Page 142 - RSDG Year of 2022 CREST

150 EAGLE AND CARBINE John Houghton
John Houghton was born on 19 June 1935 and joined The Royal Scots Greys in 1952. He was training as a radio operator when the Regimental Band of the Royal Scots Greys under the directorship of WO1 DW Turner was heard rehearsing in the barracks. John thought this would be a great opportunity to see if he could
possibly join. The Bandmaster was not aware that John was brought up in the Brass Band World and played the cornet in Bentham Silver Band in a market town in Yorkshire. He passed his audition and was invited to join as a cornet player. Little did he know and only found out later that the band was desperate for cornet players. He often said “I could have auditioned on a watering can and still got in, they were that desperate.”
It wasn’t long before he was on a troopship, HMT Empire Ken, from Liverpool bound for Algiers. The
John Gerrard
band also went out to Libya staying in barracks in Barce, Tobruk and finishing in Benghazi where, in June 1954, the Regiment paraded for the Queen’s Birthday Parade at Lumsden Barracks. The band and elements of the Regiment were also involved with the Ford Motor Company tour in Holland in 1955. This involved a fleet of white ford cars chauffeured by members of Ford in white coveralls which toured around Holland with the band playing at different events.
John left the band in 1955 and became a barber in High Bentham, the town where he came from and where he lived up until his death on 15 October 2022. It was a trade he had dabbled with in the Greys as he used to cut the other soldiers’ hair before parades. He always said that if everyone who said to him “I’ll buy you a beer for that” he would still be drinking them today.
John is survived by his wife and two sons, two grand daughters and six great grandchildren.
John married his first wife, Margaret, and started working for Scottish & Newcastle Brewery as an Assistant Bar Manager and worked his way up to be a Finance Manager. After twenty-five years of marriage to Margaret, she sadly died. John met and married his second wife, Linda, in June 2003 and they were married for nineteen years. He was a keen classic car enthusiast and had three classic cars. He was a member of the Greenock Cricket Club and, although he did not play cricket, he enjoyed the bar with his friend Scot Lang.
John was a member of the Glasgow Branch of the Association but he also kept in contact with the North West and Wales Branch attending some Nunshigum dinners and annual reunions.
John passed away suddenly on the 6 September 2022. His funeral took place at Greenock Crematorium on 16 September 2022 and four of his old Carabiniers comrades from the North Wales and Wales Branch made the journey to Greenock for his last parade, which was also attended by the Chairman and a number of the Glasgow Branch members.
John (Chez) was born on 1 October 1948 in St Albans to Leopold and Joyce. Leopold, served with the 6th Dragoon Guards in India and was serving when the 3rd/6th Dragoon Guards was formed in 1922.
John joined the Junior Leaders in
1964 at Bovington where he met his lifelong friend Neville Castell. Neville was going to join the Royal Scots Greys but John persuaded Neville to join the Carabiniers. His first posting was to Lothian Barracks, Detmold in 1966. He joined B Squadron SHQ troop as a gunner on the Squadron Leader’s tank (Major Buckley). He was then posted to Chester in November 1967 where the Regiment converted to Armoured cars and, in 1968, he went to El Adam, North Africa in the Sahara for nine months. In 1969 he was posted to Munster and then to Herford in 1970. On amalgamation in 1971, John joined D Squadron, The Royal Scots Dragoon Guards in Redford Cavalry Barracks, Edinburgh. He was a corporal in charge of signals in SHQ Troop. From Edinburgh he did three tours of Northern Ireland and a six months tour with the UN in Cyprus before leaving the Army in
December 1973.