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professional artists to complete the camouflage. From late 1941 until the end of the war, he served as chief instructor at the Camouflage Development and Training Camp at Helwan in Egypt. Announcing victory at El Alamein in the House of Commons, Winston Churchill praised the work of the camouflage directorate: ‘By a marvellous system of camouflage, complete surprise was achieved in the desert’.
After the war, Cott returned to Cambridge and became a fellow of Selwyn College, where he worked until he retired in 1967. After his retirement, he continued to take part in expeditions, including surveying crocodile nests on the Nile at the age of 72. Hugh Cott, one of the select bunch of wartime camoufleurs, died in 1987.
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