemorative DVD features the full length match plus some very special highlights and interviews and plays for over 2 hours. |
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Official H4H Mascot - Now with army
uniform |
 Hero’s blog
has become the latest hot spot. One day just an ordinary bear, one of many
on Louisa’s bed and now, Hero, celebrity combat bear, H4H mascot, friend
of the famous and loved by thousands. Have a look at his adventures and
then let everyone know about him and let us see if we can make money for
the wounded by selling thousands of his friends. |
| Do some Christmas shopping at H4H |
 Emma has been
very busy sourcing exciting new products for the shop, and for all those
ladies out there, we now have Help for Heroes Chocolate.Our latest new products are: Slant Pads, Stick Notes, Diaries, Copper and Silver Bangles, Wool Scarf, Hero Figurine, Hero Prints and our very own Hero Teddy with Army uniform. |
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Band of Brothers Bike
Ride |
 Need a New
Years Resolution? - Here's one, Get fit and Help our Heroes. Perfect
!Sign up to The Band of Brothers Bike Ride and you have a chance to be one of the riders. 300 of us will ride through the Normandy battlefields to commemorate the Allies’ liberation of Europe 65 years ago. With us will be teams from our Allies of today, wounded servicemen from America, Canada and France as well as our own from Headley Court. |
| H4H Challenges - Kilimanjaro |
 If cycling
isn’t your thing, or you did that with us this year, how
about climbing Killie? The numbers are limited but a hardy team from
H4H are going to take on Africa’s tallest mountain, its very high, very
challenging so why not rise to the challenge
and join us? |
| H4H Challenges - The Desert Challenge |
 To the Sahara
for a trek across the desert with the experts. We will be taking a group to
experience the desert with all its challenges and then throwing some extra
ones in! A team of desert specialists will come along to teach us how to
survive so, if you loved Lawrence of Arabia, here’s your chance to see
what its like! |
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H4H Challenges - Lands End to
John O’ Groats |
 The so called
LEJOG is the cycling challenge that all cyclists have to do once in their
lives and this is a chance to do it and raise money for H4H... Just think,
Lycra for days on end! |
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