Most families have one: a grandad who did national service, a mother who was a nurse in the forces, an uncle who went to Vietnam and came back quieter. Everyone knows they served. Very few people know what it was actually like, because nobody asked, or somebody asked the wrong question once and the subject closed.

The wrong question is nearly always the big one. “What was the war like?” or “Did you ever kill anyone?” asks a person to open the hardest door first. Most veterans will not, and the ones who answer will give you the version they have given everybody.

The questions to ask a veteran that work are smaller. They start with the ordinary parts of service, the food, the friends, the letters, the boredom, and they leave the hard parts for the veteran to bring up if and when they choose. The forty-five below are ordered that way on purpose.

Before you ask: three ground rules

Let them choose what to talk about. Tell them you would like to hear about their service, and that they can skip anything. Then mean it. A veteran who trusts that a “no” will be respected usually ends up saying more, not less.

Start with the everyday. Training, barracks, food, mates and leave are easy to talk about and full of detail. They also show the veteran you are interested in their life, not in war stories.

Do not ask about killing, wounds or the worst day. If those things come up, they will come up on the veteran’s terms. Your job is to listen, not to steer towards them. There is more on handling heavy subjects in how to ask about difficult family history.

Joining up

How old were you when you joined, or when you were called up?
Did you choose the service, or did it choose you?
What did your parents say when you told them?
What did you take with you on the first day?
What do you remember about the journey there?
Who was the first person you got to know?

Training

What was basic training actually like, day to day?
Who was your drill instructor or sergeant, and what were they like?
What did you find hardest, and what came easily?
Was there a moment you thought you would not get through it?
What is something you learned in training that you still do now?

Daily life in the service

What did a normal day look like, from waking up to lights out?
What was the food like, and what did you miss from home?
Where did you sleep, and who was in the bunk next to you?
What did you do when there was nothing to do?
What did you get paid, and what did you spend it on?
What was your job, in plain words?
What was the best posting you had, and the worst?

The people

Who was your closest friend in the service?
Are you still in touch with anyone from your unit?
Who was the funniest person you served with?
Was there an officer you respected, and why?
What did people call you?
Is there someone from those years you think about often?

Letters, leave and home

Who wrote to you, and what did their letters talk about?
What did you write home about, and what did you leave out?
What did you do on your first leave?
What did home look like when you came back to it?
What news from home do you remember getting?

Where you served

Where were you stationed, and what did you think of the place?
What did the local people make of you?
What did you see that you had never seen before?
Was there something about that place you still miss?

These are the questions where a map helps. Bring one, or a phone with a map open, and ask them to point. People remember far more when they can see where they were.

Coming home

How did you get home, and who met you?
What was the first thing you did?
What was hard about going back to ordinary life?
What did people at home not understand?
What did you do for work afterwards?
Did the service change what you wanted from life?

Looking back

What are you proudest of from that time?
What do you think the service taught you?
What would you want a young person joining up today to know?
What do you think people get wrong about veterans?
Is there something you have never been asked about your service?
Is there anything you would rather I did not ask about?

The last question matters. Asking it out loud tells the veteran you are not fishing, and the answer tells you where the edges are.

Things to bring, and things to leave at home

Bring the photographs. Service photos, a uniform, a medal, a discharge paper or an old letter will start a conversation faster than any question. Ask who is in the picture and what happened just before it was taken.

Bring the paperwork, if the family has it. Dates, units and places make the stories easier to follow and easier to write down later. The veteran will often correct the paper, which is a story in itself.

Leave the history books at home. You do not need to know the campaign to ask good questions, and correcting a veteran’s memory with a fact you read last week ends the conversation. Their account is the point.

If the conversation gets heavy

Sometimes a gentle question opens something the veteran has not talked about for decades. If that happens, slow down. You do not need to fix it or say the right thing. “Thank you for telling me” is enough, and so is sitting quietly.

Watch for tiredness, shorter answers or a change of subject, and stop without fuss. You can come back another day. One good conversation is worth more than a complete list.

If talking about service stirs up more than your family can handle, there is help. In the US, the Veterans Crisis Line is free and confidential: dial 988 and press 1. In the UK, Combat Stress supports veterans with mental health needs.

Record it, and think about where it goes

Record the conversation if the veteran agrees. A phone on the table is enough, and the guide to recording a family interview on your phone covers the settings and placement. Ask permission each time, and tell them they can ask you to switch it off.

If the veteran served in the US forces, their account can go somewhere permanent. The Library of Congress Veterans History Project collects first-hand interviews with veterans, and family members can record them. Its free field kit has the release forms and guidance; interviews need to run at least 30 minutes. In the UK, the Imperial War Museums sound archive holds thousands of recorded service memories, many free to listen to online, which is a good way to hear what a long interview sounds like before you try one.

For the family, the version that lasts is usually the written one. A few of these answers copied out, in the veteran’s own words, next to a photograph from the time, will be read long after the recording has been forgotten in a folder.

Veterans Day and Remembrance Sunday are natural moments to ask, but any quiet afternoon works. Pick two questions from the first sections, bring a photograph, and let the veteran decide where the conversation goes from there.