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Winter
2013
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for the pun) I was fortunate to be caned by the Head rather than
Dick Hawkey (our form master), who played first class squash
and I think my backside would have accordingly suffered much
greater pain.
At school my sporting prowess was on a par with my
academics – pretty ordinary; though at Terry’s I did once win
the Victor Ludorum but then it all went downhill after some
idiot medic thought he discovered I had a weak heart. Anyway,
I enjoyed my rugby and was very average at cricket; though I
remember as an OMT my stepfather asked me to play for his
Sunday side at Durrants and, as a desperate measure, he invited
me to bowl at a rather stuck-in batsman. Much to my surprise,
and probably my step father’s, I bowled him first ball, which was
an absolute fluke! I played for Colin Cole’s Extra C and enjoyed
the bar at Durrants.
Rugby in those days and at my level was very much a
“gentleman’s” game and I remember a tackle that brought me
down. I had gone quite grey at an early age and the tackler
came up to me in the bar afterwards and shook me by the
hand, apologising profusely for tackling an old gentleman so
hard. I was all of 23! On HMS Newcastle there was a Surgeon
Commander Dow, who had played rugby with the Huskissons
and as soon as he learnt I was an OMT, I was in the ship’s first
team and then played for Singapore Naval Base. Once I played
against a Fijian side with no boots. Fame at last, I thought,
but pride before a fall, as they were very hard tacklers. Thank
goodness my three grandsons look as if they are set for better
things than their grandfather!
My favourite day in the week was Friday – Corps day. I
relished drill under Messrs RSMMallion and CSM Bell. We
were all proud as punch to be inspected by Lord Alexander of
Tunis. I was privileged to be a member of the successful Drill
Squad which swept the board at Summer Camps against all
comers. I shot with my old and very great friend Ian MacGregor
at Bisley camp. Then like many sons of divorced parents, I,
as they say in Norfolk, “did different” and joined the newly
formed Naval Section and the RNVR at HMS President. All
this because my father had ended his war in command of his
battalion in Rome and I suppose I wanted to prove a point.
My end of school exam results were far from satisfactory. One
thing I did learn from the famous John Fryers was how to hold
my pen and write. I don’t think students are taught this these
days, judging by the way many hold their writing implements.
I ended my days at Taylors’ by steeling back the last night of
term to haul a chamber pot to the top of the flag pole – oh well –
little things...!
I then enjoyed two years’ National Service in the Royal Navy,
mostly on the cruiser HMS Newcastle; meeting up with my
old school friend Hamish Darke on the Far East Station. On
two occasions, under the direction of our Gunnery Officer Lt
Cdr Henry Leach (later 1st Sea Lord), we scored direct hits on
Communist positions in Malaya during the Emergency. My
action stations were either loader on Red Two Bofor or deep
down in the bowels of the ship as handler in the lower cordite
gallery; not a very pleasant place to be during action stations!
I learnt a lot from my immediate boss Commander Michael
Pollock in the Commander’s Office. He later became 1st Sea
Lord and we kept in touch right up to his death. During my
time in the Far East I was able to stay with my brother Ian on
his rubber plantation in the midst of the Emergency. I was
sent up-country with a Lee Enfield .303 rifle and five rounds of
ammunition. I asked the Master at Arms “Why only five?” and
he replied that the “commies” would get me long before I had
fired off all five rounds!
After National Service one came down to earth with a bump
and I enjoyed jobs with Whitbread’s as a trainee Abroad Cooper,
then a gravel pit manager near Slough and then an assistant to
the directors of an electrical wholesale firm run by a girlfriend’s
father in the West End! Then I met my wife and we married in
1960. I fell in love with her and her county of Norfolk, so took a
job with a crop spraying company there; ending up as a director.
In 1976 my wife Sheelin was appointed Head Mistress of a girls’
boarding school – Runton Hill in North Norfolk. We had ten
very happy years there and during that time I raised money for
our Church by organising Pageants and Son et Lumieres, then
Country Fairs in aid of Norfolk Scouts and St John Ambulance.
Country Fairs followed at Chatsworth, Holkham Hall, Fyvie
Castle, Castle Howard, Belvoir Castle, Stratfield Saye, Woburn
and Broadlands.
One day I had a sort of dream that Norfolk should have her
own Sail Training ship; so in 1980 I organised a Country Fair
at Holkham specifically to raise money for this. Then started a
journey which resulted in a Norfolk Boat charity which helps to
send more than 120 children on sea-going voyages every year.
We invest our capital and spend about £25,000 of its interest
each year to achieve this. I have been recently truly humbled
by being presented with the honour of an MBE, which I am to
receive just before Christmas this year, 2013. Humbled, because
it has been very much a team effort by many friends and family.
Andrew Cuthbert (1950-1953)
Son of Eric Cuthbert (1910-17)
Stepson of Alan (Beady) Turner (1920-1925),
Brother of Ian Cuthbert (C1940-1943)
& David Cuthbert (C1943-1947)
