Page 26 - OM Newsletter - Issue 44 - 2020

OM OBITUARIES
youth and at Malvern played the trumpet solo for the last post for Remembrance Day. Holidays with the family were mostly on the beaches of Cornwall or in Andratx, Mallorca where he had met Annie in 1977. Ben will be remembered for his quiet intelligence, his sensible advice and wonderful dry sense of humour. Ben suffered from various illnesses in his youth and then in the last years of his life from Parkinson’s disease and cancer. He suffered these bravely and without complaint as he always had done; a sign of the courage and fortitude which never left him. He was a thoughtful and loving person, husband, father and friend who will be enormously missed by all. His untimely death is a great sadness to everyone who knew him. Ben is survived by Annie, his son James married to Trina, and his granddaughter Sophie. Died 4 May 2020, aged 69.
Dods Alastair William (1.61-67) House Prefect. Cricket XI. After first becoming the accountant for a Turtle Farm in the Cayman Islands, Alastair moved back to the UK where he set up a business renovating and re- cycling early computers. He then returned to his family home in Kenya where he worked in accountancy before moving with his second wife, Betty, to Uganda where they set up a school for disadvantaged children. In 2005 they moved to the Turks and Caicos Islands where he bought a leisure business, taking tourists to see marine life from a semi- submersible submarine. When Betty died he passed his business over to his niece and nephew-in-law who were a tower of strength in caring for him during his last six months. Died 25 October 2020, aged 71.
Edge Christopher Martin (7.57-62) House Prefect. On leaving Malvern Chris went up to St. Andrews to study dentistry; the dental hospital was across the water in Dundee which is where he was based for five years. It was a massive culture shock for him going from rural Herefordshire to a big industrial city, and in the beginning he was sure they were speaking a foreign language!! He very quickly settled down and made friends with students and locals alike. He met Christina and they married in 1965 in his final year. A year later they had a son Alan just before he graduated. On graduating, the family moved back to Herefordshire. After a number of positions as an associate he bought his own practice in Hay-on-Wye where he remained until his retirement. Unfortunately, he was diagnosed
with Parkinson’s within weeks of retiring. It was a great blow, but he and Christina decided to carry on as they had planned until the disease made it too difficult. They played golf, bought a campervan and had many wonderful holidays playing all the wonderful Scottish golf courses. He was still playing golf with the help of his little buggy before he finally had to go into a nursing home just a few months before he died. His other great love was his model railway which occupied a great part of his life, and Christina is sure that he must have bored his Malvern school mates with the wonders of “God’s wonderful railway” GWR. Died 20 February 2020, aged 76.
Gillett Gordon (SH.58-63) School Prefect. Gordon always referred to his years at Malvern College as the happiest of his life. Those years formed him into the generous and kindly man that he became as well as developing his outstanding leadership qualities. He spent almost all his working life with Nestlé not only in the UK but also in Ghana, USA, and predominately at head office in Switzerland, returning to the UK in retirement. Within Nestlé Switzerland he rose to become a Senior Vice-President as their expert in commodity purchasing. Retirement in the Cotswolds
brought new challenges and he was happily involved with many local projects. He will be missed by all who knew him. Died 26 April 2020, aged 74.
Hedin Richard Carl Louis (SH.65-69) House Prefect. After taking a degree from Loughborough Richard worked all his life in the industrial heating elements business, first for the family company and then he set up his own business. Richard was divorced but had a wonderful relationship with his three children, Abigail, Emily and Lucy. He was a keen golfer, an avid horseracing follower, a lifetime Spurs fan and also loved playing OM football in the Arthurian League, on occasions enlisting his younger brother Tim to play as a ‘guest’ Malvernian when they were short of players. Tim and his sisters, Mary and Clare, remember that Richard had an amazing gift for saying exactly the wrong thing at exactly the wrong time and getting away with it, a gift that he never grew out of and that was tolerated, expected and understood by all who knew and loved him. Richard had been in good health, so it was a devastating blow to his friends and family when he passed away suddenly. Died 11 July 2020, aged 68.
Knill-Jones Samuel Alan (SH.56-61) House Prefect. Sam left Malvern for the Royal College of Music, but ill health meant that a career as an oboist could not follow from his training; he was a dedicated chorister and he seldom missed a concert on Radio 3. Entomology absorbed Sam from early boyhood to the end of his life and his collection and identification of moths around his home by Tennyson Down on the Isle of Wight led to two species being recorded in the UK for the first time. In Ireland he discovered a new subspecies which carries the latinisation of his surname – knilli. Sam showed lifelong loyalty to family and friends from the College, from the world of music and entomology. All will miss his regular phone calls. Sam found no need for internet or mobile phone but greatly valued news from family and friends all of whom will be much the poorer for the end of Sam’s life. Died 3 August 2020, aged 77.
26 | Old Malvernian Newsletter