OA BULLETIN
David Browne’s schooldays: the 1960 School athletics team OA Gazette – Page 38
Old Albanian Club
DIARY DATES
July 2012
OA Beer & Curry Night – Friday September 28 London Drinks Party – Thursday November 8 Annual General Meeting – Tuesday December 4 Carol Service – Tuesday December 18
O A C O N TA C T
OA BULLETIN JULY 2012
OA CLUB www.oldalbanianclub.com President Stephen Burgess 01727 867868 hawkeyeb59@btopenworld.com Secretary David Buxton 01727 840499 d.buxton@virgin.net Treasurer Brian Sullman 01582 460317 Membership Secretary Roger Cook 01727 836877 Rogercook@btinternet.co.uk OA SPORTS www.oarugby.com RUGBY President Robin Farrar 07985 347077 Email: robin.farrar@oarugby.com Chairman Rory Davis 01727 843538 rory.davis@oarugby.com Treasurer John King 07712 837473 john.king@oarugby.com Secretary Peter Lipscomb peter.lipscombe@OARugby.com Mini Chairman Brian Clark 07764 682650 brianclark.home@yahoo.com Junior Chairman Chris Branagan 07810 180013 bran_cb@yahoo.co.uk OA Saints Chairwoman Tasha Saint-Smith 07971 849290 Tasha.saintsmith@club-concierge.com FOOTBALL www.oasoccer.co.uk Club President Simon Bates & Manager 07720 383600
Nick Chappin – Editor Andy Chappin – Design & Production Roger Cook – Membership
01442 240247 David Hughes 07890 831315 01727 769237 dh@sherrards.com Sponsorship Secretary David Burrows 07841 431614 CRICKET www.oacc.org.uk President Aln Philpott Chairman Andrew McCree 07890 831315 / 01727 769237 andrew@oacc.org.uk Treasurer Denis King denis.king@btinternet.co.uk Fixture Secretary Julian baines Jules_baines@msn.com TENNIS Membership Enquiries Sue Barnes 07970 301345 susyb52@hotmail.co.uk OTHERS Rifle & Pistol Andrew Wilkie 01727 856857 Angling Geoff Cannon 01582 792512 Golf Peter Dredge 015827 834572 pjdredge42@aol.com Treasurer & Club Secretary
OA LODGE Assistant Secretary
John Williams 01438 715679 johntwilliams@talktalk.net
SCHOOL WEB site www.st-albans.herts.sch.uk
Mike Highstead – Gazette Printing - Herts & Beds Printing 01923 234959
Please send your contributions to: Nick Chappin, Editor Post: 18 The Pleasance, Harpenden, Herts AL5 3NA Email: nick@chappin.co.uk
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Editorial
Selective memories
test.” And with that he was gone. The systematic brain damage I was flattered to be described in a continued as I progressed seamlessly letter from Simon Clark (74) in the into the Old Albanians after some last issue of this august organ as “a old bloke in an overcoat and flat cap fast and tough full-back, who feared sidled up to a couple of us at King no one in the tackle, and would Harry after a Senior Colts match consistently bring down players and invited us to play at Beech much bigger than he.” His memory Bottom after Christmas. Nowadays, is probably better than mine, as I of course, he would be reported for spent an inordinate amount of time hanging around on school property in the A&E department and approaching of St Albans City teenage boys, but these Hospital in those days In those days were far more innocent in varying degrees days. Nor was there of consciousness. On you were thrown the gentle progression one notable occasion – through the game away to Berkhamsted head-first into that youngsters enjoy School, according to today; rather than my medical records a freezing pool gently dipping your toe – I not only managed with a spot of touch to get my usual of wizened old rugby, in those days concussive bang on the you were thrown headhead while tackling, alligators in first into a freezing but also sustained pool of wizened old some damage to a jockstraps and alligators in jockstraps shoulder. Following and scrumcaps. My a lengthy visit to scrumcaps introduction to club their School matron, rugby in the Sixth who trussed me up XV (yes, sixth – count like an Egyptian mummy with a them) was at once both brutal and full head bandage and sling, I was enjoyable. A motley selection of personally chauffeured home to good players on their way down my own mummy by Colonel Pryke. – the venerable Nigel Cartwright “Good evening, Mrs Chappin,” he was still turning out for fun and announced with a charming smile I thought he looked bloody old as my mother opened the front then in his WW2 Desert Rat shorts door. “Don’t worry, it’s not as bad exposing a vast expense of builder’s as it looks.” The smile instantly bum every time he hit a maul – and evaporated like his breath in the a few younger ones on their way damp November air as he turned to up. The rump of the side, though, me. “Tomorrow Chappin, Physics were guys who weren’t especially
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good – and that’s being kind to some of them – but were just turning out for a good time or, even better, a good punch-up. To see a bit more of the action I moved from full-back to stand-off, and (after a couple of painful lessons) became rather adept at swerving and ducking out of the way of swinging straight arm, neck-high tackles from marauding flankers or lazy props still trundling back from the previous scrum. I won’t bore you with the next 15 years or so, but suffice it to say that I was awarded a season ticket to the local A&E and had enough stitches to get an O-Level in needlework. Looking back now, it seems a faraway land: the Beech Bottom mud, the showers that were either scalding hot or ice-cold, the toxic communal baths that could cause a veritable medical encyclopaedia of diseases. But more important were the great characters, the great sense of belonging, the sense that in less peaceful times these were the
Notes for budding authors l Subject matter Absolutely anything you think would be of interest to fellow OAs, from anecdotes and recollections of your schooldays to the events and experiences over the intervening years. Your contribution can be in any form, from a letter or article to a snippet of news or a simple photo caption, and can be submitted electronically via e-mail or in hard copy format by post to the address on page 2.
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guys you would like in your trench alongside you. To me this is the very heart and soul of rugby, and while – in my normal circuitous way – I offer my heartiest congratulations to the OA First XV on their promotion into the very highest echelons of the modern game, I hope that this sense of camaraderie and togetherness isn’t totally lost in the professional era. In this issue we salute several great former OA sportsmen who have left us in the last few months, and look forward to developing a new generation of sports enthusiasts as the School’s fantastic new sports hall and swimming pool opens. My thanks as usual to the regular contributors, but especially to all those who take the trouble to write with their news, anecdotes and memories – they are all greatly appreciated. Nick Chappin (75) Editor
l Length There is no limit to length, but as a guide a page in the ‘Bulletin’ is around 450 words. Please note that we reserve the right to edit the text as appropriate. l Photos Photographs on any subject are always welcome. They can be submitted either electronically (preferably in JPG format) or in hard copy format to the address below. Once scanned, the originals will be returned to the sender. Both colour and black and white photos are acceptable, as the ‘Bulletin’ is printed in mono but appears online in full colour.
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President’s Notes
A farewell to some old friends n OA Club President Stephen Burgess remembers some well-known OA sportsmen who have passed away recently
During the last few months a number of prominent OAs have passed away, all of whom I got to know when I left school in 1962 and joined the OA Club and the OA Rugby Club. The first of them who passed away in the late autumn was David (Dickie) Dickinson. Dickie was skipper of the ‘A’ XV when I first joined the club and he continued to skipper the ‘As’ for a few years before captaining the Extra ‘As’. He was a very successful skipper, diligently getting a good side out for every game. His sides often seemed as good as the side above and he was certainly able to get players from the universities and forces where other skippers were not so successful. This owed a lot to his scouting prowess, but was also due to the fact that he ran a tight team who greatly enjoyed their rugby. This side once went unbeaten for over a season. Dickie was an excellent captain and good company. He died after bravely and calmly coping with cancer as he entered his 81st year. In January we lost David Morgan who developed heart problems in December. David was the most gregarious of men. He was an excellent rugby player with several seasons in the OA 1st team, and he represented Hertfordshire on a number of occasions. He was also a fine cricketer playing into his fifties. David
was a character on the sports field, often regaling fellow players with stories and comments which put the opposition off. David loved his fishing and was a founder member of the OA Fishing Society. He maintained his enthusiasm for fishing up till the end he was in excellent form at the Fishwives Supper in early December. David also had a long and successful career as an architect and for 29 years was the School’s official architect. David was a fine all-rounder in sport and in life, and I will remember his cheerful banter and his stories with fondness. A few months after David’s death, John Giffen and Don Kiff died in quick succession. I was privileged to play both cricket and rugby with Don. He was a keen and dedicated player showing considerable prowess even into his forties. Don had been skipper of the 1st XV at school and went on to skipper the OAs. He was also President of the OA Club. John was a little older and had retired from rugby by 1962 but I recall his keen support for the club during my years in
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the 1st XV. He rarely missed a VP lunch until he retired and moved away. All four served the OAs well and all were excellent company. I was privileged to pay a tribute at a rugby club lunch, and I concluded then that they will be fondly remembered and greatly missed. As I am sure will be reported elsewhere the OA Rugby Club had a very good year with the 1st team gaining promotion to National 1 by winning National 2 South. The rugby played was invariably very entertaining. They were by far the highest scorers in the league but also had the second best defensive record. The club would love to have your support in the future. During the run-in to the end of the season a number of supporters went to Cornwall to see games against Redruth and Launceston. At the Redruth game at
Former OA Committee Member Bill Franklin pictured at the match between Redruth and the OAs
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the end of March I was delighted to meet an old friend in Bill Franklin, now in his late eighties and living near his family in Cornwall. I served on a committee with Bill over many years when he was chairman of the Ground Sub-Committee and I was secretary. Bill was on the OA Committee for over 20 years and his enthusiasm and support were tremendous. I also remember Bill as a fine rugby referee. He retains his love of the game and despite being in a wheelchair he gets to most of Redruth’s home games. He said his loyalties were a bit split when the OAs were playing Redruth but he was pleased to enjoy a good game and to meet old friends. Meeting Bill again brought back good memories of good times at Beech Bottom. Founders’ Day The Gaudy Reunion this year was for 19351949 leavers. During my time as President the Gaudys will have covered the period from 1935 to the end of the 80s, and it has been good to meet people who left school before I started to those who finished nearly 30 years after I left. I enjoyed meeting a group of OAs who left school some years before I was born and most of whom left school before I even commenced primary education. There’s a thought! Coincidences I entered the housing market nearly 40 years ago, buying with my wife Jane a maisonette in Marshalswick. My next house was a town house built at the end of Beech Bottom and designed by David Morgan and Geoff Cannon. I then moved to a house which was built in 1930 for Ernie Nightingale, a maths master at School. In 1995 I bought a fine late Victorian house in
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The victorious OA First XV squad after their final game against Launceston which confirmed them as winners of National 2 South Clarence Road. The architect of this house similar informal supper with beer and was Percival Blow, an Old Albanian who curry as the theme, and including an designed the School’s blocks in the upper opportunity to see the new sports centre yard as well as the original designed by David Morgan science block built in the late and completed just after his thirties. I have now downsized OA Rugby had a death, as well as Aquis Court a bit and have purchased a just purchased and a short house in Ellis Fields on the very good year way down Fishpool Street. site of Beech Bottom sports The end of the site abuts the field. My second home on this with the 1st team School orchard and will form site. What next? a new 6th form centre. Please gaining promotion make an effort to come along Beer and curry night for both supper and to see Friday 28th September to National 1 by the latest developments Last year we replaced the which mark your old school’s dinner with a less formal winning National success, details are on the occasion at the School. This website. proved very successful and 2 South Stephen Burgess this year we will hold a President, Old Albanian Club
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Headmaster’s Notes
Exciting times n Headmaster Andrew Grant reflects on exciting times for the School as the new sports hall and swimming pool – proclaimed the best in the region – open and work begins on the recently acquired Aquis Court
The sporting account for the autumn term closed well in credit, with the intermediate cross-country team successfully defending their 2010 national title in the final at Princethorpe College, Rugby. As last year’s version at Alnwick in Northumberland took place only in March, having been postponed due to last winter’s snow, the squad have the unusual distinction of having won the national championship twice in the same calendar year. If anything, this year’s was the tougher contest, with several top schools, including multiple past winners Southend High School at full strength and West Hill School, from Manchester, fielding two internationals. In the event, our team packed exceptionally well, Robbie Lightowler taking a close third behind the two West Hill boys, Adam Thorpe in 6th, Joe Brennan in 11th and Daniel Myers running the best race of his career for 21st place, giving us 41 points to West Hill’s 68. Unsurprisingly, in the first race of the new term, they ran away with the U15 championship in the Hertfordshire AAA county club championship. In rugby, the same age group made impressive progress in the Daily Mail U15 Cup, including seeing off, in Round 5, the mighty Bedford School, whom they beat
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15-12. Sadly, in what became, for them, perforce, a two-term rugby season as the competition reached its climactic rounds, they met their Waterloo against Stowe School under Woollams floodlights early in the spring term. They were in the hunt right to the final whistle; unfortunately, though, they hadn’t been in the match, let alone the hunt, for the entire first half. If it had been a game of three halves, they would have won. The U16s, meanwhile, deserve congratulation on an unbeaten season which saw them top the Schoolsrugby performance league. The First soccer XI have had an exceptional season to progress to the quarter finals of the County Cup and for a brief, glorious, time were “Team of the Moment” on the Schoolsfootball.co.uk web site, as well as topping the Evening Standard League. They commenced hostilities on the first Saturday of the spring term with a hard-fought 3-2 victory over Corinthian Casuals, the footballing equivalent of an MCC side, and by the end of term had won their way through to the final of the District Cup where they completed a convincing 3-0 victory against Verulam at Clarence Park. Netball, too, has been highly competitive, our girls being a match for any opposition, including the best all-girls schools. In addition to beating Loreto College 16-4 in the final of the District Plate competition, another victory particularly to savour was a 23-20 win over the High School. The spring term saw them take third place in the annual Bedford Modern School Tournament ahead of the host school, Stowe School and other top netball schools in the area. In badminton, the U18s won the season-
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long HSBA competition and Mark Sadler deserves particular congratulations as U18 county individual champion in Boys Singles, Boys’ Doubles and Mixed Doubles. The extended run of success in the Aegon Championship that had been enjoyed by the other racket sport – tennis – came to an end in the quarter finals at the hands of Sevenoaks Tennis Academy, which was certainly no disgrace. As the autumn term drew to a close, we enjoyed an imaginatively-directed, very well-acted and very funny performance of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, which triumphantly surmounted the challenge of losing, for several evenings, two of its leading actors to Oxford interviews. There were many superb individual performances, but credit and major plaudits for ensuring that the show must, and did, go on were due to Emily Anderson for an exceptional job of understudying the role of Hermia and the outstanding ensemble ethic engendered by Mr Chris Bhantoa in his directorial debut, not to
mention his own willingness to put his LAMDA training on the line, six years since he last trod our boards as a St Albans student himself, in picking up the role of Lysander. A very fine autumn concert, among a range of lively pieces, instrumental and vocal, gave a preview of parts of the Carol Service(s), which, in the judgement of many were of unparalleled quality, featuring, as they did, some challenging modern choral works as well as more traditional material, carried off superbly by a 70-strong choir ably supported by trumpeters, excellent readers and very large congregations in fine voice on both occasions. Barely had the last notes of “Oh Come All Ye Faithful” died away, before 97 CCF cadets deployed to Longmoor in Hampshire. After making shelters for the night and a hot meal, patrols were sent out to gather information on the enemy, whereupon it started to rain and continued for the next ten hours, conditions the like
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of which new cadets had never experienced Against formidable opposition before. After a cold, wet night in their (Australians and New Zealanders don’t bashas, at first light platoons were sent travel halfway across the world merely to out to despatch the enemy at a cost of take part, and Algeria has produced some 6000 blank rounds and 24 smoke grenades, of the best senior distance runners of all after which, in the face of forecast frost, time) they did their School and country collective contingent hypothermia was proud. Led home with a top ten individual averted by an early return to School. placing by Robbie Lightowler, they finished The annual round of Oxbridge just out of the medals, in fourth place applications brought 12 offers from Oxford behind Turkey, Algeria and Australia. and three from Cambridge, Academic challenges with very few outright over the term included rejections, so whatever their The Choir participation in two ultimate fate, this has been an Olympiads: the 44th encouraging Oxbridge year. travelled to Paris International Chemistry The hockey season began Olympiad, run by the Royal promisingly for the 1st XI and performed Society of Chemistry, saw 3 with a very successful and of our students receive silver enjoyable trip to Somerset at Versailles and and 4 bronze awards, whilst to play two fixtures on the in the incomprehensibly first Saturday of term. A 5-2 Trilport to highly difficult UK Linguistics victory over a tough West Olympiad, which requires Buckland side was followed appreciative sellstudents to work out patterns by an 11-0 rout of Wellington and codes from very obscure School. It was a harbinger out audiences languages such as Waorani of a superb season during (spoken by about 600 native which they suffered only one Americans in Ecuador) or defeat and took second spot in the seasonartificially created languages spoken by long national performance league on the aliens from far-off planets, Emma Russell Schools’ Hockey web site. gained a gold award, and three others won The intermediate cross-country team’s bronze. magnificent form against senior opposition The term’s other sporting successes continued in January with 2nd place in the included a win in the District Cup for the Knole Run, the biggest senior mob race in U13 football team and the Hertfordshire the country and third in the King Henry Schools’ Emsall Trophy for our shooters, relays in Coventry, its relay counterpart in led by Chris Oates’ perfect score, and the status and in the last week of last term, it runners-up spot in their national league. was my pleasure and privilege to travel to The Easter holiday brought no Malta to support them as double winners slackening of the pace. of the English Schools Cup in representing The Choir travelled to Paris and Great Britain in the World Schools’ Cross performed at Versailles and Trilport to Country Championship. highly appreciative sell-out audiences, and
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also found time to visit the city as well as night exercise judged by S/Lt Waller RN Disneyland. (OA) recent winner of the Commodore’s For the first time in many years, the Award at Dartmouth. Meanwhile, Lance annual Easter ski trip crossed the pond to Corporals Beaty, Eastham and Rossi find good snow in Vermont and a return via successfully completed RAF Gliding Manhattan, taking in Times Square, a trip scholarships over Easter and are now to Macy’s, and a walk along Fifth Avenue. entitled to wear the Silver Wings badge. On their return, in the ERSA Schools’ Ski In the first week of April, on schedule Championship, held on the much more and on budget, the keys to the new sports prosaic slopes of Gosling Stadium dry slope hall and swimming pool were handed over in Welwyn Garden City, the by the contractors, and a U16 first team posted some magnificent facility it is. The very impressive times and In April, on pool has been pronounced the were placed third overall, best of its kind in the entire winning bronze. schedule and region by top local swimmers No fewer than 117 Fifth brought in for initial trials and Lower Sixth pupils, on budget, the of the facilities and I am supervised by 20 members confident the same claim of staff, took part in Duke keys to the new can and will be made for the of Edinburgh practice rest of the complex, which expeditions over the holiday sports hall and includes an “endless” training in a variety of inhospitable pool, climbing wall, dance locations including swimming pool studio, fitness centre, motion Snowdonia, the Peak District capture cameras and software and the South Downs, in were handed over and, of course, a four-court almost exclusively foul sports hall. weather. The great majority Risk assessments and demonstrated their determination, skill various other preparatory work have still and endurance to qualify for the real thing, to be done before the building is fully whilst fourteen OA’s have now completed ready for use, but we hope to be using their DofE Gold Awards this year, and will it for lessons by half term. The formal be going to St James’ Palace on 3rd July opening ceremony is likely to be in the to receive them along with current Upper autumn term. By then, we shall also have Sixth Former Simon Chelley, who has taken possession of Aquis Court and work achieved the rare distinction of gaining his will have started on the conversion of the Gold Award whilst still at School. gym into a refectory. In addition to the 43 CCF cadets involved We have exciting and busy times ahead in Duke of Edinburgh expeditions, four of us, then, and the School will have RAF cadets attended camp at RAF St changed radically by the next time you Mawgan in Cornwall, where their very full visit. programme included shooting, command Andrew Grant tasks, flying and a drill competition and Headmaster
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OA Lodge
Hello and goodbye n OA Lodge Assistant Secretary John Williams welcomes new Master of the Lodge Jonathan Wedgbury, and says goodbye to three distinguished Lodge members who have recently passed away
The Lodge year commenced as usual at the Installation meeting on Saturday May 12th when the new Master of the Lodge, Jonathan Wedgbury, was installed in the Chair in a consummate manner by the outgoing Master, Ian Parker. At 29, Jon is the youngest Master ever to occupy the chair of the Old Albanian Lodge. And he is the third Wedgbury to do so: his grandfather Clifford, a veteran of Arnhem (now sadly deceased) was installed as Master in 1973, and
David Morgan, 1928-2012
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his father Richard in 1996. Richard will occupy the office of Chaplain during the year – as his father did during his year. Jon studied Law at Southampton University, and being very interested in politics, after graduating he went to work for the Conservative party at their headquarters in London, joining the Carlton Club. He also served as secretary of the Marylebone Conservative Association. Jon is currently head of corporate development for a financial consultancy based in London and lives in Huntingdon. The Lodge has had an excellent year, but tinged with great sadness by the deaths of three senior members who were all, until relatively recently, very active in Lodge affairs. David Morgan, who died in January after a short illness, was a great character and raconteur and until his recent retirement, the School Architect. In the Lodge entry in the Bulletin before last, he outlined his time at School and the start of his architectural practice, which is well worth revisiting alongside the obituary written by Geoff Cannon in this Bulletin. To mark his retirement, David was very touched to be taken out to dinner by the Chairman, Headmaster, Bursar and a Governor of the School and presented with two watercolour paintings of the School buildings. These had a note pasted on the back which said: “May we take the opportunity
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to say how greatly the School has valued your immense contribution to the ‘property life blood’ of the School; the Old Hall horizontal division, the Science Block extension, the Art and Languages and the Fitness Suites, along with many other projects, quite apart from the two major projects of Woollam’s Pavilion and the new sports hall and swimming pool development.” David was initiated into the Lodge in 1976 and after passing through the various progressive offices, he was installed as Master by his predecessor, Peter Smith in 1990. At the end of his year, he installed his successor, Don Kiff. David then completed a year as Assistant Secretary, before serving as Director of Ceremonies for five years, stepping down to Assistant DC for a further three. His last office was that Chaplain for two years, stepping
down only last year. In the Province of Hertfordshire he was appointed to the prestigious – and most appropriate – active office of Grand Superintendent of Works in 1997 and received a promotion in 2008. In 1997 he was a founding member of the ‘Scholars in Amity’ Lodge of Mark Master Masons, meeting at Ashwell House. David was also a Member of the Old Albanian Chapter and was First Principal in 1996. Reginald John Giffen, who died in April, was initiated into the Lodge in 1968 by the then Master, John Turner, some four years after his year as President of the Old Albanian Club and a School Governor. After passing through the various progressive offices in the Lodge, he was installed as Master by his predecessor, Charles Bloxham in 1980. At the end of his year, he duly installed his successor, John Tame.
The OA and OV Lodges’ Garden Party
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In 1982 he was appointed Secretary of the Lodge and served until 1990, when he handed over to Geoffrey Goodman. John was a dedicated Freemason. He was First Principal of the Old Albanian Chapter in 1983 and a founding member of the ‘Scholars in Amity’ Lodge of Mark Master Masons In 1997. One of John’s passions was the Federation of School Lodges, of which the Lodge was a founding member and he served as Secretary of the Federation, Chairman and finally Vice President. In 1990 John received the accolade of being appointed to Grand Rank in the United Grand Lodge of England, the headquarters of which is Freemasons’ Hall in Great Queen Street. An obituary written by his brother George is included in this Bulletin. Donald Kiff, who died in April, was initiated into the Lodge in 1979. Don’s family lived in St Albans and
John Giffen, 1919-2012
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Don Kiff, 1924-2012 his father was in the navy. As a youngster Don had a fine voice and became a chorister in the Abbey. He won a scholarship to the School, but his parents still found the inevitable additional expenditure difficult to manage and Don was very conscious of this for the rest of his life. Don excelled in sporting activities, playing both rugby and cricket, captaining both the 1st XV and the 1st XI and becoming Head of School. After leaving in 1942, Don served in the Navy until the end of the war. He subsequently played both rugby and cricket for the OAs and served a year as President of the Club. Don was initiated into the Lodge in January 1979 by the then Worshipful Master, Monte Copas. He progressed through the various offices to Junior Warden in 1990. Owing to the sudden resignation of the Senior Warden, he was installed as Worshipful Master one year early in 1991 by his predecessor David
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Presentation to our hosts, Dick and Gill Knifton, by Ralph Howell of the OV Lodge
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Morgan and at the end of his year he installed his successor, George Giffen. During his year in the Chair he initiated the present Secretary (!) into the Lodge. Don subsequently served as Almoner until 1994, and was appointed Chaplain in 1998, a role which he relished - and he served until his health had begun to deteriorate in 2008. Don was a very committed Mason, regularly attending committee meetings, rehearsals and Lodge of Instruction.
In recognition he was appointed to Active Rank in Hertfordshire in 1998 as Provincial Grand Pursuivant, playing his part at the Annual Provincial Meeting in Grand Lodge at Freemason’s Hall impeccably. He was promoted to Past Provincial Senior Grand Deacon in 2000. Don was also a member of the Old Albanian Chapter. Don was offered a further promotion in 2008, but by that time his health was deteriorating and he sadly declined
2012 Annual General Meeting n The Old Albanian Club Secretary David Buxton publishes below the agenda for the 120th AGM
What an astonishing record this Club has and how both Club and School have changed over this time! As always, all positions are open to anyone who would like to take their turn in the running of this wonderful OA Club. We look forward to appointing a new President following the sterling work Stephen Burgess has carried out in recent years in order to maintain and increase the links between former pupils and the School. Please do attend and let us know if you wish to stand for any position. Old Albanian Committee Agenda for the 120th Annual General Meeting of the Old Albanian Club to be held on the 4th December 2012 at 20:00 in the ‘948’ room 1. Apologies 2. Minutes of the 2011 AGM 3. Presidents Review of 2011 4. Social Events Report 5. Clubs Reports 6. Bulletin, Development Office & Membership 7. Annual Accounts 8. Election of Officers 9. A.O.B.
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it. Reflecting his life-long and deep attachment to the Abbey, Don’s funeral service was held in the Lady Chapel and was well attended by members of the Old Albanian Club and the Lodge. An obituary written by Nigel Cartwight is included in this Bulletin. On a happier note, the annual Lodge Garden Party – shared with the Old Verulamians Lodge – took place on Sunday 1st of July, once again hosted by our Provincial Grand Charity steward, Dick Knifton and his wife Gill. Despite the recent weather, which was much better than might have been expected, it was very well attended and raised in the region of £1,200 to be split between the Hospice of St Francis in Berkhamsted, where Lodge member David Pitcher received such good
treatment before returning home, and the Scouts in St Albans. The Lodge meets only five times a year on the second Saturdays in January, March, May and September and the first Saturday in November. All those connected with the School, including fathers of past or present pupils are welcome to apply for membership, for which purpose the first approach should be to any Lodge member, the Secretary as below; or Nigel WoodSmith or Mark Pedroz at the School. Members of other Lodges, be they OAs, parents of past or present pupils, staff or Governors are encouraged to visit the Lodge whenever they wish, and the Secretary will be delighted to hear from them. John Williams Lodge Assistant Secretary
Membership Secretary’s Notes
Tightening school ties n Members buck the open-collar trend as Membership Secretary Roger Cook reports on steady sales of Old Albanian Club ties
It is with sorrow that I register the death of John Giffen, David Morgan and Don Kiff, three more friends from the mud-splashed days of OA rugby at Beech Bottom.
Despite the increasing “tieless society”, sales of OA ties have continued. I have just ordered another batch. Ties are available (£13) from myself or the School Development Office. Most OAs read the Bulletin from the website. However, I am still distributing 300 copies to the UK and worldwide (10 years ago it was about 1,500). Roger Cook Membership Secretary
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De Fortunis Albanorum l Major Martin Everett (56) was awarded the MBE in the New Year’s Honours list for services to the Royal Welsh Regimental Museum, Brecon. Formerly known as The South Wales Borderers, the regiment is legendary for its role in the Zulu War of 1879. A brief account of Martin’s career after leaving St Albans School appears below. l John Machell (88) has been appointed Queen’s Counsel. l James M Futcher RA, passed out at the 168th Sovereign’s Parade, Sandhurst on Friday 13th April 2012. l Robbie Waller graduated from Britannia RN College on Thursday 12th April 2012, the only Direct Graduate entry Marine Engineer (Submariner) to do so. Sub-Lt Waller RN was one of three graduates presented with the Commodore’s Personal Award ‘in recognition of their great contribution to the general life of the College and worthy of special recognition’.
Deaths It is with regret that the following deaths are announced: l John Giffen (36) died in April 2012. An obituary by his brother George appears below. l Geoffrey Munns (38) died peacefully in the arms of his wife Sheila at home on 29th December 2011. An obituary by her is
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published below. l Don Kiff (42) died in April 2012. An obituary by Nigel Cartwright appears below. l David Morgan (46) died in the Lister hospital in Stevenage in January 2012, following a short illness. An obituary written by his friend and long-time business partner Geoff Cannon appears below. l Dickie Dickinson (49) died on 11th September 2011. l Barry Corbet (51) died suddenly on 5th February 2012. His oldest school friend Roger Seymour writes: “While convalescing from an operation for a collapsed lung, Barry injured his head during a fall at home and died a few hours later from what appeared to be a brain haemorrhage.” l Keith Trice (55) died on 11th September 2011. l Geoffrey George Martin (58) died suddenly on Friday 11th November 2011, suffering a heart attack following a game of tennis. l John Vendon Curtis died suddenly of a massive heart attack on 27th January 2012, at the age of 70. He leaves a wife Sally and three daughters, Hannah, Georgina and Imogen.
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l Timothy Ball (68) passed away on 13th August 2011 at the Countess Mountbatten Hospice near Southampton, aged 61. He leaves two sons by his first wife Jan (who is also deceased), and his second wife Lois and their son Dominic. He also leaves two grandchildren, Jasper and Lois.
Obituary l Major Geoffery Ferrers Altham Munns Geoffrey was born in Darjeeling, India on 25th July 1920 and had an idyllic life which came to an abrupt halt when at the tender age of eight he was sent “home� to England and eventually St Albans School. How he missed India, his parents, sisters, the servants, the whole way of life. But he soon came to enjoy his new life in England and was always so proud of St Albans School where he excelled in athletics, swimming and rugby, and was made head boy. After taking the Army examination he left the School in 1938 and started his officer training at the Royal Military Academy Woolwich and joined the Royal Artillery. Unfortunately war was declared and Geoffrey found himself in Dunkirk. After that he was posted to the North West Frontier then Arakan (The Box), Malaysia, Suez and many other postings in the UK. At one point he fought alongside 7th Indian Division of the Indian Army and was proud to do so. Geoffrey retired from the army in
1960. He continued to work for the Royal Artillery in a retired officer post at the Royal Artillery Record Office at Footscray, Kent, where he met his beloved wife, Sheila. They were so happily married for almost 43 years. When the Record Office moved to Fulford Barracks in Yorkshire, Geoffrey moved to the MoD London in Army staff duties and retired eventually in 1987. Geoffrey always had a love of wildlife, his passion being ornithology. He was regional representative for the British Trust for Ornithology for Kent for 33 years with two terms on the council, and was awarded the prestigious Tucker medal for his outstanding work. He was very well known in the field by all the major ornithological societies both in the UK and overseas and will be much missed. Geoffrey leaves behind many who loved him, none more so than his wife Sheila, son Christopher and Richard, Anthony, Julia and Penny by his late wife.
Obituary l David Morgan David Morgan died in the Lister hospital in Stevenage in January 2012. He had been suffering from a heart condition and breathing difficulties for some time previously. David was born in Shanghai in 1928. His father was chairman of the Shanghai Stock Exchange and the family enjoyed a comfortable lifestyle. Following the Japanese
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invasion of China in 1937, the family returned to England leaving all their assets in China. It took David some 40 years to obtain limited compensation. He entered Woollams in 1937 and joined the main school in 1938. His father died soon after leaving the family without an income. His two brothers also attended the school and then joined the RAF. Both became pilots and were shot down and killed towards the end of the war. However, the governors of the School were sympathetic and waived the fees for the remainder of David’s school career. He played rugby, cricket, was in the ATC and the school shooting team. He joined many OA clubs, the rugby club, cricket club, fishing society and OA Lodge. We both played rugby for the OA rugby club for many years. I was scrum half and he was the hooker. He represented Hertfordshire on several occasions. In those days, the ball had to be put in the scrum straight (not the case these days). David must have been a contortionist able to lift a leg so high that it could not be seen by the referee. When the ball was put into the scrum all he had to do was strike, very effective. One of the more memorable incidents I recall is one afternoon the ATC were requested to assist in launching the naval section’s cutter on the lake. David and Ian Stebbings took the oars and rowed out towards the island. Unfortunately, it began to founder; they had forgotten to
replace the drainage bung in the bottom of the boat. Two very wet cadets had to be rescued. David was a great character, storyteller and after dinner speaker. He had many opportunities for this; becoming president of the St Albans round table and rotary clubs, the OA fishing society and held high office in the OA Lodge. He was called up for national service in the RAF in 1948 and served as a radio operator at various stations in England. On being demobilised he wanted to train as an architect but found difficulty in being accepted in a school of architecture. His mother (a feisty lady) lobbied the Air Ministry on the grounds of “My other two sons were killed in the war – the least you can do is to assist in training my remaining son”. This apparently worked and David enrolled in the school of architecture. He qualified in 1954 and worked for British Railways at Kings Cross where he was involved in design work for St Pancras, Norwich and Cromer. He and I set up an architectural partnership in 1959 in which he took an active part until his death in January. Some of his projects included St Peter’s church chapter house and Dagnell Street baptist church in St Albans. He did many projects for the School including the School sports pavilion at Woollams, his last being No 77 Fishpool Street, and the School’s new swimming pool and sports halls.
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His fishing activities took him and his fellow members to many venues over the world, the UK, Scotland, Ireland, Alaska, Florida, Costa Rica and Salvador. His birthplace in Shanghai always caused a problem with the immigration authorities when the fishing parties re-entered the country from abroad and he was regularly delayed. Having lost his father and older brothers whilst young, David found great happiness with his wife, Joan, who was his childhood sweetheart. They married in St Leonard’s church in Sandridge in 1951. He designed and built his own house and he and Joan had five children. All of his three sons went to the School. Joan died in 2000 after 48 years of marriage. A few years later he met Christine who became his close companion for his last eight years. David’s ashes have been interred at St Leonard’s church, where Joan is also buried in the garden of rest. He will be remembered as a great character. Geoff Cannon
Obituary l Don Kiff Don gained a scholarship to the School, which he entered in September 1935. He was an outstanding games player and in 1940 he became the youngest player ever to be selected for the 1st XV, playing at centre three-quarter and gaining his 1st XV colours. He was a good cricketer, gaining
his 1st XI colours in 1941. He was an especially good fielder, saving many runs on the boundary following up with a rocket-like throw in, thus keeping the wicket-keeper on his toes. In 1944 he joined the Royal Navy, becoming a sub-lieutenant and then a lieutenant. He was unfortunate enough to serve on the Arctic convoys, and an equally difficult task was to follow: he skippered a landing craft on D-Day. He was demobbed from the Navy and joined Herts Pharmaceuticals. He left them in 1950 to become a representative with the Beecham Group with whom he remained until his retirement. He was a keen member of both the OA rugby and cricket clubs. He was a successful captain of the 1st XV during the season 1953/54. He had the ability to get the best out of his players, causing them to play to their maximum potential. In 1952, he married Nola and he had five children: Gemma, Robert, Andrew, James and Jonathan. Peter Sherring adds: “After his retirement from the rugby and cricketing seasons, Don turned his undoubted sporting prowess to the more gentle game of golf. He was no Tiger Woods, more into the woods, but thoroughly enjoyed the game and was always a great competitor and companion on the course. He helped to form a small group of OA stalwarts including Tommy Furlong, Peter van Horne,
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Mike Smith, John Smith, and Peter Sherring, which went on tour as a small golfing adjunct to the cricket club’s annual tour. Visits to Brighton, Bournemouth, Gloucestershire and Devon were much enjoyed and Don played until he was almost 80, when a dodgy hip forced his retirement from the game. Don was quite literally a man for all seasons and it was a privilege to have known him.” I can add nothing further to Peter’s comments; as Peter writes, it was a privilege to have known him. Nigel Cartwight
Obituary l John Giffen As I knew John for 80 years, I thought I probably knew him for longer than anyone else here today but I gather that Mary first met John when they were in their respective prams, their parents being close neighbours. Whether they exchanged rattles or dummies is not recorded but you will get the drift that it was a love match from the first and was to last more than 90 years. John was born in St Albans in November 1919 and from the age of five attended Clare House School. Mary joined the school a year after John. His secondary education was at St Albans School. He left school early and joined our father in his electrical contracting/retail business. Here he became very involved in the mysteries of refrigeration
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in the days when few homes had refrigerators. In the period leading up to World War Two he enlisted in the Heavy Anti-Aircraft Regiment of the Hertfordshire Yeomanry, based in Welwyn Garden City and was called up two weeks before war was declared. He rapidly rose to the rank of sergeant. He saw service in France and became very involved in the newly emerging mysteries of radar. During this time, he was returned to England for officer training and, on completion returned to France. On the fall of France, he was evacuated, with his radar sets, from Le Havre. He always felt that the prevention of the radar falling into German hands was deemed more important than his own safety. Subsequently, he sailed on the Queen Mary to Egypt, via the Cape of Good Hope and was in the vicinity of El Alamein when that battle commenced. He was later involved in the Italy campaign and finished the war in north Italy. Prior to being demobbed, having been promoted to the rank of captain, he volunteered for and was given command of a unit, based in Udine, whose job was to find isolated graves, disinter the bodies, identify them if possible and transport them to a military cemetery for reburial. Although the scenery of northern Italy was very beautiful in late summer, the smells associated with the work and high temperatures must have been horrendous. On demobilisation in 1946, he
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rejoined the family company where he remained until retirement. Our father had died, intestate, in 1940 so the business was in a bit of a muddle and there was much rebuilding to be done. Later that year, in September 1946, he married Mary and, subsequently had three daughters. During his business career, he saw the company develop from a small contractor/retailer into the leading electrical contractor in Hertfordshire. His main legacy is that he developed the relationships with what are still the company’s main clients, London Underground and the railways all over the United Kingdom. I joined John in the company in 1953 after my National Service. In the early 1960s, Edward Heath did away with Retail Price Maintenance. As both John and I were really contractors at heart, this prompted an immediate sale of all our retail stock and the sale of the assets of the retail side of the company. It was all so sudden that Uncle Ted, the local solicitor, came rushing round to the office saying “Are you boys alright – not going bust!”. Things developed well until one Monday in March 1979, John suddenly announced he wanted to retire. I asked him “when?” and he replied “how about the end of the month?” As you can imagine, my response was something like “don’t be a silly boy” couched in language that I could not possibly repeat here today. He had decided that, as he
had three daughters and I had three sons, he wished to sell his shares 50% of the equity, at the same time. It is surely a sign that we were the greatest of friends that he was able to retire some nine months later with both of us happy with our respective lots. John was for many years actively involved with the Old Albanian Rugby Club. He played for and captained for a good number years the A fifteen. He played until he was 42 years old and subsequently served as President of the Club. In 1964, he was elected President of the Old Albanian Club. As President he became an ex-officio Governor of St Albans School for the duration of his year of office. It was during this year that WT Marsh retired as Headmaster, to be succeeded by Frank Kilvington. He was also very involved in raising money for the new pavilion at the OA headquarters at Beech Bottom. He was for many years a member of St Albans Round Table. John was also a very committed Freemason. He was initiated into the Old Albanian Lodge in 1968 and was Master in 1980. He was subsequently secretary for eight years. He joined various other orders and served as Secretary, Chairman and Vice President of the Federation of School Lodges. He achieved Grand Rank in 1990. In retirement, John and Mary decided to leave St Albans and make a new life for themselves in Evenley, Northamptonshire where they
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settled into village life and made many friends. He took up tapestry work in which he achieved a very high standard. Their bungalow and subsequent flat are littered with examples of his design and execution. Until a few years ago he loved caravanning and gardening. Sadly, all things must come to an end. His health slowly deteriorated over the past few years. When I last saw him about four weeks ago he was more lively and coherent than he had been for a long time and was talking about buying a new car and coming to Lodge again. I was always very proud of my big brother – I suppose he became a father figure to me when he came home from the war. We celebrate today the life of a very dear friend, brother, father and husband. May he rest in peace? George Giffen
Obituary l E M (Mike) Tarling I was a friend of Mike since we first met by St Albans School war memorial in 1937, 74 years ago. I can still see him in his blue grey raincoat with his school cap placed squarely on top of his head. Although commencing in Form IA, within weeks he was upgraded to Form I, a year ahead of his age group. He became Head Boy 1945-46, captain of cricket for two seasons 1945 and 1946, gaining his 1st XI colours in 1946.
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He played in the 1st XV 1944-45 and 1945-46, gaining his 1st XV colours in 1944. He was a very good and strong front row forward. In 1946 he was awarded a scholarship to Christ’s College Cambridge, obtaining an honours degree in history. He played both cricket and rugby for the OAs and was a successful 1st XV captain 1952/53. Upon leaving Cambridge in 1946 he commenced his National Service and was commissioned in the Royal Army Educational Corps. In 1951 he was demobilised but because of the Korean War he was obliged to spend an additional period in the TA as an officer based in Hertford with the Herts Yeomanry. In 1951 he joined ICI in their publicity department at their Millbank Head Office and it was here that he met his future wife, Jean. In 1953 he married Jean who, from 1996, stood by him throughout his long battle with Parkinson’s disease. Mike refused to give in to this disease and continued to live a very full life. In 1960 he was promoted to ICI’s Runcorn office and, after several further promotions, took early retirement in 1983; then moving to Winchcombe. Upon retirement he formed his own marketing company ‘Fan Fare Communications’ which he eventually sold in 2003 as a flourishing marketing company. Mike and Jean first set up home in a flat in Streatham, then quickly moved to their own house in
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Coulsdon, moving to Birkenhead when Mike’s work took him north. During this time Mike and Jean had three children - one boy and two girls – who have in turn given birth to seven children. Mike was a dedicated family man and a very keen gardener. Since boyhood he worked a succession of allotments in St Albans, Coulsdon, Birkenhead, Winchcombe and Peterborough. He was tending his Peterborough allotment a few days before he died. I always admired Mike for his determination and strength of character and it is by these factors plus Jean’s help that he achieved a great deal despite medical setbacks. He remained a strong and loyal friend to the very end. Nigel Cartwright
Harold Wilson: A Tribute n Following the obituary in the last issue, Harold Wilson’s school friend Michael Knight (48) sends a special tribute from his home in Stockholm
Harold started at St Albans School in 1941, a year after me but, if I remember rightly, we did not really get to know each other until we started playing rugby together – both of us in the scrum, with more effort than skill – first in the house sides and then in the School 2nd XV. I can remember the games at Belmont Hill, where we could all at least enjoy a hot bath but it was worse when we played at The Causeway, where there were no changing sheds at all. The nearest shower was up the hill at the School
The St Albans School Second XV in 1947
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– one shower for everyone – so most of us went straight home, muddy and exhausted. We also both joined the school ATC (Air Training Corps) after the first year in the army corps – this was during the war, of course. This meant we went on summer camps together at RAF bases and learnt the basics of flying. Around this time Harold and I ganged up with David Cannon, also in Harold’s year. David had a drop-handlebar bike, while we poor mortals had ‘sit-upand-begs’. However, we went off on various country excursions to places like Prae Wood, Gorhambury and down Sandpit Lane, which was quite unbuilt up at that time, to Simonshyde. This cycling led to our great adventure in France in 1946. Mr ‘Puffer’ Stevenson, our French master, arranged a Treasure Hunt round Brittany, and we three set off
via Southampton and St Malo on our bikes and with a two-man tent. We were quite successful, actually, although Harold decided he had an ailment that could only be cured with doses of Benedictine, combined with Brittany cider – a potent combination that slowed us down somewhat! Nevertheless, we won first prize and were presented with a medal by the French Embassy. The other activity that brought us together was the annual school play, run by Mr Bob Tanner backstage and Mr DI Davies as producer. Incidentally, I think Bob Tanner taught his pupils more than any other about life and art working together, not least through the school plays. Harold starred in many plays – Arms and the Man, L’Avare (in French), She Stoops to Conquer and not least The Importance of Being Earnest, in which he played
The 1948-49 School Prefects featuring ‘The Three Musketeers’ and Jo Barnett
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The Wilson Heraldic Coat of Arms the young Cecily – in fact, it seems that Harold only played stunning young girls! Two other actors I remember starring with Harold in these plays were Jo Barnett, who I still keep in touch with, and Roger ‘Rosie’ Clifford. They also all took part in the 1948 St Albans pageant performed outdoors at Verulamium. (During the school holidays when we were in the Sixth Form Harold introduced a popular activity. We would study at the Public Library in Victoria Street and then move on to the Waterend Barn, where we enjoyed coffee and gossip). On leaving school we ‘Three Musketeers’ Harold, David and Michael, split up. Harold and I went into the Air Force to do our military service before going up to Cambridge – Sidney Sussex and Pembroke respectively. David took up his Exhibition at Lincoln College
at ‘the other place’ but we all met up in the vacs to compare notes. Harold was based at one time in Abingdon and, being short of cash as we all were, he used to ride his bike at weekends, now equipped with some sort of petrol engine, between Abingdon and St Albans – about 75 miles cross-country. Harold was not very much into technology, and informed us that one night when his engine broke down he investigated the carburettor with his cigarette lighter. He was lucky to survive! Both Harold and I partly financed our university years by doing weekends with the RAAF – which sometimes involved drinking at the Officers Mess in the 3604 Squadron in Queens Square in Bloomsbury. Happy memories, but oh, so long ago. After I moved to Sweden in 1955, it became more difficult for
His Honour Harold Wilson performing his duties as Shrieval Remembrancer for Oxfordshire prior to the swearing-in of the High Sheriff in 2004
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us to get together. Still, I did meet Harold now and again, first in East Hagbourne and later in London and Oxford, where he was a judge of high standing. He and I last met when we both were asked to give our Tributes to the other “Musketeer”, David who died a year earlier. I shall miss my meetings with Harold for many reasons – his sharp mind and great insight, his warm sense of humour and because he always had a stock of thought-provoking and amusing stories to tell – including many anecdotes about our joint lives at St Albans School.
Museum and archive Now that the resplendent panels are on the walls the museum is taking on the shape that was always expected. Exhibits are now well displayed thanks in the main to Nigel Wood Smith, who has put so many hours into the museum’s growth.
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Never let the name of Robin Ollington escape us either. His ideas and energy have been key factors in the whole process. He recently, amongst other donations, has given stamps he designed for Guernsey’s celebration of the bicentenary of Victor Hugo, a booklet celebrating 100 years of cinema in the island, four stamps “Guernsey Salutes Columbus 1492-1992”, the First Day Cover “Queen Elizabeth, The Queen Mother”, and the island’s Post Office mint stamps dated 28th February 1995. Our next task is to decide how to use the extra room we shall have in September of this year – it will probably be devoted to the story of the Abbey Gateway in the history of St Albans. Nigel, Robin and myself will consult widely. Any ideas would be carefully considered. Mike Highstead
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From the Archive Jim Woodfield has sent us this picture of the JTC 1944-45, and a photo of the signatures on the back
Mike Kenningham has sent us a photo of the OA 1st XV 1953/4, featuring some well-known names. Back row: Mike Smith, Dick Thrale, Bob Smith, Roger Cook, George Giffen, Mike Kenningham Middle row: Dickie Dickinson, Alan Richmond, Don Kiff, David Morgan, Jes Freestone Front row: Harry Lyall, Frank Deamer, Geoff Cannon, Pat Brannam
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From IT to TA and MBE n Keen military historian Major Martin Everett (56) describes his life since leaving St Albans School, and how a retirement hobby can bring unexpected rewards
Martin Everett was born in Woking, Surrey when his mother was evacuated to escape the London bombing. After the war his parents moved to Watford after attending a preparatory school in Harrow, in 1952 Martin was awarded a Hertfordshire County Scholarship to St Albans School. In 1956, his parents moved to Hereford and he transferred to Hereford Cathedral School. On leaving school he enlisted into the Regular Army and started training with the Scots Guards at the Guards’ Depot then in Pirbright. His ambitions to gain a place at Sandhurst were dashed when he failed the Regular Commissions Board. However, being a keen mathematician he decided to train as an actuary and joined the Phoenix Assurance Company in the City of London in January 1961. But he was soon diverted into the world of computing. His company had then bought one of the early commercial machines – a LEO – that was a direct successor to the machine developed Manchester University from the mechanical and electronic code-breaking work done at Bletchley Park. After a lifetime
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managing the development of major computer systems, on retirement Martin joined the Regimental Museum in Brecon in 1992 as a parttime archivist. In the meantime he had also served over 36 years as a part-time Territorial Army soldier; starting with the Honourable Artillery Company in the City, with whom he obtained a commission, and then for the last 20 years with The Royal Regiment of Wales, reaching the rank of Major and forsaking his uniform in 1996. In April 1998, he was appointed Curator of the Museum. Always a keen military historian, Martin has travelled widely to the many battle sites in North America, Gallipoli, The Western Front, The Crimea, India and especially South Africa. Particularly memorable of all these visits were the crossing of the River Alma in the Crimea, where his great grandfather fought with 38th Foot, and a visit to Modder River in the Free State where his grandfather served with 1st Scots Guards. More recently, he collaborated with South African historian, David Rattray, on a book ‘A Soldier-Artist in Zululand’ which brought to light some 120 watercolour sketches from the 1879 Anglo-Zulu campaign. Until he retired he was a Committee Member of the Federation of Museums and Art Galleries of Wales, and is a member of the Society of Archivists and a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society. In June 2006 he was one of the initial recipients of HE Prince
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Mangosuthu Buthelezi award for Service to the Zulu People. Martin was able to welcome Prince Buthelezi, former South African Minister of Home Affairs, to Brecon in February 2008. Martin, now aged 71, retired from museum in March 2011 and lives in Tintern in the Wye Valley. The award shows that retirement ‘hobby’ can bring significant and unexpected rewards. He continues to undertake research to enhance the regimental archives.
Wrong number Our thanks to Stewart Owen (65) for pointing out that the photo on page 28 of the previous issue was incorrectly labelled as the School First XV – it was, in fact, the Second XV, “renowned more for having
fun and surviving without lifethreatening injuries than winning fixtures at whatever cost.”
Recognizing bravery
Major Martin Everett holding a Victoria Cross
n Peter Peckham (43) has finally seen 20 years of hard work pay off when a life-size bronze statue of local war hero Lieutenant-Colonel William George Malone was unveiled in November 2011 in his home town of Stratford, New Zealand
A former Royal Navy Officer himself, Peter was inspired by stories of Malone’s leadership and character and wanted to pay tribute to Malone’s legacy by providing the community with a visual piece of history. The statue is of Colonel Malone in uniform looking toward the mountain. Peter led
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a committee who fundraised to honour Malone, one of the country’s erect the statue, obtaining grants unsung heroes, after attending a from TSB Community Trust, Dawn Service at Chunuk Bair. The New Zealand Army Association landscape there is steep broken Taranaki, Malone Quest Committee country and the invasion had been and Stratford District Council. The poorly executed. He said “it’s the statue was unveiled in November most inhospitable bit of land I can 2011 by Dr Louise Malone, a greatimagine to invade. His personal granddaughter of Lieutenant-Colonel bravery should have earned him Malone. the highest award for bravery many William Malone (1859–1915) was times over, it is disappointing that born in Lewisham, England and it has taken so long for Malone to be travelled to New Zealand in 1879 appropriately recognized.” where he served in the Armed Peter Peckham boarded at Constabulary at Woollams for one Opunake for two years. year, then at School He then farmed at House for one year, Cardiff near Stratford. after which came the Malone was active outbreak of war. He in local affairs as volunteered for the chairman of the navy aged 17 where he Ngaere Road Board, a spent the next 10 years, member of the Hawera mostly minesweeping. County Council and For three years he held the Taranaki Hospital a smallholding with Peter Peckham with Dr and Charitable his brother in Suffolk, Louise Malone at the Aid Board. He was then in 1956 the New unveiling of the statue appointed a Justice of Zealand government the Peace in 1892 and was admitted paid for he and his wife and three to the Bar in 1895. A keen rugby children to emigrate to New Zealand player, he represented Taranaki in as a farm labourer. By 1966 he had 1889-1891. He commanded the 11th acquired a state loan to buy a 110 Taranaki Rifles and created the acre dairy farm which his son still distinctive ‘lemon squeezer’ hat farms today. Peter and his wife Joy adopted by the New Zealand Army. travelled to Raratonga in the Cook Lieutenant-Colonel Malone led the Islands to support the School’s First Wellington Battalion in the 8th and XV on their tour in 2009, where the 9th August 1915 attack on Chunuk team presented him with a First Bair ridge in Gallipoli. He, along XV shirt, number 7 which was his with several hundred of his men, number in the 1943 First XV. was killed during the battle. Peter Peckham said he felt compelled to
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Swinsons at St Albans School n Jeremy Swinson (68) reflects on the literary and artistic influence of St Albans School on two generations of his family – and their legacy of the ‘Company of Ten’
In 1917 an 11 year-old Bernard Swinson walked through the gates of St Albans School. He was the first of nine members of the family to be educated at the school over the next 50 years. In 1921 he was joined by his younger brother Cyril, and later his two younger brothers Arthur and Ted. Not long after Bernard left school their father Hugh died. Bernard therefore assumed financial responsibility for the family and managed to sustain his younger brother and sister, Elizabeth, through school. Bernard went on to become a highly successful businessman much of which was spent abroad. He retired to Jersey in 1958 after being Finance Director of Burmah Oil in Canada. All the brothers were taught English at the school by a legendary teacher J C Dent. One feature of his teaching was to read plays allowed in class; not revolutionary by today’s standards, but it set him apart from others at that time. His teaching had a lasting impact on them all but especially Cyril and Arthur, and gave them all a profound love of English literature but especially plays and the theatre.
When Arthur left school in 1932, together with his best friend Terry Newell and other members of the Abbey Fellowship, a youth club for young people attached to the Abbey, they decided to set up a theatre company of their own, which as there were ten of them they called it ‘The Company of Ten’. It was only after they cast their first play the realised they needed an experienced director and so Cyril was persuaded to become the eleventh member. J C Dent continued an association with the group and would often be asked to provide criticism of a number of productions. The Company of Ten grew from strength to strength. Its first permanent home was in the grounds of Cyril’s home, Abbey Mill House, opposite the Fighting Cocks pub. In the 1970s, following a massive fund-raising campaign, it was able to move to its present home, the Abbey Theatre, at Westminster Lodge. The Company of Ten remains one of the largest and most active amateur theatre companies in the country and over the years enormously enriched the cultural life of the city. Just after the last war the city council approach Cyril with the idea of putting on a pageant to celebrate amongst other things the thousandth anniversary of the founding of the School. The pageant took place in the summer of 1948 with a cast of thousands, including an episode about the school staring a young Joey Webb and boys from the school. Cyril wrote the script
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and acted as pageant master, aided by Arthur and Terry. As a result of the success of the pageant, Cyril was asked to both write and produce others in places such as Rochester, Bath, Wisbeach, Colchester, Dunstable and another one in St Albans in 1953. Apart from his activities locally, Cyril was a director of A&C Black publishing house where he was instrumental in reviving their fortunes after the war by developing their education section. He also persuaded them to publish books on his other great love, the ballet, a number of which he wrote himself. Cyril sadly died at the early age of only 52 in 1963 while president of the OAs. He was not the only author in the family. Arthur, who had distinguishing himself fighting the Japanese at Kohima, eventually became a full-time writer. He wrote countless radio plays, television scripts (including Dr Finlay’s Casebook and Sargent Cork) as well as novels and military histories. His account of the battle of Kohima is still regarded as the standard work on the subject and his book on the sinking of the Politician, which was the subject of an Ealing comedy, Whiskey Galore, has recently been reprinted (Scotch on the Rocks, Luath Press). Like his brother Cyril, Arthur died in 1970, ironically while also holding the office of OA president. Along with Arthur, the youngest brother Edward (Ted) was an active member of the OAs rugby club
before the war. During the war he fought in Egypt with Montgomery’s Eighth Army and went on to a long career as a chartered account. By the 1960s the next generation of Swinsons appeared at the school. David (known as ‘Happy’ because of his gloomy expression) was at the School between 1959 and 1966. He went onto Cambridge before embarking on a career in the chemical industry. He was joined in 1960 by Peter, who was allowed to develop his interest in photography while at School and on one occasion used a gas-filled air balloon in the School orchard to take aerial photographs of the boys below. Peter had a distinguished career on the technical side of the film industry, including the design and development of a pioneering colour analysis machine which is now used by almost every television company in the world. The following year he was followed by his twin brothers, Andrew and Jeremy. Both twins played prop for the undefeated first XV of 1967. Jeremy followed the family tradition by both writing and performing sketches in the end of autumn term review. After university, Andrew ran a bookshop in Bradford but sadly died at the early age of only 30. Jeremy went on to become principal educational psychologist in Liverpool and is author of a number of academic papers and of a book, out this year, on the application of psychology to teaching practice. Arthur’s son Sheridan was at the School
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The Swinson family pictured in 1958
between 1978 and 1980 went onto to Cambridge before a career in publishing. He now runs a ‘book barn’ in Shropshire. Lastly, his sister Antonia, now a journalist and author based in Edinburgh, although not a pupil at the School had the distinction of being the first pupil from the Girls Grammar School to direct a joint production of a play called Admetus, performed at the School and written by her father, in 1974. The world has changed in many ways since members of my family was at school. The modern jobs market means the current generation of Swinsons are spread from Scotland to the Welsh boarders. Today there are only three Swinsons living locally. Peter, Sarbera, Sheridan’s sister and Brenda, Cyril’s widow, who, at the time of writing is now in her 102nd year. The chances of any more of our family attending the School are extremely unlikely. The School has played a major part in the lives of our family over two generations. It was, however, one teacher – J C Dent – who the 1920s inspired in Cyril and Arthur with a love of the written word
and the theatre. His influence, lead directly not only to the cultural enrichment of our city through the Abbey Theatre, but also to their wider contribution to the arts on a national basis and in turn to the current generation of the family in terms of publishing, journalism, books and writing. Our schooling and the people who teach us have an important impact on all our lives, but I doubt whether J C Dent has any idea the influence he had on the lives of so many people.
Blot on the landscape n The following extract is taken from ‘A Matter of Survival’ by Dr Gerald Robinson (48) and recounts how a bottle of Indian ink nearly ruined one of St Albans Abbey’s great works of art
Robin Ollington writes: The following story sent in by Dr Gerald Robinson (48) relates in graphic detail the incredible story of his involvement with several other boys on the huge cutaway architectural
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drawing of the Abbey prepared in the 1940s by the Architect to the Fabric at that time. For those who do not know this amazing piece of draughtsmanship, it can be found hanging in the Treasury of the Abbey where it bears witness to the skills of those who not only worked on it, nearly ruined it, but finally conserved it – certainly well worth looking at when next in St Albans. Bob Tanner had little formal education so it was strange that he would have such an appreciation of architecture. We had Bannister Fletcher’s compendium for reference, and Batsford’s ‘The Parish Church’ was our standard text, and of course the Abbey/Cathedral was just next door where we could see all the styles from Romanesque to Perpendicular Gothic. The nave is like a history book, with columns changing from Saxon to Norman to Gothic as you move along. They had just discovered on the plain pillars dating from Saxon times some early murals that had been painted over, so ghost images of crucifixions and sombre saints and bishops were starting to appear. We learned all the English styles from Saxon to Georgian, and history was far more familiar to us through its architectural expression than through the lists of battles and beheadings we had to learn in History Class. We studied churches, but Mr Tanner gave short shrift to anybody that got too holy about it. He said
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“It’s good to have some religion in your life, but it’s bad to have too much.” (I could not have said it better myself). After studying woodcarving in some churches where the glory of the English parish church is expressed in their rood screens Mr Tanner (I’m going to call him ‘Bob’ now, although I never did then) gave us mallets and chisels and we tried our hands at carving a linenfold panel, which gave us a real appreciation of the skill of those that had done it five centuries earlier. We also built up an association with the Architect of the Fabric who was preparing a drawing of the Cathedral. The walls of the building were massive, and walkways and passages were concealed in the thickness of many of them, with spiral stairs built into the columns connecting the various levels. Some of these passages were a hundred feet up in the air. The Architect had measured the structure, and was preparing a huge cut-away drawing to show its construction. It was a diagonal view of the interior of the tower showing part of the nave and part of the transept, and you could see the little corridors running through the walls and some of them had little people drawn in them. He had made a precise pencil drawing, using instruments, but unfortunately he had developed a bit of a tremor so it was hard for him to ink it in, so Bob arranged for a group of four of us to come into the Art Room after school
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and do the inking. The drawing was huge, about three feet wide by five feet high. It was on a sheet of a special paper called Fabbriano which had been specially imported from Italy and had to stay flat, it could not be rolled up. We had to wear rubber gloves when we were working because we could not touch this precious paper with our grubby little hands. It was a heavy responsibility, and a big one because it was a huge job. We worked at it for several weeks. St Albans Abbey, which was depicted in the drawing, had been commenced around 730 AD by Offa, King of Mercia. In a regrettable urge for economy he used bricks salvaged from the old Roman town of Verulamium to construct the tower. Verulamium was the third largest Roman town in Britain. It was a walled town with a forum, a basilica, and a theatre seating two thousand. Built on the site of an old Iron Age settlement overlooking the River Ver, it was occupied from 50 AD until the departure of the Romans in 430 AD. The drawing of the Abbey tower showed thousands of these bricks from the old Roman town which King Offa had knocked down. Each one had to be individually drawn, using a fine drawing pen and India ink. One evening, four of us were working on the drawing, and perhaps joking around a bit, and somebody knocked over the bottle
of India ink. I don’t know who did it, but it was probably Renton. I can see it now. We stared transfixed as in slow motion the bottle rose off the table and gradually somersaulted over and a flume of black ink emerged from its mouth and formed a black pool on the paper, the convex edge of its tidal wave reflecting our working lights. The pool started to spread. We stared at it, mesmerised by the horror. Then I realised something had to be done, so I picked up this precious sheet of paper which had never before been sullied by human hand, ran with it across the room, dumped it in the sink, and turned on the taps full blast. At least we had stopped the blot from spreading. Not knowing what else to do we sandwiched the sheet between several layers of blotting paper to help it dry out, and we put a piece of glass on top of that which we piled up with weights to keep the sheet flat, and left it overnight, turning off the lights. Next day we did not know what to expect, but when Mr Tanner saw the disaster all he said was “Gor Blimey!” This is a condensation of “May God blind me, that I be preserved from this sight!” He gave out ink erasers to the whole class, that’s a piece of rubber impregnated with carborundum grit, and we took it in turns to rub away at the offending area until our arms got tired. After three Art Classes the traces of the blot were almost gone, but the paper was worn down to half
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its thickness, and it’s slightly dimpled texture had been smoothed off. “Now we’ve got to re-flock the paper.” We embarked on a process of transmutation that would have made an alchemist proud. First, we took a small sheet of the same Fabbriano paper from a sketch pad, and soaked it in methylated spirits, and then painted the back with orange shellac (we gave it a good shellacking!). The shellac gradually diffused through the paper. When it just started to appear on the front surface we held it over the gas and dried it off, and then left it to dry hard. Next day we gave the front surface a thin coat of something called Artists Parting Agent, I have no idea what that was, and put the sheet in a shallow tray. We filled the tray with another material called Dental Plaster, and let it sit. Next day it was rock hard. We turned it over and carefully peeled off the shellacked paper, and there was a mould for the texture of the paper that our rubbing had removed.We softened the paper of our original drawing by holding it in the steam from a kettle, then we clamped it over the plaster mould face down, and with a soft roller forced the paper into the crevices of the mould and left it to dry. We learned it was OK to do this, because that was the way the paper had been made in the first place. When we inspected the results it looked pretty good, except there was
still a faint brownish stain where the blot had been. This we treated cosmetically, giving it a slight dusting of chalk and a spray of Artists Fixative until it blended in. Unless you were looking for it, you would not notice it. The drawing was framed in an oak display stand and placed in the north transept of the Abbey with much ceremony, where it still stands. Visitors find it helps their understanding of the structure that surrounds them. Fifty years after this event I returned to St Albans and made a point of revisiting this work of art which had caused us so much trouble. It was still on display, but to my horror I found that the stain in the upper left corner was starting to reappear! Like the portrait of Dorian Gray, the picture itself was changing in order to reveal the sinfulness which we had covered up. To my eyes the stain was now obvious, and getting darker! On Judgement Day, when all our shortcomings shall be revealed, it will be as black as the original bottle of India Ink. May God protect all poor souls.
David Browne’s schooldays n David Browne (60) has written two articles to mark the approaching 60th anniversary “of the entrance to the School of various luminaries such as Stephen Hawking, and many lesser
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ones, like myself”. The first describes his first impressions of the School in 1952, and the second a memory of Headmaster W T Marsh
September 1952 ‘The past is a foreign country. They do things differently there’ L P Hartley September 1952 certainly now seems a foreign country. War in Korea, rationing, a new monarch, steam trains and coal fires, utility clothing and Aertex, Len Hutton and Stanley Matthews, John Arlott, Raymond Glendenning and John Snagge, Brylcream and brilliantine, Archie Andrews and Ray’s a Laugh, one black and white TV channel (which many of us did not have until the 1953 Coronation); these were just a few features that come to mind. Despite the fading short-term memories of a septuagenarian, my memories of the first few days and weeks at St Albans School are certainly still clear. The first thing I saw was a boy wearing a straw boater (although this was the first and last time I witnessed this phenomenon) and the second was a diminutive bespectacled second former who thrust his face towards mine and cried ‘new bug! There were two of us from Tennyson Road Primary School in Luton – Mike Reilly and myself. Because of parental rivalry we did not really get on – when I was placed in Form 1A my mother’s joy was reduced only by hearing Michael
was in the same form. A year later, when I was relegated to 2B it was a different story – sent to bed with the imprecation ‘How will I lift my head when I meet Mrs Reilly in the street?’ Anyway, there we stood in our new caps and ties, grey jackets, short grey trousers, long grey socks and grey shirts – truly it was a grey era, although the ‘coat of many colours’ which we wore in the summer made up for this. In those days of little or no casual clothing the fear of wearing that blazer in Luton’s streets practically turned me prematurely into a recluse. The first day was a blur. I remember we were lectured by a grand and important person, who told us about the School rules and penalties – we soon learned what ‘up pre’s’ meant. He seemed so important and grown-up that someone raised his cap to him in the street. He was, in fact, the Head Boy. Next to him and his fellow prefects the masters seemed insignificant. I will not go through all the masters – everyone has their own favourite stories – except that I never saw one driving a car and they did seem to confirm to the image of shiny suits and sports jackets with leatherpatched elbows. Nevertheless, to me they mainly seemed a relaxed and friendly bunch, all Oxbridge (the Boat Race was so important that radios were brought into the form room and plugged in for the event) and knowledgeable. I will mention only my nemesis, ‘Joey’ Webb.
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Having dressed me down at length for my atrocious Luton accent and hearing me murmur “you can talk” he weighed in again, saying “Well you certainly cannot, and until you learn to do so, keep your mouth firmly shut.” So the first thing I quickly learned for my father’s outlay of 10 guineas a term, plus extras, was to ‘talk proper.’ Silence was required in the dining room. I still remember an odious meat pie, burnt red jam tart and the popular game, heavily punished, of holding the rice pudding upside down to see if its qualities of adherence would defy the force of gravity – which they did. Dinner tickets cost 1/- for us out-county boys but sixpence for the scholarship winners. Basil King soon sent up an arrangement with one of his friends (John McClenehan or Stephen Hawking?) whereby they bought tickets at sixpence and sold them to Basil for ninepence – a mutual weekly profit of 1/6d, which would buy many biscuits in the tuck shop. Our first Rugby lesson was at Belmont with Dad Reed, whose kit consisted of a pair of boots and socks into which he tucked his trousers. The showers needed crampons to climb into – my fear was the slatted boards on which we huddled would collapse and send us into the bowels of the earth. Others started at the Causeway and its cowpats, where there were no changing rooms – one changed in a form room and padded barefoot and naked except for a towel across the
Hall to the showers under the stairs. No wonder we all got verrucas. For some there was the luxury of King Harry Lane, the new playing fields a cross-country uphill march away but with all the facilities. For PE (or was it PT in those days?) we performed in the Hall, changing in the doorless cloakroom with its icy winter blast. Thankfully, when we reached the third form the gym block was built. The Orchard was the one place we could play football and I could do my Ron Baynham (Luton and England goalkeeper) impressions. There was also the tuck shop – a delight in those days of sweet rationing. The one person missing from our acquaintance was the demon Headmaster, WT Marsh. First forms did not go to assembly, so we only saw him sweeping up the aisle of the Abbey twice a week. Unless one was a miscreant and had to visit him after getting two masters’ initials on the form’s report card (another feature of school life to which we were quickly introduced) one could avoid the fearsome presence and indeed some boys may have passed their entire career without a close encounter, but his perpetually angry persona loomed over all of us and we learned that he was to be avoided at all costs. Saturday school, rugby, petty rules and regulations, a strict hierarchy, masters and prefects in gowns, corporal punishment (though rarely exercised on first formers), heaps of ‘prep’, a real social mix of
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ex-prep school and ex-state primary school boys – these were all features to which we quickly had to adjust. Truly it was a foreign country, both then and now, but one which we septuagenarians all remember clearly. Was it really 60 years ago? Memories of W T Marsh Whenever OAs of a certain vintage meet (for example at the OA Golfing Society events) and talk is about the School, the name of the man whom Time magazine inaccurately titled ‘ruddy-faced Thomas William Marsh’ arises. (Some brave soul crossed out the word ‘faced’ in the Library copy). The story of WTM, who took over the School when it was apparently at a low ebb and led it through 30 years of depression, war, shortages and so on, taking it to an eminent position, is well-documented. Undoubtedly
he deserved his reputation, which has been perpetuated in the choice of his name to be one of the four houses in the School’s revised house system. However, Marsh was a man who believed in the autocratic style of management, something not uncommon as a management style then, or for many years afterwards. (I write as a teacher of 32 years myself, and as a former Chief Examiner in A Level Business Studies). To us, he often appeared to be irascible and intolerant. How much of this was an act will never be known but undoubtedly he had a clear belief in his powers of leadership and policy, and operated on a short fuse. His perpetual state of (assumed?) fury was often marvellous to behold. Many boys may never have come face-to-face with him unless taught A-Level Classics or being sent to
The 1959 athletics team: David Browne pictured middle row, third from left
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him ‘on report.’ A conversation with WTM tended to be one-sided, as he had a clear belief in the veracity of his arguments and did not appear to welcome discussion and, one was reminded of Queen Victoria’s complaint about Gladstone that “he always addresses me as if I am a public meeting.” So, unless one was a perpetual miscreant, WTM was mainly viewed at a distance and his reputation as a mixture of Ivan the Terrible and Robespierre lost nothing in the telling by those who had encountered him at close quarters, who were, in truth, usually serial offenders. Assemblies were often entertaining. Sometimes Marsh’s oratory rose steadily somewhat in the manner of a Nuremburg rally, but without the audience participation. On other occasions wrath erupted suddenly and unexpectedly such as the time when an innocent soul entered assembly wearing a duffel coat. “Get out and wait outside my study, you damned sub-mariner type” was the roar from the platform. Clearly Lt Commander WT Marsh RN retired regarded the brave sailors of the submarine branch as the lowest form of life in the Royal Navy. Once we were treated to a verbal demonstration of how to maintain a rising cry of ‘schoooool’ when watching the first XV. Report cards were a feature of each form. If your name occurred twice in a term you paraded on Saturday lunchtime to be told the
error of your ways. If a black blob appeared above your name after several visits it meant you would be examining the carpet at close range. A red blob probably meant blood would be drawn or else Marsh’s look-alike, his fearsome boxer dog Jason, would be set loose. Once a report card went missing and it was practically a case for Interpol, as dire threats were issued and interrogations took place. To his chagrin, WTM never solved this crime. I was only placed on report once. Marsh whipped through the names of first-time offenders – “goodbye, Smith, goodbye, Jones” and so on until he thankfully said “goodbye, Browne.” I hastily and apparently unnecessarily politely replied “goodbye, sir” and scuttled out at great speed. My next face-to-face- encounter came a year or so later when Marsh decided that too many people were avoiding Saturday afternoon games and he would personally examine all the ‘excuse’ notes. Being in the rugby and athletics teams (although I would have far preferred to play soccer and cricket – but that is another story) I must have been genuinely injured or ill on this occasion (it may have been at the time of the great Asian flu epidemic). Marsh glanced at my note, snorted and went round the other sick, lame and lazy until he reached Larry Rumsey-Williams. Larry says he cannot remember the event but it was the bravest act I ever witnessed in my eight years
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at School. “What is wrong with you, Rumsey-Williams?” evoked the extraordinary response “I want to go to a soccer match, sir.” Ruddyfaced WTM went red, purple, puce, heliotrope and several other colours as he spluttered incredulously. The event was recognised a few weeks later in the Corps Show with the rhyming couplet “Know you not what it incurs to see the Wolves play the Spurs?” Marsh gained his revenge when teaching Larry for A Level Latin by failing to complete the set book before the date of the examination. On a school trip to Rome, when fog kept us in the Channel for seven hours and Marsh bagged the only sleeper in the train in what turned out to be a 24-hour journey, I saw the more relaxed side of our headmaster. He even selected my report of the trip for publication in the School magazine (Albanian volume 21, no1, May 1959) and wrote that it was “pleasantly able”. On re-reading it over 50 years later I cannot believe that WTM did not re-write it – I am sure I was not that eloquent in those days – or even today! Later, in my last term I played the organ in the Abbey for school services, for which he wrote a nice comment on my report and sent a note of thanks to my parents. Yet, when at a recent golf event I remarked that Marsh’s bark was worse than his bite I received the riposte from a colleague that “If you had had six of the best from him you would not say that.”
My final encounter was a quite astonishing one and came in my last term when I was in the Third Year Sixth, 19 years old and rather demob-happy. WTM swept into the prefects’ room carrying a sadlooking chair. Starting his speech with heavy irony he stated that “nothing is dearer to my heart than the welfare and dignity of the prefects…” before proceeding to berate us for damaging the furniture in the prefects’ room. As he became ever more furious I could not help it – I laughed. This provoked another ‘Rumsey-Williams’ moment. After a clear demonstration of controlled rage all he could come out with was “You, you, you, you silly Browne!” He had never forgiven me for accepting a place at LSE, which he could never bring himself to name, but always called “that place.” At the end of this bravura performance he invited us to join him in wrecking the furniture and showing deft footwork for a soccer hater, proceeded to kick seven bells out of the chair he had brought in. Clearly, he had planned the whole spectacular performance by bringing in this chair in the first place. As we looked on in various states of emotion, the intrepid Mike Tangye took up the invitation to join in and together they reduced this chair to matchwood before Marsh made a spectacular exit from the room and from my life in an apparent fury that was wonderful to behold. Mike was clearly on the right track as next term he was made Head Boy.
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Colonel F A M Webster The grandson of author, javelin champion and Olympic coach Colonel F A M Webster (c 1904) has sent us two photos from 1903. His book Our Great Public Schools features a chapter on St Albans School, and copies are available at: http://www.abebooks.co.uk/book-search/author/webster-f-a-m/
St Albans School Football Club 1903; below, St Albans School OTC133
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Playing God n Former PE Master Mike Nurton fondly recalls his time at St Albans School as some of the most exciting and rewarding of his teaching career
In a teaching career one hopes to make a positive impression on those in one’s care. It would be foolish to pretend that is always the case and there are still students who recall their school career less than enthusiastically. It was therefore with surprise and dare I say pride when Robert Sharpe passed the recent OA Bulletin with a chuckle and the words “you’re mentioned on page 39 for kicking someone up the backside.” It was only when I read the article by Simon Clark that I was truly amazed at the accurate recollections of his school career in the early ’70s. Indeed it is a bit scary to realise that one’s behaviour was being scrutinised so closely. Only recently I strolled around the Lake with my wife and peering through the trees pointed out to her that the new school sports centre has been built on ground where I did most of my rugby training. Fifty sprints up The Orchard slope before lessons usually followed after school by Pete Avery’s fitness training in the gym. Generals, sit-ups, star jumps, press-ups and sprinting on the spot always going as fast as the fastest (fittest?) person. Dick Ashby, Alan Towersey and John Gittins usually led the way,
with Andy Mills-Baker lagging some distance behind! Perhaps Simon’s perception of lessons in the New Block being boring is not quite so accurate. Joey Webb’s unpredictable behaviour from standing on a table at the front of the class and announcing his name was Webb and he was mad to Charles Bloxham’s ability to write on the blackboard whilst sitting in a chair facing the class were legendary. Bob Wilkinson, of course, was a shining star and desperately unlucky in my view not to win more England caps. We used to travel together to play for Hertfordshire in the county championship and he also joined me at Bedford Rugby Club where he enjoyed a long and distinguished career. On a tour to Jersey he was introduced by Gareth Davies in his broad Welsh accent as still a schoolboy and at six foot and four inches “a big boy for an 11 year-old.” These were some of the most exciting and enjoyable years of my teaching career and I retain fond memories of my time at St Albans School. I also met my wife during that time although that was not in the school but in the Cross Keys in Harpenden! Earlier this year I watched the OAs play against Taunton at Woollams and so appreciated my warm welcome. Thank you Simon for stirring up such fond memories and, incidentally, I still attempt to play God in my role as a Licensed Lay Minister.
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Building bridges n Michael Sygrove (64) leaves the ‘waifs and strays’ list, contacting us from Australia to describe a globetrotting career in civil engineering
I stumbled across the OA Bulletin on the Web just recently and found myself in the ‘waifs and strays’ page. Does anyone know the whereabouts of Michael Sygrove? Well, yes I do. I graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree in Civil Engineering from Hatfield Polytechnic (now the University of Hertfordshire) in 1968 after completing a four year thick sandwich course which, I hasten to add, was not a sandwich course for the less gifted, but a course with an intervening one-year period in industry. I joined the Hertfordshire County Council Highways Department and, in turn, I was seconded to the Eastern Road Construction Unit, working on the design of roads and bridges; you may have passed over some of them. I went to Redpath Dorman Long in their Bedford design office and worked on design of the Westgate Bridge reconstruction and strengthening. The bridge, over the River Yarra in Melbourne, collapsed with lost lives during construction, largely due to elementary engineering principles being unrecognised. I then joined Oscar Faber & Partners and was responsible for the structural design of the new workshop and classroom block
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at the School, where the old hat factory once stood and which was the domain of Mr Westgarth Walker, the Masters’ Common Room and Sergeant Major Kilpatrick’s Orderly Room. Working for Oscar Faber took me to Hope in Derbyshire for a year or so, building a new railway viaduct, and later to Nigeria, designing a branch railway line to a cement works. I guess that the travel bug had bitten, despite the two coups which occurred at that time. I was recruited to the Tehran office of a Danish consulting engineering company and was there for the last two years of the Shah’s reign and the first few months of the republic, designing and supervising major road, railway and bridge projects throughout the country. Of course, we had to leave Tehran in something of a hurry, mainly because of the lack of functioning government to continue our work, but I picked up a job quite quickly with Brian Colquhoun and Partners in London, designing bridges for projects in London and Kent. In 1981 we came to Australia and settled in Brisbane, where we remain to this day. This was encouraged by my Grandfather, who was born in Australia and returned here after my Grandmother died in 1953. He had fought at Gallipoli and on the Somme but was wounded and hospitalised near Shefford, married a local girl and lived on Watford Road near the Three Hammers. I married Carole in 1989 and we have two children, Craig, born in Harpenden,
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and Jeanette, born in Tehran. Since moving to Australia, my Civil Engineering career has taken me all around Australia, to Abu Dhabi, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam and Sarawak, much of this for cement works projects and silos, which have become my speciality. At 65, I am starting to retire from working full time, but will keep working on jobs that interest me; we all have a limited lifespan, but who knows what that limit is? So now we will travel more, not to visit places as much as cultures, and their foods.
Never missing a beat n Martyn Simmons adds an amusing memory of his own to Jeff Brown’s article on the CCF Band published in the last issue of the OA Bulletin
I was one of the two tenor drummers in the band from 1956 to 1958. Our part was not only to beat time with our drums, but also to put on a flamboyant display of twirling the sticks around on strings attached to our middle fingers. I particularly remember the Mayoral Parade in October 1957, because as we paraded down St Peters Street my drumstick parted company with the string around my finger and performed a gracious arc up over the band and was fielded by a very alert bugler at the rear of the band. By a very clever set of manoeuvres my drumstick was returned to me in the front row and
nobody missed a beat! I believe the photo of the band taken at Shoeburyness was not taken in 1958 but perhaps in 1959, as I don’t recall going on that camp in 1958 as a member of the CCF band.
Midnight raids n Alan T Peart (48) writes of his memories of boarding at Woollams during the war – including a midnight raid on the School larder!
At age 11, I was sent to the school from Finchley in North London in order to avoid the bombing (which had barely started in early 1941). The choice was between School House and Woollams, and I believe my parents chose Woollams as offering more of a homely atmosphere. Funny that! My first night was spent in the cellar, on a bunk bed made from 4” x 2” timbers, along with maybe seven other pupils. In spite of this, it did feel homely under the stewardship of the housemaster “Daddy” Reed. Rationing became more and more intense, and coupons (called “points”) were needed for a lot of foodstuffs. Luckily, however, a baker on Holywell Hill was able to supply us each with a small loaf of bread on our way back for lunch each day. This filled us up enough to be able to survive on the lunch provided! Towards the end of the war, a group of boys (who shall be nameless) made a midnight raid on the larder. This involved careful
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removal of the staples holding wire netting over the larder window, and slipping the sash fastener to allow the window to be raised for entry. Tins of corned beef, Spam, sardines and other delicacies were handed out and taken to the garden shed. After careful replacement of the wire netting, all the food was devoured and the empty cans hidden under the floor of the shed. We all crept back to bed without sickness or discovery, and I believe it was several years before the empty cans were found. Totting up the “points” count for the evening came to well over a year’s worth for a family, but I don’t remember us going hungry after that: it may have hit the staff meals, however! The garden shed was mainly used for modelling ships and aeroplanes out of balsa wood – obtainable from an excellent toy shop right in the town centre but hidden from view down narrow passageways. We could also climb onto the shed to pick walnuts and sweet chestnuts off the trees overhanging from next door. Also in the garden was a large green wooden building, euphemistically called the Library, because the far end was covered with books. Mostly, we used this place to read books obtained from the town library, which had an excellent selection for schoolboy reading. It was from this that I developed an interest in engineering, ending up as a Chartered Engineer. Now long retired, I am building a skeleton longcase clock entirely
from wood and glue and polish, and nothing else. It has been running spasmodically, but is still demanding attention to get it to keep going for more than two days. The most reliable part has turned out to be the chain carrying the ebony weight. It is of bicycle chain form, made from teak veneer ply pieces with maple pivots, and is over three metres in length. I have searched worldwide for another all-wood clock, but they have been let down by metal weights, cord, or tiny metal pins. Can any other OA show me a true competitor?
WTM and Mensa n Tony Quance recalls a particularly painful Latin lesson when Headmaster W T Marsh hit upon a novel way of teaching declension
In the last Bulletin, I read with some amusement Richard Goosey’s plaudit of WTM’s legendary teaching skills. My personal recollection is somewhat different. On one rare occasion, Mr Jarry was not present for a Latin lesson, so WTM entered our 1A class as a procession of one. Very obviously, WTM had it in for me that day, and my inability to decline the 1st declension noun for table, “mensa”, got him hot under the collar. Not a difficult thing to do. After standing behind me and slapping “mensa, mensa, mensam” etc…. into my head a couple of times, I finally got it. To this day, I have never forgotten how to decline
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mensa. However, in the intervening 54 years, I have never been called upon to recite it. You can say one thing about WTM; if reason and persistence wouldn’t work, violence was always a good standby.
In concert n Dr Robert Luder (75) writes of the pleasures in taking part in the St Albans Joint Schools Choir Concert 2012 – and encourages others to join in!
About six years ago, an old school friend of mine, Tom Willson, mentioned to me that he sang in a concert annually in the Cathedral, and suggested I joined in. I thought I would give it a try, as I had become musically restless after seeing my two daughters perform at various of London’s top venues with a very good local children’s choir. And so, I have now sung for the past six years in this choir, which is a tremendous privilege, given the practices taken by either the Girls High School or Boys School musical directors (Nigel Springthorpe or Mick Stout respectively), and the amazing venue to sing in of St Albans Cathedral. It was certainly very odd indeed to walk into the School Hall for the first practice when I began in 2007, having not set foot in it since 1975. Even odder still perhaps, was actually being recognised by the music teacher who was around in my time, Robert McCord, now overall musical
supremo at the boys school! Over the past years, we have always sung something of great merit and highly enjoyable to take part in, and this year was no exception. Taking place on Wednesday 21st March, we sang Mozart’s famous Requiem, which he died writing, and Handel’s oft-sung Zadok the Priest. The joint schools orchestra played Vaughn-Williams’ fabulous Fantasia on a theme by Thomas Tallis, which they did brilliantly. I think we carried it off, and having 14 tenors, 20 or so basses, and over 50 female voices in the altos and sopranos, makes a tremendous noise in such a large space as the Cathedral. It was well attended, with over 120 people there, I believe. Anyone at all can join in and sing in this choir, which is not auditioned. You don’t even have to have any connection to either school, but most people seem to either be or have been, parents or ex-pupils. I have sung over the past six years with other fellow pupils, such as Mark Waller, also in my year at school, and Peter Baker, from the year above. I would definitely encourage any of you to join in, and it only involves rehearsals from mid-January until the concert in mid-March, so isn’t a huge commitment.
Payne remembered n Anthony Lane (48) remembers former master PO Christopher Payne who died in action in 1941,
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and sends us an obituary written by Headmaster W T Marsh for ‘The Albanian’ in January 1942, together with an editorial comment from the time
I was moved to see in the last Bulletin that photograph of a gravestone in Brookwood Military cemetery, to someone described as “PO Christopher Payne (OA) who died in 1941”. However, I felt that something there wasn’t quite right. Then, putting my memory into gear, I realised that it was in fact the grave not of an OA but of Christopher Bradley Payne, a member of staff. I just missed him at the School since I didn’t start there until September 1941, by which time he had joined up. Nevertheless his death must have made a great impression on me and not just his death but also his personality, even though I had never so much as seen him. For one thing he came from Mill Hill, as I did. The striking photograph in The Albanian must have made me, even as a 12 year-old, open to taking in the gist of the obituary. Then at that time I belonged to the Crusader Bible Class in Mill Hill and there Christopher Bradley Payne was held in the highest regard, having been one of its leaders. That regard was so magnificent that, that too I registered. We didn’t then talk of role models, but I think that unconsciously he became that for me. The world was
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certainly a poorer place on account of his death and by it St Albans School suffered a grievous loss. CHRISTOPHER BRADLEY PAYNE Pilot Officer RAFVR Killed on Active Service in December, 1941 When Bradley Payne left us in October 1940, to join the RAF, he had already endeared himself in the hearts of Masters and Boys alike. He had always refused to allow his lameness to be a barrier to his prowess on the rugger field, in the bath, and in athletics generally and this determination of character, coupled with his fearlessness and sense of duty, set at nought also any idea of rejection even for a Service demanding the highest standards. In his training he was head of his course and obtained one of four commissions granted out of fifty candidate. He gloried in flying and was acknowledged to be a first-rate pilot. It is heart-breaking to record his passing – killed on active service during the last month of the year. I felt it to be special though indeed a sad privilege to be able to be present when he was laid to rest with military honours on January 7th 1942, in beautiful surroundings amid a noble company of others who had sacrificed their all in the same cause. In bright sunshine the snow-covered scene formed an impressively simple, almost unearthly, setting for an intimate farewell, and I knew I was carrying
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with me the thoughts, the pride, the grief of all who knew him at School. His mother had written to me on the day when she first learned that he had been killed; a wonderful letter from which I quote with reverence and admiration: “He loved the School and was thoroughly happy there. He would have wished to be spared longer in order to take more part in this terrible war, but he had perfect faith and trust in God and was prepared for any fate. Whatever he has passed through, I am certain that his gallant spirit is not broken or his faith dimmed. He had very many and great friends and has had a wonderfully happy life full of scope and service. Our great personal loss and sorrow is only a tiny part of the sufferings of the world and his brave spirit is with us still …. I shall always think of the School with affection because of the great happiness he had there with his fellow workers and with the boys. The place too he loved with its beauty and traditions.” I must also quote from a short appreciation written by HGB in The Times of January 14th. It reads as follows: “The news of the death of PilotOfficer Christopher B Payne while serving with the RAF has brought a sharp pang of sorrow to his very wide circle of friends, not least of whom are hundreds of children. His boisterous light-heartedness was never mere frivolity, for beneath it lay great depths of character which
were patent to all who knew him. The inspiration of his personality was his Christian faith. This was the motive power of all his activity at the University, in the classroom, and elsewhere. He displayed a remarkable love for young people and children, to whom he devoted his career and his leisure. The number of young people who are now practicing Christians through his influence is an eloquent testimony to him”. I could write at length in full and heartfelt testimony to his fine character, his work, his influence for good, his successes at Woollams, with the fifteen, with the swimming teams. My words of remembrance at the first Masters’ Meeting and the first Assembly of term could only be inadequate though sincere tributes. The Dean at the first Abbey Service of the term nobly and simply expressed what all of us feel. And yet my most vivid memories of Bradley Payne will always be these: one, of a pilot paying a flying visit to the School and to the playing fields where but a few months previously he had been taking forms and coaching the fifteen – a pilot handling his machine with mastery, dash, determination. The other, of a figure departing along a stretch of sands in North Devon during the summer of 1940 – a figure surrounded by a happily enthusiastic band of children, one tiny tot carried high on sturdy shoulders. The memory of this gallant and lovable master will remain with
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many others as well as with me, and the example of his life as of his death will forever be an inspiration to all he knew and especially to us at St Albans School. W T Marsh Editor’s Note: Mr C Bradley Payne was 27 years old; he was educated at Mill Hill School and St Peter’s Hall, Oxford, where he took an Honours Degree in Modern Languages and secured several College Colours. On leaving Oxford he was for a year a Master at Dudley Grammer School. He came to St Albans School in September, 1938 and was Housemaster at Woollams. He soon made a name for the School swimming teams and the successes of the 1939 and 1940 seasons were directly due to his energy and coaching skills. He took over the First Fifteen – on Mr Bloxham’s departure for the Artillery – at the beginning of the Autumn Term 1940, and he had firmly laid the foundations of what proved to be one of the best seasons the School fifteen has ever had before he joined the RAF about half-term. He came to visit us on many of his leaves; his last visit was shortly before his death.
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Putting names to faces n Brian Davidson (53) – who was also a member of staff from 1959-62 – helps us identify some of the missing names from the photo of the masters which appeared on page 26 of the previous issue of the OA Bulletin
One in from the left in the top row is H E Wortley, who taught history and was Senior Master in succession, I think, to Joe Barnett’s father. His son Richard A. was Head Boy and Captain of the worst First XV ever in the Autumn term, 1952. He followed his father to Exeter College, Oxford and went on, I believe, to work in the BBC. He was also a very good tennis player. One OA, certainly older than myself, should be able to pick out in the staff photo R O Sanders, the old boy who wrote the ‘Little Black Book’. He was probably already beyond retirement age when he taught Form 1(1) in my first term, September 1945. We were shocked to learn of his death early in the Christmas holiday 1945.
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OA SPORT
Rugby
Sent to Coventry n Chairman Nick Hallett (65) celebrates as the Old Albanian Rugby Club joins the elite top 40 clubs in England and looks forward to fixtures against famous names like Blackheath, Rosslyn Park and Coventry
Two years ago it was exciting to report that OAs had been promoted out of National League Three South (the league formerly known as London 1) to Level Four – National League 2 South. After a year of consolidation when the club managed to finish fifth out of sixteen contenders, this season the dizzy heights of National League 1 have been reached as, for the first time, OAs were declared League Champions in front of the clubhouse on the last fixture of the season at Launceston RFC. This means that next season OAs’ fixture list will include such august names as Blackheath, Esher, Rosslyn Park and – does anybody remember the halcyon days of David Duckham, the Peters, Preece and Rossborough and Fran Cotton? – yes, Coventry. Much of the credit for this success must go to Director of Rugby and player/coach, James Shanahan and his team of skipper/coach, Lawrence White, Bruce Millar and manager Jamie Simpson. ‘Shanners’ and his team have moulded and kept together a winning squad of players, the
majority of whom played all the way through from the first to the last fixtures of the season and who have come to play a brand of entertaining rugby underpinned by an unforgiving defence. Although bagging a few victories at the start of the season, the teams who really mattered – the clubs which beat OAs at home and away last season – still managed wins, albeit with margins considerably reduced. The pivotal moment was at home against Southend in late October 2011 as a 22-15 lead was overturned to a 22-33 loss. After the match, Shanahan was seen to be banging his head against the post upright in frustration. From that moment on, OAs put together nineteen straight wins in a row, only slipping up by one point against Launceston in the final game. In that time the target clubs, Henley, Richmond, Hartpury College, Worthing (twice) and, cockles all round, Southend were all well beaten. Over the season, OAs scored fifty points or over eight times, scored 1,095 points total and had by far the best points difference (a possible deciding factor if matters are close) of 592 – 153 better than second-place rivals, Richmond. In the thirty-match season, OAs only lost only those five matches. No 8, Andrew Daish was top try-scorer with twenty-three, whilst longserving No 15 and kicker Richard Gregg slotted 101 conversions - 20 more than his nearest rival - 20 penalties and scored seven tries
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for a personal tally of 297 points. Wing Ollie Marchon and centre Terry Adams were both among the league’s top try-scorers but both suffered from injury during the season; Adams did not play after a tumultuous game at Hartpury College (aka Gloucester Seconds) although Marchon returned six weeks after being injured in the same match. A major downside to the championship celebrations has been the poor attendances at Woollams compared with our rivals. This is in part due to the large concentration of other clubs, either in St Albans or within a ten-mile radius; however Hertford, also in the same league this last season but, alas, relegated
can quite easily double OAs’ match attendances at their club. This begs the question – have you as an OA been to a match? If you have you will know how exciting the atmosphere can become when the OA backs get into their stride. If you haven’t then a treat awaits as we welcome older and betterknown opposition in the new Level Three National League 1 season beginning at the end of August 2012. Better still, join the club as a Vice President and also enjoy the many VP and Supporters’ lunches held prior to home fixtures at Woollams. Find out more at www.oarugby. com or see the next fixture board outside the club gates. Nick Hallett
Golf
Second round n Secretary Peter Dredge reports on a successful end to the 2011 season, and looks forward to further success under Captain Anthony Bolton – back by popular demand for a second season
The final major of the 2011 season, the Briggs Goblets, was held at Mid-Herts GC in October. After a lengthy and careful scrutiny of the scorecards submitted, John Van Der Welle and Peter Dew triumphed with an incredible 46 stableford points. Runners-up were David Browne and Kevin O’Donoghue with 42 points.
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The secretary found himself under considerable pressure from other members to undertake an immediate review of handicaps (difficult with 4-ball better ball format). Tony Bolton, one of our top players, is doing a sterling job as Captain of our prestigious Society and continues by popular demand for a second season. Tony presided over an enjoyable and highly successful end of season dinner at Woollams attended by 44 members and their ladies. The first event in 2012 was a winter warm-up (March 20C!) team competition at Hadley Wood GC. Winners were Nigel Moore, Larry
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Legendary Olympic sprinter Michael Johnson practices his line-out skills at Woollams while visiting Saracens to deliver a motivational talk Š Graham Hughes Photography
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Rumsey Williams and Ian McKenzie, closely followed by Archie McDonald, Simon Cooper and Rick Drakard. The programme for the remainder of 2012 is: 20th July: OAs v Old Fullerians at Mid-Herts GC (pm) 10th August: OAs v Old Haberdashers at Harpenden Common GC (pm) 17th August: OAs v Old Cholmeleians at Highgate GC (pm) 2/3/4th September: Trip to Thorpeness, Suffolk
21st September: London Old Boys Foursomes at Highgate GC (pm) 26th October: Briggs Goblets at Mid-Herts GC (am) 23rd November: Annual Dinner at OA Sports Pavilion, Woollams All OAs are warmly invited to attend any of these events, whatever level of ability (handicaps range from 2 to 28). The main aim is to enjoy some friendly occasions and to meet up with contemporaries. Peter Dredge Secretary OA Golf
Angling
Tight lines, David n Honorary Secretary Geoff Cannon reports on a sad winter for the OA Angling Club with the loss of President David Morgan, who died in January
Over the winter season the Club continued with its monthly meetings except in February when the nonfishing outing took place. Members visited Warwick and The Ashmolean Museum in Oxford. No connection to fishing, but an enjoyable weekend for those attending. Members continued to fish over the winter especially taking advantage of the local Verulam Angling Club waters. The autumn weekend to Norfolk took place, fishing on sections of the
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Norfolk Broads. The Fishwives Supper was held in November and was well attended. Our President, David Morgan, who had been President since 1974, was taken ill at Christmas and unfortunately died in January. He will be greatly missed. New members are always welcomed to the Club, all they have to do is to contact Geoff Cannon, whose details are below. Geoff Cannon Honorary Secretary, OA Angling Club 14-16 Church End Redbourn AL3 7DU Tel: 01727 861622 (daytime) 01582 792512 (evening) Fax: 01727 861623 E-Mail: cannonmorgan@btconnect.com
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David Browne’s schooldays: more photos from our contributor (see page 38) Above, the 1957/58 2nd XV; below, the 1959 vintage 2nd XV, captained by David Browne, holding ball
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David Browne’s schooldays continued: more photos from our contributor (see page 38) Above, the 1955 Under 15 XV; below, the 1957 athletics squad, coached by ‘Laddie’ Finley
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