Page 126 - The Light Dragoon 2024

The Regimental Journal of The Light Dragoons
a member of the England Under 23 squad and was an electrifying centre with rare flair, but sadly the England cap never quite happened – perhaps because of a knee damaged while playing for Richmond from which he never fully recovered.
He volunteered to be on the advance party for a 6 month UN tour in Cyprus with 16/5L. This involved finding an agreeable house, as a base for checking out the beaches and contacting the girls whose names and addresses he had been given. Back in England, Philip found time to take up polo where, with the relaxed confidence that was his hallmark, he was soon a competent rider and skilled enough to play in teams that reached the finals of the Captains and Subalterns and Inter- Regimental polo tournaments. Once his regrettably short time with the Regiment was over, he maintained his friendships through sport especially as a founding member of the Fantasians, a travelling cricket side, which is still going after some 40 years. Taking breaks from a very successful career in pub management, he walked in stages with some friends from North Somerset via Canterbury to Rome, following in the footsteps of a 10th Century Archbishop of Canterbury. The route was just over 1500 miles.
The one sport he played into later life was golf. Astonishingly, he would use the “wrong” club to send the ball improbable distances. He never used a driver but might favour an eight iron instead. That could be a metaphor for Philip’s approach to life. Despite his apparent conventionality, he made his own way and was not easily deflected from what he thought was right. Those of us who were fortunate to know him will remember him as a thoughtful and kind man, who took great pleasure from life and conveyed that pleasure to those around him, especially his wife Alex and their large family to whom he was devoted. His enigmatic smile was the outward sign of a man of great modesty and integrity.
JS
J M Westcott
Italian colony where the United Nations has appointed Britain to support its post-war transition.
After a long voyage by ship, John arrived in Libya in June 1948 and two weeks later reached B squadron in Misrata. He wrote in his diary: “I brought a draft of ten men with me, four sacks of barley for the horses, a drum of oil for the armoured car guns, and cases of whisky and brandy for the officers.”
The regiment’s role was internal security. On the day of his arrival at B squadron, a troop of armoured cars was stood-to during an outbreak of civil unrest in Tripoli, but was stood down again when the police brought things under control. Later, his troop was one of two called on to provide an escort for a convoy of trucks carrying Tunisian men who had volunteered to fight against the newly-formed state of Israel and were being sent back home through Libya.
For the rest of his tour, the squadron was based in Barce, further along the coast, where despite a lack of further major incidents, “the time seems to pass very quickly”, as he wrote in September 1948. “A week ago I had a week-end in Benghazi playing cricket, before that three of us spent a week-end at Cyrene. Last week the squadron was out two days on a scheme in the Djebel. This week we are all going to camp by the sea for gunnery practice – after that, more schemes. Every day there is sport, every day there is routine work.”
One such “scheme” near the end of his tour proved to be a highlight. His troop navigated across the desert to a ruined fort. “We live in comparative luxury in an armoured car regiment because everything is carried on the car. A portable cooker, pot, waterproof bivouac cover, tent-pole, electric light laid on, places inside for everything (my camera fits nicely into a smoke canister container and binoculars hang neatly on a hatch handle). Room for a camp-bed and a bedding -roll and camp-bed inside. A wireless which can be tuned into a civilian radio station for amusement.”
After being demobbed and returning home to Somerset, John opted for the law as a career, taking Law Society exams in London, where he met his first wife, Anne. They married in 1956. In 1960, they moved to Bristol and he joined what is now Veale Wasbrough Vizards. He became a partner two years later and stayed at the firm for the rest of his career, retiring as managing partner.
John specialised in family law and became a pioneer of mediation as a way of offering married couples a way of settling disputes out of court. The ground-breaking Bristol Family Mediation was eventually set up, with John as its first director.
He started voluntary work in the youth sector soon after moving to Bristol. He became chair of Avon Youth Association and also helped to steer Kingswood school in East Bristol through its transition from a reform school to its present incarnation as the Creative Youth Network, offering training, education and support for young people.
After retiring from the law, he kept busy with Kingswood, served on the Pensions Tribunal and took an MSC in Child Welfare at Bristol University, which he received in his seventies. Home was Baltonsborough in Somerset, where John was fully involved in village life, serving as a school governor and chairman of the Royal British Legion.
He is survived by his second wife Jennifer, his children Catherine and Tim, and six
grandchildren.
the Bogs, an area of old grassland. Even in his mid-70’s he had an electric bike!
He did National Service from 1958-60, undergoing initial training [at the new Hadrian’s Army Camp] at Carlisle [and trained as a wireless operator].
He married Molly then served in Malaya in the King’s Dragoon Guards before trans- ferring to the 13/18thRoyal Hussars for the rest of his service.
He travelled out by ship [on the Steamship Oxfordshire], it took 21 days, stopping at Gibraltar, Aden, Ceylon and Singapore. During the Malaya Insurgency Emergency, he went on motor patrols, radio exercises, learned to drive in a Ferret Scout Car and went by train north to Johor. Here he was assigned to drive a Saracen personnel carrier- a novel experience but he survived in a dangerous environment.
In November 1959 he sailed back to England and was home for Christmas and
TW
Mr B Barkley
Died 1 May 2023 Served 1969 - 1975
Mr C King
Died 3 May 2023 Served 1958 – 1960
Clive was born on 20 November 1938
From an early age he liked speed- sledging down the path at Railway Gardens to
Died 21 April 2023 Served 1948 – 1950
John Miles Westcott, who has died aged 94, was a solicitor who specialised in family law and whose lifetime of voluntary work with young
people was rewarded with an MBE in 2009.
On leaving Taunton School in Somerset, he was called up for two years of National Service. After basic training in Barnard Castle and Bovington, he was commis- sioned in the 13th/18th Hussars. At the time he joined in 1948, the regiment was in Cyrenaica (now Libya), then a former
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