Hild Bede Alumni Association Magazine

Shelter from the Storm – page 05 From the River Wear Hild to the Black Sea (via the Mary Rose) – page 08 The Art of Seeding Bede the Dream – page 11 Private Andrew Wilson, Durham Light Infantry Alumni – page 14 St Hild’s in the 1930s Association and the 1960s – page 20 magazine 2019 5737_DU_Hild_Bede_Alumni_mag_v15.indd 1 28/02/2020 16:51 St Hild and St Bede page 2 5737_DU_Hild_Bede_Alumni_mag_v15.indd 2 28/02/2020 16:51 Alumni Association Magazine Principal’s Letter – page 03 Shelter from the Storm – page 05 From the River Wear to the Black Sea (via the Mary Rose) – page 08 The Art of Seeding the Dream – page 11 Private Andrew Wilson, Durham Light Infantry – page 14 Thomas Derrick Griffiths – page 16 St Hild’s in the 1930s and the 1960s – page 20 Modern Pentathlon at Bede College in the 1960s – page 24 Congratulations – page 25 Alumni News – page 26 Staff News – page 30 Clubs and Societies – page 32 Scholarships and Awards – page 36 In Memoriam – page 46 page 3 Contents 5737_DU_Hild_Bede_Alumni_mag_v15.indd 3 28/02/2020 16:51 St Hild and St Bede Principal’s letter Dear Friends. This will be the last letter I write to you as Principal of Hild Bede because, as many of you know, I am standing down from the role as from the end of August. I must emphasise that this was not an easy decision for me to take. I love Hild Bede and always will, but felt for all sorts of reasons (some professional and some personal) that I was not the right person to take our beloved College on into the future. easier. My research work is ensure that it is honoured and also very important to me and preserved as far as possible. I feared that, as the planning We all know how shabby and building progressed, this College has become over the would require more than 50% years – I have received many of the Principal’s time if it were letters and emails from you on to be done properly, and I did that subject! This project will not want to sell short either the enable us to offer first-class College or my research. Finally, facilities to incoming students, and perhaps most importantly, while respecting the Hild Bede I thought that it would be in the traditions and ethos of which best interests of College to have we are all so proud. someone in post to oversee the whole project, from planning Finally, I would like to express to ‘decant’ to bringing Hild my appreciation to you all Bede back on site and taking it for welcoming me into ‘your’ forward into the future. It is for College; to the students (many all these reasons, then, that I of whom are now alumni) for decided that the time was right being such delightful young for me to stand down. people (even if a very few of The Principal, Jan Clarke, with As many of you know, my I am not, though, leaving the them have occasionally caused Norman Sherrington, former staff parents are unwell and getting University – just going back to me to tear my hair out!); and, and students and Ann Boynton down to Derbyshire to see my department full time. And last but not least, I would like Award winners. them as often as I would like I very much intend to remain to thank all the wonderful Hild is not really compatible with involved with College, primarily Bede staff who have supported the weekend working that is as a member of the Senior me so well during my time here. required as Principal. I also Common Room. I really will ‘Never Forget’. spoke to you in my last letter about the discussions that When speaking of the I will be handing over the reins were ongoing around the redevelopment and how long to Professor Simon Forrest, who development of the College it may take, I do not wish to is joining us from the University site. Since then, things have alarm you in any way. We of Newcastle (you will find out proceeded steadily but, as is all love the College (and the more about Professor Forrest almost inevitable given the two Colleges from which it elsewhere in this magazine). complexity of our site, we still sprang), but our versions of I wish him every success and have no definite plans nor these are all different. And in hope that he will be as happy indeed absolute confirmation order to survive, the College at Hild Bede as I have been. that the development will must continue to evolve. proceed. However, if and One thing that has given me With all good wishes, when it does go ahead (and great satisfaction as I have I must emphasise that from participated in planning Jan Clarke the College’s point of view it is meetings during the course of Principal absolutely vital that it should), the last year is the extent to it is certain to be a lengthy which the University and its process and involve the College planners, as well as those of being moved temporarily into the Durham County Council different accommodation. Planning Department, are This all comes at a time in my appreciative of and sensitive to life when I was starting to think the College’s history, and how about taking things a little far they are prepared to go to page 4 5737_DU_Hild_Bede_Alumni_mag_v15.indd 4 28/02/2020 16:51 Alumni Association Magazine Meet the new principal Professor Simon Forrest Simon has 30 years’ experience Advisory Group for Social of teaching, research and Justice and Rainbow Network. activity in practice in policy associated with the social Between 2009 and 2017, he aspects of HIV/Aids, Sexual and was Head of the School of Reproductive Health, Gender Medicine, Pharmacy and Health and Sexualities, and the social in Durham. He has a background sciences in medicine and health. that spans higher, secondary, He came to academic life via He came to academic life via further and prison education. teaching, youthwork and a short teaching, youthwork and a Public engagement and support short career as a professional for social change is central to his career as a professional musician. musician. work and reflected in authorship of not only academic outputs, Simon has been working in the but work with the mass media Institute for Health & Society and publication of several at Newcastle where he led a guides to sexuality and health UK Research Institute Doctoral for young people, parents and Training Pathway in ‘Health, schools. He is Chair of the Board Wellbeing and Society’, Chaired for an international Aids charity the Institute Board of Examiners, and a HEA Sir Ron Cooke was the Director of Education International Scholar. and the Faculty Director of Equality, Diversity and Inclusion. He sat on the University page 5 5737_DU_Hild_Bede_Alumni_mag_v15.indd 5 28/02/2020 16:51 St Hild and St Bede Shelter from the Storm Nuala Ellwood (Hild Bede 1998-2001) was perished or boarded disease- find work. His idea of England ridden coffin ships bound for up until that point had been a chosen as one of the Observer’s ‘New America. Those who survived kind of Arcadia – a blissful land that horrific journey slowly of undulating hills, shiny black Faces of Fiction 2017’ for her first thriller, pieced together a new life in cabs, beefeaters, and palaces. the bestselling My Sister’s Bones. Nuala the land of the free. As a family, The small North East town they we remember these journeys, arrived at that first rain-soaked teaches Creative Writing at York St John not only through the stories night did not quite live up to the that filtered down the ages, but fantasy but it became home: University and lives in the city with her also deep in our bones. Those the place where he established young son. Day of the Accident is her voices haunt us like a half- roots, met my mother, raised a remembered song. My father family, and became an award- latest novel. recounts the time he visited Ellis winning television journalist. But he never forgot his real home, We are all, each of us, at any the mystical country across the one time, just a hair’s breadth water that he and countless away from catastrophe. Peace, others before him had been order, safety: these are temporal forced to leave behind. states, vulnerable to the whim of governments, ideologies, And so the sense of movement, extremes of weather. It is the tie of fleeing hardship and that binds us as human beings, persecution, or leaving your the fact that your life can turn country behind to find a better on a dime at any moment. A life, is written into my DNA. It hurricane hits your city, leaving influences everything I do: from death, destruction and chaos being unable to settle in any in its wake; war erupts; your one place for more than a few village is gassed; a dictator months to the themes I explore comes to power and decides to in my work. My debut thriller, eradicate everyone who believes My Sister’s Bones, published in your god. It could happen by Penguin in 2017, tells the anywhere at any time: from New story of a troubled female war York to Nuremberg; Aleppo to reporter who returns from Syria Aberdeen. to her childhood home on the North Kent coast and starts to So the worst happens. What do fear that something horrifying you do? Well for most of us, the is happening in the house next answer would be to scoop up door.

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