Remembrance Day marks not only those who fell in action, but the millions who sacrificed their youth and career prospects because they went to war.

William Adams, 91, Bermuda War Veterans Association president and a Second World War Royal Navy signalman, lost his mother while he was a small child and not yet 5 years old.

He explained he struggled to get a good education and later a good career.

Mr Adams said: “I never saw school until I was 9 and I was out of school again at 14. To this day I still don’t have a piece of paper to say that I went to school.

“A charity in St George’s stepped in when I was 9 and my younger sister was with me. They put us in a foster home and I was handicapped because they wanted to take me out of school — they couldn’t afford to keep me.”

Despite academic potential, Mr Adams ended up working with Belco and said that while he got up to speed within six months, his pay remained basic because of his lack of qualifications. So on his 18th birthday he signed up with the Royal Navy at Dockyard and entered a war that had already been going on for several years.

Mr Adams said: “The unusual part was in the few years I had been at school, we had the Army Cadets and Sea Scouts and so I caught up with quite a bit of stuff.

“Five of us joined up at the same time; I was put in as an ordinary signalman because I had done some Morse code.”

Just two days after joining the Navy, Mr Adams was posted to sea on the bridge wing of a warship as a signalman bound for Halifax, Nova Scotia.

Within two weeks his ship was in action against a German U-boat and Mr Adams watched from the bridge as the submarine was destroyed.

Mr Adams was later sent on a four-week electrical course in the major naval base of Portsmouth, known colloquially as Pompey, before spending seven months servicing landing craft vital to the invasion of Europe and defeat of Nazi Germany.

Mr Adams said: “It was an experience I will never forget, but what I learnt in that seven months I couldn’t have learnt in 30 years otherwise, so I got an education out of it, no question about that.

“If you didn’t have parts you made parts. It stood me good in life.”

But Mr Adams still struggled to find a good job when he returned home to Bermuda, despite his military training and experience.

He returned to Belco, but his lack of civilian qualifications still held him back.

Mr Adams said: “When I came back to Bermuda, the agreement was that the company you had worked for would make up your pay while you had been away.

“Because I had been paid so little I only had a couple of hundred pounds for three years.

“I showed Belco my papers from the Navy but that didn’t mean anything.

“They said I could have the money if I went back to work for them for three months but I would be on the same pay as before.

“I started looking for a job locally and it was the same story — my papers meant nothing.”

Eventually, Mr Adams was able to secure work at Columbia University in New York, where he said “they treated me for what I was worth and I worked my way up”.

Mr Adams said he hoped that the community would come out on Remembrance Day to help recognise the sacrifices of all kinds made during the war.

Alan Brooks, a Royal Navy helicopter pilot and later commanding officer of HMS London during the Bosnian War, backed Mr Adams.

Mr Brooks, who will lead the veterans parade, said: “Without history we have no touchstone or reference point on how we move forward.

“I subscribe to the view that if it wasn’t for the efforts of folks who have gone before we wouldn’t be sitting around this table.

“I don’t think for a second that we go on parade to say ‘look at me’. We go on parade to remember and perhaps stimulate other people to think about it.

“For me, there are two particular young men who I remember when I am there, especially at the cenotaph.

“Although one died in combat and the other died in peace time, I still believe that when people give their lives to the service of the common good, it is appropriate to remember their contribution.”

Diane Andrew, whose late father Peter Woolcock was one of the island’s last surviving war vets, added: “These war vets went to war at 18 and there was no further education — it was in the Navy, it was in the Army, it was what they learnt at war.

“But from the point of view of bringing that back to peace time, walking in and looking for a job, they had no college, university or technical training. That is also what they sacrificed.”

Ms Andrew added: “I would encourage people to come out to the Remembrance Day Parade. There are only a few veterans left from the Second World War who are still able to march in the parade but it is an historic and moving sight. Members of the public who come will tell their grandchildren in years to come that they watched veterans from the Second World War march down Front Street accompanied by the Royal Bermuda Regiment Band playing well-known songs from the Second World War.

“This generation of men and women have been called ‘the greatest generation’ and for a very good reason.

“They sacrificed so much so that we could have the freedom that we enjoy today.

“We must make sure that we never forget.”

The Remembrance Day Parade begins at the flagpole on Front Street at 10.30am on Saturday and a ceremony, including the laying of the wreaths and a minute’s silence, will take place at the cenotaph at 10.50am.

Anyone who wants to make a donation to the Bermuda War Veterans Association, which supports vets and their dependents, can do so through Bank of Butterfield account number 20-006-060-092582-100.