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Overlooked Important WWII Figures from History

Khalid Elhassan October 20, 2019 31 min

17. The Kid Commando

Young Stan Scott was a 13-year-old Briton when WWII began, and he desperately wanted to join the action. Fired up by the Battle of Britain, he could no longer contain his enthusiasm, and in 1941, when he was 15, Stan lied about his age and claimed to be 18 in order to enlist. However, his mom found out, and to his chagrin, the teenage recruit was yanked out of training and sent back home.

A year later, Scott successfully enlisted at age 16, and after training, he was assigned to guard airfields in southern England. That did not satisfy his desire for action, however, so he volunteered to join the Commandos, and passed their entrance tests. As seen below, he took to life in that elite outfit like a fish to water.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.