Mishall RehmanAn extraordinary piece of English military history was made last month when a Scottish couple traded places as commanding officer of a British Army unit.
LCol. Gill Wilkinson handed over command of 154 Scottish Regiment Royal Logistics Corp to her husband, LCol. Alan Wilkinson in late March.
According to BBC News, this makes the duo the highest ranking couple to follow each other in a command role.
The Wilkinsons were married in 1998 and have two teenage children.
While Gill was CO, Alan took over the role of being the primary caregiver to their children.
“It almost feels like I handed over the children to him two-and-a-half years ago before taking command and this feels very similar.
“You do feel a responsibility for a regiment. It is quite a parental role. Your soldiers are like your family.
“Normally when a commanding officer leaves command they don’t look back at the regiment, they leave the next CO to carry on.
“Obviously I’m trying to do that, but I can keep an eye out and ask how people are getting on and satisfy that parental bit,” told Gill to BBC News.
Gill joined the British Army reserve in 2003 and Alan joined in 2009 after first serving in the Army.
“We have worked closely together throughout our career in the Army. I was in the fortunate position of being able to speak to Gill in the months before about it, so it only took about four days to handover. It was fine,” said Alan to BBC News.
