7 FEBRUARY 2004, Page 26

Smalls defence

From Mick James Sir: Dot Wordsworth recently referred to *shreddies' as a slang term for underpants. When I joined the RAF in 1959, the term was already in common usage. It referred specifically to those garments issued under the official nomenclature of 'drawers cellular'. These were large and voluminous and made of an Aertex type of material that was said to resemble the texture of shredded wheat, which is one suggestion as to the origin of the term. Another, possibly more likely, origin is that the garments made a certain part of the anatomy difficult to access. In a beer-induced emergency, they were simply torn to shreds.

Mick James

Mittagong, NSW, Australia