LCpl. Jack Jones

Jack Jones is the local butcher and a veteran of countless imperial campaigns, quick to volunteer with "Don't panic!" and to launch into rambling recollections of the Sudan or the Somme. He is elderly, courteous to a fault, and treats every crisis as an occasion for tea, though he means every word of his devotion to the platoon.

Clive Dunn was in his forties playing decades older, and the trick never shows: the shuffling walk, the quavering enthusiasm, the delight in old campaigns nobody else remembers are utterly lived-in. Jones's catchphrases could be one-note, but Dunn plays the sweetness underneath the dodderiness, so the joke never curdles into cruelty.