Page 55 - RADC Bulletin 2021

OBITUARY
Colonel Dick Docherty L/RADC
Dick Docherty died on 29th June 2021 at the considerable age of almost ninety four in St. Andrew’s House Care Home back in his beloved Scotland, where he had spent the last years of a long, happy and successful life among his family and friends.
He was born on 13th August 1927, was educated at St. Ninian’s High School and trained at the Dental School of Glasgow University. He qualified with an LDS in October 1951 and, almost immediately, was called upon to fulfil his deferred obligation to complete his National Service commitment, being commissioned as a Lieutenant in the Royal Army Dental Corps in February 1952. These were the days when the British Army could be found all over the world so, after a short introductory course to the mysteries
of drill and not making an ass of oneself in uniform, he was posted to The British Station Hospital, Khartoum in the Sudan, where he met Anne, a theatre sister there whom he courted relentlessly for the next three years. He was demobilised from there two years later as “..a first class officer who has taken a full part in all unit activities.”
Dick returned to Scotland and set up two civilian dental practices with his brother, marrying Anne in January 1955. But clearly his experience abroad, albeit in a setting described as “that insalubrious spot” by
his Commanding Officer, had given him a taste for something more than the ordinary run of the mill as a year later he applied to the Colonial Office for overseas service. This idea was abandoned at an early stage and was followed by six years working
in practice, during which time his sons Christopher and Richard were born.
But the wanderlust remained and, in 1962, he reapplied to join the RADC. Although,
at age 35, he was above the age limit, his old Khartoum boss had by now become a General who had “...happy recollections of the excellent work put in at Khartoum and saw “...no difficulty in his age being treated with considerable latitude.” Unsurprisingly, he was readmitted and commissioned as Major in August that year.
Obviously, Dick had been badly bitten
by the Lawrence of Arabia bug as he was posted to Tripoli, Libya, in 1964 and from there to Benghazi in 1966. The following year he was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel and posted back to the UK for a short
spell before leaving for a four year tour in Düsseldorf. This was then the home of the Corps Dental Laboratory in Germany, and
it was here that Dick developed his long standing interest in dental prosthetics. In 1971 he was selected to study this specialty at the Eastman Dental Hospital being awarded an MSc by the University of London the following year.
He was posted to the old Corps Headquarters in Aldershot in 1972 to
take over the Dental Laboratory there
and oversaw its removal to the new Headquarters building in 1974 as Deputy Commandant. In 1976 he returned to Düsseldorf and was promoted to Colonel the following year when he was then posted back to the MOD as the Assistant Director, Army Dental Services. Whilst in this most demanding post, he still found time to be awarded a Fellowship of the Chartered Management Institute.
In 1980 he returned to the Corps Headquarters, this time as Commandant, being admitted into the Order of St John later that year and appointed the Queen’s Honorary Dental Surgeon in 1982.
His next posting was in 1984 when he moved to Paderborn as Commanding Officer No.1 Dental Group until he was posted back to Aldershot in 1986 on retirement. He then worked as a Civilian Dental Practitioner at Winchester for the next seven years, serving as Colonel Commandant from 1988 until his final retirement in 1993.
I first met Dick in 1972 when I was posted to our Headquarters as the Staff Officer to the then Commandant. With the Freedom of Aldershot Parade preparations and the imminent move to the new Headquarter building these were “interesting times “, made more so by a Commandant who had recently attended a course advocating an obscure Wheel of Management system to which he had become devoted. As Dick had already discovered, Dental Technicians
belong to a brotherhood almost impervious to outside interference, so that he alone
felt able to face the future with relative equanimity. But then our leader decided it was necessary to create the post of Deputy Commandant. With only two Lieutenant Colonels in the Headquarters, it was always a two horse race between Dick and the officer in charge of the clinical wing, with Dick as favourite. But one morning the Commandant called me into his office and told me to go and tell Dick it would not be him. I suggested this might come ill from
a junior officer but was told, “I don’t keep
a dog to do my own barking!”, which I’m pretty sure wasn’t something he’d learnt
on his management course. So I put on my hat, walked down to Dick’s office and broke the news. I’ve never seen Dick lose his rag properly but this was a close call. He stared at me for some thirty seconds, stood up, put on his hat and, without a word, walked down the corridor I had just vacated.
The following day it was announced
that the new post of Deputy Commandant would be filled by Lt Col R Docherty with immediate effect, and that the Commandant congratulated him on his appointment. So, behind his soft Bishopbriggs accent and gentle manner, there was a steely centre to Dick that, whilst rarely needed, was best to be avoided.
To me, and everyone else, he was always great company with an easy laugh and a
dry sense of humour that made you feel relaxed immediately. A naturally rather quiet, even retiring man he confessed to a horror of public speaking. He told me that he had once been chosen as the best man for a wedding and was seated next to one of the bridesmaids. As the moment approached, he got out his speech notes in preparation. To his dismay, his companion said, “You don’t need those, just speak from the heart,” and tore them up. There was a long, significant pause while I waited for the happy ending, the Damascene moment that signified his release from the strictures of this terrible affliction into the sunny upland pastures of public fluency. He grasped my wrist and in a voice hoarse with emotion said, “Philip, she might as well have cut my throat!”
I think of that story every time I get up to speak. It’s never helped yet.
So it’s farewell to a really good man, a loving husband, a caring father, a supportive colleague and a great and amusing friend. That our paths will never cross again is another sad milestone passed.
Obituary by Col (Retd) P Horobin
RADC BULLETIN 2021 53