Aldershot, a happenstance that became a community

People go to Aldershot to do things. Not things like go to the movies or go to the pub, but they are sent to Aldershot with a purpose to serve. It's a fine place to live, but it isn't a hometown that developed organically. It wouldn't really be noteworthy unless the Crown had stepped in back in 1854, and while it is now a town of some renown, it is not a place many people fondly remember as the place from whence they came.
But Aldershot has meaning. It is the site to one of the largest military training grounds in all of the United Kingdom, and has been since 1854. Colloquially, it's known as the home of the British Army, thanks to its permanence, existing as an important garrison for 160 years. Before 1854, Aldershot had only about 1,000 people, but shortly thereafter, the population shot up to about 16,000.
Aldershot Town is home to only about 50,000 people, but along with the other towns and villages in the area, most notably Farnborough, the region is home to 250,000. There is no obvious nexus to the region, but like the garrison, other important institutions seem to gravitate towards Aldershot.
They host the biggest soccer team in the area (Aldershot Town) as well as being the host to the local cricket and rugby clubs. Most famously, they are home to the Aldershot, Farnham and District Athletics Club, a regional host to some of the best runners in the region. AFD has produced 10 Olympians, including three at the Rio games.
People go to Aldershot to do things. They go to the town because they have enlisted in the military, or they have joined an organization or club. Aldershot is thrown together as both a military town and the center of a conurbation. It is not a home town, but it is a community, with all the elements of this town, this happenstance, interacting as they do in any community.
The surest sign of a community's strength is how it copes with tragedy. The garrison was the site of a deadly IRA attack, when a bomb went off outside the mess hall in 1972, killing 7. The site is now home to a plaque honoring the victims, and the garrison continues, just as influential and important as it has always been.
Less than a month ago, the important elements of the town came together in a terrible tragedy. A still unnamed soldier, garrisoned in Aldershot, drank too much and got behind the wheel, ultimately striking and killing two young runners, 17 year old Lucy Pygott and 16 year old Stacey Burrows, members of Aldershot, Farnham and District as they trained for a competition coming later that week. Both had met some success on the competitive circuit, with Lucy winning a bronze medal in Tbilisi, Georgia in the European Youth Championships. Their status earned the attention of the greater athletics community of the United Kingdom, but their deaths gnawed at souls of their friends and family in Aldershot.
There were memorials covering the ground and fence near the accident scene, a procession by flashlight of loved ones and those there in support of the team and the girls' family. For all the mechanics that engineered Aldershot into the town it is today, it can't escape its inherent humanity.
People go to Aldershot to do things. Do things like come together and support one another