The Salopian no. 160 - Summer 2017

102
OLD SALOPIAN NEWS
In April 2015, he was diagnosed with Acute Myeloid
Leukaemia. That summer he underwent transplant of stem
cells donated by his sister, Lucy. This led to a lengthy period
of remission, which he absolutely made the most of, but
David relapsed at the end of 2016 and died on 10th January
2017 at home, with all his family around him.
His treatment was conducted at the excellent Haematology
Centre at The City Hospital in Nottingham, thankfully not
far from his home, so Karine could visit several times a day.
During his lengthy stays there, he started to write a blog
about his experience. It is called “AML Too much reality” and
is available to read at amltoomuchreality.blogspot.co.uk.
He always had a great sense of humour – and was great
company – but I was astonished that this was still the case
throughout his illness. A few weeks before he died, I had
a very enjoyable lunch with David and Karine at home in
Nottingham. He did not often talk about times past, but I
was amazed that he had total recall of something that I had
almost completely forgotten. His animated account, given his
condition, was extraordinary.
In the summer term of 1969, Adrian Struvé and Roger
Sainsbury organised an epic fund-raising sponsored walk
from Shrewsbury House in Everton to Shrewsbury School.
We left Everton on Friday evening, spent the night in
Widnes Town Hall, walked to Whitchurch on Saturday
(as we approached Whitchurch, it rained so hard that we
paddled the last few miles) and spent the night drying off
in Whitchurch Scout Hut. The party comprised such stoic
luminaries as Nick Davies, Patrick Thomas, Ahmed Hussein,
Donald Black and Charlie Kemp – all from Churchill’s –
several members of Shrewsbury House, who were such
great company, keeping up an endless barrage of badinage
and scouse repartee. On Sunday we were met at Wem by
Donald Wright and others – and walked back to Shrewsbury
for tea. And this was less than two weeks before our
A-Levels; but we didn’t worry about that sort of thing in
those Golden Days.
R.R. Jones (Ch 1965-69)
Martin Whitworth (SH 1939-43)
Martin Whitworth was an engineer, a waterman, a home bird
and a family man.
He was born 25th October 1925 in Quetta, part of the Indian
Raj. He kept up with other children of the Raj right up until
his death. He first met his wife Betty there when they were
three years old – a budding romance put on ice for 25 years
after she trod on his trainset!
He went to boarding school in England from the age of
eight, first at St Pirans and then Shrewsbury, while his
parents were based in India. He saw them on their home
leave most summers but not at all between 1939 and 1943,
school holidays otherwise being spent with family in North
Wales or Berwickshire. He excelled as an oarsman on the
River Severn, while his choice to major in science subjects at
Shrewsbury he reckoned was viewed with some disdain by a
school dominated by classicists!
In 1943 he went up to St John’s College, Cambridge to do a
compressed two-year Engineering Tripos while rowing took
up much of his time. He rowed in the wartime Boat Races
in 1944 (at Ely) and 1945 (at Henley), stroking the 1945
Cambridge boat to victory. One of the specifications for any
of the homes he lived in afterwards was a suitable place to
hang his oar!
After Cambridge he joined the Royal Navy in August 1945
and was posted to the Pacific Fleet. He spent two years in the
Far East before he completed his war service. While there he
visited Hiroshima and Nagasaki – a sobering experience he
described in a letter home.
He then joined the Henrietta, an ex-German MTB fitted
out ostensibly as a millionaire’s yacht touring round the
Mediterranean. The Henrietta was actually landing agents on
the coast of Albania for MI6. His duties were not only to keep
the engines running but also to row agents ashore. He even
had to carry them ashore so they didn’t get their feet wet!
Once he missed the initial rendez-vous with the Henrietta
and set off to row across to Greece. Fortunately they found
each other soon after!
In 1951 he came back to England to source some spare parts
for the Henrietta’s engines and met Betty at a mutual friend’s
wedding, a fellow child of the Raj. They met once for lunch
in London and then went their separate ways, she ostensibly
to the Foreign Office and he to the Admiralty. When they
bumped into each other at the doors of MI6 they had blown
each other’s cover!
They married in August 1953 and were together for 56 years
until Betty died in 2009. Their son was born a year after they
married and their daughter Christine a year after that. By this
time Martin had started working at John I. Thorneycroft at
Woolston, Southampton, building mainly warships for the
Royal Navy. He worked at Woolston until 1969, apart from
two years in the fifties working for Paxman’s in Colchester.
Martin was a real engineer. He could do the clever design
and draughting very well, but he was never happier than
in a boiler suit getting into the nuts and bolts of a machine
or ship. It was both his profession and his hobby. He liked
nothing better than working at home in his workshop
designing and building some novel gizmo.
When in the late 1960s, Thorneycroft was bought out, he
joined Reavell’s in Ipswich as Works Manager. When he saw
Mill House in Woodbridge on the market he fell in love with
it, and managed to buy it at a rain-soaked open air auction.
Betty said shortly afterwards “the only way he is leaving this
house is in a box!” – how right she was!
The job at Reavell’s lasted a relatively short time before
another takeover and Martin moved on to consulting
engineers WH Gamble and partners based in central London.
For the next ten years he joined a small but merry band of
commuters on the early train from Woodbridge to Liverpool
Street, then cycling across London to his office. He was
perhaps at his happiest working at Gamble’s, as it got him
back to the real engineering.
Mill House and Woodbridge were made for Martin. He could
sail his dinghy on the River Deben, he had plenty of home
and garden to sort out, not to mention the windmill (his
involvement and encouragement aided its renovation in the
1980s), and there was always the Lagonda (which he rebuilt
as a retirement hobby)! He and Betty loved having the local
Scouts using the field, and hosting events in the mill yard,
whether for vintage motorbikes or for their favourite charity
St Elizabeth Hospice.
After Betty died in 2009, Martin became increasingly disabled
which made it difficult to get about, and he relied more on
his IT for communications, some of it ancient! But thanks to
a series of live-in and day carers, medics, neighbours and
friends, and his daughter Christine, he was able to stay at Mill
House until he died. He enjoyed going to the Quay Church
most Sundays and taking part in the actively retired group,
as well as keeping up with Children of the Raj and his life
Presidency of the Isle of Ely Rowing Club.