Old Stoic Society Committee President: Sir Richard Branson (Cobham/Lyttelton 68) Vice President: THE MAGAZINE FOR OLD STOICS Dr Anthony Wallersteiner (Headmaster) Chairman: Simon Shneerson (Temple 72) Issue 4 Vice Chairman: Patrick Cooper (Chatham 86) Director: Anna Semler (Nugent 05)

Members: John Arkwright (Cobham 69) Peter Comber (Grenville 70) The Art of Giving Colin Dudgeon (Hon. Member) Gordon Darling (Grafton 39) is one Hannah Durden (Nugent 01) of ’s most significant living John Fingleton (Chatham 66) philanthropists and was instrumental Ivo Forde (Walpole 67) Jerome Starkey (Chandos 99) talks to in establishing the National Portrait Jonathon Hall (Bruce 79) our new President, Sir Richard Branson Gallery of Australia. Tim Hart (Chandos 92) (Cobham/Lyttelton 68). Katie Lamb (Lyttelton 06) Stowe: A Place Nigel Milne (Chandos 68) Ben Scholfield (Temple 99) of Influence Jules Walker (Lyttelton 82) James Furse-Roberts (Grafton 95) discovers the effect Stowe had on the work of two of our most acclaimed Old Stoic architects.

Old Stoic Society Stowe MK18 5EH Telephone: +44 (0) 1280 818349 Email: [email protected] www.oldstoic.co.uk

www.facebook.com/OldStoicSociety

ISSN 2052-5508 (Online) Design and production: MCC Design, mccdesign.com Tuesday 10 June 2014 7.00pm – 12.30am All Old Stoics and their guests are invited to join us for this informal evening. Welcome reception in the Spanish Gardens, live bands, barbeque and drinks until 10pm Tickets £40 BOOK NOW TO AVOID DISAPPOINTMENT CALL 01280 818349 or E-MAIL [email protected] Contact the Old Stoic Office if you would like to e-mail your year group personally to ensure as many of your friends are there as possible. Cash bar from 10pm to 12.30am

Kensington Roof Gardens, 99 Kensington High Street, W8 5SA

2 THE MAGAZINE FOR OLD STOICS

Issue 4 Features 6 Britain’s Best Loved 16 THE ART OF GIVING Entrepreneur Gordon Darling (Grafton 39) is one Jerome Starkey (Chandos 99) talks of Australia’s most significant living to our new President, Sir Richard philanthropists and was instrumental Branson (Cobham/Lyttelton 68). in establishing the National Portrait Gallery of Australia. 12 OLYMPIC FLOWER TURF AT THE 18 STOWE: A PLACE OF INFLUENCE OLYMPIC OPENING CEREMONY James Furse-Roberts (Grafton 95) David Hewetson-Brown (Chatham 56) explains the history behind his farm discovers the effect Stowe had on the and how he diversified to produce work of two of our most acclaimed wild flower turf for the Olympics. Old Stoic architects. 20 STOWE ENGINE The history behind the Stowe steam Page 6 engine is revealed, as a major restoration project gets underway. rEGULARS

2 EDITORIAL 31 MARRIAGES 4 FROM THE HEADMASTER 32 BIRTHS 22 NEWS 33 OBITUARIES 60 STOWE’S RICH HISTORY INSIDE

Page 16 2 WELCOME FROM THE CHAIRMAN OF OSS 54 SUPPORTING A CHARITY 3 NEWS FROM STOWE THE TEACHING STAFF FROM 1923 10 PERFORMS AT STOWE 55 OLLIE’S ODYSSEY 14 FISHING FOR 56 STOWE BEAGLES 15 OLD STOICS WED AT STOWE 57 RING OF BRIGHT WATER 37 2090 MILES AND 12 COUNTRIES DUBAI DRINKS RECEPTION 38 MUSIC AT STOWE IN THE 1970s 58 STOWE AT WAR 39 NOSTALGIC AT NINETY 59 WOUNDED WARRIOR 40 A BRIEF HISTORY OF A SPECIAL 60 ELEPHANT BIRD EGG RELATIONSHIP 61 OLD STOIC CORKSCREW SOCIETY FINDING YOUR CALLING ANOTHER OS BAND 41 AUSTRALIAN FRIENDS OF STOWE 62 OS SPORT 2014 Page 18 OS MEMBERS AREA sTOWE TEMPLARS 42 CELEBRATING ONE YEAR IN THE FIVES JEWELLERY BUSINESS SQUASH 43 BUTCHER, BAKER OR CANDLESTICK 63 OS CLAY PIGEON SHOOTING MAKER? OS CROSS-COUNTRY 44 THE NATURE OF CYCLIC TIME GOLFING SOCIETY 46 STOWE GHOSTS OS 48 OUTRAGEOUS FORTUNE... 64 OS FOOTBALL TEAM 50 AND THE NEXT ROOM IS... 2014 GIFT COLLECTION 52 A PRE-WAR CULTURE TOUR INSIDE BACK COVER JF’S POETRY CLASS 2014 EVENTS 53 BOOK REVIEW: A ROGUES GALLERY THE ROXBURGH SOCIETY Page 20 JF ROXBURGH – POEM EDITOR’S LETTER Welcome from...

Welcome to the THE CHAIRMAN OF oss fourth edition of The Old Stoic Society has had another very busy The Corinthian year and it has been a great pleasure to see so many OSs taking part in our various events and – the magazine activities. In particular, we have seen and heard for Old Stoics. from a large number of Old Stoics who have not previously been willing or able to get involved. With the celebrations of Stowe’s 90th This has been hugely gratifying, because a major Anniversary year now drawn to a close, the part of our strategy has been to broaden the reach of the Society and to engage with as many people as possible. Ideas are always pages of this magazine chronicle the events welcome, and we’ve responded to several suggestions by giving which took place to mark the occasion. money and resources to help members make things happen. Enclosed with your copy of the magazine, you will find a souvenir programme from the OS Highlights of 2013 included the fabulous Nostalgic at Ninety party Society’s celebration, Nostalgic at Ninety. I hope which Nigel Milne (Chandos 68) and his events sub-committee th that those of you who were unable to join us on organised to mark Stowe’s 90 birthday. Andrew Chance (Chandos 71) did a wonderful job of orchestrating the evening and a great time the night will be able to capture the flavour of was had by all. In May, Stowe hosted a very special concert by Roger the evening from the programme. Photographs Hodgson (Grenville 68) and the following day saw a Speech Day with and a film of the evening are available at delightfully brief and un-boring speeches, with a record number of www.oldstoic.co.uk entries for the OS classic car display, with unusually sunny weather, Along with commemorating last year’s flagship and with a flypast by the RAF’s Lancaster, a Spitfire and a Hurricane. occasions, this magazine brings news from Around the world, too, we have been busy, with parties in Old Stoics from around the globe, with word of Australia, Hong Kong, the USA and Dubai. We have additional their achievements, details of gatherings which sports groups and a number of new special interest groups including have taken place and a diverse and eclectic an OS art group, an OS property group and an OS military group. mix of articles on topics I hope will be of interest OS Corkscrew, our society, has held two excellent events, to you. with more to follow when they sober up. Our online presence has grown too, and we now have 819 members on LinkedIn. Thank you to all those who have sent in their news, as well as to those who have written This is only the second year of our ambitious development strategy, articles for the magazine this year. If you would so now we are actively recruiting local ‘champions’ to co-ordinate like to submit an article for next year, I would support, events and activities all around the UK and in the many countries where we do not currently have an active group. Budgets be delighted to hear from you. Thank you to the have been assigned to facilitate and subsidise local events, so you advertisers who have supported the magazine no longer have to live near London or Buckingham to get the best this year. Also, a huge vote of thanks to out of the Society. Please get in touch if you can help run things in Caroline Whitlock, who has spent countless your own locality. hours collating your news, as well as proofing submissions for this year’s magazine. We are also developing our careers support and, at long last, it looks like we can achieve an integrated service that will give Lastly, an important reminder: please make advice, encouragement, work experience and networking support sure we have your correct contact details, that starts with Stoic leavers and continues until retirement. in particular, your email address. The majority Stowe is nothing if not an incubator for entrepreneurs, and we of our communications are electronic, so have a number of notably successful OS business leaders. As part if we don’t have your email address, we of the wider career support, in 2014 we will be piloting specific can’t let you know about all the exciting programmes to offer insights, training and support for those wishing developments we are making and unmissable to start their own businesses. I’m delighted that our new President, events that are coming up. If in doubt, Sir Richard Branson (Cobham/Lyttelton 68), will be helping us in email [email protected] this – as you can read, in his interview in this magazine. Finally, let me repeat that it’s YOUR Society, so DO let us know if you like what we are doing and DO volunteer to help. Enjoy The Corinthian and I hope we will see you at an OS event Anna Semler (Nugent 05) or two this year. Old Stoic Society Director Best wishes

DISCLAIMER: The views expressed in this publication do not necessarily reflect the views of the Old Stoic Society and/or Stowe School. The publication of advertisements in this magazine does not constitute endorsement by the Old Stoic Society and/or Stowe School. Simon Shneerson (Temple 72) 2 Old Stoic Society Chairman Part of my role at Stowe is to compile the School magazine, The Stoic, but I am also responsible for putting together our regular e-newsletter, Stowemail, which is emailed out to parents, staff, Stoics and some Old Stoics every couple of weeks and features the highlights from School life. I consider myself very lucky; it is a really enjoyable part of my life a Stowe. So much goes on at the School, the Stoics always seem to have been up to something brilliant and I am the one who gets to share this news with the wider Stowe community. Asked to highlight some of my favourite news items from the last year, I looked through this year’s issues of Stowemail and The Stoic but found it an impossible task to condense the best bits into a page – on top of regular School life, we also celebrated our 90th Anniversary last year and the sheer number of extraordinary events is incredible. So, unusually for me, I think less words and more pictures will give you a better snapshot of this last year at Stowe. I have picked my favourite snippets which you will see on these pages and I finish with a plug... There is so much going on and you, too, can read all about it! You can sign up to receive Stowemail and The Stoic by contacting Anna Semler in the Old Stoic Office, or you can follow our twitter feed @stowemail – and if you are really keen, please feel free to do both! Back issues of both The Stoic and Stowemail are online at www.stowe.co.uk/news-and-events/ publications. Even better, come back and see your School in action, you are always welcome. Tori Roddy, Marketing Director

1 (left to Right) Stowe becomes an All-Steinway School as our new music building opens; Speech Day To sign up to receive Celebrations; Return; Making Music – Senior Unplugged just one of the many musical events Stowemail please email performed by Stoics; Our Academic Life – Stoics in the Classroom; Senior Congreve Present Cabaret – a truly memorable show; Stowe Challenge – not for the faint-hearted; Stoics perform at Bill’s Birthday Bash; [email protected] A whole lot of Urns – Replicas of the original urns are placed on the South Front balustrade; Speech Day Flyby; Setting records – and beating Eton – in Cricket. Our cricketers finished second in the national league; To opt in to receive a printed Sports Day – Exhausting for some!; The Music School Rises; Happy Birthday Stowe – a Speech Day to copy of The Stoic, please email Remember; Advertising Stowe – our 1st XV take part in a photo shoot Rugby Club Magazine; Roger Hodgson [email protected]. returns!; Music School; Winners at the U15 Tynedale RFC Schools Rugby Festival; Preparing the new prospectus – Chandos pose for the camera; Community Support – Stoics get involved in Kidscape; A contribution of £2.50 Stowe Fashionable – Stoics put on their glad rags to raise funds for the Cancer Vaccine Institute; p&p will be requested. Bruce win the ‘snowman’ competition with a time lapse video of their igloo construction; Run for the hills. The girls compete in the cross-country race; Lions on the move – The Medici Lions return, restored, to Stowe. 3 From the Headmaster

MUSIC AT STOWE: THE EARLY YEARS

Music runs as a leitmotif the highlights were a potpourri from Don through the history of Stowe. Pasquale, waltzes by Labitsky, an overture by Adam and a polka by Johann Strauss. The The recently restored State concert after dinner started with Weber’s Music Room is one of the Oberon overture, a Scotch air by Waddell, most remarkable interior more polkas and waltzes by Labitsky and spaces in the Mansion. “The Dream” from Balfe’s Bohemian Girl. The Lifeguards were followed by a more Decorated by Vincenzo Valdrè, a little-known rarified postprandial concert in the Italian artist who was resident at Stowe from Hall, conducted by one Monsieur Jullien, 2 Portrait of Leslie Huggins. 1779 to 1790 before leaving to continue his whose orchestra played some Meyerbeer painting career in Ireland, the exuberant (Robert le Diable), a quadrille from Herold’s wall paintings evoke the frescoes which the Zampa and sections from Beethoven’s Leslie Parry Huggins, affectionately known of Buckingham saw first-hand “Pastoral Symphony”. and Albert as “Hug”, was educated at Rugby and Balliol when he visited Naples and Pompeii on his listened from the comfort of the Temple (B.A., M.A., B.Mus. and D.Mus – “this will in 1774. , the god of Room (perhaps also an acknowledgement look very well in our School list”, music, appears twice: obliquely as the sun that the acoustic in the Marble Hall leaves commented Roxburgh laconically). He had at the centre of The Dance of the Hours (the something to be desired) and after Prince served with distinction in the Royal Field original Valdrè painting, sold in 1922 for Albert had given his approbation and Artillery during the Great War, winning the 140 guineas, which will return this summer thanks to Monsieur Jullien, the royal couple Military Cross in 1918 for leading numerous having been secured for Stowe through a retired at 11.30pm. The night’s festivities private sale negotiated by Christie’s); Apollo did not end there as the Mansion continued teams of horses through artillery and gas appears for a second time on one of the wall to resound to the Overture from William Tell, barrages for use at the front. Huggins spent panels, standing on a pedestal while the post horn gallop (with the fêted Herr five years cutting his teeth as a presenting a laurel wreath to Mary Nugent, Koenig on cornet) and other popular pieces schoolmaster at Radley before being Marchioness of Buckingham, an which reverberated all the way to the royal appointed Stowe’s second Director of Music accomplished musician and painter, who in bedroom (the State Bed-Chamber is now a in 1929, for the modest salary of £400 per turn presents Apollo with a lyre. The theme Chandos dormitory; sadly, Borra’s annum. He was an accomplished organist, of music is reinforced in the decorative gilt elaborately carved state bed was sold in pianist, choirmaster, arranger and composer of pan-pipes and crossed horns 1921 for 150 guineas and is now in the Lady (in the tradition of Vaughan Williams and interspersed with bucrania (ox-heads) that Lever Art Gallery at Port Sunlight). Herbert Butterworth). Before taking up his new post, he was able to secure an forms part of the which frames Stowe’s first headmaster, the great JF interest-free loan of £1,000 from an the room. This magical room has a superb Roxburgh, declared himself to be “totally anonymous benefactor to secure the acoustic which is particularly well suited for unmusical”. When a boy’s mother asked splendid Rushworth and Draper organ for compositions from the Baroque period. him to listen to an early opus by her the new which was to be dedicated musically-inclined son, Roxburgh replied: “I The culmination of Stowe hospitality in on 11 July 1929 (the estimated cost of the only sometimes go to concerts at Stowe as a ducal times came in 1845 when the second organ was £3,250). The loan ostensibly matter of duty and only last term I narrowly of Buckingham hosted came from a close friend. Huggins, a man of escaped hearing the Rio Grande performed and Prince Albert for three days of lavish private means, did not divulge the identity twice in the same evening. I hardly know entertainment. The Duke staged one last of the mysterious benefactor – although when I shall have the courage to go to a magnificent display of extravagant Roxburgh had his suspicions: “it is rather Stowe concert again.” In spite of Roxburgh’s indulgence, before the bubble burst and hard to thank an anonymous abstraction, professed indifference, music flourished insolvency beckoned. No expense was but I am in fact full of thankfulness towards spared and the Duke was reputed to have and Stowe boasted a Choral Society, a the impersonal source of this unexpected spent £75,000 on refurbishing and Madrigal Society, two orchestras, a band help – and also, as you know, towards you.” redecorating the house in the three months and a panatrope (an early version of a The final instalment of the loan, a payment before the royal visit. The Duke conjured up record player). Characteristically, Roxburgh of £333, was eventually given to the an intoxicating blend of receptions, was able to turn his lack of interest in Queen’s Temple Fund in 1934, “on banquets and music for the delectation of matters musical into a virtue: “there is, condition that it is used solely for building Victoria and Albert (as well as a mass therefore, no one to interfere with the practising rooms”. slaughter of game in the park). On the first musicians, who develop their habitual evening, a Regiment of Lifeguards played a initiative in every direction, happily for the A series of successful subscription concerts selection of musical treats while guests most part at a considerable distance from was launched and Stoics were introduced to 4 feasted in the State Dining Room – among my rooms.” an eclectic and sophisticated range of first floor, Queen’s Temple did not have adequate space for conversion into suitable practice or recital rooms. Instead, “the ideal Music School would be a simple brick building of one storey shaped rather like an army hut, but wider and longer with a central passage and practising and teaching rooms off on either side. At one end of the building would be a large room for orchestral and singing practices. The ideal site for this would be somewhere in the centre of the School.” Roxburgh won the argument and the Queen’s Temple with its majestic outlook across to the Gothic Temple and 1 The Dance of the Hours by Vincenzo Temple of Friendship was renovated to Valdrè, sold in the 1922 sale. become the home of Stowe’s Music 5 The New Music School, formally opening Department. Building repairs were in May 2014. supervised by the architect Fielding Dodd and, in addition to two teaching rooms, eight small practice rooms were built within the rusticated basement. As for the remoteness of the Temple, Roxburgh calculated the walk from Grafton by the North route took him exactly three minutes, covering a distance of 275 paces: “For the whole of the Eastern end of the School the Queen’s Temple is therefore more accessible than Chatham”. musical tastes. Huggins directed “The C. Hylton Stewart, Director of Music at When war became imminent, Huggins, who Polovstian Dances” from Prince Igor, with Haileybury. Thereafter, Huggins redoubled had kept his commission in the Regular John Saunders, a young master who also his efforts to raise the profile of music at Army Reserve, was appointed as a Major, arrived in 1929, arranging the Stowe and achieved remarkable success Royal Artillery, TA on 29 July 1939 and choreography. The production was with gentle persuasion (he never raised his served with 120th Field Brigade, finishing the favourably reviewed in . Huggins voice), kindness and humour. In another war as an artillery instructor. He was edited and contributed hymns to Cantata reference, this time for an unsuccessful bid demobilised in July 1945 and returned to Stoica and collaborated with Roxburgh to to move to Winchester College in 1937, Stowe for the start of the academic year. The cut out “most of the savagery and most of Roxburgh reflected on how Huggins had post-war years, however, were exceedingly the nonsense” from the Psalter. A notable been making excellent bricks without straw: difficult. The loss of 270 Old Stoics broke triumph was the 1935 production of Boris “we cannot afford to give him a proper Roxburgh and he suffered from bouts of Godunov with the professional, Denis Music School or even proper practice rooms, depression. While subscription concerts Noble, in the title role (giving rise to Major and yet music of every kind flourishes in the resumed, distinguished soloists visited the Haworth, housemaster of Chandos, place.” Among Huggins’ more unusual School (Huggins would often pay their fees quipping “Is Boris good enough?”). This was activities was his great enjoyment of hunting out of his own pocket), the LPO again followed by Der Freischutz in a new in the winter (he became Joint Master of the performed in the school gymnasium, an translation by John Saunders who also took Grafton Hunt, occasionally hurrying from the ambitious production of St Joan was staged, the role of Samiel, the Demon Huntsman. Thomas Beecham travelled overnight from and arrived at the School to conduct we cannot afford to give him a proper the London Philharmonic Orchestra with Music School or even proper practice rooms, only minutes to spare. Sir Henry Wood and Adrian Boult also accepted invitations to and yet music of every kind flourishes in the place. conduct at Stowe, the former leading the Choral Society in his arrangement of hunt to play the organ in Chapel with his Huggins suffered from recurring ill health choruses from Handel’s Operas. surplice covering mud-splattered clothes). A and died in April 1952. A few weeks later, Huggins did not suffer from the weaknesses man with a strong sense of Stowe’s place in the School received a letter from a firm of which can sometimes afflict the best the local community, Huggins also accepted solicitors with the news that Dr Huggins had musicians (as Roxburgh remarked, “I have the leadership of a troop of Boy Scouts in a left to the governors £5,000, “for the known one or two who have the neighbouring village. erection of a new and adequate Music temperament of an actress”). Writing a School and his gramophones and A scheme to commemorate the School’s reference for Huggins who in 1933 had gramophone records to be used as a tenth anniversary in 1933 by converting the applied for the post of Director of Music at permanent library for the use of the boys”. Queen’s Temple into a Music School did not Marlborough, Roxburgh wrote, “Huggins is With this exceedingly generous gift and the initially meet with Huggins’ approval. He not an intellectual man, but he is I believe a creation of the new Music School some argued that it was too far away from the first-class musician and it is a blessing to sixty-two years after his death, Leslie find anyone who though being so musical is School for the boys to use in their free Huggins will always be remembered at Stowe at the same time so easy to live with and so periods; his teaching staff would not be able and his spirit lives on in the building which normal”. Fortunately for Stowe, although to supervise music practice when pianos will be formally opened on 23 May 2014. Huggins made it on to the “shortest of short would still be scattered all over the School; lists”, he was pipped to the post by apart from the imposing central room on the Dr Anthony Wallersteiner 5 6 “It was taking up most of my time in School” he remembers. “Finally the Headmaster said to me, ‘You have either really got to concentrate on school work, or leave School and do your magazine’. And I decided to leave Sir Richard Branson (Cobham/ School and concentrate on the magazine.” Lyttelton 68) is kite-surfing, “In those days Stowe was boys only” he adds, somewhere in the Caribbean, as if to explain his decision. “I think going to with a millionaire model single sex schools is very unnatural.” clinging to his back. Or at It was 1967 and, according to school lore, least that’s what his Twitter the late Headmaster, Bob Drayson, bid him farewell with: “Congratulations, Branson. feed proclaims, moments I predict you will either go to prison or become before we talk. a millionaire.”

“Oh?” he says, surprised, when I ask about “I think that was true” says Sir Richard. the picture. “I think that was a few days ago.” “Drayson had his good points, but he was pretty old school. The current Headmaster, There’s a smile in his voice and he sounds if one of his pupils was running a national slightly out of breath. I can’t help wondering if magazine, I think would probably welcome it, he has just waded up his palm-fringed beach: not give them a choice: Don’t do it, or leave.” kite under one arm, lithe, brunette socialite from the photograph on the other. And that’s Sir Richard says he ran Student from the probably exactly what he wants. School ‘phone box, until he was forced to move to London. Today, the Virgin Group has Britain’s best loved entrepreneur, Stowe’s started up almost 400 companies, in sectors most famous old boy and, in the words of ranging from mobile telephony, travel, one of his 3.8 million Twitter followers, “the financial services, leisure, music, holidays planet’s coolest billionaire,” is talking to and health & wellness, and they employ The Corinthian (via telephone, I am afraid) almost 65,000 people all around the world. from his private island, Necker, in the British Virgin Islands. Bob Drayson bid him farewell with: It is an interview to mark his latest accolade. The rich-list regular and world-record collector, “Congratulations who was knighted in 2000, can now Branson. I predict you President of the Old Stoic Society among his many honours. will either go to prison or It is quite an achievement for a man described become a millionaire.” as a “school dropout” in the Encyclopaedia Britannica, and who by his own account, “was pretty hopeless” in class. “If I had been able to play sports and if I had been good in the class room I wouldn’t have “I can’t say I enjoyed it enormously,” left school and Virgin wouldn’t have been remembers Sir Richard of his time at Stowe. born” he says. “I was, and am, dyslexic, and I was pretty hopeless at conventional studying. I had been He managed to wangle interviews with a raft pretty good at games and then I tore the of notables, including the Prime Minister, cartilage in my knee, and that grounded me.” Edward Heath, the actor Peter Sellers and the author John Le Carré. He sent his own children, Sam and Holly, to St Edward’s in . “We would write a lot of letters and we would get a lot of knock backs but, if ten people said “I think at that stage I hadn’t really realised yes we would have the makings of the what a revolution had gone on at Stowe, since magazine” he says. “There’s no question that I had left” he says. “I honestly never felt was an incredible education for how to get on massive warmth towards wanting to go back. in life, because if you don’t ask you don’t get.” It’s only having seen the absolute transformation, and having met lots of people “And if they didn’t say yes, once I had left who have been there recently, who have school, I would turn up at their hotel room, spoken really highly of it, that I have sat up to lugging this massive reel to reel tape recorder take notice.” around, and hope they would take pity on me.” “The Stowe that I visited recently just seems What kind of pupil was he, as a junior in like the kind of school that I would love to be Cobham? part of. It’s got a really good Headmaster who genuinely cares.” “The first week I turned up at School, I turned up at church and there wasn’t a designated Struggling academically and robbed of the seat for me, so I never went to church again chance to play sports, Sir Richard launched a and I wasn’t missed” he says. “That hour, I national magazine, called Student, “to was able to work on my magazine.” campaign on issues that young people felt strongly about.” Dedicated, and it seems, rather resourceful. 7 It was around that time, Sir Richard says, that he was first approached by Stowe on more amicable terms. “I got a letter from the Headmaster, when Virgin was starting to be successful, and they were thinking about letting girls into the School and he asked whether I could sponsor it, financially?” he says. “I didn’t have a lot of money and I thought the best way I could get out of it was to write back and say that I would be happy to sponsor it, but they would have to name it after the company. “I didn’t hear anything from them after that.” However, Dr Wallersteiner had already warned him that were he to make the same 2 Sir Richard Branson with the 2012-13 Branson Scholars. offer twice, the School might not be so prudish. “I had a Dutch girlfriend in my last term, and He already supports a Branson Scholars I managed to put a tent up in the grounds programme, which brings five pupils a “There’s Flamingos making love” Sir Richard for a week” he says, still proud of his year from the Dominican Convent School suddenly exclaims. They are on one of the two lakes on the island which he bought for shenanigans. in Johannesburg, to spend a year at Stowe, $180,000 from Lord Cobham, just eleven and he is full of praise for what the School “Where?” years after leaving Stowe. is doing to try and foster entrepreneurs, “Ahh,” he says. “There were enough wooded “within the constrictions of the formal “It’s a very complex thing for a flamingo to areas where you could sneak a tent in.” education system that is set down make love” he explains. “The male has to by Government.” fly in order to make it fit. You have to take The more we talk, I can’t help wondering your hat off to them.” how his OS Presidency is going to sit with “Most people who leave Stowe are going the more authoritarian members of the to find they have to work bloody hard at The glee in his voice at watching nature on masters’ common room, if indeed there are whatever they are doing, whether it’s his island hideaway makes it easy to any left? Being a successful entrepreneur, it building up an international business or believe him when he says he’s enjoyed seems, requires a healthy sense of mischief, not” he says. “It’s really tough building a “every moment”. and a good dose of disdain for petty rules business and a lot of people fail on the way. Last year he became the oldest person to and conventions. If you fail, make sure you pick yourself up cross the English Channel on a kite surf. In 1987, he set the record for the first hot air “Most people who leave Stowe are going to find they have to balloon to cross the Atlantic, while in 1991 he was aboard the first balloon to cross the work bloody hard at whatever they are doing, Pacific from Japan to Arctic Canada. He was whether it’s building up an international business or not.” also, in 2004, the richest person to present a reality television show, according to the Guinness Book of Records, who estimated “I managed to persuade a local farmer to and try again. If you do succeed, it’s his wealth at $4.6billion. let me go shooting on his land and I hid a a fantastic way of life to be working Any regrets, I wonder? “To be honest, no” shotgun at Stowe and I used to sneak out” for yourself.” he says. But there is one. Sir Richard says. “And I used to sneak out His advice for aspiring entrepreneurs? for the Grand Prix.” “Many, many years [after I left Stowe] I “First of all you have to stand back and was with the two most famous cricketers It is no wonder the Headmaster thought in the world, at the time, Viv Richards and he’d end up in prison. think what a business is. A business is coming up with an idea to make a positive Ian Botham and I was flying over in a “I don’t think I did anything different than difference to other people’s lives. If it’s helicopter and I saw a cricket match going most kids are doing today” he adds. not being done well by other people, or if on” he remembers. “Hopefully they are breaking the rules just it’s unique, even better. My attitude is “I had never been back to Stowe and I was like our generation did, and having fun. screw it, just do it.” tempted to land on the cricket pitch, but It’s all part of growing up.” “Surround yourself with great people and I didn’t have the courage to ask the pilots. Sir Richard says he only became an make sure they believe in what you are I have always regretted that.” entrepreneur “by default” when he was trying to do. If you have a great team, your Jerome Starkey (Chandos 99) forced to sell advertising to keep his idea has a chance of succeeding.” magazine alive. In 1971, a year after Sir Richard started Jerome Starkey (Chandos 99), is The Times’ “In order for my magazine to survive, I had selling mail-order records, Drayson’s correspondent. He was recently to become an entrepreneur and that took up th prediction very nearly came true. The Virgin awarded the 10 annual Kurt Schork even more time than the editing” he says. boss fell foul of HM Customs and Excise, Memorial Award for his coverage from “It was perishingly tough just getting after failing to pay duty on several van loads and Libya. He also penned the enough advertising to keep every edition of records. He spent a night in jail, was extensive coverage documenting the life of going but it was an incredible education. It bailed out by his mother and had to pay a Nelson Mandela, following his death last year. www.jeromestarkey.com 8 was the university education I never had.” hefty fine of £60,000. THE GREAT BRITISH CLUB

‘Top 100 Courses you must play in the World’ GOLF WORLD ‘Top 10 British Spas’ TATLER

Summer Events at Stoke Park... SportsAid presents KATHERINE SIR JENKINS OBE CONCERT

28th June 2014 29th June 2014 17th - 21st June 2014 www.stokepark.com/concerts www.stokepark.com/concerts www.theboodles.com

Only 35 minutes from London and 7 miles from London Heathrow. For further information please contact the Events Office on 01753 717171 or by email on [email protected]. www.stokepark.com

SPC_Summer Events_AD_Stowe A4.indd 1 11/02/2014 10:58 8 Roger Hodgson.

On the same day that an outrageous south westerly brought By now, the marquee is pretty full. It is at down a venerable old tree in the Grecian Valley and ripped up this point that I really must eulogise about the production of the whole event. a marquee that had been erected on the South Front, Stowe The setting was spectacular. Seeing all of was about to be hit by another storm of even greater force. the equipment on the stage added a frisson of excitement of things to come. The lighting was dramatic and effective The talents of three Old Stoics and their stage presence and vocal delivery and the sound quality created by a respective bands were about to deliver coming over like a cross between brilliant team of engineers was faultless. an evening of such high octane musical Pat Benatar and Avril Lavigne. I personally have used this team before power that not even the ridiculously Hardly had the audience realised what as well as the producer, Andrew Chance arctic and inclement weather conditions had hit them when the equally driving (Chandos 71), and boy, do they deliver! could outdo! Let me set the scene: Chasing Shadows forced them into the Back to the stage which, by now, has Two thousand people stoically (literally), backs of their seats. But this time the been totally commandeered by a ten were trying to cope with their picnics lyrics are tempered with urgent longing piece combo carrying a myriad of musical in the wind, rain and Siberian ‘take me to the bedroom – let me get to and percussive devices ranging from temperatures, some determined to enjoy know you’. Hmmm, straight to the point, guitars and cellos to flutes, drums and a their supper by wilfully sitting it out on I should say! No dithering about here! laptop and led by one of the most the trestle tables provided. Others Two more anthemic belters Wordless charismatic front men that I have ever huddled in the semi-shelter of the South and Forever Criminal followed. Then the watched . This is ORLANDO SEALE AND Front , whilst the VIPs were dining announcement of an Olly Murs cover! THE SWELL– in fact the whole band is in the State Dining Rooms. However, – Whattt??? – Puhleeez! – A blistering mesmerising. There is so much going on British to the core, we all took the rendition of Heart Skips A Beat ensued that you cannot take your eyes off them. elements in our stride because nothing – a brilliant interpretation and far more Orlando Seale’s (Lyttelton 91) songs defy was going to stop the anticipation of exciting than the original. Suddenly, it categorisation. Whereas in some cases Stowe Storm 2 – THE CONCERT! is time for the final number, aptly titled the lyrics are dark and in others upbeat, The apocalyptic tones of a disembodied To The Ending. As in all of the showcased the whole aura around the band is one of voice alerted the picnickers to the songs, the band delivered a real punch imminent arrival of the first band. With here with tight chiming guitar duets, joy and fun. a double beat drum intro, fleshed out by fearsome riffs, pulsating bass and Their set began with several bars of heavy guitar riffing, RYKER SEAR hit the whiplash drumming. “We are strangers” sustained strings and choppy acoustic stage with the searing Tell Me Why. They the band cry out in chorus during the guitar strumming leading into the are a fresh, young, vibrant act pulsating last number – not for much longer they mysterious The Lost and the Keeper. with energy and with front girl Regan aren’t if this performance was anything There are hints of Kate Bush in the 10 Vincenza’s (Nugent 05) commanding to go by! ambiguity of the lyrics tinged with the gave each song new life and a more contemporary and urgent sound. Hit followed favourite hit. had us all singing along and we all identified with , which was inspired by his time at Stowe. One tends to forget just how many superb songs Roger has written, though when he played lesser known songs from his more recent solo albums the tendency was, as is always the case, to feel mildly frustrated. However, I think that we all accepted that the man is a fecund composer who, quite naturally, wishes to give an airing to his newer fabulous back catalogue material of which he can be justifiably once again – after all, that is why they proud – as it wasn’t half bad! had all bought tickets in the first place – At one point a curious thing happened. but no one had expected what they had A mosh pit began to develop! – probably just experienced from Orlando Seale and not something that such a rock and roll the Swell. luminary would have expected. And then pretty girls clambered onto the stage and Now, by this time, everyone was on full put their arms around him. And there he alert. The support bands had more than was, my old school contemporary, with done their stuff in whipping up a colossal whom my band would occasionally share atmosphere and so when ROGER amps and mics, now elevated to HODGSON materialised on the stage, superstar status and living the rock and the whole place erupted. It was like ‘The roll dream of a school boy’s imagination Second Coming’ – rather than a and playing back at our old School – how 1 homecoming! Orlando Seale and the Swell. bloody wonderful is that? 1 Ryker Sear. I, personally, was thunderstruck by the The concert just grew and grew and degree of support and adulation every one of us was rewarded with our bestowed upon Roger by the audience drama of Scott Walker. It was a fantastic favourite Supertramp song. Dreamer, – Heaven knows how he must have felt. set. After the first number I looked about the number with which we all used to me and saw the audience slack jawed Graciously and rather movingly show off the awesome stereo effects of with disbelief. From then on, Orlando acknowledging his reception, RH our brand new sound systems, could had us all in the palm of his hand. straddled his keyboard stool, flexed his never disappoint and was followed by fingers and launched straight into Take Fool’s Overture. By this time, no one Dance Little Man is bright and jiggy and The Long Way Home which had us all up even wanted to remain seated. Then in mid-session two of the girls change on our feet and where we would have after two hours and two encores Roger from spirited drum and tom-tom beating willingly stayed if he hadn’t, tactfully brought this magical evening to a close to flute and oboe and back again. In fact, throughout the whole set, instruments are being changed and roles reversed – “I felt tremendously privileged to be part of the celebrations whilst all the while continuous and insistent rhythms take over your entire and to play alongside Roger and Ryker Sear being – hypnotic stuff. – the whole experience was thrilling.” ORLANDO SEALE These Streets has an infectious sing-a- long chorus with a lyric content not too invited us all to sit down and by the end with, appropriately, the happiest far from, but considerably more cerebral of which we were all back in 1980 and sounding song about miserable weather than, Jefferson Starship’s We Built This very happy to be so. There then followed ever written It’s Raining Again. City On Rock And Roll. a succession of familiar Supertramp There is a lot to be said about the power Chanting For Snakes and Filthy Hope are tunes. School, Hide In Your Shell and of music and in this instance it moody and introspective but infused with Sister Moonshine were interspersed with manifested itself in us all filing out of the drama and tangible mystery. Airplanes selections from his solo albums. Now, marquee feeling elated and happy to find drives along with an urgent Bolero-like everyone knows the Supertramp oeuvre that the temperature had risen, the wind insistence and the finale I Love You Beast but only the diehards would be familiar had dropped and the rain had stopped. is all trembling strings and tribal rhythms with Roger Hodgson’s solo output. This and with a resonating climax. is a great shame as there are some real What more can be said other than, “Thank you, Roger, thank you, Orlando, The buzz amongst the crowd outside the treasures amongst them. In Jeopardy, thank you, Regan and all of your fellow marquee during the opening acts was Lovers In The Wind and the immensely band members, thank you Andrew and one of euphoria. Ryker Sear had got the thought provoking Death And a Zoo. your brilliant production team, thank you party started and had us all fired up with Roger has a distinctive and mildly Artemis for their kind and generous their particular brand of hard driving rock plaintive vocal delivery which has made sponsorship – and thank you Stowe for a and, of course, everyone was excited all of his songs iconic. His new band is phenomenal and unforgettable evening.” about the prospect of seeing Roger brilliant and, whilst faithfully note perfect Hodgson (Grenville 68) and hearing the to the original Supertramp recordings, Nigel Milne (Chandos 68) 11 Green and Pleasant Land scene at the FEATURE Opening Ceremony of the Olympic Games. This included the bank of flowers which the athletes paraded around and the ‘Tor’ where the competing countries put their flags and Lord Coe made his opening speech. Bespoke mixes were also grown for the Athletes Village and this year large areas have been grown for the transformation work in the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park. As it is such a versatile product it has been used for many films, including all the Harry Potter films. It is also used for green roofs and roof sites supplied include the Cliffs of Moher visitor centre, County Clare, Peppa Pig World at Paultons Park and the Visitor Centre at Wild Flower Turf Cardiff Castle. Entomologists and ecologists love the at the Olympic Opening Ceremony product due to its beneficial properties for bees, butterflies and insects, and the media interest and coverage in all things – where we began experimenting with I enjoyed Stowe (Chatham ‘wild’ has been very helpful with generating soil free lawn turf and variants. By using 1951-56) particularly the music awareness for such an important habitat. under Dr Huggins, then after compost and no soil, we produced a Our redundant farm buildings are shortened National Service in superb quality lawn with no weeds in it at all. converted into light industrial units. the Navy, I began 5 years of This income, plus the turf enterprise, The system evolved so in one operation we farm training including has enabled us to build excellent drying lay a plastic sheet on a field, a netting (of Cirencester, where I stayed floor and seed cleaning facilities for our varying thickness on top) and ½” thick with Pat Smythe. 200 acres of herbage seed production. layer of compost with seed premixed. This The business employs 7 people and produces a very high quality grass turf to I bought my first farm near Winchester in another 15 to 20 people work here in the sell 6 weeks later. The turf is length cut in 1964. Completion was on June 28 and I rented buildings, when a farm of this size either .75m width rolls for hand laying, or was faced with a burnt out grain drier, no 3 would normally need half a man. 2m wide, 700kg for JCB type machine phase electricity and 400 acres to harvest. laying. The roots enmesh in the netting to I have been hugely supported, as a Luckily, my previous year had been with a enable quite rough handling at this very newcomer to farming, by the highly fantastic mentor farmer nearby who was young age (conventional soil turf can only entrepreneurial farmers in this area. I have hugely supportive. We had to remove a be lifted when it is 18 months old). The thoroughly enjoyed my farming life and am barn end and, in exactly 4 weeks a new rolls are much lighter than soil-based turf, delighted to have seen our business drier, cleaner and 3 phase supply was a very even thickness and the roots have survive and thrive over the years. installed and the next day we started not been cut giving a carpet like quality. David Hewetson-Brown (Chatham 56) harvest. We never looked back. Nat West Laying is three or four times faster than for Bank loaned us 60% of the farm purchase conventional turf. Any specific seed mixes price and has been very supportive ever can be supplied i.e. for sea defences, river since (50 years this year and only about banks etc. 5 bank managers in total!). Our eldest son, James, took over the farm However, in 1969 the proposed M3 ten years ago and developed soil-less motorway was announced and would take wildflower turf, www.wildflowerturf.co.uk , 40 acres through the middle of the farm. based on the same system but using a We got paid compensation finally 19 years small percentage of low growth grass seed later. It was a nightmare, so I feel with a mix of around 20 perennial wild desperately for the HS2 rail affected flower species. Our system of production 1 An aerial view of the farm, showing the property owners. achieves a very high germination of flower turf being grown. seed, unlike trying to establish wildflowers 5 A wild flower bank at the Olympic Keen to intensify to replace the ‘lost’ in soil, which is often a failure. We have Opening Ceremony. motorway acres, I was approached by a this product ready to sell in 10 weeks from friend to grow turf in heavy erosion-control starting the process. The inclusion of a netting to supply an instant green product. wide variety of flowers provides suitability We had a huge learning curve, trying for all soil types on the destination site. different zero-soil growing mediums and The only maintenance required is an developing machinery for our ‘unique’ use. autumn cut and removal of material. In 1983, we moved and bought this lovely 700 acre farm (600 arable acres) – the 2012 was a big year as we supplied all the 12 motorway having driven us off my first farm wildflower and turf areas for Danny Boyle’s Chance Organisation and Arts at Stowe present THE RUSSIAN NATIONAL ORCHESTRA conducted by Carlo Ponti with LESLEY GARRETT and CRAIG GREENE in a Gala Concert at Stowe introduced by HOWARD GOODALL Programme will include Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto No 1 Tchaikovsky Excerpts from The Nutcracker Arias and songs by Dvoˇrák, Lehar and Bizet

Friday 23rd May 2014 Stowe, Buckingham MK18 5EH TICKETS £50 (Premium Tickets: £150, including best available seats and Palladian Picnic) Ticket Hotline: 01432 355416 or order online at: www.jsltickets.com 13 1950s Stowe: Fishing for Memories

1 The elegant restaurant Taking a break while winter steelheading on the Skeena River. Vancouver with its spectacular 7 The writer as a well-dressed teenaged harbour and mountain views angler. was the perfect setting for a 5 Stowe memories will never fade. reunion dinner.

The Belfast-born, Old Stoic writer and Daphne, his wife, have lived in Canada with their two sons – now well into their forties with their own families – since 1971; the other two men at the table, a second Old Stoic, also named Peter, and his friend John, were on their way home to The tench demanded a dawn start but no Sadly, it was not great eating despite a rich after a successful week’s fishing one ever seemed to notice that, in June and sauce and all her culinary efforts: far too for steelhead on the Skeena River in July, we were departing our dormitory beds many bones. By comparison, her pie made northern British Columbia. to go fishing shortly after 4.00am. On the from the breasts of young rooks, shot by way to the lake, Peter H B recalls searching Fishing, and in the beginning Stowe, Historians under Bill’s supervision, was the dew-heavy grass on the South Front brought the two Peters together again for quite superb. cricket pitch for lobworms, along with bread the first time since they went their separate Measured against today’s norms, life at paste the best possible bait for the tench, ways almost 60 years before. Their Stowe Stowe in the early fifties was on the free and tenacious fighters weighing four pounds was a very different place to the Stowe of easy side but we learned to be responsible and more. today. Sweets, bought at the School shop and polite, to respect others and to enjoy near the tennis courts, were still rationed My first Stowe fishing rod was a whippy, our surroundings and, of course, to follow with coupons required; the inspiring, metal affair that possibly started life as an the inevitable boarding school routines. As sprawling estate, with its many ornate aerial on an army tank while the wooden Peter Houghton Brown says, “It is with great temples and monuments had yet to attract Nottingham-style reel, which I still have, was pleasure that even now I go out with the recognition and the ongoing bought second hand for a few shillings in Stowe Beagles where I meet Chris Mullineux restoration of buildings and grounds. the tackle shop in Buckingham. The other (Temple 52) and get asked to shoot by Sir Peter adds, “Memories fade over 60 years Back then, with the aftermath of the Second Richard Sutton (Temple 55), both friends but I do remember my best great aunt taking from my Temple days.” World War still very real, the two Peters, me to the Army and Navy Stores, of all McMullan and Houghton Brown had been places, to get me a rod. A very helpful So many of our fishing memories from the assigned to Temple House, the writer at the gentleman produced an Apollo spinning rod 1950s live on for me in the carefully detailed start of the final year (1949) of the Roxburgh made of steel. They are not made any more pages of The Angler’s Pocket Record, a era, his good friend arriving in the autumn but it was my pride and joy for many a year.” cherished Christmas gift from my parents, of 1950. filled with neatly written notes of those long As we approach our eighties we both ago fishing experiences. The Stowe part More than half a century has elapsed since reflect on our Stowe days with considerable begins on 21 January 1951 – two small pike then and they both still love to fish, moving pleasure. I was no great academic but taken spinning and on dead bait from the on from the pike, roach, perch and tench, relished the traditions, the sports and Octagon – and concludes on 15 March that still populate Stowe’s Octagon and inter-house competition, friendships, 1953, ‘very cold, stormy’, when Peter H B Eleven Acre lakes, to fishing in the United the fishing and the day-to-day activities Kingdom and Western Canada for Atlantic associated with an always quite and I landed six Eleven Acre pike on perch and Pacific salmon, brown and rainbow remarkable establishment. live bait, none especially large but a fine way trout and steelhead and also much further to close out the coarse fishing . I know the fishing experiences most afield – Iceland, , – All you have just read is a reflection of a when the urge to travel grows too strong. definitely helped to shape my life as did the influence of Historian tutor, army officer (MC, bygone time but very much a defining aspect As boys in their teens Peter Houghton Normandy) and author, Bill McElwee, not of my life. We can only hope the present Brown, an farmer to this day the remarkable Patience, his wife generation of Stoics and Old Stoics feel as and the writer, a retired editor and at Vancouver Lodge, then ’s good about the School when, in 2074, their communications manager, fished together unconventional cultural retreat. On one turn comes to look back 60 years. Perhaps at Stowe whenever the opportunity memorable occasion, she actually stuffed they, too, will be fishermen. presented itself. In the winter months, pike and baked a five pound pike for us. Peter McMullan (Temple 53) were the principal quarry; in summer their turned to the handsome tench found where the Eleven Acre empties into Peter McMullan writes on fly-fishing for Chasing Silver Magazine and for the Copper Bottom, in their time nothing www.ariverneversleeps.com. He also conceived and co-authored a 2010 book more than a swampy marsh with an on the Babine, a famous steelhead river in British Columbia. He is a nephew of the evocative name as a reminder of its late Fred Gardiner DFC (Grafton 36), who flew Spitfires in the Battle of Britain. 14 previous grand history. Old Stoics Wed at Stowe!

The grounds of Stowe School House Singing Competition. She also held Journalist, declared the wedding a great were awash with Old Stoics, leading roles in the Senior Congreves, success and say they are still flying high on playing Fantine in Les Misérables and cloud nine after returning from a three week family and friends in the Connie in Alan Bennett’s Habeas Corpus. honeymoon in Malaysia and Borneo. summer of 2013 for an extra Jonny joined Grafton House as a fresh faced Emily said, “It was the most beautiful day. special reunion – the marriage 13 year old in 2002 and went on to become The sun shone and everything went of two former pupils. Chapel Prefect, as well as Head of Chapel perfectly. My favourite moment was walking Choir. He also sang with the Chamber Choir, down the to the harp and seeing Jonny Old Stoics, Emily Ansell (Nugent 07) and led Grafton in the House Singing waiting for me. We went round the Stowe Jonathan Elfer (Grafton 07) exchanged vows Competition and held leading roles in grounds in a golf buggy and had in the Stowe grounds before enjoying a numerous Congreves. Jonny was renowned photographs at all the places we loved lavish reception in the main house. for his portrayal of Fat Sam in Malone when we were pupils at the school, such as and the eccentric vicar, Canon Throbbing, in Their guests enjoyed champagne and the lakes and the Palladian Bridge. We Habeas Corpus. canapés, a three-course meal in the Music enjoyed every moment of the day and it was Room, an evening buffet in the Marble Hall It was when performing together in Habeas wonderful to celebrate with all our friends and dancing in the Temple Room. Corpus that the pair struck up a friendship and family.” Entertainment included lawn games, a and soon became an item. Jonny added, “I will never forget seeing harpist, a caricaturist and eight-piece band, The duo always said they could think of no Emily come into the church. It was such a The Dark Blues, who perform at private better place to get hitched than Stowe – the magical moment. We had our first dance in parties for the Royal family. The couple also place where they first met and which had the Temple Room, the room where we met surprised their guests when toastmaster many happy memories. So, when Jonny for the very first time at a choir supper, and Ken Chaproniere taught Jonny to sabrage a popped the question at the top of the Eiffel were surrounded by the life-long friends we bottle of champagne in the Marble Hall Tower on a trip to Paris, a date was set and met at the School. Stowe was the perfect before their first dance. the planning began. Emily and Jonny setting for our wedding.” exchanged vows in Stowe Church on When ’s arrow struck the two Stoics Mrs Emily Elfer (née Ansell, Nugent 07) Saturday, 10 August 2013 and then danced back in 2007, little did they know that they the night away in the main house. would return to the School six years later to become husband and wife. Emily joined Old Stoics celebrating with the couple Stowe for Sixth Form in 2005 and included: Libby Collins (Nugent 07), Chloe immediately became known for her singing Dorrington (Nugent 07), Imogen Midwood voice. She was Head of Altos for the Chapel (Nugent 07), Siobhan Keeley (Nugent 07), Choir in Upper Sixth, sang in the Chamber Natalie Scott-Gray (Nugent 07), James Richardson (Temple 07), Harry McCorkell Choir, performed as female vocalist for the (Walpole 07), Julian Nesbitt (Chandos 07), Stowe Jazz Band and led Nugent in the Jamie Gubbins (Grafton 07), Richard Hill (Grafton 07), Giles Lucas (Cobham 07), Toby For information about getting Marshall (Walpole 07), Duncan Bennett married at Stowe, please contact (Grafton 07), George Coote (Chatham 07), Becky Maclean, Wedding Co-ordinator, Ollie Ritchie (Chatham 07) and Jack Peile by telephoning 01280 818280 or (Walpole 07). Director of Drama, Nick Bayley, email [email protected]. also joined the celebrations and Head of To see photographs from weddings Keyboard, Ben Andrew, was pianist for the at Stowe please visit wedding breakfast in the Music Room. www.pinterest.com/StoweEvents The couple, who currently live in London, where Jonny is a Barrister and Emily is a

Photos by Stuart Bebb 15 FEATURE

2 One of two etchings by Pedro Wonaeamirri donated to the Art School at Stowe. The Art of Giving

Gordon Darling (Grafton 39) These etchings are the latest addition to returned to the School he had known as is one of Australia’s the growing collection of gifts from a student, in pre World War II Britain. most significant, living Darling, a collection which includes the Darling is three years older than the philanthropists and was Crossroads Millennium Portfolio of School and, like the School, he has Aboriginal Artist prints (which colour charted a formidable career spanning instrumental in establishing the walls of both the British Museum across the worlds of business and art. the National Portrait Gallery and now Stowe’s Art Department) and Darling’s first career propelled him to of Australia. a soulful watercolour by the late Albert the top of the Australian business world, Namatjira. Thus, Stowe now possesses th where he sat as the longest serving of In celebration of Stowe School’s 90 a fine collection of Australian aboriginal birthday last year, the Australian BHP’s directors. BHP (the Broken Hill art, with thanks to Darling. philanthropist Gordon Darling (Grafton Proprietary Company) is the largest 39) gave two etchings by the In 2011, Darling came from Australia to mining company in the world, and contemporary aboriginal artist Pedro visit the painting by Namatjira he had Darlings have sat on its board for a 16 Wonaeamirri as a birthday present. donated to Stowe. In doing so, Darling century. Yet, it is his second career for which he is famed: Gordon Darling’s Gallery during its transition to the understanding that they come alive inspirational philanthropic work has of Australia (NGA). with investment of a wider cultural transformed the Australian art scene. “There have been very few people who prospective, means you can investigate their importance in a multicultural society. Darling remembers Stowe in the 1930s have been lucky enough to open a I think the human story behind the art with great fondness, describing his time flagship national institution, the National as a “happy one”, and adding that Gallery of Australia, and to have a really that Darling donated to the School was “Grafton (my House) won the Lauris Cup memorable four years there, and then to the lesson he was hoping to impart.” in my final year, 1939”. Darling came be involved in the creation of the National Namatjira (1902-1959) was the first to Stowe in 1935. His parents had been Portrait Gallery,” said Darling. “So all Aborigine to be given Australian living in the UK since the First World War, those things, much to my surprise, have citizenship. The watercolour pictures as his father was in charge of the London been much higher profile and a much an Australian landscape painted in the branch of the family business of John more rewarding experience than 40 years Western tradition. The gum tree in the Darling & Son. “My father had been to in business.” foreground, together with the style and school in Australia and he had no UK school links”, said Darling, “Stowe was new then and he simply chose it.” Darling is three years older than the school and, Darling’s philanthropic second career like the School, he has charted a formidable career may be defined by the urge to preserve spanning across the worlds of business and art. and promote Australian arts, yet – unexpectedly – he took little inspiration from his surroundings at Stowe, instead he The inspiration behind the National composition of the painting, all speak was “very focussed on cricket”! Whilst the Portrait Gallery came from a trip to volumes on the aboriginal struggle. beauty of the School may not have Washington in the early 1980s, when When asked why he had chosen to give influenced his later career, he was greatly Darling visited America’s National Portrait these gifts to Stowe, Darling replied, impressed by his art teacher, and he Gallery. “I walked down the main corridor “I wanted Stowe to have an example of remembers having “two small Van Gogh and kept on recognising names,” he prints pinned up in my study – I looked at recalls, “I finally said to myself, ‘this is Australia’s first internationally recognised them long and often”. Another inspiration ridiculous, we could do one of these’, aboriginal artist, Albert Namatjira, from in Darling’s life came from his Headmaster, so that was the starting point.” Hermannsburg in central Australia. Both JF Roxburgh. Darling remembers with Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip own Gordon Darling’s campaign gathered affection how JF was in his prime. After a work by Albert Namatjira.” Darling is momentum in 1992 when he launched a assembly he would seek out any boy bursting with admiration for Australian travelling exhibition, Uncommon celebrating a birthday and say, “Many aboriginal art, and he clearly takes great Australians: Towards an Australian Portrait Happys, Gordon” or whoever. “When as a pride from promoting the “highly rated” Gallery. This provided the impetus for a school prefect I was to read the lesson in Crossroads collection. temporary home for portraits in Old Chapel for the first time, he went with me Parliament House in Canberra, and later a Darling’s donations have inspired the Art to the lectern and coached me. It was a permanent location in the parliamentary Department at Stowe to take advantage shared moment I will never forget.” triangle next to the High Court. “There’s of its independence from the national When the Second World War broke out, nothing wrong with giving paintings and curriculum and to put on an exhibition of Darling (then aged 18) moved back to money” commented Darling’s nephew, a South African and Australian aboriginal Australia, where he spent the war as an documentary filmmaker and former art, which will hopefully air at some point intelligence officer. It was during the war banker, “but Gordon’s campaign for a this year. Brian Johnson trusts this will that Darling’s first eardrum burst, on National Portrait Gallery is up there with give Stoics the opportunity “to look board a flight from Sicily to Cairo at high the smartest philanthropy. This beyond the narrow Western tradition of altitude on a DC4 when he was on his represented an outstanding piece of painting” and into “a much wider level of way to join Dwight Eisenhower’s war long-term strategic thinking... It showed understanding. Not just purely aesthetic room for the southern Mediterranean how important it is for the private sector but of the nature of rights and citizenship. campaign. After the war, Darling became to show leadership to government.” Students can learn to see these images a commodities trader in the family The application of Darling’s ferocious as political, cultural and social images, business, with a dizzying 32 year career business mind to the Australian art scene and start to see them as a valuable door as BHP Director, until disaster struck in has meant that, today, Australia boasts a onto an understanding of people.” the 1980s with the perforation of his National Portrait Gallery, a National second eardrum during a site visit to the Gordon Darling’s second career is now Gallery of Australia print collection, the Port Kembla steelworks. Struggling to in its fourth decade and it is far from over. Gordon Darling Foundation and the hear the discussions of billion-dollar The Gordon Darling Foundation was set biggest collection in the world of Albert deals at board meetings, he was up in 1991 to focus on visual arts, and it Namatjira’s work. compelled to retire from the BHP board dispenses significant sums annually to and from the Chairmanship of Rheem Among the very long list of Darling’s provide travel scholarships for curators in Australia in 1986; a move that ended the admirers is our very own Brian Johnson, regional galleries and to assist institutions lineage of the BHP ‘Darling seat’ that had Stowe’s art master. Alongside many that might otherwise be deprived. Over begun with his grandfather. Forced away Stoics, Johnson has been inspired by the years it has given out some $8 million from the world of business, Darling Darling’s gifts to Stowe, in particular the through some 700 grants. Darling’s instead dedicated his time to improving watercolour by Albert Namatjira. philanthropy will no doubt continue to the arts of Australia. “This watercolour has taught Stoics how inspire people the world round. It is a This period of Darling’s life began with his important research into a work of art can wonderful testament to one great man. Chairmanship of the Australian National be. Examining these images with an Helena Kealey (Lyttelton 09) 17 6 HRH the Duke of Edinburgh presenting FEATURE Professor John Frazer with a British Design Award for Autographics Software 1988 (Computer software for architectural design).

classical design. For him, the architecture of Stowe has played a huge part in his architectural education and the work he produces. Francis says that, “This is sometimes conscious, but at other times completely unconscious. For example, a few years ago I designed a portico to go on an existing building, which I thought had a rather original column configuration. It was only after the work was complete that I noticed it was directly copied from the North Front!” The classical architecture of Stowe was a major factor in it being chosen as a school for Francis. Having spent his holidays in European cities, such as Venice, and Prague, where he and his father would draw and paint the great architectural masterpieces that can be found there, it was only natural that, while at Stowe, Stowe: A Place of Francis would spend a lot time of drawing the main building and temples. This was mainly motivated by his desire, at that time, to become an artist. After following this dream for a while, Francis decided that Influence he was better suited to architecture. Had he known he was going to be an architect, Almost twenty years after leaving Stowe, I am enjoying the autumnal Francis hopes he might have spent more time looking at the detail of Stowe’s colour of the down which I am driving. As I cross over the architecture but his artistic skills still play humped back of the ornate bridge, the sun sparkles off the water that a vital role in helping him communicate his flows underneath. vision for a building to his clients. Francis and his father run the architectural practice The lake appears to sit effortlessly in the rugby or the clarinet and couldn’t tell you Quinlan and Francis Terry LLP where their landscape but I know that its form is what was said during those assemblies, drawings often look like those that man-made, the result of Lancelot but I can close my eyes and feel what being Vanbrugh or Kent might have used to explain their ideas for updating Stowe to ‘Capability’ Brown’s design. I am here for in those spaces was like. a meeting with the National Trust to help ensure it kept at the forefront of fashion. As Old Stoics, we have all been lucky them plan how best to make use of this Since leaving Stowe, Francis has returned enough to spend time in a world renowned once ducal estate. However, I’m not back a few times. His most recent visit was with landscape designed to embody within it at Stowe, instead I am at the 3,800 acre an American client to whom he wanted to many stories and messages about politics Clumber Park in Nottinghamshire but the show Stowe’s impressive collection of and love. Effectively conveying these similarities are striking. Is this feeling of , ahead of a project he is working messages to the audience of the time, familiarity with this estate that, until today, on to design their house and grounds in without the use of language, required its I hadn’t visited before just a coincidence? Kentucky. Thus, Stowe continues to I don’t think so. I can trace direct links from designers to understand how people use inspire and influence landscape and the five years I spent at Stowe, absorbing spaces and the meanings they associate architectural style. the atmosphere of its landscape and with them and the symbolism they contain. Another Old Stoic working within the field architecture, to the work I now do as a This is still very much the case today when of architecture is Professor John Frazer consultant to the heritage sector. designing experiences for visitors to gardens and parks. I attribute my interest (Chandos 63), although his career path While at Stowe, I never had lessons in and understanding of this process to the and approach to the subject are completely landscape architecture or architectural time I spent living within the work of past different to those of Francis. John is history; however, I did regularly walk the masters and was fascinated to discover recognised as the leader in the field of length of the hand-dug Grecian Valley on whether Stowe’s influence on my thinking evolutionary digital design and, in the the way to games at the Bourbon pitches. was replicated in other Old Stoics. So, with 1970s, founded one of the first computer I played the clarinet, badly, at recitals in the aided design software companies. He was the help of the Old Stoic Society, I spoke Queen’s Temple with its classical columns International Research Co-ordinator for with a couple of the one hundred or more and Roman and, during school Gehry Technologies, where computer Old Stoics who have gone on to become assemblies, I got to stand in the Marble design software was critical in allowing architects, landscape architects and Saloon and gaze at the intricate frieze Frank Gehry’s complex designs for designers about their experiences. running around the roof. In many ways, the buildings, such as the Guggenheim landscape and architecture were incidental Francis Terry (Chatham 88) is an architect Museum in Bilbao, to be realised on time 18 to these activities; however, I no longer play who, together with his father, specialises in and within budget. He has also held several prominent positions at the the longest in the country, will be shared buildings and landscape continue to universities of Cambridge, Ulster, more obviously with the public. influence those who are privileged to Hong Kong, Dalian, Fudan and Shandong. spend time absorbing their genius. While Clumber Park, the property I mentioned at it is important both financially and perhaps While at Stowe, John studied Maths, the start of this piece, is an estate without even morally that Stowe is open to far more Physics and Chemistry but, inspired by a Mansion. Like Stowe and so many other than just Stoics, it is my hope that future the freedom and creativity of the art country estates, financial pressures in the pupils continue to have the unique department, he added Art to his list of 1920s and 1930s resulted in it being sold. opportunity to imbibe some of the subjects, completing the curriculum in However, unlike Stowe, there was no country’s best classical design as part six months. This allowed him to go on to Roxburgh with a vision for Clumber that of their experience and education while at Stowe. It might not be part of any a much wilder place with curriculum but it is a unique part of an education at Stowe and one that can have temples to be discovered amongst the trees a life-long effect. that had grown up around them. Dr James Furse-Roberts (Grafton 95) study architecture at the Architectural would find a new role for the House. Dr James Furse-Roberts (Grafton 95) is the Association. With John’s aptitude for Instead, it was dismantled and sold for founding director of FRLA Ltd, a heritage mathematics and his interest in computing, scrap. The original architects of Stowe consultancy that provides master-planning, one might be forgiven for assuming that intended the spaces they created to interpretation and spatial design services Stowe’s landscape had little influence on influence the people who occupied them. to private landowners, charities and public bodies – www.frla.co.uk him. However, John feels that it was an By choosing Stowe as the location for his important part of his education. During our School, Roxburgh not only helped to save Prof John Frazer – www.johnfrazer.com conversation he recalled climbing the large it for the nation but also ensured that its Francis Terry – www.qftarchitects.com cedar tree on the South Front and seeing, laid out in the lawn below, the outline of the formal gardens that were replaced by the ‘Capability’ Brown’s informal . He also spoke of cross-country runs that took him along the old coach road allowing him to contemplate the experience of arriving at Stowe via this route. These examples of an ability to look at things from different perspectives are perhaps indicative of one of the skills that have helped John reach his standing within the architectural world. John also remembers helping clear trees from the Elysian Fields as part of the Forestry activity. They opened up this overgrown part of the gardens so that the could once again be accessed. When talking about Stowe, we all know 1 Entrance – The Oxford Water. of it as a geographical location but the 3 Professor John Frazer giving the opening content of that space changes over time. keynote speech in the new MIT Media Lab The landscape of Stowe in the 1960s, building by architect Fumihiko Maki in when John was there, was by all accounts Cambridge Massachusetts 2010. a much wilder place with temples to be 5 The North Front, Ferne Park, Dorset. discovered amongst the trees that had grown up around them. During my time there in the 1990s, Forestry still existed as an activity and, with the National Trust’s recent leasing of the grounds, there was a concerted effort to clear the trees unwanted in their vision for the landscape (these ended up providing firewood for pensioners in the local community). Since the 1990s, the landscape and House will have changed again for the current students. The number of trees being felled has decreased while the increased number of National Trust visitors mean that, on a sunny day, the view from the South Front steps now includes families picnicking by the Octagon Lake, something that would be alien to many Old Stoics. As the Preservation Trust increases the number of visitors to the Mansion, its wonderful enfilade of State Rooms, 19 No. 928 Stowe

The forty ‘Schools’ class locomotives of the 4-4-0 Restoration The iconic status of Stowe resulted in a wheel arrangement were designed by Richard fast-track overhaul, but with 19 years having Maunsell, of the Southern Railway, to both haul 400 elapsed since it last steamed, deterioration had inevitably taken place especially within ton trains and traverse the restricted Hastings line. the boiler. This was lifted off on 5 October 1980, enabling all the other parts to be No. 928 Stowe, came from the second class, being scrapped along with Harrow removed and refurbished or renewed as batch constructed at Eastleigh, entered and others. Stowe was the last to be necessary. A new front had to be fitted to traffic in June 1934 and was based at withdrawn and was purchased by Lord the tender, the buffing pads built up with weld and a new water filler manufactured. Fratton depot, near . It was Montagu of Beaulieu for his Motor Then both the tender and the engine were repainted in malachite green in July 1938 Museum in the New Forest. Transferred cleaned down to bare metal, ground to a and performed with distinction on the from Eastleigh to Millbrook by rail, and smooth surface and fully painted with eight Waterloo – Weymouth expresses. Stowe thence by road to Beaulieu on 14 coats followed by lettering and lining in holds the highest authenticated speed February 1964, the locomotive was Maunsell olive green livery. All was finished record for the class of 95 mph, which was placed on a stretch of track along with in a very commendable timescale of just attained near Wool, Dorset on a four Pullman Cars Agatha, Fingall and Car 35 coach train in 1938. under a year for a return to steam over the to represent the Bournemouth Belle, weekend of 13/14 June 1981 with the Renumbered 30928 in June 1948 following although there is no evidence that Stowe official renaming ceremony on the Saturday the nationalisation of the railways, the ever hauled this prestigious train. when Lord Montagu was guest of honour. next allocation was to Stewarts Lane, Later, the space was needed for an Service London to work the heavy Newhaven expansion of the catering facilities so the No. 928 Stowe proved to be a popular boat trains. In June 1949, Stowe appeared locomotive and Pullmans were dispersed, locomotive on the Bluebell Railway and, in British Railway’s lined black livery and, with Stowe being transferred to the East in addition to normal services, appeared in May 1955, had its first overhaul at the Railway at Cranmore. It left Ashford works; previously these were in special events including the weekend Beaulieu on 30 November 1972 and, undertaken at Eastleigh. The last visit of 14/15 August 1982 with another by a combination of road and rail, was Stowe made to the works was May/July Maunsell locomotive No. 1618. Stowe eventually hauled to Cranmore by 9F 1959, after a grand total of 1,404,040 also took part in the 50th anniversary of No. 92203 Black Prince, owned by artist miles from new. At the same time, it was the start of the London to Paris ‘Night and Old Stoic David Shepherd (Chatham fitted with the latest improvements and Ferry’ service in 1936 when Wagons-Lits 49), about a year later and put on static painted into Brunswick Green livery. sleeping car No. 3801 was displayed at display. Two of the Pullmans survive, Loaned to Tonbridge shed in August 1961, Sheffield Park Station over the weekend Agatha in the VSOE reserve fleet and it was finally transferred to Brighton and of 11/12 October 1986. In August 1990, Fingall giving good service on the Bluebell th eventually withdrawn from traffic 12 to celebrate the 30 anniversary of the months later on 17 November 1962. Railway following a period in store at the Bluebell Railway, Stowe again took centre Both Stowe nameplates are preserved. Railway. Later, Montagu stage shortly before being withdrawn for Ventures arranged for Stowe to be loaned its statutory 10 year overhaul after a total Into Preservation to the Bluebell Railway for restoration to of 13,584 miles on the line. There was no Withdrawal of the ‘Schools’ started in full running order, where it arrived on slot in the Bluebell’s overhaul programme, 20 1960, with No. 900 Eton, the first of the 10 July 1980. so Stowe was stored as a static exhibit. FEATURE

A DVD about the restoration of the Stowe Engine is enclosed with this magazine.

New Owner Early in 2000, Montagu Ventures announced that they wished to sell Stowe even though there were still two years left on the 21 year loan agreement with the Bluebell. The railway had first refusal to purchase but, due to the looming expense of the extension to East Grinstead, they were reluctant to do so, although keen to see it stay on the line. The Bluebell-based Maunsell Locomotive Society was therefore approached and their Chairman felt that this was a good opportunity to add a named engine of Maunsell’s most famous design to their fleet, so immediately started raising the necessary six figure sum. was complete by the end of the year. The subsequent purchase of Stowe by the Painting of both the engine and new MLS at the end of October 2000 was made tender in malachite green, plus lining possible by several events coming out and lettering in the Bulleid style, together. An original nameplate from King resulted in the locomotive looking very Arthur class ‘Sir Dinadan’ was sold at smart with many visitors assuming it was auction and the ex-scrapyard Class S15 ready to steam. Unfortunately, a major No. 830 was sold to a group in , problem had to be resolved first, who wished to restore a second concerning the copper inner firebox of locomotive to complement their existing schemes. With the assistance of the the boiler, which was life expired and No. 841. The remainder came from MLS Bluebell’s fundraising Trustee, a DVD needed to be replaced at an estimated funds, plus donations and loans. was compiled featuring the well known cost of £250,000. BBC Newscaster, Nicholas Owen, which In order to justify the purchase of what Overhaul it is hoped will close the gap on the was now the flagship engine of the MLS, a additional amount needed to bring Stowe start was made on its overhaul by tackling In 2013, the working team started back into working order on the railway, the tender which required a new water stripping down Stowe, as their work on possibly by 2016. tank. Having just made one for U Class No. the overhaul of S15 No. 847 had largely 1638, the MLS volunteer team proceeded been finished. However, there were only Progress on the overhaul of Stowe can rapidly with the fabrication. A new front enough funds to tackle the chassis of No. be followed on www.maunsell.org.uk. dragbox was constructed and the wheels 928, involving sending the wheels away Contributions towards the cost can be sent for turning to Swindon prior to that for re-profiling and general refurbishment made on www.justgiving.com/Stowe or facility closing. Good progress enabled a of all the component parts. The expensive (with Gift Aid if applicable) to the Bluebell re-wheeling of the chassis on 14 boiler repair needed outside funding to Railway Trust, Sheffield Park Station, November 2003 and the whole tender, supplement that being received from East Sussex, TN22 3QL apart from welding the tank underside, members of the MLS and from other David G. Jones, C.Eng. The Bluebell Railway 21 The Revd Donald Reece (Walpole 55)

NEWS Donald celebrated 50 years Many thanks to all those Old Stoics who submitted news items for this edition. Please accept of marriage to Julia Paget on 5 September 2013. the editor’s apologies that some entries have had to be abridged and that some photographs have been omitted due to their print quality. John Hamer Please keep sending in your entries for the next issue of The Corinthian to (Grenville 55) [email protected] or post them to Old Stoic Office, Stowe School, Buckingham MK18 5EH. John writes, “While showing some Australian Jock Asbury-Bailey Stoics in this country who also play, friends around the grounds this 1930s (Walpole 47) with a view to having a game and a good chat.” Please contact me on: summer, I Walter Drysdale [email protected] observed in the recess above the (Grafton 37) Worthies a which was not there during my schooldays. The photo Walter writes: I do have a charity Adam Blandy is of John Powell-Rees (Grenville 55) called Integrated Water Resources (Temple 54) in occupation of the same recess International and we are about to in 1953. embark on a major project in Ghana Adam writes, assisting local communities achieve “In July 2012, a healthy and viable way of living. Dougal McIntyre Two former Heads of Walpole met fires occurred in (Cobham 55) If there are any Old Stoics interested up again in May 2013. Derek Binns Madeira Island in Ghana I would be very pleased (Walpole 46), after a lifetime of when temperatures Having published if they would contact me on farming, shooting and fishing – and reached 30 a booklet on the [email protected] There is also degrees. During one night, a hot dry seldom venturing south of Yorkshire Agates of Dunure a website, www.iwri.org.uk wind from the North East spread – is now taking things easy. Jock still in 2008, Dougal flames in the hills above Funchal; retains his interest in St Edmund’s has developed his town dwellers saw a wall of flames School Canterbury, where he spent hobby of collecting, cutting and about 20 metres high and thought all of his teaching career, and polishing the local Agate stones 1940s that homes where we live were manages to travel and play a bit of Ayrshire into a family business. destroyed. We were lucky as the fire of tennis. Managed by his son Stuart, Dr John Kessler took hold of scrub and eucalyptus ‘Stones of ’ exclusively (Bruce 44) and there was no significant damage offers these intriguingly beautiful to buildings. Since then, we have Dr David Read natural images for interiors, John writes, “To my surprise I was embarked on a programme of (Temple 49) artworks and fashion products. the only wartime Old Stoic at the clearing and replanting with Madeira www.stonesofscotland.com Nostalgic at Ninety party at the Park endemics on land below and Getting older but still alive! Lane Hotel on 12 October, but I sat surrounding the Palheiro Estate. next to some very interesting people Business conditions in Madeira are The Rt Hon Lord Justice which made the evening a pleasant challenging, mainly due to austerity one. On 8 March a second great- 1950s measures in Portugal and increased Mathew Thorpe grandchild was born and another is VAT, decreed by the Troika. However, (Chandos 56) now on the way. My main business, Oliver Wall the number of visitors from the UK apart from a few preaching Mathew writes, “On 30 July 2013, (Chandos 50) and Germany has increased and engagements in Spain, Nicaragua there are better prospects for 2014. I retired as Head of International and here in Costa Rica, has been Overall, the Madeira Wine harvest Family Justice and Lord Justice of Oliver attended the christening last re-editing books that have been which ended on 11 October proved Appeal. I have returned to private September of his two grandsons. sold out, but are worth reprinting. to be an excellent one in terms of practice as an expert: please see my This was in a small church in a It is quite a bit of work because the both quantity and quality. Funchal website at www.intfamjustice.com Munich suburb. The organist played books have to be updated, in some harbour continues to be a popular It says it all.” an English hymn for them (Lord and cases a chapter added, and above port of call. The New Year’s Eve Father of Mankind), which they all all they have to be digitalised. In fireworks display was a major event sang fervently. 2012, I helped with the publication with 9 ships calling and for 2014, Charles Dawes of six books, but for 2013 only three over 300 calls have been booked (Bruce 57) have appeared. A fourth is on the by cruising vessels. For golfers, skids but the printer has suffered James Alexander Madeira offers 3 courses including Charles is still working and he is a big robbery and is trying to (Grenville 54) the Ballesteros designed course in part of a dredging group. He is reorganise his business”. the neighbouring island of Porto happy to meet anyone from the James writes to say, “In the previous Santo. In November, the Palheiro dredging industry, tugs and cranage. edition of The Corinthian you were Golf Club hosted a match against The Revd Christopher Dunn kind enough to put in a paragraph the Hookers and (Temple 46) about my move to New Zealand, surprisingly lost. In 2014, we hope Dr Robert Whitaker saying that it was quite an to face the Rye Ragamuffins. (Cobham 57) undertaking for a 77 year old. So It would be good to see OS golfers this is just to let you know that the in Madeira and arrange a match. Robert was move has been successfully www.palheiroestate.com awarded the undertaken and that I am now Christina and I thoroughly enjoyed Farquharson happily ensconced in my new home the Nostalgic at Ninety ball at Award from Christopher writes, “Elizabeth and I out here, both I and my belongings London’s Park Lane Hotel in the The Royal celebrated our Golden Wedding having arrived safely. I am much company of Mike and Ferrier. College of anniversary on Wednesday, enjoying my golf in my retirement It was good to meet Dr Wallersteiner, Surgeons of Edinburgh in 4 December 2013. We had a very and currently playing off a handicap – surely JF (whom I just missed) recognition of his important happy family reunion with our of 12. As from time to time I do would have been happy to have contributions to teaching in the three children in a hotel, The White some touring in my motorhome, I such an incumbent filling his boots subjects of surgery and anatomy. 22 Hart in Salisbury.” would be glad to know of fellow Old at Stowe...” The award came with £1,000 which he donated to Selwyn College, Richards would have been proud of Lewin was the only Regular. providing logistic services for Cambridge’s Medical Elective Fund us, especially in my case where The Officers were Regiment foreign companies coming into which supports students taking trips doom was forecast in my last school including Edward Sladen. They were Spain with abnormal loads. Our first to far away countries to observe and report. Happily, thank heavens, attached to Orde Wingate’s army clients were British, by coincidence. participate in medical management matters turned out differently.” and sent on long range patrols many We are still working on these same different from our own. miles behind Japanese enemy lines. lines now, even if Spain is not a very Capt Edward Sladen and a Kenyan brilliant place currently because of Alastair Stone were killed by a Japanese sniper at the construction and infrastructure John Bryan (Temple 59) the beginning of the campaign crises. Meanwhile, I have watched (Temple 57) which was a hard blow to the Scouts my 4 multilingual children growing Alastair writes, “We and soldiers. The most decisive up – one boy and three girls all now John’s wife, Gill, writes, have now been in battle of the war in Burma, at in their thirties: Marc, 38, working in “Unfortunately John is now in a Arizona a year, and Imphal shortly after, broke the spine Munich, Denise, 36 is in London, Nursing Home in Yeovil. He has while I am still of the Japanese army. The hit and Samantha, 33 in Munich and the had two strokes and suffers from singing (in 2 choirs run tactics were very effective. youngest, Stefanie 30 lives in Brazil. myasthenia Gravis, Neuromyotonia – thank you Stowe) Simon Sladen and my cousin and I Only Marc went to Public School and has vascular dementia. He is and am active on tennis and pickle- will try and find where he is buried (Bedford) in England. The girls were still smiling though and enjoys a ball courts, I believe my stage days and see a bit of Burma.” in the excellent German school in glass of wine with his lunch.” are now over. In 2010, I was Maj. Barcelona from 7 to 18 and then the Gen Stanley in a concert version of same Spanish University. I have the Pirates in Breckenridge, my Gerald Morse now retired but am still working and Hugo Morley-Fletcher swan song... and my O.S. tie was (Cobham 60) travelling a reasonable amount. (Temple 58) part of my ‘uniform’.” However, since the transport Gerald (aka-investormorse) has business is very low now, we are Hugo spends his Wednesday experienced busy times in Cyprus looking into trading on world mornings helping children with Richard Miall now his financial radio shows are markets in specific commodities. (Bruce 59) Literacy at an inner city primary broadcast in Limassol as well as I still live between Barcelona and school in Bermondsey, which he Paphos and on the web, following Cambrils, and our small company, very much enjoys. Richard and his wife will be moving hydrocarbon finds, venture Universal Trade Transport, has its soon from their home of 20 years fund buying and the influx of office in the centre of Barcelona – in Palm Beach (25 miles north of 30,000 Russians who need a visa. a beautiful city indeed. I come to Alastair Hodges-Nugent Sydney centre) to the Southern the UK a couple of times a year and (Temple 58) Highlands in NSW. This is the area hope to catch up with some of the of Bowral, Burradoo, Moss Vale and Colin Hughes-Adams Old Stoic activities”. note this simply to seek any OS who (Temple 60) may already be there. Colin writes, “I am Hugh Taylor trying desperately (Chandos 61) to segue into semi- 1960s retirement, which Sadly, Hugh’s wife Alastair writes, “This year, I am has meant only died on 8 November Kit Clucas three murder cases this year. Just 2013. He writes, celebrating 40 years as an (Walpole 60) Independent Wine Merchant and finishing up my last for 2013 – “We met in New York Shipper, which I have run alongside waiting for the verdict as I write!” in 1966 when she Kit writes, “I am quite pleased to my wife’s and my mainly arable was doing a world report that I have recently become a farming business. I have been in trip from Sydney after receiving the full member of Styal Golf club after farming now for 55 years. My wife, Air Commodore Miles Australian Photographers’ Model of many years wandering in the Madeleine, and I have been married Williamson-Noble the Year Award. We married in June wilderness without a handicap at for 42 happy years. I am convinced (Temple 61) 1969, and our son Guy (Chandos any club. After putting in the that she is the sister of Lara Croft, 89) was born in July 1971. 12 years statutory three cards, I was given of multiple myeloma but, she so active is she. She has persuaded a handicap of 22 and by the end Miles Williamson- survived to see Guy marry me to take up sea kayaking at the of October I had reduced that to 19, Noble (Temple 61) Jacqueline in January 2013. age of 73! I must be mad. We both winning one competition, coming is sing in a local Choir in Chichester. second in another and seventh in of Rutland in I enjoy returning to Stowe on a Nomination for the a third. Next year I am planning to Dr Michael Spira regular annual basis to lecture to reduce to 16, which at the age of year 2014/15. (Chandos 62) The Corkscrew Society.” 72, will be the lowest handicap that I have ever had since I started playing golf at the age of 12.” Ed Bacon Michael was recently appointed John Bouckley (Walpole 61) Medical Director of The Smart (Temple 59) Clinics which provide private Brian Macoun Ed writes, “I was in Walpole House family healthcare including GPs John writes, “In September 2013, (Grafton 60) until 1961 and spent the next 10 and medical specialists. I flew to the UK from the States, years or so working in shipping There are three clinics in where I have lived for the last 30 Brian writes, “My uncle, Capt offices and learning languages Notting Hill, South Kensington years or so, to spend 3 days at the Edward Carew Sladen (Bruce 31) around Europe, specifically France, and Wandsworth Common. Goodwood Revival with my long was the father of Simon Sladen Spain, Italy, Germany, Norway and suffering American wife who, being (Grafton 62). He was killed in Burma Sweden. After spending 4 years in reasonably sane, is not as car crazy in 1944. Simon and I and another Manchester, I moved to where James Cartwright as me. We met up with two of my cousin are travelling to Rangoon in I was employed by the Delaware (Chatham 62) study mates, Patrick Hope Johnstone February 2014 for the 70th River Port Authority, as Regional (Temple 59) and Anthony Littlejohn anniversary of Edward Sladen’s Manager covering most of southern James took BEWCC (Barristers of (Temple 59) who are both keen car death. Edward served in the Kenya and eastern Europe, Africa and the England and Wales C. C.) to Delhi collectors and were also at the Regiment in the 11th (East African) middle East, for 5 years. Having in October 2013, to play in the Revival for 3 days. We all stayed at Scout battalion, originally the Kenya moved from Milan to in fourth Lawyers Cricket World Cup. Anthony’s house and it was just like Coast Irregulars. They were trained September 1976, in 1985, together Any Old Stoic Barristers wishing the last 50+ years did not exist and on unusual principles to scout and with Spanish, German and Egyptian to play cricket in London might like we were back sharing a study again. to use ‘tip and run tactics’. It had partners, I set up a project transport to contact him at 10, King’s Bench A really wonderful time. Our old European Officers but no white and forwarding company, in Walk, Temple, EC4Y 7EB or email House Master, the Rt. Rev. C Windsor other ranks. The CO, Major (Chippy) Barcelona, especially directed at him on [email protected] 23 expensive for a mass market. Paul Nicholl NEWS Are there any OS publishers out (Bruce/Lyttelton 68) there?” Please contact him on: [email protected] Paul writes to say, Roy Rhode company by a Chinese group “My latest news is that I am in the process of (Grafton 62) facilitating a rapid roll out of the Jess Miller business in China and worldwide. publishing my first (Cobham 67) book! It’s entitled A Roy has created a social History of St Peter’s recommendation website, together Jess has published a Church, Brighton.” with his son Alan and other Peter Rapelye (Bruce 66) semi-autobiographical entrepreneurs, which incorporates a illustrated book of cashback scheme. He suggests that humorous, ridiculous, those who could be interested in the Richard Nicholl riotous, hilarious and (Lyttelton 69) project, look at the Beta on www. poignant short stories ejero.com and then send him an and anecdotes from his 40 years Richard writes, “I’m continuing to email at: [email protected] of fishing for Atlantic salmon on enjoy retirement very much, Scotland’s river Tay. He is challenging remaining in Dorset near to where anglers and non-anglers alike to work Retirement after forty years in I was working: a beautiful county! Michael Chapman out 10 stories from the 100 in the independent school education (last I’ve just joined the Governing Board (Chatham 62) book that are not true, for a chance to seven as head of school) became at nearby Canford, the twin to Stowe win salmon fishing, fishing tackle, in the Allied Schools, renewing the Michael writes to say, “I am still official as of July 2012. Peter is angling books and more. You can acquaintance I had as a parent and here in Kiribati enjoying the remote enjoying time with his grandchildren, make 20 free entries into Jess’s as Head of a feeder prep school. tropical tranquillity. Our Horizontally the outdoors, and auditing courses competition on his website Retirement also allows more time Drilled Outfalls should start at Princeton University where his TrueorFalseFishingStories.com. for family, which is both hugely construction soon which will be spouse is Dean of Admissions. Their Jess Miller’s ‘100 True or False rewarding with much grand-parental technically interesting. Then in my travels took them back to Stowe in Fishing Stories’ book and 5 CD travelling coming up!” spare time, I am trying to the fall of 2012 and Nostalgia at audio book are available from Jess’s conclusively establish a relationship Ninety in London last October. Peter website and the book is also between earthquakes and solar recalls fond memories of Stowe as available from Amazon, Kindle, etc. flares – God knows why!” one of three postgraduate “Yanks” Old Stoics and media are welcome 1970s 1965-66. to talk to Jess on: 07813 908999. Andrew Nahum Ian Ritchie (Walpole 63) Charles Graham Gratian Yatsevitch (Temple 71) (Chandos 67) (Chatham 67) Andrew is Senior Ian writes, “I Keeper at the Charles has published a novel in 3 stepped down as Science Museum, volumes – San Fermin 1/2/3 by Director of the City has just led the Jesse Graham. It’s available on of London Festival production of a Amazon and on Kindle. It’s a novel this summer after new digital book about the fiesta and its regular eight years to or app for iPad participants over the years. devote more time entitled Journeys to a wider range of Invention in partnership with of musical Touch Press, the market leaders in Angus McDonagh Gratian writes, “Gratian is 5 years interests. These include the artistic this new sphere of publication. (Grafton 67) old and his sister Clara is 4 years old. direction of the Setúbal Music Andrew was drawn to this new The picture is in Southwestern, Festival, which I recently set up in digital medium because it allows Angus writes, “I Pennsylvania, an area now best this city south of Lisbon and, of The visitors to mirror the behaviour of discovered that the known for the Flight 93 incident Musical Brain, which produces an actual Museum visits. Some like a title of my book which crashed on 11 September annual conference exploring the free search – others want a more The Stamp 2001. We live in an idyllic part of many fascinating frontiers between structured narrative. The app allows Collection had Pennsylvania surrounded by farms, the arts, science and the mind. I also this and it also offers high definition already been used for a cookbook, now largely run by Amish and continue to be involved in a number 360 degree views and animations so I repackaged it under a new title Mennonite farmers. One might say of musical charities, including of more than 80 key objects in the Anarchist Philatelist. It is the story of ‘far from the madding crowd.’ Musicians without Borders which history of science and technology my testing the credibility of Royal Monica, my wife, just co-authored a works at home and abroad with which are rendered with Mail systems in a humorous way book now out on Amazon entitled musicians of all backgrounds and extraordinary realism. Currently, with homemade stamps being Betrayed: The Shocking True Story of people suffering from the effects the app is configured exclusively successfully sent all over the world. Extortion 17 as Told by a Navy SEAL’s of conflict. I have also started to for iPad and is available through A preview of the book is available in Father which tells of the terrible sing once again as a soloist, thereby the App Store. Two journeys are the online Bookstore at Blurb.com incident in Afghanistan where 22 completing the circle of a lifelong available for free, making it an Towards the end of October, I had navy SEALs were killed in a fiery musical journey which began ideal post-Christmas adventure. the good fortune to contact a helicopter crash. An event in 2011 at Stowe.” https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/ freelance journalist who showed that could have easily been avoided. journeys-of-invention/ interest and four days later a small The book is selling well. I am working id685965924?mt=8 story appeared in The Sun. Two days in the what now must be the long Charles Allen later I was talking to NBC in passé coal business which I don’t (Bruce 71) America, being filmed in our living think is doomed by any means.” Peter Champness room by the BBC and that night (Chandos 65) having a live interview on Radio New Zealand. I also featured as a Roger Charlton Peter is Executive Chairman of news item on Have I Got a Bit More (Chatham 68) SolaQuaGen™, a company which News for You. Despite these features has developed world beating and the extensive Google inventory Having started training flat horses in technology in desalination and of newspaper articles, I still cannot 1990, Roger had his best season in Charles writes, “In January 2013, I waste water treatment. At David find a traditional publisher to bring 2013, thanks to Al Kazeem winning was appointed Executive Chairman Cameron’s recent visit to China, a the book to a wider audience. The three Group One races, including of Heritage Insurance Management deal was announced for a self published ebook (for iPads) is The Prince of Wales’ Stakes at Royal Ltd in Guernsey. We are the largest 24 substantial investment in the fairly priced but the hardback is too Ascot and The Eclipse at Sandown. independently owned insurance management operation in Europe. David Kneeshaw Infrastructure Consultant, but will Court Mews, a country house B&B Since my last update to The (Cobham 75) otherwise be looking to offer his near Maidenhead, Berkshire Corinthian we have started offices in experience and expertise in the www.bedbreakfastmaidenhead.co.uk both Malta and Gibraltar. Apart from David is Chief Executive of Royal London area. www.tranlowe.co.uk and would be delighted to welcome that, I have been trekking in the London 360, the international any Old Stoics. Atlas Mountains visiting Berber division of The Royal London Group, villages and learning of their led a management buyout of the Major General Sir William fantastic way of life based on the company from its parent in Cubitt Clarissa Edwardsen extended system of family support.” November 2013, backed by Vitruvian (Temple 76) (née Whiteley, Stanhope 77) Partners. Henceforth, the company will be known as RL360 and David Major General Sir William Cubitt runs Clarissa and her husband, Gregg, run Dr Jerry Wales will continue as Chief Executive. his family’s estate in Norfolk. He is Vin Santo a small family owned and (Temple 72) Vice Chairman of the Norfolk Branch operated Italian Restaurant. We are of the Country Land and Business now celebrating our 15th anniversary Jerry is leaving NHS practice. Charlie Forbes Adam Association and, from January 2014, and are located in Madison, In his post, he has authored or (Bruce 75) Norfolk County President for the Wisconsin. www.vinsanto.us co-authored 101 publications, Royal British Legion. 140 conference papers and 28 Charlie writes, “With my FAB team at books and chapters in medical Escrick Park Estate, I won The Royal Rory Penrose journals and texts. He leaves to Agricultural Society of England (RASE) Marcus Corbett (Temple 77) take up post as Director of Bledisloe Gold Medal for Landowners (Grafton 76) Endocrinology and Diabetes at the for 2012, awarded in July 2013. Rory is now living in Matakana, new Queensland Children’s Hospital As other recent winners include the Marcus writes, “I released a new New Zealand and would love to in Brisbane, opening in 2014. Duke of Westminster and the of album Strung Deep with Classical meet up with any OSs, particularly Leicester, I were reet chuffed, as we India Tabla players Nitin Gaikwad those who left around 1977. Rory’s might say in Yorkshire.” and Sharanappa Guttragi.” son, Harry, who goes to Kings Neil Davidson www.marcuscorbett.com College in Auckland, recently had a (Cobham 72) term’s exchange at Stowe, which Christopher Drake was a huge success and he loved Neil started a new filming division, (Walpole 75) Mark Richards his time spent with everyone at MWP Digital Media, specialising (Walpole 76) Stowe. Please contact Rory on: in corporate video and digital Christopher [email protected] marketing. Clients include Royal writes, “As Mark has been Mail, Hewlett Packard, Nuffield Chairman of The commissioned to Health as well as hundreds of Asia-Pacific make a statue of Frank Egerton smaller businesses. Neil has been Network Matthew Flinders, the (Temple 77) selected by Cunard and P&O Cruise for Moral man who charted the Lines as a guest speaker on the Education I led the organisation of coast of Australia around 1800 for Frank was appointed Operations history of Hollywood and a conference at Jogjakarta State Euston Station. This will be unveiled Manager for the Taylor Institution entertainment. He is speaking in University, Indonesia on Learning in July 2014. Progress of the statue Library and Taylor Bodleian Slavonic March on The Aurora, cruising from Diversity and Commonality: being made can be seen at and Modern Greek Library (University from to Mauritius. Ways Forward for Moral Education www.flindersstatue.blogspot.co.uk of Oxford) from 1 October 2013. in the Asia-Pacific and we are now Bronze maquettes are available, to getting busy with 2014’s conference, view visit http://flindersstatue. Dr Francis Graham-Dixon to be held at Fudan University, blogspot.co.uk/2013/05/purchasing- Mark Bevan (Temple 72) Shanghai, China on Making Moral maquette.html or telephone Matt (Chatham 78) Education Work: Tradition and Johnson, Australia High Commission, The postwar Innovation in the Asia-Pacific. It was +44 (0)20 7520 9111. Please quote Mark has been appointed a occupation is often also a good and active year for TCK Stowe if you purchase a maquette. Managing Director of Coutts & Co. overlooked in histories Learning Centre for Migrant Workers, of the Second World an educational charity for migrant War. Francis’ book, workers in Hong Kong, and we ran a Brewster Barclay The Allied Occupation series of workshops at the University Keith Springer (Grafton 76) (Chandos 79) of Germany reassesses of Hong Kong, held two exhibitions ten years of British rule, a civilising on Indonesian Art and Culture each Brewster was appointed, in mission designed to shape having a day full of dance, song, Keith writes to say that, “My brother, September 2013, as Business Germany’s democratic rehabilitation. poetry, traditional dress shows and Shaun Springer (Chandos 74) Development Director for Zuhlke It reveals many paradoxes – the handicraft displays. I also initiated passed away following a heart Engineering Ltd, a leading European humanitarian catastrophe caused a group trek to ascend Kilimanjaro attack on 25 April 2013.” bespoke software development by the expulsion of millions of ethnic which raised over £30,000 for Exeter company based in London. Germans, the legacy of wartime College, Oxford as well as marking its bombing and the challenge of 700th anniversary in 2014. I’ve also Tony Kelly reconstruction, control and liberalism been spending time on HealthPhone (Bruce 79) and squaring retribution for war www.healthphone.org which uses James Bamford (Bruce 77) crimes with reconciliation. mobile ’phone technology to bring Tony has taken up a To order online, go to health and nutrition information number of new and www.ibtauris.com/allied-occupation directly to those in need, with a James has an additional different sporting and enter the discount code particular focus on rural communities role – he is now interests since turning AN2 when prompted. Offer expires and being illiterate-friendly. Chairman of the Lloyd’s 50. He has run five half 31 March 2014. Francis is Market Association marathons with a personal best of researching a new book on Italy in Political Risks, Credit 1:40 and is hoping to take part in the the shadow of Fascism. Craig Tranfield and Financial Contingencies London Marathon in 2014. Those (Temple 75) Business Panel. He has held this who remember him as the 1st XI position since December 2012. scorer at Stowe will not be surprised The Revd John Partington After 30 years in IT across several to hear that he has also become a (Grenville 74) business sectors, Craig went full qualified cricket umpire, officiating time with his business Tranlowe Ltd David Joyce most Saturdays in the Cambridgeshire John recently published a small in the new year. He has lined up a (Chandos 77) Premier League in summer. Most book, Spice of Wisdom, to which the 12 month part time contract with unusually, he has thrown himself into Duchess of contributed a Oxford University Department of David has retired from a career in the world of competitive mini and foreword: www.kenelmpress.co.uk Computer Science as their the City and now runs Pinkneys crazy golf after first coming across it 25 continue to enjoy living in Kuala either watching my son or coaching NEWS Lumpur and that I have taken up the Guildford U15s who were a new position as a Partner in League Champions for the fourth technology consulting at CSC year in a row. Highlight of the year working primarily across Asia, at though was growing some more when he was commissioned to write responsible conservation tourism the beginning of the new year.” facial hair for “Movember” which an article for The Times. He now in the Himalaya. Old Stoics are has now thankfully gone and very welcome to visit. spends his weekends travelling Mrs G can begin speaking to me www.tigermountainpokhara.com around the country on the British Jonathan Portman again. I attach a photo to show minigolf tour and represented the (Chatham 83) the full horror.” Great Britain team at the World Minigolf Championships in Doro Morrison Jonathan writes, “We moved in 2011 and Bad Munder, Germany (Cobham 82) Matthew Woollard 2013 as well as the European October 2012 to bigger premises in Lambourn, Berkshire with our (Lyttelton 85) Championships in Porto 2012. Doro writes, “My Documentary Racehorse training business and ‘No Apologies’ has picked up 8 have had our best season to date Matthew is Director awards around the world including Marc Hope in terms of prize money won. We of the UK Data Archive, Best Documentary and Best Editing based at the University (Cobham 79) in a Documentary, at the won at Royal Ascot for the first time amongst other notable wins.” of Essex. He was made Southampton International Film a Professor in 2013 for Marc continues to Festival. Inbetween preparing for his work in digital preservation and play a pivotal role on the next project, I have been busy in data service infrastructure. driving corporate commentating and covered the Asia James Rawcliffe sponsorship and Cup and the World League Hockey (Walpole 84) successful commercial in Malaysia, as well as The East Asia Sarah Madden revenues for the 2014 Glasgow Cup (football) for television.” (née Yearsley, Stanhope 85) Commonwealth Games with sports marketing agency SMAM, part of the David Jenkins Sarah has Lagadere Group. Games tickets are spent the last (Walpole 82) almost sold out. He has also spent year travelling the last three years as a Non- James writes, “The Caribbean throughout Executive Director of GB Taekwondo David writes, “Following 17 years in Southern Africa and continues to sit on the oil industry where I managed Catastrophe Risk Insurance Facility, our largest captive client, won the with her a number of other Boards. Marc the Texaco brand in Europe, I am husband has been selected to fight the now working as a director of Woking 2013 Outstanding Captive Award at the Captive Insurance Company Richard Madden writing The Bush Whitton Ward, Richmond Borough and Sam Beare Hospices, two Telegraph – a multi media travel in the 2014 local London elections. charities in Surrey providing end-of- Association Awards in 2013. CICA is the largest captive owner’s column in about In his spare time, he also presents life care to over 1000 people per life behind the scenes on safari in association globally and is based a sports programme on Radio year.” www.wsbhospices.co.uk the African bush. Their adventures in the USA.” West . continue in East Africa in 2014. Twitter: @SarahOnSafari and Chris Boxall www.telegraph.co.uk/bushtelegraph Louise Bryan (Lyttelton 82) Tim Hall (Stanhope 79) (Cobham 84) Chris is Manager of the high Simon Kyte Louise writes to say, “I launched my performer investment fund, SF Tim Hall has recently (Chatham 85) new website www.paralosgallery.com Fundamental Energy, and discusses published a book of his photographs a specialist website for collectors the attractions of the energy After seven and a half years working entitled Above the and lovers of antiquarian maps, equipment services sector in a as an economist at City Hall, Clouds. It is images of books and prints.” recent video http://reut.rs/HTJDR3 Simon is leaving the Greater London the Arlberg mountains Authority and going to work in near the ski resorts of Lech and South Wales as economist for Jules Walker Zurs. Originally commissioned by Natural Resources Wales (Cyfoeth 1980s (Lyttelton 82) the Aurelio Hotel in Lech to take Naturiol Cymru), the body created pictures for the walls of the hotel, by the merger of the Countryside Simon Burrell Jules writes, “My book, he was inspired to continue Council for Wales, Environment (Chatham 81) The Cape Crusaders shooting the beautiful environment Agency Wales, and the Forestry about my experiences around Lech in order to complete Commission Wales. Simon has recently launched a Travel driving a Dennis fire the book. Tim’s landscape work is Club and Forum for the readers of engine from the tip of bought and commissioned to his Travel Advisory Website Europe to the bottom of adorn the walls of chalets, hotels, Justin Anderson www.omotg.com and would like to Africa in 1987, is now available in apartments and houses all (Cobham 85) extend an invitation to all Old Stoics ebook and print formats from all good around the world. Available to register to this free club and take high street and online retailers, directly from his website advantage of some substantial especially Amazon. Initial demand www.timhallphotography.com discounts and savings on hotels, (150 copies sold on day 1) has restaurants, health spas, bars and created a small wait, but despite my more around the world. To join bias as the author, I think it will be Jonathan Gumpel please register here: worth it. Old Stoic, Paul Calkin (Chandos 85) http://omotg.com/tc/register/ (Lyttelton 81) was the Finance Justin and Richie Saville (Chandos Director on the Cape to Cape project.” Jonathan writes, 85), cofounders of Flexeye “Workwise I am still (www.flexeye.com), recently took Marcus Cotton Investment Director over the Science Museum in London (Chatham 82) Mark Berner for Brooks Macdonald for the evening and gathered over (Temple 83) Asset Management in 500 leaders of UK Industry and Marcus continues at Tiger Mountain London and Government to discuss the topic Nepal, now separate from Tiger Tops Mark writes to say, manager for the Defensive Capital ‘Smart Data. Safe & secure planet’. and Mountain Travel. With top “My news for the year Fund, which somehow managed to The event was hosted by Lord Erroll reviews, the lodge is one of is that my family and get a Citywire AAA rating earlier in and there were two panel debates, Nepal’s leading tourism products I, wife Setsuko and the year. I seem to spend a lot of one on the Internet of Things, the 26 developing the concept of daughter Sophie, time on or beside rugby pitches other on Information Security. The photograph shows Richie Saville Jonny Kaldor PE firm Lion Capital, which opened Jeremy Nichols, Tony Meredith and being interviewed by Bettina Traz (Chandos 88) a new office in Los Angeles. She Brian Stephan.” Ryan, SVP Gartner on Flexeye’s new lives and works in Santa Monica, software. Jonny’s company, Kaldor won CA and would love to hear from any ‘Business to Watch’ at the recent OS living in, or visiting, this part of Katherine Farrants Association of Online Publishers the world. She is the OS and AFS (Nugent 93) Caroline Cooke awards. The business is responsible representative for California and (Nugent 87) for publishing apps for The can be contacted on Katherine writes, Spectator, The New Statesman, [email protected] “My news is that Caroline has been running Share & New Scientist, The Week, Times I have founded a Care for 7 years. Share & Care is a Literary Review, The Economist, new online yoga very low-cost homeshare service Hansard and many others. Hannah Wright and wellness which matches elderly homeowners (née Baker, Nugent 91) website. It is who have a need for some company called Movement and practical help, with a younger Roger Potter Hannah and her husband have For Modern Life: Revolutionising live-in Sharer who is happy to give an (Former Staff 1970-1988) moved back to be closer to Stowe Online Yoga & Wellbeing. It is the agreed level of help and company in and now own a smallholding in first British website to bring the Best their spare time. Please contact Roger is Chairman of The Marsh Gibbon, near Bicester where of British yoga teachers and studios Caroline on [email protected] Britain-Nepal Society and would they hope in years to come to in an online community. We make or 020 8875 9575 for more welcome enquiries about resemble ‘The Good Life’! yoga and wellness really accessible information. membership from anyone with an by offering programmes of classes interest in, or connection with, by their specific benefit (e.g. stress/ Dr Emma Hornby insomnia/core/pregnancy) with Simon Ferrand Nepal – especially those who came on his Himalayan expeditions in (Stanhope 91) classes that range from just 5 (Cobham 87) the 1980s. Please contact him on: minute ‘super-mum’ yoga, to one [email protected] Emma writes, “I’m still at Bristol and a half hours for the weekend. After almost ten years of working University, now a Reader in Music. Now the best yoga teachers can be overseas – Germany, India and Until 2018, I’m running an accessed any time, any place – Qatar – Simon is back in Whitehall Chris Lascelles EU-funded project on early Iberian don’t worry about what you wear!” and overseeing a programme of (Temple 89) chant, based in Bristol.” www.movementformodernlife.com non-humanitarian government funded projects being delivered in Syria. London life is slowly growing Chris recently set up a digital publishing company focusing Mahesh Asnani Wendy Saunt on him but he misses summiting (Grenville 91) (Stanhope 93) peaks in Nepal and exploring on non-fiction ebooks remote parts of the world. Closer to www.cruxpublishing.co.uk If any After 15 years home, his eldest son – currently in Old Stoics are bursting to have a Mahesh is living in Nigeria and is in journalism, the Fifth Form at Stowe – is doing book published, then he’d be married with 3 children aged 6, 6, Wendy has the family name proud. His second, delighted to hear from them! and 3. He is a Partner and Owner recently and much younger son, is itching to of the Emel Group of Companies, launched Pole follow in his brother’s footsteps! which is a family business trading Privé – London’s Simon’s doing some studying of his and manufacturing housewares and only private own on programme and project 1990s building materials. He is also a management with an open mind as member of YPO (Young Presidents pole-dancing to what next steps he might take. Tim Dew Organisation). lesson service (Chandos 90) (where the pole is brought to you, no less!). She is Paul Saville Tim is the founding partner of Mount Ben Holloway passionate about pole dancing’s (Chandos 87) Parnassus Partners LLP, operating (Chatham 91) redefining of itself as a beautiful across the UK. They are a business and athletic art form; the antithesis of all things Peter Stringfellow. She Paul is currently working for brokerage and also build value in Ben writes, “We are living in trains with a former world champion Lionbridge Inc. on the Rolls-Royce businesses prior to sale. Maryland just outside DC. We have pole dancer and has competed Defence Aerospace contract in three children – William 8, Sam 6 nationally. www.poleprive.co.uk Filton. Promoted to Project Manager and Lucy, 3. I work as minister on EJ200 in February 2012, he holds Alex Saxton of youth and college at Fourth responsibility for technical authoring (née Rice, Nugent 90) Presbyterian Church, Bethesda, MD.” teams across four defence projects. Jonathan Cheng (Temple 93) He is also the Lionbridge STE Alex writes, Trainer, and has run courses in “My company, Dr Jim Burns Simplified Technical English for both London Permanent (Stowe-Harvard Fellow 92) Jonathan has been working in the Lionbridge and Rolls-Royce Cosmetics, is HSBC group since 1997, first in employees at multiple sites over the coming into its Jim writes, “I was Hong Kong and then relocated to past two years. www.lionbridge.com third year and is the first Stowe- HSBC Shanghai Branch in 2004 to doing really well. Harvard fellow help expand their China Franchise. I’m still working freelance for one of from 1991-1992. During the 7 years in Shanghai he Guy Hooper the top semi-permanent make-up I now work at the met his wife and married in 2009. (Grafton 88) companies in the UK. Loving the US Securities and In 2012, he left HSBC to join UOB artistry and satisfaction of making Exchange China (United Overseas Bank), and Guy continues to live and work in so many people happy (special days Commission as Deputy Director of is now responsible for their Chile. 2013 saw him celebrate 20 with Mr Melber in the art school the Division of Trading and Markets, Corporate Banking business years in the wine trade. As well as stood me in good stead!) I also where we oversee US regulation on development in Southern China. working with the Huneeus family at feel blessed that I can work from an array of market related issues. Viña Veramonte in Chile’s famed my studio at home. Enquiries to: Imagine my delight, the day after Casablanca Valley, he also finds time 07882 660815.” the SEC completed its work on the Arvind David to make wine from vines in his Volcker Rule, to find myself meeting (Chatham 93) garden, with the first release OS Charles Roxburgh (Temple 77), scheduled soon! He still actively Roberta Collier-Wright Director General for Financial Arvind is a producer of film, plays cricket for Chile, and when not (Nugent 91) Services in HM Treasury, discussing television and theatre, whose travelling, enjoys precious time with that issue, market structure and current projects include a Broadway his wife and 4 children: Nico (16), Roberta moved to the US West Coast other cross border regulatory issues, Musical based on the back- Isabel (13), Elena (8) and Amelia (5). in July 2011 with the London based as well as trading stories about catalogue of Alanis Morissette 27 negligence and Richard Clapham NEWS catastrophic (Temple 99) injury claims. Away from work – Richard is a Partner with London he completed his Jagged and a West End musical law firm Monro Wright & Angus Campbell first (but definitely based on his movie, The Infidel (Cobham 96) Wasbrough LLP. He lives in not last) Ironman, which he is co-writing with Sevenoaks with his wife Gemma at Lake Tahoe in comedians David Baddiel and Erran and their son Alex, and daughter Angus has recently started a new job September 2013. Cohen. His first job in the film Emilie who was born in October. as Head of PR at FxPro, based in the This involved a industry was interning for the late, City. 2.4 mile lake swim, 112 mile bike great OS film producer, Simon ride and 26.2 mile run, all at a height Olivia Channing-Williams (Chandos 64). of over 2000 metres, and with an (née Armitage, Lyttelton 99) Stuart Mun-Gavin outdoor temperature at the start of (Chatham 96) Alexandra Baker the race of minus 2 degrees! After getting lots of practice doing Finishing time was 14 hours 5 (née James, Nugent 93) up her own house, Olivia is setting Stuart is now working for Brightsparks minutes, not 15 (as he didn’t cross up a business in 2014, making as their Business Development start line for 10 minutes). curtains, loose covers and other Alexandra is now Business Manager. Brightsparks has a globally soft furnishings across Sussex, th Manager of Old Master and 19 unique concept when it comes to Surrey and Hampshire. Century Art at Christie’s. graduate and young professional William Austen [email protected] recruitment. They have directly (Chandos 98) employed over 9,000 students and Matt Mahoney graduates throughout their studies. William completed the London Hugo Douglass (Walpole 94) When they graduate and for the next (Chandos 99) 5 years, Brightsparks endeavours to Marathon and moved from Summer help them find their ideal career by Fields in August to become Deputy Hugo launched a luxury knitwear being able to represent them with a Headmaster of Ludgrove in Berkshire. label in 2013. The premise behind huge amount of certainty. Plum of London is to create luxury Simon Post and eco-friendly knitwear and Louis Aslett (Chandos 98) woven accessories in contemporary designs and colourful hues, which (Temple 97) have been ethically sourced and Simon has been at Accenture since made solely in Britain. Using what 2004 and he is a senior manager in Louis achieved a First in Mathematics is arguably the world’s finest yarn, their UK/I Digital business. at Trinity College Dublin and then Royal Alpaca, each piece possesses Matt won the Cotswold 100 in 2013. went on to complete a PhD in qualities unrivalled by any other, This is a 100 mile non-stop road Mathematical Statistics. He is now Samit Gehlot both natural and synthetic. marathon that circumnavigates the working as a post doctoral researcher Visit www.plumoflondon.com (Bruce 98) Cotswolds. at the University of Oxford in the to find out more. Statistics Department where the application area of his research is The Hereford medical genomics. Hugo Chance (Chatham 94) (Grafton 99)

Robin writes, “15 years after doing Hannah James Hugo became engaged to Rebecca two weeks’ work experience, I am (Nugent 97) Martin in Italy in 2013 and is due still working at Bonhams, as a board to be married in July 2014, in director in our Art Collections, Having spent the best part of a Somerset. He is running an Estates & Valuations Department.” decade on the front line of motorsport investment initiative ‘Angels & in commercial, operational and Equity’ under Truestone Investment Samit writes, “Richard Branson management roles, Hannah now Management, raising capital for recently opened a camp in Kenya works as a consultant bringing start-up businesses. Jessie Fletcher together with us, with an Opening (née Childs, Lyttelton 95) together some of the world’s biggest music brands with racing drivers, Ceremony, which comes 6 years teams and promoters. She works with after Richard originally became a Jessie’s second Vincent Hobbs clients in the UK and North America recognised tribal Maasai Elder in (Grenville 99) book God’s under the Decibel Racing banner. 2007. This took place on the plains Traitors: Terror near Mahali Mzuri and began with and Faith in Professionally, after five years at opening prayers. Along with eight Jetlag Productions, the last two as Elizabethan Laura Marshall elders, Richard blessed Mahali managing partner, Vincent felt he England is to be (née Humber, Lyttelton 98) Mzuri with prayers, honey and a needed to shake his feet loose so published by little beer! A ceremonial fire using embarked on a six month hiatus, Bodley Head on Laura writes to say that, “I have traditional fire sticks and olive visiting friends and family across 6 March 2014. recently been promoted to the branches was placed onto the fire to the US, Europe and South East Asia. Her first book Henry VIII’s Last position of Account Director at Lyons produce the smoke, which drifted Since August 2013, he has joined Victim: The Life and Times of Henry Seafoods. My husband and I have through the camp as a sign of Uniplan Shanghai as Associate Howard, Earl of Surrey won the also started up our own business. blessing. This was followed by the Director, Strategy to develop cutting 2007 Elizabeth Longford Prize for Please can Old Stoics take a look at local Maasai community singing and edge creative content to the growing Historical Biography. The gap www.minimummonthlybills.co.uk dancing around the fire before live communication industry. between books was filled by and www.makedough.co.uk I would leading the crowd in a march back research and babies (Isabella, now appreciate any feedback!” up to the plains where they enjoyed 5, and Lara, 2). Jessie credits her a blessing feast. Mahali Mzuri is a Michael De Butts love of history to the wonderful joint partnership between Sir (Grenville 99) department at Stowe, namely Mark Bowman Richard Branson and the Gehlot Mr Johnson, Mrs Green, Mr Rudolf, (Cobham 98) family, who run the Intex Group of Mike got engaged in August to Diana Mr Cottam and Dr Stunt, who gave companies in Kenya. Members of Rose Corbett. The photograph is of a marvellous, impromptu how-to- On 1 May 2013 Mark was promoted the Gehlot family joined Sir Richard his piece for 2012’s Hampton Court read-early-manuscripts class one to partner at Field Fisher Waterhouse, Branson for the opening ceremony.” Flower Show; an 8 metre working 28 rainy day. www.jessiechilds.com continuing to specialise in clinical www.mahalimzuri.virgin.com windmill with seating at its base. Richard Clapham guide, so some of my spare time is Oli Cullingworth well as lots of other exciting events (Temple 99) spent climbing on very icy, cold, wet (Grenville 02) in the pipeline for 2014. He would and windy mountains. Next year, I love to hear from any Old Stoics Richard is a Partner with London am planning to climb the Heckmair Oli continues to work as the with a sense of adventure. For law firm Monro Wright & route (the original 1938 line) on the Operations Director for Red Box more information, please go to Wasbrough LLP. He lives in Eiger North Face.” Consultancy Services, specialising www.thechelseacarclub.co.uk Sevenoaks with his wife Gemma in Catering and Facilities Current Old Stoic Members include and their son Alex, and daughter Management strategy and Nick Langridge (Temple 11), Adam Emilie who was born in October. Alex Housley procurement in the Business and Minney (Temple 11) and Oliver (Chandos 01) Industry, Oil and Gas and Nohl-Oser (Grafton 01) (all of whom Education sectors. Oli and his wife, came on our Isle of Man Weekender Olivia Brass Alex writes, “My current venture is a Sally, are also excited to announce event and feature in the group (née Armitage, Lyttelton 99) Last year also saw PirateTechnics tech start-up called Rummble Labs, the forthcoming arrival of their first photo). We do, however, have a at The Chelsea Flower which acquired my first business, child in February. handful of other Old Stoics on our Show, The South Bank Centre, After getting lots of practice doing Total Hotspots, in 2009: books and their ages range across The Olympic Park, Oxford University up her own house, Olivia is setting www.rummblelabs.com I have a the board! and John Lewis, not to mention up a business in 2014, making side-project called Genome Laser, Alex Dietz Glastonbury and seven other major curtains, loose covers and other which plans to broadcast the (Chatham 02) music festivals. More photos are soft furnishings across Sussex, personal human genome via laser Matthew Gracie available at www.flickr.com/photos/ Surrey and Hampshire. in the Nevada desert in September: Alex is now a Commercial Manager (Walpole 03) pirate_technics/se [email protected] www.genomelaser.com.” at Cargill Kenya.

Hugo Douglass 2000 Nico Heath Rosie Armitage (Chandos 99) (Grafton 01) (Lyttelton 03) Hugh Arbuthnott Hugo launched a luxury knitwear (Cobham 00) Rosie has set up as a freelance label in 2013. The premise behind tailor and costume maker Plum of London is to create luxury Having left the Army, Hughie and basedin Stratford upon Avon, and eco-friendly knitwear and making bespoke clothing Clare live in southern Spain and Although Judy Gracie has finished woven accessories in contemporary organise holidays in South America, ranging from waistcoats to designs and colourful hues, which wedding dresses. Please visit as housemistress of Lyttleton last Morocco and Andalucia. In July and year, it seems she has inspired a have been ethically sourced and August, they run Family Holidays www.rosiearmitage.co.uk for more new generation, as her son Matthew made solely in Britain. Using what from their home in the hills information and contact details. Nico writes, “2013 has been the Gracie started running Talbot’s, a is arguably the world’s finest yarn, overlooking the Straits of Gibraltar. best year to date due to the recent boarding house at Bedford School Royal Alpaca, each piece possesses They also arrange bespoke holidays arrival of Orlando Henry Heath, a in September 2013. Matt, his wife qualities unrivalled by any other, throughout the year. In November Benjamin Forbes happy and healthy baby boy.” Nico Katie-Jo and two children, William both natural and synthetic. 2012, they had an Old Stoic (Grenville 03) lives in Singapore where he is (6) and Elisha (3) are in their fourth Visit www.plumoflondon.com Reunion for a long weekend of Co-founder of the luxury tour year at Bedford. Their dog Cooper to find out more. golf, walks and long lunches. Ben is now working at the Battersea operator, Lightfoot Travel. Lightfoot www.arbuthnottholidays.com Power Station Development has also quickly become a favourite specialises in tailor-made family Company and living in London. with the boys in the house. They Hugo Chance holidays, honeymoons, corporate would be very happy to meet and (Grafton 99) Tom Oliver travel and private villas around the host any Old Stoics passing through world and has just opened a new (Bruce 00) Will Gallimore Bedford, particularly any who were Hugo became engaged to Rebecca office in Dubai, adding to its existing (Bruce 03) at Stowe at the same time or who Hong Kong and Singapore hubs. are old Walpudlians. Email: Martin in Italy in 2013 and is due Tom recently launched a premium Holidays range from African safaris [email protected] to be married in July 2014, in fish oil supplement that contains Will has recently been made Director (in which Nico specialises), multi- Somerset. He is running an only the purest, sustainably at work and now runs the UK country tours around South investment initiative ‘Angels & sourced DHA and EPA Omega 3 division of High Finance Group. He America, Antarctic cruises and Equity’ under Truestone Investment Phospholipids, along with Choline. has just joined Royal St Georges Dr Brian Orger beach breaks throughout Asia. “I’ve Management, raising capital for “The Omega 3 MOPL” Herring Golf Club and takes his King Charles (Former Staff 1980-2004) had a few Old Stoics contact start-up businesses. Caviar contains 300mg/g of cavalier with him to help find the Lightfoot for help planning holidays, DHA, an important fatty acid in balls. He is still living in London and and I love how this business has put supporting healthy brain function – keen to see more Old Stoics, not me back in touch with old friends Vincent Hobbs three times the level found in other just at the wine tasting events. and classmates,” Nico says. Contact (Grenville 99) Omega 3 supplements. DHA and EPA are essential fatty acids that [email protected] or visit Professionally, after five years at help support healthy skin, joint www.lightfoottravel.com Angus Nohl-Oser Jetlag Productions, the last two as health, brain function, good vision, The photograph shows Nico teeing (Walpole 03) managing partner, Vincent felt he weight management and a off from Mount Cecil, overlooking needed to shake his feet loose so healthy heart. Available from Queenstown, New Zealand. embarked on a six month hiatus, www.tomolivernutrition.com and England may have lost but Stowe visiting friends and family across selected pharmacies. He has also got its hands on the Six Nations the US, Europe and South East Asia. started another company which is Andy Comber Cup! Retired Stowe masters Lionel Since August 2013, he has joined Equine Performance. The product (Grenville 01) Weston, Brian Orger and John Uniplan Shanghai as Associate is called EQmach. A game changer Dobbin, father of OSs Richard, Director, Strategy to develop cutting in the equine performance arena. Andy started at Jones Lang LaSalle Edward and Chris Dobbin, chanced edge creative content to the growing www.equine-uk.com on 2 December 2013, in the upon the Six Nations Cup while live communication industry. agency/asset management strolling around Cardiff Bay on a department for the out of town Angus has recently set up the boys’ weekend to see the rugby Roderick McLauchlan retail division of the company. Chelsea Car Club, a regional Car international between England and Michael De Butts (Temple 01) Club for all Petrolheads who drive Wales in March 2013. Sadly, the (Grenville 99) sports and performance cars next time they saw it, it was being Roderick writes, “I work as a fitness Amelia Annfield within central London and the handed to the Welsh captain after Mike got engaged in August to Diana consultant, based in the Scottish (Nugent 01) surrounding area. From January a sound defeat of England. Rose Corbett. The photograph is of Highlands. I have a range of clients 2013, the Club has run monthly However, the singing, led by his piece for 2012’s Hampton Court from racing drivers, climbers and Amelia writes that she is living and meets and drives from Hyde Park, massed Welsh choirs, was Flower Show; an 8 metre working Pro footballers. I am training to working in New Zealand as an followed by a tour to the Lake memorable, almost lifting the windmill with seating at its base. become a professional mountain events stylist. District at the end of February, as closed roof off the stadium. 29 Monty Lewis based in Ales (France) completing NEWS (Bruce 09) work experience for three months. I am then embarking on the Aldi Despite his efforts after the graduate scheme in May as an Area Nostalgic at Ninety Ball, Monty Manager and will be based in Araminta Reeves Jessica Rollo Bristol. I recently did some hockey (Lyttelton 04) (née Leon, Nugent 06) Lewis has not become a member of Annabel’s. coaching at Stowe and it was so great to see the constant Jessica is now a Nursery school improvements the School is teacher. Nickleby Evans making. I didn’t think it could get any better!” (Grenville 09) Robert Secret Nickleby and Freddie Hicks (Grafton (Former Staff 1978-2007) Nicholas Rewcastle 09) will be running the 2014 (Grenville 10) London Marathon in support of DEBRA. DEBRA is the national Nick writes, “I graduated from the charity that supports individuals University of Chester with a 2:1 in and families affected by Araminta writes, “I am now in my Journalism and Public Relations Epidermolysis Bullosa (EB) – a fourth year of working for a sports and am currently working towards painful genetic condition which and entertainment management gaining the appropriate skills and causes the skin to blister and shear agency as a Senior Client Manager. experience to set up my own Public at the slightest friction, or even This means I spend my time looking Relations agency in Hampshire. I after clients such as Frank Lampard, spontaneously. Nickleby’s sister, Robert has conducted Figaro and am currently working as a Public Ian Wright & Marco Pierre White! Francesca, died of the condition. Carmen with Stowe Opera (now Relations and Marketing Manager The photo attached is of me at a Show your support for the boys by renamed Winslow Hall Opera) and for Hampshire Mezzanine Floors.” book signing in Harrods, with simply texting NEFH90 to 70070 has conducted orchestral concerts Frank Lampard.” followed by the amount you wish to in Prague. He is the viola player in donate. E.g. NEFH90 £10. The Metzger Ensemble which has Rupert Leyland (Walpole 11) Oliver Collins given many concerts recently (Cobham 05) including St John’s Smith Square Felix Parker and the Schloss Berleburg – the (Cobham 09) Oliver is currently working for residence of the family of Sayn- Lombard Odier Asset Management Wittgenstein-Berleburg. He Felix and Marcus Fountaine as a Junior Portfolio Manager in continues to run The Buckingham (Chandos 09) set up Fairfax and Global Credit. He has been in the Summer Festival, is conductor of Favor in the summer of 2013 role for 3 years after having spent The Oxford Harmonic Choir and is with the aim of bridging the gap 2 years at Moore Capital chairman of The between smart and casual. Management, a multibillion global Arts Council. Photograph, from left The third Old Stoic involved is Ellie Rupert is thoroughly enjoying the macro hedgefund. to right: The Metzger Ensemble. Rix (Lyttelton 11). We offer a range second year of his Marine Sports Jeremy Sampson, Lisa Nelsen, of shoes and beautiful Spanish Science degree in Falmouth and Robert Secret and Julian Metzger. riding boots. We have plans in taking full advantage of the year Olivia Brabant 2014 to be at all the big shows round water based activities. In (Nugent 05) with the aim of launching into addition, he is currently playing Lara-Clare Tarr Harrods. Please see our website Wide Receiver and Tight End for the Since qualifying as a vet in 2010, (née Bourdeaux, Lyttelton 07) at www.fairfaxandfavor.com and Falmouth Tridents, a combined Olivia has worked in cattle practice use Stowe14 for a complimentary universities side and has been in West Sussex and then moved 15% discount on our wonderful selected to play for the South West north of the border to the south products. Regional American Football Team west of Scotland to set up a (the Cornish Sharks) this summer. practice with her partner Hugh. She then moved to the University of Abby Webb Edinburgh to take up a position in (Nugent 09) Catherine Cornelissen the farm animal practice but is now (Stanhope 13) moving even further north to Lara-Clare and Michael Tarr (Grafton Abby writes, “I left Stowe in 2009 Morayshire to work in a mixed 08) are married and living in Cardiff and graduated from Birmingham Catherine writes, “In September I practice and help Hugh on his where Lara is doing a two year with a 2:1 degree in Geography. began my Undergraduate course at return to the family farm. In January Masters in Vocal Performance, at After this, I organised a trip for Christie’s Education in London. I am 2014, she had her first article the Royal Welsh College of Music myself and twelve others to cycle studying Arts of Europe from published in a veterinary journal and Drama. Michael set up his from London to Istanbul for charity. Cycladic figures in 3000 BC all the and hopes to publish many more in online cycle shop, Cycles Direct, As a team, we raised over £22,000. way up until arts in the 21st century. the future. whilst at university in 2009. It is It was the most epic, challenging I was so happy when I received my A going from strength to strength and rewarding experience I have Level results and did not hesitate to ever been a part of. We camped and sells a wide range of bikes, confirm my place at Christie’s Edward Joudrey every night for two months and parts and accessories. Education in September. I am very (Walpole 06) cycled over 5000 km (3000 miles). much looking forward to becoming The money is going towards the as involved as possible at the Edward recently relocated to Charles Thuillier Cancer Care and Haematology Unit Christie’s auction house on King New York and transferred to J.P. at Stoke Mandeville Hospital, Street and learning more about the (Bruce 07) Morgan’s North American where they are hoping to raise art world and market in London. I Diversified Industries Investment enough funds to build a much am adoring my small and cosy flat Banking division after his Charlie and Harry Thuillier (Bruce needed extension. After this, in St. James and absolutely loving successful promotion to Associate. 07 and Bruce 04) have founded I worked for a ski season in Val adjusting to my new London lifestyle This followed 3 years with J.P. Oppo Ice Cream, an actively healthy D’Isere and then did a volunteering in comparison to my hometown, Morgan Cazenove in London superfood ice cream that matches project in South East Asia with Toronto, Canada. I have started an focusing on UK Industrials & the indulgence of traditional dairy children and elephants. I am now art blog which I try my best to Infrastructure Investment Banking, ice cream. Oppo is launching into in France doing a TEFL course and remain committed to and have having graduated from Durham the major retailers in Spring 2014. in January 2014, I started on the joined a members’ club in Mayfair University in 2010 where he read Please look out for us! programme, to stay fit and socialise at particular 30 Natural Sciences. www.oppoicecream.co.uk which is a fully funded programme cocktail parties and events.” Crispin Marsland-Roberts Alex Housley (Walpole 96) (Chandos 01)

Marriages Crispin married Victoria Murray on 26 October 2013, in Herefordshire. Jeremy Nichols Chris Lascelles Best man was (Former Headmaster) (Temple 89) Christopher Harrington (Walpole 96). Ushers Jeremy married Katherine Lambert Chris married Ewa included Oscar Marsland-Roberts on Saturday 11 May 2013 in Prygiel on 24 May (Walpole 97), Oliver Gregson Alex married Micol Molinari on Cornwall. Katherine is the author of 2013. Old Stoics (Grafton 96) and James Dewar- 24 August 2013 in Guilford, Gardens of Cornwall and the Good in attendance Durie (Chatham 96) with a further Connecticut. They met via Harry Gardens Guide 2010-2011. were, Ralph Hazell 11 Old Stoics in attendance. Heneage (Chatham 01) who (Lyttelton 90), attended St. Andrews with Micol. Annabel Struthers Harry and Buster Drummond (Nugent 88), Ben Whitfield (Grenville Simon Post (Chandos 01) were both 1950s 89), Charlotte Brenninkmeijer (née (Chandos 98) groomsmen and Gemma Tipping Wilson, Nugent 91), Alison Arnott David Ridley (Nugent 01) was a bridesmaid with (née Howard, Nugent 91), Ben Ridley his sister, Sophie Housley (Nugent (Cobham 59) (Walpole 90), Nicola Morrison Simon married Natalie Clearie on 20 July 2013 at Harburn House, 02). Photograph, left to right: (Nugent 91), Jane Willcox (née Gemma Tipping, Buster Drummond, David writes, “Three near Edinburgh. They live in Lascelles, Nugent 87), Jonathan Alex Housley, Micol Molinari, Harry years ago Lida Roe St. Margarets. Shillington (Temple 89) and Toby Heneage and Sophie Housley. and I decided that Gauvain (Temple 89). after twelve years Vincent Hobbs together we were Nick Verney extremely happy (Grenville 99) (Temple 01) and likely to remain 1990s so for ever, so we decided to marry. Vincent writes, There followed three traumatic years Rupert Mayhew “I finally Nick married of a variety of stressful negotiations (Bruce 90) decided to Alexandra Munro on my behalf and exceedingly pull the trigger Ferguson on 4 May 2013 tedious complications for Lida, Rupert married and marry my girlfriend of seven at Inverness establishing her existence with the Charlotte Louise years, Zheng Jie Vicky. We had an Stadthaus in Zurich before we Hankey on Saturday, official ceremony in Shanghai Cathedral. obtained a wedding licence. On 2nd November 2013 China on 20 October 2012, Edward Hackett- Saturday 16 November 2013, we at Saint Mary’s Church, followed by an amazing wedding Jones (Temple 01) was an usher married in the Stadthaus in Zurich. Dinton, Wiltshire. shindig at 300 year old Hoeve and Philippa Murray (Lyttleton 02) Old Stoics in attendance were my Other Old Stoics attending were Engelendael in Sint-jan-in-Eremo sang a solo in the Anthem. brother, Michael Ridley (Cobham Michael Robinson (Bruce 91), in Belgium on 5 May 2013.” 56), my sons Simon Ridley (Walpole William Humphreys (Lyttelton 91) 95) and Ben Ridley (Walpole 90).” and Henry Sword (Chandos 64). Benjamin Forbes Alexa Fereday (Grenville 03) (née Alexander, Lyttelton 99) 1970s Arvind David (Chatham 93) Alexa and Alex got Louise Bryan married on Friday (Stanhope 79) Arvind 16 August 2013 at now lives Stowe Church and in Venice celebrated Louise married her long time Beach, afterwards at partner Panagiotis Chantziaras California Villiers Hotel in on 19 August 2013. Ben married Diana Friedrich on with his Buckingham; along with Old Stoics wife, Janine N’jie David and their Gabriella Alexander (Lyttelton 03), 26 October 2013 in Aylesbury, with insane cat, Olive. Arvind and Janine James Furse-Roberts (Grafton 95), a blessing in Buckingham. 1980s were married on 10 August 2012 Matt Furse-Roberts (Grafton 96) and in Oxford. OS attendees included Thomas Furse-Roberts (Bruce 00). Giles ‘Baz’ Thompson (Chatham 93) She writes, “Having left Stowe in Chi Kavindele Justin Anderson (Temple 03) (Cobham 85) who was a groomsman, Sam 1999, it was nice to return, 14 years Edenborough (Grafton 93) whose later, to celebrate our wedding in band The 246 played a rollicking the beautiful grounds.” Chi married rock set, Shaan Mahrotri (Temple Claire McFarlane 93) and Arvind’s brother, Armand on 22 June 2013 David (Chatham 98). 2000 in Fife, Scotland.

Andrew Bates Sally Williamson Jessica Rollo Justin married Miranda (née Leckie) (Bruce 94) (née Clark, Lyttelton 00) (née Leon, Nugent 06) sister of OS Euan Leckie (Chandos 81) in Chiddingfold, Surrey on Andrew married his Sally married Jessica Leon 22 June 2013. wife, Amy Dickson, Simon Williamson (Nugent 06) on 23 June 2012 at on 1st June 2013 married William The Walled Garden in the Music Rollo on 5 April Kate Gordon-Watson at Cowdray in Room at Stowe 2013. Old Stoics (née Reardon, Nugent 87) Midhurst, West Sussex – an historic School. Old Stoics present were her Grade I listed site. James Paravicini in attendance two Old Stoic Kate married Charles Gordon- (Bruce 94) was his best man and were Jonathan Boyman (Walpole brothers, Henry Leon (Temple 01) Watson on 18 May 2013. several other Old Stoics attended. 00) and Simon Creek (Grafton 00). and Keith Leon (Temple 06). 31 Shelley Dawson (née Wisner, Lyttelton 98) 2000 Vicky Osman BIRTHS Another little boy, (née Bell, Nugent 00) Ronnie Dawson born on 13 May 2013, big Vicky Osman (née Bell, Nugent 00) brother for Sidney, and Serrol Osman (Grenville 96) Henrietta Black who is very proud! 1980s (née Magan, Lyttelton 95) had a girl on 7 September 2013, and named her Ziva Belle Osman. Jane Lazzeri (née Baker, Stanhope 88) Henrietta and Dan are delighted William Austen to announce the arrival of Harry (Chandos 98) George Black, born on Hugh Arbuthnott Jane gave birth to a son, William (Cobham 00) 16 December 2013, a little Ryan Lazzeri on 10 January 2013 William writes, brother for Jamie and Ella. in Camaiore, Italy. “2013 has been Hugh and his an eventful year wife Clare, had a Angus Campbell in the Austen daughter, Isabella (Cobham 96) household. In Charlotte 1990s April my wife Arbuthnott, on Jossie gave birth 8 January 2013, Caroline Naude to Archie our in Gaucin, Spain. (née Drummond-Hay, Nugent 93) first child. He is doing well and only thirteen years Caroline and Gary Naude would like away from coming to Stowe!” Gene Kindell to announce the birth of their second (Cobham 01) son, James Edward, on 27 August 2013, in East London, . Arabella Connell Angus writes, “My wife Katrina and (née Arbuthnott, Nugent 98) I had a second son, a brother for Susannah Acland Arabella and her husband, Charlie, (née Bell, Nugent 93) Monty, born on 27 October 2013 and we have called him Charles had Charles Octavius Douglas Angus Fraser Campbell.” Connell on 4 February 2013 in Susannah and her husband Perth, Scotland, a brother for Alexander had a little girl, Arabella sister Lucia. Gene and his partner, Pepita Del Rio, Iona Rose born on 10 May 2011, Leila Brahimi had a son, Måns Valentine Kindell, a sister for Olivia. who was born on 24 April 2013. (Nugent 96) Olivia Brass (née Armitage, Lyttelton 99) Richard Lloyd Leila Brahimi Roderick McLauchlan (Grenville 94) (Nugent 96) (Temple 01) had her second Richard and his wife, daughter, Roderick and Heidi, are pleased Camille Brahimi his partner, Iona to announce the Chaves on 27 Wotherspoon of birth of Alwyn David September Kiltarlity, Inverness- on 14 March 2013, 2013. They are still living in NYC shire became a sister for Louisa but Leila keeps in regular touch with parents on Alethea. Stowe through the American Friends 1 September 2013 and have a Olivia is living in West Sussex and of Stowe. Her elder daughter Soraya wonderful little boy called William had a second baby in June 2013, is now 5. They are hoping to make a Iain Thomas McLauchlan. Robin Hereford trip to Stowe for Speech Day 2014, Annabel Fleur, sister for Bertie, (Chatham 94) so she can show her family the now aged 2. beautiful grounds. Nico Heath (Grafton 01) Vincent Hobbs (Grenville 99) Stuart Mun-Gavin Nico and Camilla (Chatham 96) Heath (née Ruggles- Vincent writes, “on Brise, Nugent 01) 22 November 2013, had a baby boy, we became the proud Orlando Henry parents of Elvira Victoria Heath, born on Marianne Schoofs. 28 November 2013. Robin writes, “In 2013 my wife She’s the best.” and I had a daughter, Sophia, on 10 January (7lb 2oz).” Daisy Gibbs Georgina Peace (née Russell, Lyttelton 02) Stuart and Catherine Mun-Gavin (née Lee, Nugent 99) Stephen Spencer have become parents for the first Daisy had a son, (Walpole 95) time, when Otto James William Mun- Somerset Gibbs, Gavin was born on 26 October 2013. on 29 September 2013. Alexandra Blake (née Williams, Nugent 97) Luke Brewin (Temple 02) Charles Blake (Grafton 96) and Alexandra Blake (née Williams, On 1 November 2013, Georgina Luke writes, “We celebrated the birth Stephen and Angela welcomed a Nugent 97) had a son, Toby and her husband, Alex, had a baby of our second child, Hudson Philip son, Henry Robert Michael Spencer, Jonathan Blake, on 20 July 2013, a girl called Clemmie Annabelle Luke Brewin he was born on the 32 on 20 June 2013. brother to Edward (Teddy). Peace. She weighed 7lbs 3oz. 28 February 2013, a brother for Tilly. Air Marshal Sir Reginald Obituaries Harland KBE CB AE MA CEng We have provided information about the lives and careers of a number (Chatham 38) of particular Old Stoics. In so doing, we realise that there are many 1920-2013 other Old Stoics who will have made no less a contribution to society, the country and the lives of others. We hope, though, that in reflecting Air Marshal Sir Reginald Harland was one of upon the lives of these alumni and their achievements in the world of the RAF’s most distinguished engineering academe, politics, the arts, the services and business, we are able to officers who held numerous senior appointments culminating in being the Air Officer Commanding-in- demonstrate the enormously diverse contribution of Old Stoics to the Chief of the RAF’s Support Command. world. Due to space limitations, names marked with a * have obituaries available at www.oldstoic.co.uk After Stowe, Sir Reginald joined the University Air Squadron in 1938 and took first class honours in the mechanical sciences tripos in June 1940. In September 1940 he was mobilised into the RAF. 1920s Mr Nicholas Andrews His war years were spent ensuring that aircraft were in a constant (Chandos 43) on 3 September 2010, state of readiness in support of the First , firstly in in the USA Group Capt Gwilym Griffith-Jones North Africa and then in Italy. Post war, he was one of a small (Chandos 29) on 20 November 2013, Mr James Kenally-Smith number of engineering officers who were trained as pilots before at the age of 102 (Grafton 43) on 22 January 2013 returning to technical duties, when he became the Chief The Revd Timothy Lawrence Engineering Instructor at the RAF College, Cranwell. 1930s (Grafton 43) in March 2011 Sir Reginald was one of the first RAF engineer officers to specialise in guided missiles. Following five years of immersion in the subject, Prof Charles Miles Mr Graeme McKelvie (Chandos 34) on 1 February 2013 (Walpole 43) on 17 June 2012 in May 1958 he was appointed as the first British Liaison Officer on the staff of General Bernard Schriever who commanded the USAF’s Mr John Foord Mr Roger Booth Air Research Development Command, based in Los Angeles. The date is unknown (Chandos 35) on 10 July 2013 (Grenville 44) Schriever, described as the architect of the USAF space and missile Mr Robert Fisk Mr Geoffrey Loftus programme, had established the Division a few months earlier (Chandos 36) in February 2012 (Bruce 44) on 27 February 2001 soon after the Soviet Union had launched its first Sputnik. Thus, Sir Reginald was in the unique position of being intimately involved in Mr Lindsay Pirie *Mr Peter-John Mackay (Grenville 36) on 13 May 2013 (Temple 44) on 17 April 2013 the development of all the aerospace systems which have been launched into orbit. This included support for NASA in its Mr Andrew Walker Mr Peter Morris-Johnson man-in-space and other programmes. (Walpole 37) on 26 May 2012, at (Grenville 44) on 17 February 2013 home with all the family round him Later, Sir Reginald returned to the Ministry of Technology as project Mr Noel Saunders director for the Harrier aircraft. He played a key role in the Dr Christopher Bartley (Walpole 44) on 5 January 2013 introduction of the unique short take-off and vertical landing (Grafton 38) on 20 June 2012 Mr Robert Abbott aircraft into RAF service. He also demanded specification changes *Mr Norman Eddy (Grenville 45) on 25 October 2013 in order to create opportunities for the Harrier to enter service with (Cobham 38) on 21 June 2013, in Mr Michael Manton the US military forces. New York (Chatham 45) on 6 March 2013 Harland had a questioning mind and felt it was important neither Air Marshal Sir Reggie Harland Mr Anthony Mulgan to take things for granted nor to make assumptions and to listen to (Chatham 38) on 30 July 2013 (Grenville 45) on 27 June 2013 other people’s points of view. He had a fine eye for detail and was Col Julian Fane exceptionally good at explaining things. He was appointed KBE Mr Michael Falcon (Bruce 39) on 11 August 2013 (Chatham 46) on 18 February 2013 (1974), CB (1972) and received the Air Efficiency Award. He was *Mr George Turner elected a Fellow of the Royal Aeronautical Society, of the Institute Mr David Morgan-Grenville (Cobham 39) on 1 January 2013 of Mechanical Engineers and of the Institute of Electrical Engineers. (Walpole 46) on 14 November 2013 Mr Harry Gordon Ward 1940s (Former Staff, 1947) in February 2010 Mr Raymond Hall Mr Christopher Scarlett (Walpole 52) on 22 March 2013 (Temple 54) on 24 October 2013 Mr Derek Harvey-Piper Mr John Hemsworth Mr Kildare James (Temple 40) on 12 October 2012 (Walpole 48) on 24 August 2013 Mr Robert Shelley (Temple 52) on 18 June 2013 (Grenville 54) on 22 July 2012 Mr David Lloyd Mr Frank Ruhemann Mr Michael Preece (Chatham 40) on 27 July 2013 (Chatham 48) on 24 January 2012 Mr Gordon Thomson (Grenville 52) on 24 July 2013 (Walpole 54) on 10 May 2013 Mr John Dodd Mr John Withinshaw Mr James Wright Mr Edward McElroy (Grafton 41) in September 2012 (Cobham 48) on 4 February 2013 (Bruce 52) on 18 March 2013 (Grafton 55) on 1 October 2013 Dr Robert Kennon Mr Peter Hubert (Grafton 49) on 3 February 2013 *Prof Keith Middlemas Mr Peter Clarke (Grenville 41) on 15 March 2012 (Chatham 53) on 10 July 2013 (Grenville 56) on 26 August 2013 Mr Hugh Massy Mr Richard Sparrow (Walpole 49) on 30 November 2013 *Mr Richard Pearman Mr Alasdair Osborn (Temple 41) on 2 October 2012 (Walpole 53) on 8 December 2013 (Chandos 56) on 26 September 2013 Sir Anthony Montague Browne Mr Michael Peel Cross Mr Timothy Philips (Cobham 41) on 1 April 2013 1950s (Grenville 53) on 4 March 2012 (Grafton 56) on 5 March 2010 in Dublin Mr James Sutherland Mr Peter Harkness Mr Simon Waley Mr Paul Vincenzi (Walpole 41) on 18 May 2013 (Temple 50) on 29 December 2012 (Walpole 53) on 18 November 2012 (Grenville 56) in December 2010 Mr Martin Taylor Mr Richard Bostock Mr Jeremy Hawtrey-Woore Mr Anthony Robinson (Grafton 41) on 20 June 2013 (Chandos 51) on 30 November 2013 (Bruce 54) on 9 July 2013 (Walpole 57) on 24 September 2013 *Mr Gordon Baker Mr Myles Moorby Mr Charlie Macdonald *Mr Christopher Vincenzi (Cobham 42) on 17 November 2012 (Temple 51) on 15 December 2012 (Chatham 54) on 12 April 2013 (Grenville 57) on 20 November 2012 Mr Stephen Dodgson Mr Michael Shurey Mr Ian Milling Mr Peter Aarvold (Walpole 42) on 13 April 2013 (Cobham 51) on 14 May 2012 (Grenville 54) on 17 November 2013 (Grafton 58) on 21 November 2013 33 *Obituary available at www.oldstoic.co.uk Obituaries Sir Anthony Montague Browne (Cobham 41) 1923-2013 Colonel Julian Fane MC and Bar (Bruce 39) 1921-2013 Sir Anthony was one of Winston Churchill’s private secretaries; as things turned out, he was to be the last Julian Fane’s obituary in The Times on and, apart from Lady Churchill, saw more of the wartime leader 29 August 2013 gave a vivid account of how, during the final decade of his life than anyone else. as a 19 year old 2nd Lieutenant with the 2nd Sir Anthony arrived at Downing Street in October 1952. Churchill Battalion The Gloucester Regiment, he won his was then aged 77 and in his second spell as Prime Minister. In first MC during the retreat to Dunkirk. He had 1955, a few months after Churchill’s resignation, Sir Anthony was been wounded but led 12 survivors towards La Panne. He and seconded indefinitely to the former Prime Minister as his private three men were safely evacuated and he was awarded his first MC secretary. for initiative and courage. Following Dunkirk, he was transferred to Phantom, a reconnaissance regiment. Again, he demonstrated In 1995 he published his memoirs, Long Sunset: Memoirs of extraordinary bravery which culminated in the award of an Winston Churchill’s Last Private Secretary, detailing his immediate Bar to his MC following a desperate, and successful, experience working for the great leader. Sir Anthony recalled a battle against heavy German odds in Holland in January 1945. lively visit to Monte Carlo where, on one occasion at the casino, After the war he transferred to his father’s old regiment, the 12th Frank Sinatra and his entourage walked by Churchill’s table. Royal Lancers and Michael Berger (Grafton 54) had the privilege of Sinatra stopped, vigorously shook Churchill’s hand and said, being a junior subaltern in the squadron which Julian commanded. “I’ve been waiting to do that for ages.” After he left, Montague When the regiment amalgamated with the 9th Lancers, Julian Brown recalled Churchill turned to his friends and demanded to transferred to the Life Guards which he commanded from 1962 to know, “Who the hell was that?” 1963. Thereafter, he had a number of staff appointments, left the Sir Anthony was also on hand during the holiday in the South of army in 1968, joined a merchant bank and had a distinguished City France when Churchill fell and broke his hip and was found, career until retiring in 1984. “looking like a dying stag.” He was taken to Monte Carlo hospital Apart from his Times obituary, there is a much longer and detailed but, as Sir Anthony related he said to him, “I want to die in account of how Julian, together with a handful of his men, England. You’ll see to that.’” Churchill was brought back in an air eventually got back to Dunkirk in Hugh Sebag-Montefiore’s ambulance and died some months later on 24 January 1965. It definitive book: Dunkirk, Fight to the Last Man. It is hair-raising was Montague Browne who signed the death certificate. stuff and illustrates the bravery and resourcefulness of a very Churchill played a relatively small part in the planning of his own young Old Stoic. funeral, only telling Montague Browne, “Remember, I want lots of Michael Berger (Grafton 54) military bands.” In the event, there were nine. Despite their presence, and the lively hymns that Churchill had also requested, the service threw Sir Anthony into ‘black melancholy thoughts of *Dr Paul Bramley Mr John Hunt the decline and decay of so much of what Churchill had stood for. (Walpole 58) on 25 February 2013 (Former staff 1958-1969) Well might the nation mourn him.’ on 16 January 2014 Mr Robert Dunlop Following Churchill’s death, Sir Anthony was then seconded to (Bruce 59) on 23 August 2012 the Queen’s Household for two years. Thereafter, he worked in 1970s the City for various companies, including International Life Insurance and Gerrard National. He was a founder member of the 1960s Mr Robin Page Winston Churchill Memorial Trust established in 1965, and Mr Barrie Irving (Cobham 72) on 31 March 2013 served as Chairman. He was appointed OBE in 1955, CBE in 1965 (Cobham 60) on 20 February 2013 Mr Al-noor Manji and KCMG in 2000. Lord Alistair McAlpine of West (Bruce 74) in July 2011 Green (Temple 60) on 17 January 2014 Mr Shaun Springer (Chandos 74) on 25 April 2013 Mr Peter de Havilland Mr Stephen Dodgson (Walpole 42) (Chatham 61) on 12 March 2007 1924-2013 Mr Nicholas Martin 1980s (Bruce 61) on 11 August 2012 Stephen was one of the few British Mr Tom Bannister composers to establish himself writing Mr Laurie Barnard (Lyttelton 82) on 22 June 2013 primarily for the classical guitar. His prolific (Bruce 63) in 2012 Mrs Margaret Temple, output was championed by such masters Mr Simon Bishop wife of Mr Muir Temple of the instrument as Julian Bream and John (Chatham 63) on 1 April 2013 (Former Staff 1958-1988) Williams. Dodgson also composed for Mr John Tilbrook on 3 November 2013 other instruments, notably the harpsichord, harp and piano. (Chandos 63) on 9 March 2012 After Stowe, where he had played horn and viola, Stephen was Mr Martin Bellamy 1990s conscripted into the . Following the war, Dodgson took (Cobham 64) on 5 October 2013 music lessons privately with Bernard Stevens before entering the Mr Luc Ferrand Royal College of Music. He won the Corbett Memorial Prize for a Mr Jonathan Peck (Cobham 91) on 3 January 2014 string quartet he had written. (Walpole 64) on 15 September 2013 Mr Jamie Christopherson While briefly teaching at the Royal College of Music’s Junior Mr Arden Morgan (Grafton 95) on 12 January 2012 Department in 1956, Dodgson encountered the 14 year old John (Temple 66) on 24 June 2013 Williams, who three years later made the first recording of his Mr Philip Douglas Mr Adam Medway Guitar Concerto No 1 that established Dodgson’s name. He (Lyttelton 95) in 2008 (Grafton 68) on 12 August 2013 returned to the RCM in 1965, this time as Professor of Composition Mr Michael Soames and Harmony. (Cobham 68) on 2 June 2013 2000 In 1986 Stephen became chairman of the National Youth Wind Mr Christopher Edwards Mr Joshua Downing Orchestra of Great Britain. His Partita No 4 was written for the (Walpole 69) on 17 July 2013 (Bruce 04) on 4 March 2013 young virtuoso, Nicola Hall. 34 *Obituary available at www.oldstoic.co.uk Mr James Kenally-Smith (Grafton 43) Mr David Morgan-Grenville (Walpole 46) 1925-2013 1928-2013

For many years I counted James as my oldest David was a great grandson of the last . His grandmother, friend. We first met in 1962 when the Lady Kinloss, was the last member of the family to live at Stowe. He died on Manchester Victorian Society led a walk around 14 November 2013, in Knowlton, Canada, having emigrated to North America Victorian Knutsford. His home, Brae Cottage, in 1950. was on the list and as with the regular groups David was part of the startup team that planned and initiated construction of of Rolls-Royce owners seeking to admire Henry Churchill Falls; he played a central role in overcoming logistical, technical and Royce’s first house, James was quick to move political challenges and four decades later, Churchill Falls remains the world’s us along. Luckily, a later meeting was more fifth largest hydroelectric power plant. He was also involved in the project cordial and he introduced me to the management of the building of the Channel Tunnel and established the Centre Manchester Tennis and Racquet Club, which he for Cold Ocean Resources Engineering (C-CORE) in Canada. had joined in 1947 entering his profession on his application form as ‘coalman’. David’s passion was strongest when framing a new venture or embarking on a new endeavour. Days before his 84th birthday he wrote, “Life remains sweet I quickly came to venerate his wit and wisdom, while there are obstacles to be negotiated, surprises to be encountered and discovering with surprise that we had both much still to learn and do.” been in Grafton at Stowe over a decade apart and both scarred by the same Housemaster. One day, aged 16, Jim was called to the Housemaster’s study and told bluntly that his father had died. This was followed by a Mr Charles Macdonald (Chatham 54, Former Staff 1964-1996) brusque, “You can go now boy.” 1935-2013 One loses count of all the Old Stoic events, tennis parties, walking tours, skiing trips, carol Charlie was a man of many facets. He loved singing and real tennis tours organised by music. Why did he choose the trombone as his James. They were always enormous fun, mainly instrument? Important to him was quite simply because of the leader’s eccentricity. that his trombone enabled him to play a part in the school orchestra. He would not have A favourite is from skiing days wanted ever to be a solo performer; but he very when Jim’s Tours had made the arrangements. gladly contributed reinforcement Arriving at Geneva, his cousin-in-law inconspicuously to school music-making, where Christopher enquired where we were headed typically he could and James consulted the tour guides in the give encouragement and yet just be himself. two buses on the snowy car park. Choosing the one for Val d’Isere, he was told that people “Just being himself” was perhaps the most there were sleeping in cars, so off we went to striking thing about Charlie. He never drew Avoriaz. The three brutalist hotels were booked attention to himself or treated indiscipline as a solid and at 11.00pm Jim spotted a restaurant personal slight. Instead, he consistently gave still open. After a good dinner he led us back all he’d got; sympathy, support, kindness and to the first hotel, strode up to the night porter intelligent, thoughtful guidance. His energy and enthusiasm were colossal. and requested the three keys hanging behind Again and again as I think about Charlie, I’m struck by what an exceptional his head. It was not just his way of getting encourager he was. There was never anything insincere in his approval. He into scrapes but his Houdini like facility for respected everyone – boy, girl, staff and parents – and encouraged us all in turning things around, which marked him out our various tasks. He could forgive their peccadilloes, be amused at their as special. idiosyncrasies, but again there were boundaries. He left no-one in any doubt that bullying was abhorrent to him. For those who have not read Jim’s memoirs I can thoroughly recommend them, not as Encouragement was what he gave me when he was Senior Housemaster literature – for despite his early career as a and for my last year, Second Master. He helped me clarify my objectives. newspaper proprietor, reporter, hot metal Encouragement was what he gave his colleagues; his was “hands-on” setter and delivery boy, the abrupt end to his leadership, never pompous, often with light-hearted remarks of self-deprecation Stowe schooling limited his style, but he and always humane. He recognised integrity and excellence when he saw it. unquestionably lived life to the full. Who else I’ll always remember how, when we last met, he said of some man who had did we know who had his finger in so many shown special moral courage, “He’s a good man, isn’t he?” pies? The family coal business, Knutsford Fuel And that aptly describes Charlie himself: a good man of exceptional moral Oil, carnations from Nice, Manchester’s first courage and integrity. He had a strong Christian faith, a personal commitment tourist buses, trade magazines, employment to Christ, which guided and informed his working life and was revealed in the agencies, to name but a few. instinctive kindness and respect he showed to all, however different from him A typical late innovation was his weekly real they might be. He was a man of prayer, but not at street corners. tennis challenge with £100 prize to any pair Charlie avoided the limelight when he could, but being himself, as ever, he who could beat him and his partner off level. wasn’t afraid of it when duty or humanity required it. He met every challenge Many tried, only to fail narrowly, and the fixture which came his way without hesitation. His acceptance of his illness was became a solid favourite with members. phenomenally courageous, truly humbling to all of us as we reflect on what His partner, the Club professional, collected had been his notable characteristic, his natural energy and vitality. One of my a well-earned £100 at the end of each year. treasured memories – and Lucia and I will be eternally grateful to him for this – Jim carefully choreographed his funeral at is of the words he spoke publicly to us on behalf of the staff in the farewell party Rostherne church on 7 February 2013 with the they gave us in the Music Room. They were very well chosen words and it was high notes in unknown South African hymns clear that he understood emotionally as well as intellectually what his embarrassing his friends. There was many a colleagues wanted to say; and he said it. Forgive me for how far short these tear when his widow Bobba, unchoreographed, words fall of what you would like said to Charlie. He was a good man and we tossed a real tennis ball into the open grave. knew him as a warm-hearted, very human friend. He was fun. Nick Clayton (Grafton 56) Christopher Turner (Former Headmaster, 1979-1989) 35 Obituaries

Lord Alistair McAlpine of West Green (Temple 60) 1942-2014

Lord McAlpine of West Green, Throughout his life he was obsessed with collecting all manner was an early supporter and of objects, from police truncheons to modern art and . confidant of Margaret Thatcher He seemed to buy more for the pleasure of having things pass and, as Conservative Party through his hands than of owning them permanently. When his treasurer in the 1980s, was interests changed he gave things away or sold them; the Tate and probably the most successful other galleries were among the beneficiaries. fundraiser the party ever had. He After leaving Stowe, he started work as a timekeeper on McAlpine’s provided the financial sinews that South Bank site in London. He never forgot the bullies who got enabled the Thatcherite revolution to change the face of Britain. workers on the site to toe the trade union line. The experience Lord McAlpine was never really “into” politics. In the 1970s, he made him a strong supporter of Thatcher’s trade union reforms. was a fervent believer in the Common Market and was treasurer of the “Britain in Europe” campaign for the 1975 referendum. But he In 1987, McAlpine had to have a major coronary bypass operation, was not then active politically and, at one stage, members of and in 1990 he gave up the treasurer’s job. His name was on IRA Harold Wilson’s kitchen cabinet even thought of offering him a job hit lists and, ostensibly for reasons of safety and tax, he decided as a Labour Party fundraiser. to move to Monte Carlo and Venice. Everything changed in 1975 after he met Margaret Thatcher. He When Mrs Thatcher fell he remained loyal, continuing to address admired her forceful radicalism; she appreciated his garrulous her as “Prime Minister” and scorning her assassins as a bunch of charm and air of business efficiency. “I told him he would have to pygmies and worse. He made no attempt to make the transition to give up his German Mercedes for a British Jaguar,” she wrote in her John Major — whom he once described as “hanging around like a memoirs, “and he immediately complied.” He served as deputy pair of curtains.” McAlpine defected to the Referendum Party in chairman of the Conservative Party from 1979 to 1983 and 1996. Following James Goldsmith’s death in 1997, McAlpine treasurer from 1975 to 1990. became its leader. He sat as an Independent Conservative for some time in the House of Lords before rejoining the During the Thatcher years, an invitation to his lavish parties at the Conservatives. annual Conservative Party conference was a sign of high political favour. His job was to persuade the business world that it was In the 1990s he turned to writing. He was the author of some Thatcher who represented a new type of Conservatism which would dozen books, including two volumes of memoirs, guides to the save Britain’s economy. In 1975, the year before McAlpine arrived, world’s museums, and mischievous political parodies. One of his the Conservatives raised about £1.5 million. By the time he books, The Servant, was a brilliant reprise of Machiavelli’s The stepped down, he is thought to have raised about £100 million. Prince, with Mrs T as the prince. Lord McAlpine was the third child of Lord McAlpine of Moffat, and Lord McAlpine died peacefully at his home in Italy and is a great-grandson of “Concrete Bob” McAlpine, who built the West survived by his third wife and by the three daughters of his Highland Railway and founded the family construction company. earlier marriages.

Mr Christopher Edwards (Walpole 69) 1951-2013

Chris Edwards, one of the UK’s most respected Commercial Property advisors, has died at the age of 61. He was Managing Director of Commercial Property Advisors Ltd and was previously Chairman of UK top 40 real estate consultancy Phoenix Beard for 10 years. He was past President of the Independent Surveyors and Valuers’ Association (ISVA), Chairman of the Royal Institution of Commercial Surveyors (RICS), Commercial Market Board and advised both the office of the Deputy Prime Minister and Department of Communities and Local Government on a range of issues. He was also a member of both pan-industry steering groups for the two additions of service charges in commercial property; a guide to good practice and was elected Chair of the pan-industry service charge group which created the current RICS Service Charge Code. Chris was a Member of the Standing Conference for Mediation Advocates and an accredited mediator and a member of the RICSs Presidents’ panel of independent experts. He lectured extensively on current commercial property matters and the Mr Joshua Downing RICS code on commercial service charges. (Bruce 04) His firm’s client list read like a Who’s Who of the commercial property industry including some of 1986-2013 the UK’s biggest names in development, management and property investment. He also provided independent expert advice to in-house property management teams and external management In a short but well lived life, Josh agents as to how to achieve service charge compliance, lease and code compliance and the best managed to bring some joy and practice in service charge management. He was also a livery man of the Worshipful Company of happiness to all those whose Chartered Surveyors and a Freeman of the City of London. Away from property, Chris was current lives he touched. President of the Birmingham and Edgbaston Debating Society, which dates back to 1846 and In association with the National whose former Presidents include Neville and Joseph Chamberlain. He was awarded the Paul Harris Trust, a specimen Black Walnut Fellowship for his contribution to Rotary, one of the few Rotarians to receive the honour. tree has been planted in Josh’s Unfortunately, his wife, Catherine, died 7 weeks prior to him. His children paid tribute to a father memory, between St Mary’s whom they described as a loving man, who was not only accomplished in business and respected Church and the South Front of Stowe School. by his peers, but also “a great Dad”. 36 Mr Tom Bannister (Lyttelton 82) 1964-2013

Tom Bannister arrived at Stowe in September 1978. He quickly became established as a keen and talented sportsman, playing a leading role in the School’s rugby, cricket and teams. His love for country sports led him to become Master of Stowe Beagles, a passion that stayed with him for life. After Stowe, between 1982 and 1984, he studied at the Royal Agricultural College at Cirencester. More recently, Tom was a well known and much loved businessman and hotelier in the Yorkshire Dales. As Managing Director of the Coniston Hotel, which has been home to the Bannister family since the late 1960s, Tom worked with his mother and father, Ethne and Michael Bannister (Walpole 51), tirelessly to build the business over 25 years. As well as sport, the land and country pursuits, Tom’s loves included good food, wine, travel and good company. Back in the Dales, he joined his mother and father at Coniston Cold, developing a fish farm at Bell Busk and opening the estate’s own 2090 miles and farm shop and fishery. Work experience at Prue Leith’s School of Cookery and leading delicatessens in London led to a love of the catering profession (as well as being no 12 countries mean cook himself) and the opening of the Coniston Tearooms in 1992, and Tom Old Stoics William Childs (Bruce 09) and Freddie Prendergast (Cobham 09) became one of the driving forces behind cycle from London to Athens for Breakthrough Breast Cancer. the ongoing development of The Coniston into the 71-bedroom hotel and country Summer exams and coursework deadlines at Oxford Brookes were fast approaching. estate that it is now. It was clear that Will and Fred needed a distraction, or rather a light at the end of the tunnel. A decision was made that the following summer they would cycle from At The Coniston Hotel, Tom was a very London to Athens! hands-on Managing Director, and was often up to serve Breakfast to guests in the They decided to raise money for Breakthrough Breast Cancer and were amazed by the morning, and dinner to them in the generosity of the strangers passing through Sloane Square tube station (fundraiser), evening. The business enjoyed steady along with friends and family. growth over the years, and last year was 14 months later, after dozens of hours researching and training, Will and Fred set off runner-up in the Yorkshire Tourism White on their completely self-sufficient trip carrying tools, first aid, maps, camping and Rose Awards, a personal testament to how far the business had come. To Tom, the cooking equipment. After complaining about mild weather on the first day, they were team of staff, some of whom had been with hit with 42�C four days in a row in France. They were each drinking 5-6 litres of water the hotel since its opening in 1998, were a day to stay hydrated and calculated that by the end they had each drunk around a his second family. quarter of a ton of water! Tom gave much time and effort to the local The crystal clear waters of the Dalmatian and Adriatic coasts allowed for several community. He genuinely loved living in daily dips in the Med. Along the way, they stopped at 3 UNESCO sites, each one this part of the Yorkshire Dales, and was a as awe-inspiring as the next: Plitvice Lakes and Dubrovnik in Croatia and Meteora true champion of rural life. Recent roles Monasteries in Greece. As a mode of travel, cycling is unobtrusive yet thrilling; included being a Member of Manorlands with challenging 2.5km climbs in the Alps and the excitement of a 60km downhill Hospice Fund Raising Committee (including road through the Dolomites. Often they camped in gardens and restaurant parking helping the charity raise over £50,000 last areas and, throughout the trip, were never turned away. year), the Northern Representative of the Point to Point Association, Clerk of the After 6 weeks on the saddle, 2090 miles cycled and 12 countries crossed, Will and Course at Pendle Point to Point and Master Fred arrived in Athens for a glorious finish at the Acropolis, astounded by the final of Pendle Forest & Craven Hunt. As a fundraising figure of £8,800. previous Manager of Cartmel Racecourse, They published a 15 minute documentary of the trip on YouTube (search for ‘London horses and racing (especially Point to to Athens bicycle tour’). Point) were truly in his genes. William Childs (Bruce 09) and Freddie Prendergast (Cobham 09) 37 Goodall sat writing and rehearsing in the It was before they had a record deal and I room down the corridor. Having refused all was greatly impressed. I returned to School Music at form of musical tuition, my efforts were truly with new ideas; I cut my hair short, gave up awful but Howard never objected to my my A level studies and spent the rest of the Stowe in the tuneless thumping and he encouraged me to term learning how to play their songs on my practise more when I quizzed him about the guitar. I wanted to leave the education chords to Benny & The Jets by Elton John. system as soon as possible. In 1976, I bought a cheap guitar and formed A month later the debut album by The Clash a four piece Stowe band called ‘The First of was released, and I remember walking the 1970s The Last’ along with drummer Martin three miles to Buckingham to buy it on the I was interested to read the article Selby-Lowndes (Grenville 78), bassist and day of release, only to find that the shop’s singer Jon Jacobs (Lyttelton 76) and our lead only copy had been pre-ordered by another in the last Corinthian on pop music guitarist Andrew McAlpine (Lyttelton 78), Stowe boy. I had to wait over a week to buy at Stowe, and so I’m writing now who owned a sunburst Gibson Les Paul. The one on mail order and I’ve remembered the as an Old Stoic from the 1970s to star turn in our repertoire was a bad version incident with vague feelings of bitterness record events from those years, of Free’s Alright Now. ever since. In those days the ownership of as I remember them. At one concert at a local sport centre, we the highly prized new LP by The Clash were advised by the experienced headlining mattered more than anything else in my life. It was an extraordinarily rich period for act that we needed a novelty trick if we were It was my last term at Stowe. I formed a three music; my years at Stowe were not marked to leave a memorable impression on the piece punk rock band called The Lovers with by academic or sporting achievement, but I audience and so decided that we would Matt Moffatt (Grafton 78) on drums and Sean left the school in 1977 inspired to follow a swap guitars mid-song. This trick worked well Burns (Grenville 79) on bass. We wore ripped career in entertainment, which I have done in rehearsals, but we fumbled the exchange shirts stencilled with political slogans, black for the last 30 years. at a concert at Tudor Hall and looked like eyeliner and we had safety pins embedded When I arrived at Stowe aged 13 in 1972, blundering idiots. Thankfully, the girls in the in our cheeks. This look alarmed the School new boys were still expected to perform audience didn’t mind. authorities and our first concert was banned. chores for the Sixth Formers, and I was told We spent a year rehearsing noisily at However, common sense prevailed and The to ‘skiv’ for the Grenville Head of House. It weekends in the Stowe classrooms and, at Lovers were granted permission to play a was through clearing up his coffee cups and one of these sessions, we were interrupted single concert at the Upper School Club on hoovering his study that I learnt that older by Tom Robinson, who was about to have a Plug Street, where we thrashed out a set of boys had record players in their rooms. Top 10 hit with 2468 Motorway. He was our favourite songs which included Sheena These music systems were status symbols, visiting his cousin, Stoic Ez Robinson Is A Punk Rocker, In The City and White Riot, evidence of progress and achievement, and (Chatham 78), but despite his inspiring the audience to pogo dance and the most enlightened of the Sixth Formers encouragement, The First of the Last failed to enjoy ‘a riot of their own’. It was great fun. had expensive Pioneer turntables and large make any impression and so eventually we I’ve worked in the music industry since wooden Wharfedale speakers, along with broke up. leaving Stowe, and enjoy a lasting friendship record collections with albums by Ten Years Our bass player, Jon Jacobs, went on to with three other Old Stoics Matt Moffatt After, Deep Purple and Genesis. In the become a successful producer. His work at (Grafton 78), Mike Watts (Grafton 78) and Grenville Houseroom we had limited access Air Studios introduced him to Paul Raymond Watts (Grafton 80) and together to music, other than through transistor McCartney and Eric Clapton and recently he we’ve released music on record, CDs and as radios or visits to the Roxburgh Hall or the engineered The Beatles re-released downloads now for a span of 25 years. Queen’s Temple. recordings on Apple. Our band is called The Hit Parade and I’m In 1973, a typed letter was stuck on the My life changed course decisively in March proud that the music we’ve recorded bulletin board in North Hall announcing that 1977 when I travelled to London with my together, against the odds, still appeals to a top 10 pop band was coming to Stowe to Stowe friend Simon Gregory (Walpole 77) fans of obscure pop music from around the play in the Roxburgh Hall, and we were during the Easter holidays to see The Jam at world. www.the-hit-parade.co.uk asked to vote on a choice between Wizzard a pub called the Red Cow in Hammersmith. Julian Henry (Grenville 77) and The Electric Light Orchestra. Wizzard won and they arrived to play a full set, including their soon-to-be hits See My Baby Jive and Ball Park Incident. I loved every minute but wondered why the singer Roy Wood avoided talking to the audience. I discovered later that he was impossibly shy, a strange thought, given the band’s raucous behaviour on Top Of The Pops. In 1975 the music scholar, Howard Goodall (Lyttelton 76), was studying for his A levels at Stowe and the studies that lined Cobham Court echoed to Supertramp’s Crime of the Century, which had just been released. We were impressed by the fact that the band’s songwriter Roger Hodgson (Grenville 68) had attended our School and I was inspired to explore how to play music, spending many painful hours in the Roxy attempting to learn 38 the piano break on School while Howard The Park Lane Hotel was filled to the rafters with 420 Old Stoics, parents and guests for the grand finale of Stowe’s 90th Anniversary celebrations, Nostalgic at Ninety on Saturday 12 October. We were overwhelmed by the spectacular display of 1920s costumes, which included chimney sweeps, flapper girls and Downton Abbey themed costumes galore. The entertainment line up included a solo saxophonist, tap dancer and burlesque show girl, as well as a cabaret performance and live band. Thankfully, there was nothing nostalgic about the food. The Park Lane laid on a delicious feast, which culminated in raspberry soufflés for over four hundred guests; they all seemed to rise to the occasion! Dancing continued until the early hours, there was a constant queue for the 1920s photo booth and everyone agreed it was the perfect warm-up for the centenary. One comment from a non-Stoic guest exclaimed, “Only Old Stoics know how to party like that!” A big thank you to all of our guests who travelled from far and wide to join us for the celebration and thank you to all those who worked so hard to make the evening such a resounding success. Thank you to our kind sponsor, Stoke Park, for their support of the evening. Photographs and a film from the evening are available at www.oldstoic.co.uk and your copy of the souvenir programme has been enclosed with this magazine. Anna Semler (Nugent 05)

NOSTALGIC AT NINETY painting for sale Caroline de Peyrecave (Nugent 04) kindly produced this stunning oil painting to feature on promotional material for our 90th Anniversary celebration, Nostalgic at Ninety. This painting is now for sale. If you are interested in buying the painting, please contact Caroline de Peyrecave by emailing [email protected] or visit her website to view other examples of her work: www.carolinedepeyrecave.co.uk

39 AFS

8 Founding members and supporters of AFS celebrate the success of the most recent Stowe Harvard Fellow, Abby Koff, at the Annual Dinner 2013. Left to right: Robin Thomas, Abby Koff, Darius Weil, AFS Chairman Brian Hecht, George Sprague and Roger Lloyd. A brief history of a Special Relationship

Stowe has always been an international part-time administrator, Mona Cavalcoli, who expanded its ability institution, taking in young pupils from to plan events and conduct organised fundraising. around the world, many of whom go on The rewards have been ample: AFS today provides substantial to travel and live abroad. financial support to Stowe, not just through large donations, but also through dozens of smaller gifts from donors who participate in an annual fundraising campaign. This has made a meaningful Over the past decade, Stowe’s global footprint has been greatly difference in the ability to offer scholarships and bursaries and to strengthened by the growth of American Friends of Stowe, an undertake the massive restoration and construction projects that organisation of Old Stoics, friends, families and supporters living continue to transform the School. in the US. The organisation has also fostered a deep sense of connectivity Membership of American Friends of Stowe (AFS) now stands at 350, within the US-Stowe network with three annual gatherings, where making it by far the largest concentration of ‘Old Stoics abroad’ in old Stowe friends reunite and new connections are made. The the world. AFS has a dual mission: first, to foster connections and a sense of community among Old Stoics and Stowe supporters in the largest event, an annual autumn cocktail party coinciding with a US, and to raise funds to financially support special projects at visit from the Headmaster, this year featured the presentation of Stowe. AFS is an accredited 501(c)(3) organisation, so donations the first ‘American Worthies’ award to Peter Sichel (Cobham 41), from the US are tax deductible and it is governed by a Board of a US Old Stoic who has made extraordinary contributions to AFS. Directors which is fully independent from the School itself. Another signature programme is the Stowe-Harvard Fellowship, The need for an ‘American friends’ organisation became apparent in which each year awards one recent Harvard graduate the the late 1990s. There was growing interest among Old Stoics in the opportunity to teach and live at Stowe. The programme, generously US to donate to Stowe, but there was no convenient, tax-efficient supported by AFS members, has become an important part of life way to do so. Although increasingly frequent visits to the US by the for the many Stoics who benefit from their interaction with a young School’s Headmaster provide a good opportunity for Old Stoics to American teacher. Reciprocally, AFS, with its deep network of meet, these gatherings were largely impromptu and hastily connections, has increasingly become a contact point in the US organised. To move forward, efforts in the US needed a central for Old Stoics wishing to live, work or study in America. organisation to co-ordinate Stowe-related activities in the States. “We are so proud that American Friends of Stowe has become In 2002, several years of preliminary activity in both the UK and the an important source of support for the School and the Stoics who US resulted in the founding of AFS by Brian Hecht – who, 11 years study there,” says Brian Hecht, AFS Chairman. “Thanks to the later, is still the organisation’s Chairman. In its first decade, AFS enthusiasm of our membership, our events have become a unique steadily grew in size, scope and sophistication. AFS has attracted a way to grow and foster the Stowe community abroad. Our first world-class Board of Directors drawing from a broad range of decade has seen much success and the Board and I are eager to professions and Stowe affiliations. In 2007, it hired an experienced support Stowe for decades to come.”

Can you help? Finding your If you are interested in giving career advice to Old Stoics with an interest in your profession, please email [email protected] or call 01280 818349 to let us calling know. We would love to hear from you if you can offer Very few are lucky enough to know exactly what they want to any of the opportunities below: do as soon as they leave full time education but, fear not, the • Careers’ talk to current Stoics Old Stoic Society is here to help. • One/two week work placements for current A large number of Old Stoics have offered to give career advice Stoics/recent leavers to those interested in their particular industry so we may be • Careers’ mentoring via email/telephone/blog able to match you up with a career mentor. These invaluable connections can also help to provide work experience and • Internship internship opportunities. Don’t forget, if you are looking to recruit, you can list For more information about the OS Careers’ network, your job vacancy on the OS website and view CVs of OSs log in to the OS members’ area at www.oldstoic.co.uk looking for a role, at www.stowe.co.uk/oldstoic 40 Launch of the Australian Friends of Stowe OS Members’ Area Don’t forget to visit the OS Members’ Area regularly to make the most of benefits and services designed exclusively for Old Stoics. For those of you who are yet to discover its charms, it contains the OS Business Directory, which lists special offers and discounts for Old Stoics; a jobs board for OS employers, a CV listing service and the Online OS Register, so you can keep in touch with your friends from Stowe. The OS Members’ Area is password protected. If you need a reminder of your username or if we do not have your email address, please email [email protected] or telephone 01280 818349. On the OS website you will also find details of all the forthcoming OS events, including reunions, dinners and networking receptions. To keep up to date, you can like us on facebook, follow us on twitter and connect with us on linkedIn!

www.facebook.com/OldStoicSociety The launch of The Australian Friends of Stowe took place on 15 www.linkedin.com August 2013 at the Windsor on Park, Sydney. Chris Chance https://twitter.com/oldstoic www.oldstoic.co.uk (Chandos 74) and David Thomas (Chatham 78) masterminded the event and were responsible for attracting an impressive gathering of 45 Old Stoics and their supporters to what became an historic Stowe party. The vintages of those present ranged from David Ash (Grafton 50) to James Norman (Bruce 03), and all five decades inbetween were equally represented. Mid-way through the evening, David Thomas introduced Chris Atkinson (Chatham 59/Stowe Master 71-97) who was visiting Sydney at the time, and invited him to bring the assembled company up to date with Stowe news. This done, Chris thanked the organisers for orchestrating a memorable Stowe occasion and all those present for attending. Finally, he was proud to announce the official launch of the Australian Friends of Stowe. The toast was ‘Persto et Praesto’ and Australian Old Stoics were unanimous in their desire to raise a glass again when next called upon to do so. Chris Atkinson (Chatham 59)

www.villacavendri.it WEDDING & EVENTS VENUE IN VERONA

Palladian Villa . Swimmingpool . Amarone Wine . Romance This splendid Villa is available for rent. Special price for OS. Pietro Melloni (Grenville 99) from a buying background, whilst I’m ‘Cecily exists to be worn, experienced in PR – it seemed like the perfect combination. treasured and adored’ We were both full of ideas and in those two hours we’d come up with a name and business plan. I was a bit worried I’d feel I was working with my big sister, rather than my business partner, but we decided to give it a go and have never looked back. EA What inspires your jewellery? LC Tess had worked with gold, silver and semi-precious stones before and had a natural flare with the materials. But for me it was about my allergies; I can’t wear costume jewellery because I’m allergic to nickel. Fine jewellery is beautiful, but how often do young people wear it? There was 8 Libby Collins (Nugent 07), left, no jewellery out there made from quality Tess Collins (Nugent 02), right. materials that I found casual and trendy. There’s so much throwaway fashion these days but our jewellery is made to last and Former Nugent sisters crosses the barrier between fine jewellery and costume jewellery. There are four themes that inspire our celebrate one year in designing process: Defence, Spiritualism, Protection and Serenity. We want our the jewellery business jewellery to form a connection with its wearer and to have its own personality. Focusing on these themes also helps us Old Stoic sisters, Libby Collins (Nugent 07) call away, so the girls are in constant contact achieve a source of conversation. and Tess Collins (Nugent 02) are taking the with the craftsmen who make the pieces. jewellery world by storm with Cecily London. EA Where’s your jewellery made? Business has boomed in recent months As the business reached its first birthday, with celebrities, including The Saturdays’ LC We have some wonderful craftsmen in journalist and fellow Old Stoic, Emily Ansell Una Healy, actress Skyler Shaye and singer Bali who hand carve our bone designs and (Nugent 07) caught up with Libby to discover Miley Cyrus, snapping up their designs. The source beautiful semi-precious stones. the secrets of their success… next stage for Libby and Tess is to expand We’re also lucky to work with the finest silversmiths in Italy. We’re a team that Having seen Libby and Tess’s jewellery label their line. spreads across the world, and we all work transform from a wistful dream to a thriving The girls constantly support each other, together to develop the most creative and reality over the past year, it was a joy to sit pushing one another to the next level. There exquisite jewellery possible. Many of our down and chat about the astounding rate at is no sibling rivalry, only a burning desire to suppliers have been work associates of which it has grown. grow the business and develop the magical Tess’s for years, so she has developed a Upon leaving Stowe, the ambitious sisters brand. With an abundance of ideas and bags really strong relationship with them. full of passion, the future is limitless for the knew they wanted to turn their passion for EA Where did the name come from? fashion into successful careers and Cecily sisters. LC Cecilia is a name that has run throughout immediately set about making it happen. I met up with Libby to find out more... Libby bagged a place at the prestigious our family for generations. It derives from EA Libby, can you tell me a bit more about Saint Cecilia, the Patron Saint of Music. London College of Fashion studying for a how Cecily came about? Although beautiful, with four syllables it’s BA in Fashion Promotion, while Tess made a slightly long winded so we shortened it to name for herself as a jewellery designer and LC Tess had been working in the industry for Cecily. This name portrays the strength and buyer. The girls soon realised that two heads around six years and knew she was ready to support shown by our family, and helps us were better than one and, a few years down set up her own label. A couple of months to reach our potential every day. the line, Cecily London was born. after I’d finished my degree we began talking about it in more detail while sitting in the car, EA Was fashion always your dream? Libby and Tess have created a unique which had broken down! collection of hand crafted necklaces and LC Fashion has always been a part of our pendants that add an individual touch to I couldn’t help but think: ‘How will she do lives. Our grandfather owned a shoe even the simplest of outfits. The former this without me?’ And she happily admits business in Northampton during the post war Nugent girls wanted to create a jewellery she was thinking the same thing. Tess is era, which was passed down to our mother. label that was both fun and luxurious, so their designs centre on gold, silver, bone and semi-precious stones. The sisters firmly believe that timeless pieces will always have a place in the fashion world but they enjoy adding a unique twist to their designs. Each item of jewellery is inspired by a memory or moment in time and, due to the way it is produced, no two items are the same. Production takes place across the 42 globe, but the whole world is only a Skype We’ve been sitting on market stalls, going EA Any tips for Old Stoics starting to trade shows and helping with buying a business? trips since we were in our push chairs! LC Don’t be afraid to take a chance. Butcher, Baker We both have creative minds and have Remember, the greatest failure is not to always excelled in the arts rather than try. Once you find your niche, be the best or Candlestick academia so it was a natural progression at doing it and believe in yourself. Don’t from leaving Stowe and we love it. Life is give up. Never leave home without a pen too short not to do what you love. and paper, you never know who you’re Maker? EA What’s it like working with your sister? going to meet or what you’re going to We are constantly amazed at the sheer variety see. Always have your ’phone charged so LC We’ve grown up around family and diversity of careers which Old Stoics take you can take a picture of anything that businesses so know the importance up after leaving Stowe. From astro-physicists of professional relationships within a catches your eye. to orthopaedic surgeons, we are delighted family. We already know each other EA So, what’s next for Cecily? there is such an array of professions amongst inside out, so are able to speak our us. Keeping up to date with what you all do is LC We’re about to launch our new minds and express all our ideas without quite a challenge, but it is an essential part of collection – Million Miles. It is a bespoke offending one another. making the most of our network. collection of necklaces and pendants Overall, it’s been great for our which celebrate the connections With this in mind, please make sure that you relationship. We’re fortunate enough between the skies and the earth. There’s connect with us via LinkedIn if you can, to to see each other every day and I think no intricate design involved; each piece allow us to keep up to date as your career we sometimes take that for granted. focuses on the simple beauty of a stone develops or, alternatively, we would be EA What’s the best and worst part of found in Bali. We were blown away by delighted to hear from you personally if you running a business? the beauty of the stones and through receive a promotion, take on a new job or start your own company. LC The best part is developing our own this collection are presenting a tactile ideas and being able to put claim to and colourful experience that allows In return, we will be able to hold more events them. We control the brand and, although products unearthed from the ground, with relevance to your career, invite you to a huge responsibility, it comes with so to open a to the future. networking opportunities and encourage you many rewards. It’s been the biggest to help younger Old Stoics interested in Emily Ansell (Nugent 07) learning curve of our life, but every following in your footsteps into your industry, single creative process is such a joy. via our career mentoring services.

The worst part is the admin side of For more on Cecily London visit To update the OS Office with your current things. Maths has never been a strong www.cecilylondon.com profession, please email [email protected] point for either of us!

43 fully justified, as Smolin sets out clearly in The Trouble with Physics. THE NATURE OF Big Bang theorists firmly predicted years ago that the galaxies would be slowing down by now. They were totally wrong, they found them to be speeding up! This finding made them dream up another piece of pure fantasy, which CYCLIC TIME is the twin forces of Dark Matter and Energy, which ‘must exist’ to push or pull the galaxies on their way. I think we have made the biggest Julian Boles JB Actually Sir Roger Penrose wrote a book error in history by thinking so firmly that time (Chandos 72) is the about ‘Cycles of Time’ and Sir Fred Hoyle must be linear. Simply by testing cyclic time, coined the term Big Bang in a derisory swipe at Founder and Head we find that the answers all work, and there is a linear concept he thought absurd, so a cyclic no need of such theories. It works just by of The British universe is not as left field as one may giving time the chance to repeat itself. Gemmological imagine. Hawking actually wrote a paper in NM There is a theory that space and time did 1968 with GFR Ellis, who felt cosmology uses Institute (BGI) in not exist before the Big Bang – if so, in what far too much philosophy to create its concepts, environment did this black hole exist? London. After rather than solid facts. This remains true, so thirty five years of the field was open to new thinking and JB The entire concept of a start date for space determined study remains so. time is the error in question. By assuming time is linear, we insist it must have started up one and research, he is publishing his NM But how can you imagine that you may be day after breakfast, perhaps. This is pure right when such giants have given their life’s work FLASH TIME MACHINE in human nonsense and nothing in reality respected opinions? which he disproves the traditionally supports it that can’t be better explained by a accepted BIG BANG THEORY of the JB All this conceptual input over the last cycle. The cosmos exists all the time. Our creation of our Universe and time, as century has had a very negative effect on Western education, even at Stowe, is taken astronomy. The plain fact is that the famous from 2-300 year old ideas of this kind, and we know it. Here, he explains to Nigel experts have no firm idea of how spacetime now that almost everyone in the West agrees, Milne (Chandos 68) his reasoning works. Anyone can add a view that may be we see dissenters as almost akin to mad and what appears to be a major correct. It is easy to be put off new ideas by people! Difference is not madness, but a fresh discovery. feeling overawed by the great names in current way of thinking that may be correct, and must or past science, but all that has to be put aside be studied. to see where the evidence . As the I made the same error and felt sure at the NM Well, Julian – The Nature of Cyclic Time research progressed, results emerged. It – when and by whom was the adolescent outset that cyclic time was just a crazy idea to became clear this was no plan for a faint heart, be dismissed as soon as possible. It turned Julian Boles’ imagination inspired by such an but it called for courage and perseverance. Not out to be unbreakable, so that got my esoteric subject and, did it have its embryonic easy to find all the time, hence the need to attention. The more I tried to destroy it, the beginnings at Stowe? check for a decade or two longer and see what better it looked. The key to cyclic time also lies JB Yes and no: the real thinking did begin at emerged. Alas, it was more proof of a cycle! in the flatness of the CMB (Cosmic Microwave Stowe, in its marvellously atmospheric The myth that recent eras believed the earth Background) which would have to be random wooden chemistry labs, looking out over the was flat is just that, a myth. In fact, and featureless, if time were long as proposed. South Lawns made me wonder about the Eratosthenes proved it was a sphere in 240BC It was flat like a sheet of glass, proving that nature of the universe. I used to take 4-5 by working out its circumference, he was right something was seriously wrong with modern philosophy books to football and hockey to within 60 miles. astrophysics. The cyclic version in my book matches to read in the bus, to which the great NM In its simplest form, The Big Bang Theory gives an answer: time has recently reset, with a PG Longhurst remarked “What’s all this Boles, suggests that approximately fourteen billion 540° triple spin shift that caused this becoming an intellectual are we?”. Luckily, no years ago a “black hole” of infinitesimal size ‘anisotropy’. It appears to be correct to say this one laughed but it took some years to work and infinite density started to expand and and solves the problem. out what the word meant and, still no one is create the Universe as we know it. Is that right? NM This is not the time to enter into a quite sure of its meaning! CG Jung was also a JB That is impossible. One cannot get theological discussion but this has to revelation and the wonder of using the mind something out of nothing, let alone a whole constitute a gigantic leap of faith – like trying as a laboratory had begun. cosmos, so they happily set aside Newtonian to prove or disprove the existence of God? NM It has to be said that challenging the Mechanics to pop in any wild idea they could JB Actually, there is a huge degree of faith in works and beliefs of such eminent scientists think of, such as String Theory, which is 100% linear time, not in a cycle of time. When Darwin as Hawking, Hubble and Penrose might be made up; many think it is wrong, such as hit the scene with his famous 1859 book, considered courageous or even impertinent Professor Lee Smolin and others. I have many thinkers were tired of the religious 44 but, hey, why not? checked carefully and all their concerns are dominance, so used his theory to attack the Church. What it contained mattered very admitted that it does appear to be the product JB A very deep question, but essentially you little and it remained quite unpopular until of some grand design. In your opinion, can are suggesting ‘Nihilism’, where nothing after WWII. But, it depends on linear time, and this really be disproved or can it only be matters. If time is a cycle, then everything does as my book will show, evidence in geology excluded on philosophical grounds? matter because the timescale is not random, shows that our radiogenic dating must be JB The idea of a start remains the key error so each action creates an effect for each of us: reassessed, and there is insufficient time for because nothing supports that. We are left the law of Karma, or action and reaction, which evolution to occur. Within 3-4 years everyone with a cyclic process, whether we like it or not. is also Newton’s third law. This seems to be will be saying the complete reverse of Darwin’s It makes sense and stands up to evidence, but profoundly true. This is also where the answers thinking and have facts to prove it. My research requires a very different way of thinking. An can only be personal, yet they seem to contain has found over 1,200 such details, there is no amazing thing then becomes possible: we a spiritual element too, perhaps. This new escaping them. can’t rule out a creator, in the sense that there research does clearly show that time appears NM Ok, what about an example? could be a God who ‘re-creates’ the world once firmly cyclic but it is a matter of personal choice about what it means. JB Very well, take Neanderthal Man. If they again, since science cannot explain how lived as claimed in conventional science for entropy is reversed. If this is true, that would My own take on this is that God can exist, so about a million years, there should be 600 explain the order period as Heaven and the cyclic time can be viewed as evidence that billion skeletons. How many have we found? chaos part as Hell: odd, but it works. Therefore, there is a Supreme Being who acts as the 136 or so. That is a gap in world history that we may indeed live in a cyclic cosmos, and ‘Father’ of humanity. This concept is in every only cyclic time can fill. They have simply both science and religion can have a role to culture on earth, except Buddhism, and every extended the time in their line to fill it. This play in explaining it. That will keep you thinking ancient culture. I think it is true but that is just is pure conjecture, there is no evidence to for a while – endless fun! an opinion, backed up by the latest science. support it. Even carbon dating puts their caves NM Do you think your Flash Time theory is Curiously enough on this topic, every single at 20-40,000 years old, but we should dispute powerful enough to create a revolution in ancient culture right around the globe, except those figures as well, since this method is Science, or just another idea? one, used to believe in time as a cycle. famously inaccurate beyond 2,000 years. JB I can see so many discoveries within the NM Which one is that? A fresh clam in the Murray River of Australia cycle that solve all the questions I ever had, JB The modern West. And even then many in was tested at 3,000 years old, there are many I feel certain the answer is ‘yes’, a revolution the West also think so. 100 years ago or more, such cases. seems inevitable. In the end, we all have to this degree of deep ‘knowledge revision’ NM Before we go any further, can we decide, because these boil down to very would have been rejected out of hand, rather establish whether you are a Creationist or personal matters – is there meaning in as Velikovsky’s work was in his 1956 book an Evolutionist? spacetime or not? The Darwinists claim it’s Worlds in Collision, even though he was JB Actually, neither. You’re right, most people all random, with no God, and so there can’t correct about his catastrophism. Yet, his book fit into one category or the other, but my be meaning at a deeper level. I, and many sold out 14 editions in America and 12 here, I research stumbled onto another, third option. others, think they are deeply wrong for these believe, so people wanted to see his evidence. reasons, and since they never considered Namely, the cosmos could be part of a cycle NM Conviction in your argument is all of order and then chaos. Order would contain cyclic time as a third option, they have some catching up to do! important, and the ability to persuade others a degree of entropy after a while, and then to adopt your reasoning is essential. degrade into chaos until we reach today. It NM How do we measure time? Should a Otherwise the discussion ceases to exist and becomes unsustainable, reaches a peak and definition of time be based on an accurate just becomes a splenetic outburst of fury and creates a kind of apocalypse for a very short description of the way naturally occurring a frustrated rant as has been sadly illustrated time, but does not wipe us all out, you will be motions are correlated? by the eminent and respected scientist glad to hear! JB We can measure time but so called ‘deep Richard Dawkins in his embarrassingly Nature seems to have this pattern and the time’ is another thing. This new research in the unfortunate and scantily researched book The evidence is all there, including explaining book FLASH TIME MACHINE shows exactly how God Delusion. This resulted in nothing more the Cambrian Explosion of Life, where odd it all works. In a word, you are right that nature than a desperate outburst of the equivalent of fossils like Anomalocaris suddenly appear has the answer to this, since the parts that do ‘well if you don’t believe me then you are all with no ancestors – geology has never not work are man-made. This is why the mad!’ which is not the most tactful, scientific explained that properly. The fossil record has planets and galaxies all spin round, so or plausible way to convey a point and try to many such oddities, including the Coelacanth spacetime itself can also be rotating. I am now win an argument! Are you sure you need to [Latimeria chalumnae], which was presumed certain it does and time will shortly tell. There publish this book? extinct since the Cretaceous, 65-80 million will also be larger natural disasters alas, as we JB It was never meant to be published at all. years ago, until it appeared in a fishing catch are already seeing, so stock up on bottled I was certain that my research would simply on Dec 23 1938, off the Chalumna River water and a camping gas fire! agree with the status quo. When it didn’t, I mouth, South Africa. NM If we accept that the Universe is infinite, is realised that I had tripped over a hidden reality NM It strikes me that after all of the years of it possible that time plays no role in its of time repeating, in which even bizarre things research and theorising, scientists have still existence and that whilst there is ‘being’ there like déjà vu made sense at last. This is why the been unable to state precisely just how our is no actual ‘becoming’ and that, in fact, time book took 35 years to check and write, Universe was created. Some have even and motion are just illusions? because I was reluctant to say such 45 controversial things in public. Now that all the research has proved the idea valid, there seems no alternative. My Stowe geology teacher, the superb Dr Mike Waldman, once said in answer to our incessant questions of ‘how do you know that?’, that we are free to create any answer we like, and if it fits the facts well, or better, it may be true. Does it fit the facts? Cyclic time does, as no other idea has, so it may be true, but it took research into 45 subjects to find The Stowe Ghosts the correlations for an informed decision. Now it seems rather obvious. Everyone likes ghost stories but I remembered several things about this odd I can’t quite agree about needing to never felt the urge to tell mine until couple which I hadn’t had time to analyse in have ‘conviction’ about one’s own their pursuit. They seemed to be totally argument. Having seen how much an item in The Corinthian in its survey of Ninety Years of Stowe unaware of me behind them. There had been damage linear time has done to an old-fashioned period look about their human discovery, I take care never to made me sit up with a start. clothes. Above everything else, they hadn’t feel too strongly that I must be right. made the slightest sound – no crunch upon I may be totally wrong, but the An entry for the year 1932 was headed ‘Ghostly sighting on the South Front’. It the gravel path, no footsteps climbing the challenge is open to anyone to prove stairway. They were so close I expected them the case. I am even offering a reward described two silent figures who climbed the steps in the moonlight, passed into the gloom to be talking together but no whisper was of £10,000 to anyone who can prove audible. I tried to remember details of their of the Portico and vanished. My memory cyclic time wrong, partly to show how costume. I felt sure they wore hats and the rocked back to a moonlit night in 1944 when I firm this new cyclic evidence is, and man, who was nearest to me, seemed to be witnessed exactly that. partly to show how wrong the old wearing an oddly frock-coated length garment concepts actually are, that nothing Coming back from a walk by the Eleven Acre of a light yellowish hue. The woman’s skirt real can be proven by them. Lake – I was senior enough to choose my own was draped and ankle-length. I was never NM Finally, Julian, in that originally bedtime – I was climbing the steep grassy near enough to see their faces. slope and paused to take in the moonlit you were convinced of the plausibility I did not rush round telling people of my majesty of the Palladian façade glowing of the Big Bang Theory, may I ask you experience, expecting to be disbelieved or whitely in the brilliant moonlight, every what it was that made you spend thirty ridiculed. But the sensation was so vivid that I window blacked out because it was wartime. five years of your life proving yourself have never forgotten it nor sought to explain The only exception was a brilliant strip of light wrong when you might have been it, until I received another startling Zoink! along the edge of the great door on the out partying? reading the paragraph from 1932. So, I was Portico, coming from the Marble Saloon JB Having done that in my teens, it not alone in seeing what I saw! Thanks to within. As I stood there, I sensed movement Anna Semler who compiled that historical seemed a shallow way to spend too at the far right end of the gravel path along much time. After travelling round the survey: I have now read the full text that the frontage. I watched two figures walking appears as the leading article of The Stoic, world from 18, working in shipping and along the steps. They were adults of mining, with an amusing aim to solve April 1933, headed The Stowe Ghosts – A unfamiliar aspect. Strangers. Intruders! At that True Story. the riddle of the Easter Island statues, time of night. This demanded investigation. I these deeper questions seemed hurried up the slope as they drew nearer to After acknowledging that many readers were important somehow. the steps. By then, I could see it was a man likely to be sceptical of what followed, it At that age, one looks ahead to wonder and a woman walking closely side by side, proceeded to describe in some detail a seemingly identical couple walking along the how one’s life may end, and I didn’t definitely nobody connected with the School. gravel path and up the steps to disappear want to be one more person with a I was still twenty or more yards away when into the Portico on a fine, moonlit summer’s normal or riotous life led, yet nothing to they reached the lion on its pedestal and night. Their figures were ‘arm in arm’ and both show for it. It has proved very exciting to unhurriedly turned up the steps. By the time I dressed in an Eighteenth Century style, “The study such obscure things but to find reached the bottom step, they had passed man in a yellow coat and knee breeches, the there was real merit in the ancient idea over the top of the first flight and were out of woman in a long flowing muslin skirt.” I had of a cycle, as suggested by Plato and my vision. When I reached the halfway noticed no knee breeches but I never saw others, was amazing. To find the latest platform I just caught a glimpse of the figures what was below his coat, which was indeed astrophysics confirms it as the only disappearing over the top step into the yellowish. The other difference was that the apparent option is really staggering, but Portico. As I panted after them, I remember 1930s couple were approaching the steps there it is. We will have to get used to a keeping my eye unwaveringly on the crack of from the direction of the shop, whereas the factual reality, it seems, rather than the light round the door’s edge. If it was opened 1940s pair were definitely coming from the one our recent ancestors imagined. light would come blacking out. It didn’t – the opposite Walpole end. The previous observer NM Julian, thank you for what has door remained closed – so they must, I had emphasised exactly the same thing that been a fascinating and mind stretching thought, be in the Portico. But the Portico was so struck me – the uncanny silence with conversation. I’m now highly intrigued empty. It doesn’t take long to search it. Even which they moved. and greatly looking forward to reading in deep shadow there is nowhere to hide and My predecessor concluded that the couple the only other way out is a steep drop which THE FLASH TIME MACHINE when it could not have opened the Portico doors, nobody would attempt in his right mind. is published. “which were latched”. Of course it hadn’t Flash Time Machine by J.D. Boles As I stood there baffled, looking back down occurred to either of us, that if they were will be available in Spring 2014. the steps they had mounted, I suddenly felt a ghosts they might have passed through the www.bgiuk.com flesh-cringing Zoink! of realisation. I hadn’t door without opening it. The description 46 been following living people! Now I continued: “The witness dashed up the stairs only to find the door was immoveable. Struck ideally positioned to see the ghostly couple, inherited it in 1779? He married Mary Nugent with an absolute primitive sense of fear he from whichever direction they came. in the 1770s and lived to 1813. But it could dashed down the steps and fled.” In my time, it was widely rumoured that there also have been his heir, Richard Grenville, Like most ghost stories this leaves a number was a Stowe ghost and that the Headmaster who married his childhood sweetheart, Anna of unanswered questions. Who was the had seen it. But no-one had heard JF Brydges, the Chandos heiress, in 1796, when mysterious ‘narrator’ who tells the story? The Roxburgh admit it. Noel Annan, a first-class he was 20 and she was only 16. They were a piece is signed with the initials N.G.A, whom I scholar (later Provost of King’s, Cambridge) close couple but his parents were not. The guess with confidence to have been Noel G and prize pupil must have been on closer pair I saw were obviously close but not all that Annan, who was to become a famous Old terms than average with JF. For one thing, he young. They became Stowe’s master and Stoic, Governor of the School, life peer, was to write his biography – Roxburgh of mistress in 1813, when they were in their university head and adviser to the Stowe. Supposing one day JF had told him the thirties. All this is supposition but I have no governments on education. At the time, he story – perhaps at one of those rather doubt that the couple seen in or around 1932 was editing The Stoic and was no doubt short terrifying Prefects’ dinners that he gave? were the same couple I saw in 1944. They of a subject for the leading article, as I can Supposing he had asked permission to use definitely belonged to Stowe; possibly it testify editors often were. Here was one it? And JF granted on the strictest conditions belonged to them. guaranteed to intrigue his readers, but who of anonymity. Headmasters are not supposed What would be of consuming interest to me, told it to him? He goes to such lengths to to see ghosts, which might put off prospective is news of any more sightings of the couple, in conceal the identity of the ghost watcher that parents. That might explain the extreme it can hardly have been a boy currently at the discretion observed throughout, as though the sixty five odd years since my own. Surely, School – why not name him? One of the dealing with a state secret. they have continued to walk – if ghosts do walk when there is nobody about to see them. masters then? But which one? Few of them The next unanswered question is, who were lived in the main building. Any Old Stoic ghost spotters please come they? Ghosts are very rarely seen in pairs, forward! It would add greatly to the saga of The opening lines of the account might be a which suggests it was an intimate connection Stowe’s suitably distinguished ghosts. As an clue. “One fine summer night he decided to between those two, quite probably as man afterthought: the only detail that makes me take the air on the South Front.” Who would and wife. Ghosts also tend to appear in doubt that Noel Annan’s informant was JF more naturally do that but a person whose places with which they have a strong Roxburgh is his concluding sentence – that in rooms gave directly onto it – namely the connection. The pair I saw were strolling at a primitive fear “he dashed down the steps and Headmaster? Outside his rooms by the Gothic stately pace and mounting the steps as if they Library lay the Headmaster’s garden, then owned the place. Perhaps they once did. The fled.” I wonder if he made that up to give the recently made, on the ground between the costume details so far as they go, I am told, story a creepy ending, because it is building and the balustrade alongside the suggest the closing years of the 18th century impossible to imagine JF departing from his gravel path. And if he had sauntered out of a or early 19th – say 1780 to 1815. Thus, was leisurely pace to dash anywhere or flee from French window across the balustrade to this during the ownership of Stowe by George anybody, real or ghostly. admire the famous view, he would have been Grenville, First Marquess of Buckingham, who Peter Lewis (Bruce 46)

ALASTAIR NUGENT VINTNER TEMPLE ‘58

ESTABLISHED 1973

th A regular lecturer at The Corkscrew Society, Alastair Nugent takes great pleasure Anniversary in inviting you 40 to help celebrate his 40th Anniversary in the Wine Business, Agent for by extending trade prices Champagne to Old Stoics Legras & Haas and their families + from around the World

Nationwide delivery by Carrier at cost

WWW.ALASTAIRNUGENT.CO.UK 01730 825 678 47

Alastair Nugent half page ad 183 x 136mm.indd 1 05/12/2013 11:51 Outrageous Fortune... Growing Up at Leeds Castle

pleasing tales about them. Quite a while easier task than it might have been was the afterwards, a Los Angeles literary agent was fact that all the introspection, and ‘total persuaded to read my stories and asked ’, which was part of the process, never me to send her a manuscript. I was off to became a struggle to determine how best to the races! evaluate situations, or problems; I just had to place bum in chair, write as well as I could NM How did you find the whole process? and try not to be dull. Was it fun and totally absorbing or was it an arduous trial? NM Writing an autobiography is a very AR The ‘arduous trial’ element, curiously, brave thing to do in that one’s reasons for never really played a part. In fact, as time doing it could be construed in a variety of went on, and each successive draft took on ways. For instance, some might consider it its new-and-improved status, the process of an act of vain indulgence, whereas others learning how to write a book – always will be delighted that one has opened up a For more than five hundred years moving in parallel with how to construct a world hitherto unknown, which is deeply Anthony Russell’s (Temple 70) book − became something of a challenge; fascinating. Have you experienced both family has served the Kings and absorbing, yes; hard work, for sure; reactions and what, may I ask, has been Queens of England as Ministers, extremely rewarding, for the most part. I your immediate family’s response to it? wanted, needed, in fact, to see if I could do AR Thank you – but I never thought writing Privy Counsellors, Generals and a it; that is to say, complete the project to an about my childhood (“more spoiled than a Prime Minister. Here, he talks to editor’s, publisher’s and my satisfaction – Buckingham Palace corgi”) was a bold step, Nigel Milne (Chandos 68) about his and see the book into print. other than attempting to achieve some autobiography Outrageous Fortune NM I have often wondered about the whole small sense of gratification for a creative in which he recounts his experience process of writing a book. Having now done endeavour successfully concluded. I don’t of growing up in the extraordinary so, did you find it cathartic and did it allow think I would have started the project if I had atmosphere and surroundings of you to re-evaluate the experiences of your thought for a second my motives had been early years? Leeds Castle, Kent. infiltrated by crude ‘vain indulgence’. AR I wish I could claim that there had been Opening up a world ‘hitherto unknown’ was far more the driving force behind my wishing NM Anthony, never having written a book some cathartic element to the whole process – I worked sufficiently hard to merit, to write the book. Did I think my story of myself, I am always in awe of those who childhood was interesting enough to write a have. What initially gave you the courage perhaps, some minor ‘road to Damascus’ experience, or revelation! – but what I book about? Of course! How many children and confidence to begin? actually discovered was somewhat more grew up at Leeds Castle in the 1950s and AR: It was a very tentative start. Not a prosaic. Having accepted the challenge of 1960s where my grandmother, Lady Baillie, smidgeon of courage or confidence on the writing Outrageous Fortune, it soon became was one of the few owners of large estates in horizon. In fact, looking back I’m still a little apparent that I think about the people, England still with the resources to operate at bemused as to how a fondness for having places and events I was writing about in astonishing levels of grandeur? My the odd laugh with friends about my two precisely the same way now as I did back immediate family’s enthusiasm has been grandmothers’ eccentric exploits graduated then – with the caveat for modest growth in reserved but, in all fairness, I certainly 48 to writing three or four vignettes of audience maturity! What made writing the book an wasn’t expecting a chorus of ‘All Hail!’ NM The period you write about is quite that my views on Stowe have now changed I hope it will be amusing and relevant – emotive, with a way of life once dramatically, and for the good! My happy critics like relevant! Assuredly, it will be commonplace amongst the higher echelons memories of Stowe, of which there are written in the same style that you mention. of society dwindling. Having been brought many, are centered around the friends up on the cusp of this social advent, did you I made – and still have – and the music NM Throughout your life, pop music has find it strange being partly a stalwart of a which brought me so much joy. been a contributing factor to your overall bygone era whilst also being firmly a child happiness, whether in the listening to of the ‘60s? NM The massive popularity of the or the performing of it. What have been television series, Downton Abbey, has your most satisfactory moments and AR In the book I write, “We were fortunate. fed the public’s insatiable nostalgia for, greatest regrets? Thanks to the skill of her advisers (and, curiously, a period and lifestyle that they perhaps other indeterminate factors) AR Satisfactory moments have been many. have never experienced themselves. Is it Granny B’s cocoon of wealth remained So many I shall list just a few: my first guitar because there is something about such a relatively intact. And so, from inside my (1958): record collecting 1956-2013; the grand, elegant and exquisitely mannered gilded bubble, I observed and absorbed the Beatles Christmas Show 1964; rehearsing lifestyle that is at once comforting, revolution of Socialist Members of and playing with my Stowe friends, Max, reassuring, fascinating and so uniquely Parliament, rock stars and hairdressers, Oliver and Peter (1965-1969); playing in British that makes people wish to immerse the London pubs and clubs and recording playwrights, theatre producers, movie stars, themselves in films, plays and books such demos (1972-1976); recording and playing television personalities, photographers, as Outrageous Fortune? Your book could in Woodstock, NY (1977-1978); winning fashion designers, models and footballers not have come out at a better time! How do the Concours de Paris at the Théatre de taking over Great Britain’s airwaves and sales in Great Britain compare with those Champs-Elysées (1979); playing for headlines, with my ears tuned in and an in the USA? idealistic foot planted in two camps.” audiences across Europe (1977-1980); AR I have lived in the US for a long time my final recording (in honour of my mother By the time I was old enough to have and it is clear that Downton Abbey fever is who died in 2001), in 2003. All this become fully aware of exactly how an established phenomenon, as in the UK encompasses a lot of happiness! privileged my upbringing was, I had decided and, I believe, in many other parts of the My greatest regret is failing my mother in that the most important thing of all was to world. I don’t know exactly what it is that ignore it, discount it even, and envelop her lifetime after she’d placed such faith makes normally calm and well-educated in my coming through in the end. The music myself in the music, the ‘vibrations’ of the people go all askew over the frocks and time. Whilst loving and admiring my mother failed. The book worked. She only knew mansions and servants and banter, but about the former. for her style, manners and beauty, and Lord askew they go (myself included) and that’s Margeson (my grandmother’s best friend the way it is. It happened a long time ago and Conservative Government Minister) for NM Several years ago you recorded an with Upstairs Downstairs, with Brideshead album of your own compositions and pretty his old world charm and statuesque Revisited, and now with Downton. There is, bearing, I was also immersing myself, impressive it is too. Can we expect more in in the US, an abiding fascination with how the near future? luxuriating to the nth degree, in the the English upper classes, and those who outrageous cool of The Beatles, Stones, The work for them, have conducted themselves AR Er, no! I’m so far past the sell-by date Kinks and Cream. What seemed clear to me over history and I wonder if it’s not because it’s no laughing matter. was that “all those new rich-and-famous the revelation of what goes on behind the Swinging Sixties superstars were, in fact, castle walls, both upstairs and down, is NM Knowing you as I do, I am very aware well on their way to establishing a new something very few people know about, that there is another autobiography inside aristocracy. And the old aristocracy was so but legions would like to. Add glorious you waiting to emerge! Shall we have to enamoured of this new one that it soon was production values, magnificent storytelling wait very long before OUTRAGEOUS hard to tell them apart as they swanned and the highest quality acting and you have FORTUNE – THE ROCK AND ROLL YEARS around in velvet suits and Cuban-heeled a winning show. Of course, there is also the is published? boots at country house weekend parties fact of us being historical cousins. Killjoys and fashionable London gatherings!” AR I’m afraid no such work is in the aside, the American fixation with our Royal pipeline, nor is it ever likely to be. I have I saw nothing strange in this transformation Family (stratospheric when the Charles/ spent a considerable amount of time in – in fact I revelled in it – apart from the fact Diana, William/Kate weddings hit the the past with people who are well known, that it was failing to register at the castle! television screens) and all things stately- some very well known, but I would never My parents thought my obsession was homeish, is something to cherish, and be contemplate writing about the times I spent bound to pass. It did not. grateful for, especially when uninspiring with them, or the stories I know about politicians on both sides of the pond seem them, because it would be the opposite to have lost their way entirely. NM Your reminiscences of your time at of everything that I learned growing up Stowe do not come across as your happiest. All I can hope is that Outrageous Fortune regarding what’s right and what’s wrong. Stowe has always prided itself on will benefit from the huge media exposure I’d prefer to write a bad sex novel than a encouraging and developing the individual given to Downton Abbey. It’s the real thing; follow-up memoir telling tales on the rich and by your written account, it seems that forty years later. I have no sales figures at and famous that I knew. your Housemaster let you down in this this time, and will not have for a while, regard. Having said that, it can’t have according to my publishers. NM Rats!!! – Oh well, bring on the bad sex been all bad? What are your abiding novel I say! happy memories of Stowe? NM You have a very natural and Thank you, Anthony, for being a most conversational style of writing, Anthony, AR The fact that I did not enjoy my time delightful and entertaining interlocutor. and whilst reading your book I really felt at Stowe can be attributed to a number of I wish you tremendous success with the that it was as if you were reading it to me. reasons which, if put to music, would merit sales of Outrageous Fortune and may your Would you ever consider developing this being entitled ‘the Whinge Symphony’. fortune become increasingly outrageous! style into a work of fiction, too? I shall not apportion blame beyond what Nigel Milne (Chandos 68) I write about in the book – though I see it AR That is a wonderful compliment. Yes, more as recounting rather than blaming. I am done with writing about myself! I am I do, of course, make it abundantly clear working on a novel. It is a gentle satire. 49 1845, shows the magnificent lantern that once hung proudly within the Hall. The lantern was sold during the 1848 auction with the following (shortened) description: ‘A magnificent octangular hall lanthorn, the frame of or-molu, surmounted by a ducal coronet, and glazed with coats of arms of stained glass. It was designed expressly for the present Duke of Buckingham, by Collins, of the Strand, by whom the brasswork and glass painting were executed. The coats of arms, alluded to in the above description, include the armorial bearings of the various branches of the family of Buckingham, showing their regal descent. The lanthorn is in the form an octagon, of which each side is divided into three compartments... Subsequent to the sale, the lanthorn proved to have been purchased for Mr Edward Churchill, of the Calverley Hotel, Tunbridge Wells, the of which magnificent And the next establishment it now decorates.’ The lantern was described as still being in the Calverley Hotel (now called the Hotel du Vin) in 1898 but there now appears to be no of the item in room is... Tunbridge Wells. Since the lantern was created especially Stowe House Preservation Trust’s (SHPT) next venture in for the family and was a real centrepiece of our long-term restoration project is the Blue Room, known North Hall, it would be amazing to find it, to many Old Stoics as the Grenville houseroom. either to have or to copy. So, if you know the whereabouts of it, please do let us know. If you would like further information This room has taken on many different ‘An antique white statuary marble regarding these lost treasures, or know functions since it was created in the 1740s, mantelpiece with leaf and where something is, please do contact me including the Family Portrait Room (‘The mouldings, plain centre panel and sunk by telephoning 01280 818229. I look Grenville Room’), the Billiards Room, and a jambs enriched with chased and forward to seeing what turns up. Breakfast Parlour. This is one room of the scroll ornaments; size 6’ wide; fitted with Anna McEvoy, Stowe House Preservation Trust suite of rooms in the east pavilion – the an old chased ormolu and steel stove.’ others include those now known as the We are searching for this fireplace surround Green Room and the Victoria Room – and, at and, although it is quite plain, the one any one time, they have all had these roles. feature that connects it with the Blue Room SHPT aims to restore the interiors is the four little rosettes in the corners. These to how they were at the turn of the nineteenth tie into the rosettes found in the corners of century, give or take 10 years either side. This the damask frames. was the date that the Temple-Grenville family Another key room in the story of the evolution was at its height of political and financial of the main mansion is North Hall, seen here power. The Library has been restored to its on the occasion of Queen Victoria and Prince condition in 1797 when it was created, the Albert leaving after their three day visit to Music Room and the Marble Saloon to Stowe in January 1845. As a major entry and around 1800 and the Egyptian Hall to 1803, circulation point, now as then, it is the one when it was created. For the Blue Room, the room that everyone visiting Stowe will have date of 1800 is problematic because at this seen since 1730 and thus makes it a key time the Blue Room was known as the Print historical space. An original laid-flat plan Room, looking very much like the Library, survives by (in the Yale Centre including bookcases and a corresponding for British Art), shows his design for the balcony on the west wall. We couldn’t take it room, including two niches in the south wall back to this time because we would be taking leading to the Marble Saloon (which, at that out later additions that are now part of the time, was a five bay rectangular hall). North listed building curtilage, and adding back Hall will be restored during summer 2014, features that we’re not sure about. The with the modern floor due to be taken up and features that are still in the room today are replaced with one which is more in-keeping the 1740s Bacchic ceiling, replacement with the original 1670s version. We will clean frames that originally held blue silk damask the beautiful Kent ceiling from 1731, fix the panels (hence the name of the room) during three central canvases back to the ceiling and the mid-Victorian period and the overdoor repaint the walls according to the historic decoration. However, a key element that paint analysis. appears to have been there from the conception of the room, and sold in 1922, The image right, taken from Illustrated is the fireplace surround: London News coverage of the royal visit in ICE DRIVING

51 a month in the art room at Stowe. Evidence of the popularity of cameras abounds but a A Pre-War photograph could never quite capture the atmosphere of this relaxed scene. Culture In 2003, the painting turned up with a picture dealer in Bath, probably consigned by relatives of the Revd Humphrey Playford. It was spotted by eagle-eyed James Huntington-Whiteley, the husband of Tour Edmund’s niece Magdalen Evans and they were able to alert the School to its 1 Edmund whilst at Prep School. William (Bill) McElwee arrived at significance. Colin Anson (Grenville 50) was 5 Edmund with the Huntington-Whiteley helpful in securing it as an historical record children. Stowe as a history tutor in 1934. for Stowe of an unusual and inspiring episode By 1936, he was beginning to just before hostilities meant that travelling in implement the idea of an Easter Europe would be nigh-on-impossible for the holiday culture tour for his group of next seven years, unless to serve amongst historians, in order to introduce them a battalion. The tours did indeed start again to the art and architecture, town, after the War when Bill returned to Stowe. Sadly Edmund is the sole survivor landscape and food and wine of the amongst those shown in the painting. countries of continental Europe. Magdalen Huntington-Whiteley, great-niece 5 Edmund’s painting, which now hangs The first tour took place in France, the of Edmund Neville-Rolfe (Bruce 39) in the History Department at Stowe. second, of which Edmund Neville-Rolfe was fortunate to be a member, went to northern Italy encompassing Verona, Venice, Bologna, and Pisa. They travelled by train but in 1938 Bill and his friend Humphrey Playford, Housemaster of Bruce House, drove them all to France in their fast and capacious Lancia cars. They arrived via Calais and started conveniently close at Reims, Sens and Vézelay and then proceeded rapidly down to Provence, including Avignon, Pont-du-Gard, Arles and Nîmes (where they were ALL invited to lunch by the father of a French boy who had stayed with the Neville-Rolfes in Heacham, Norfolk the previous summer – an early, and fortunately successful example of an ‘échange’. They then turned towards Carcassonne, Toulouse, Albi, Cahors and then north to the Loire Châteaux, and on to Chartres, Gisors, Évreux and Mont-St-Michel. A typical gathering, this time in the cathedral square at Coutances, was the scene Edmund chose to recall upon his return – he remembers completing it within

And I think, by the feel, my forehead bleeds, For they fling, JF’s Poetry Class whoever has a mind, Stones at me for my year’s misdeeds.” So much did I enjoy the last issue of The All too soon the volumes of poetry were collected and Corinthian celebrating ninety years of Stowe that disappeared into the suitcase. JF left the classroom as quickly I am impelled to pen an account of JF’s poetry as he had arrived. Good teaching is infectious and JF’s teaching classes held occasionally before one of the certainly fell into this category. upper forms some time in the late 1940s. After writing this, I had the idea of ‘googling’ the lines of poetry Carrying a suitcase, JF would suddenly appear in the doorway of I remembered. The idea proved fruitful. I discovered that the the classroom. The suitcase would land with a crash on a nearby poet is Robert Browning and the poems are The Lost Leader and table and, when opened, found to contain volumes of poetry that The Patriot. Some random clicking then produced the poems were promptly distributed throughout the class. themselves. It was an uncanny moment as the words came up on the screen of my monitor. For a while, I ceased to be an elderly I have since forgotten the poets and titles of JF’s chosen poems gent sitting comfortably at home before a PC. I became an but, thanks to his enthusiasm and sense of rhythm, I can eighteen year old schoolboy sitting not especially comfortably in remember to this day the opening lines of two of his favourites. a classroom just beyond the fives courts, hearing JF declaim the There was, “Just for a handful of silver he left us, just for a riband familiar lines of two great poems to which he had introduced us. to put in his coat...” and “It was roses, roses, all the way... Oliver Wall (Chandos 50) 52 As you may well have heard or read in the media, or perhaps from friends, ‘legacy-giving’ is becoming an ever more popular way of giving money to charity. The value of doing so has been recognised by Government too, in the enhanced provision now available for tax – and by leaving a ‘residuary gift’ in your Will, you can ensure family and loved-ones are looked after first. In today’s vernacular, it could, I suppose, be described as a ‘no-brainer’. The Roxburgh Society was established in 2005, by Lord Quinton and an enthusiastic group of twelve others, to recognise those who have signified their intention to leave a gift to Stowe in their Book Review Will. What thus started off as a group with only a handful of members is now 116 OSs and Friends of Stowe strong, and growing steadily. This is, I believe, a terrific achievement – and testament to how strongly many of us feel about our alma mater. A Rogues’ But I also feel strongly that there are many more Old Stoics who might be interested and inspired to join our august group, in order to support, what I hope you agree with me to be, an enormously significant and formative place for us all in our lives. Gallery By leaving a gift to Stowe, you are able to support either or both of Stowe’s charities: The Stowe School Foundation (which supports the provision of scholarships and bursaries, along A Rogues’ Gallery comes across as a form of with the continual need to update the School’s facilities) and memoir: Peter Lewis (Bruce 46) remembering his The Stowe House Preservation Trust (which supports the life through episodes with the famous and ongoing maintenance and restoration of the House). infamous of the last century. Aside from contributing to the future success of Stowe, by indicating to either me or Gabi Murphy in the Development Each short affair gives a personal insight into the lives of those Office at Stowe that you wish to leave a gift to Stowe, you are often revered by later generations, and it is perhaps this personal automatically welcomed as a member of the Roxburgh Society. angle that gives this book the feeling of looking into another We convene every summer for a splendid lunch at Stowe and, world. There are few people still alive who could remember that as most members I am sure will agree, apart from the chance to Arthur Miller would go back to a café which he frequented when catch up with old friends and contemporaries, a highlight of he was 18 because, as he said, “I like their celery pop.” these gatherings is the chance to see some of the fantastic talent that Stowe enjoys with post-lunch musical and sporting This book not only remembers people from the past but it also performances by current Stoics. eulogises a bygone world; the heyday of Fleet Street with press ruling their empires of linotype machines and rotary The date for the 2014 Luncheon is Tuesday 3 June – I do hope presses that caused the whole building to stir ‘like a ship putting that we may see some of you there as our latest recruits! If you to sea’ – all next door to the competition. Gone are the days have any questions at all, I would be delighted to hear from you when the front page lead story could get stuck halfway down the so please do make contact. chute to the Head Printer, along with the ‘wicked’ Barons to Thank you. whom profit was merely a secondary motive – succeeded by Nigel Rice (Chatham 64) media moguls like Rupert Murdoch. Lewis laments that, “Today, I seldom recognise my country”, but in his book he manages to bring it back to life, even if it is never to return. More than anything, this book shows Peter Lewis to be an astute observer and a shrewd judge of character, except in the case of JF Roxburgh Spike Milligan – “I could never make out whether he was in fact An inspiration for so many youngsters, mad or, like Hamlet, pretending to be.” But, I doubt even Milligan A man who gave so many years to Stowe, himself knew that for sure. Set out almost as multiple diary His selfless service – this was quite formidable entries, divided up by decade, this book is perfect to dip in and As the love of all Old Stoics still will show out of, although the other worldly charm will easily absorb you as I think his heart was broken by the war you get to know all the main characters from the 1950s onwards. When every day he heard of Stoics killed, This book is perhaps best characterised by an idiom repeated by Boys he had known from teenagers to manhood EF Schumacher – the brains behind immediate technology used Whose gaps in life will never now be filled in Africa – “Small is Beautiful and Big is usually Beastly.” These But, at his prime, JF was someone very special, small anecdotes from Lewis give a glimpse into the people behind Old courtesy and kindness were his aim, the big headlines, and often how different they really are from the And those who had the luck to know him personally public perception of them. The real Diana Dors “would rather stay Will smile, with sadness, when they hear his name. home than go to orgies – but who would want to hear that?” Mrs Liz Zettl (Former Staff 38-42) Amber Shepherd (Nugent, Upper Sixth) 53 Supporting a Charity I am sure we have all given a little supporters. CRY was founded in 1995 to something to a charity from time to raise awareness of conditions that can lead to young sudden cardiac death (YSCD). time without even giving it much of a second thought. Some of us may CRY’s vision is to work with cardiologists and family doctors to promote the cardiac even give to a particular charity on health of our young by establishing good a regular basis or via standing practice and screening facilities devoted to order, for whatever reasons. significantly reduce the frequency of young sudden cardiac death throughout the UK. Every week in the UK at least 12 young In January 2012, for no apparent reason, We started a memorial fund with CRY in people die suddenly from undiagnosed I felt it was time that I did something for a Adam’s name and have since raised nearly heart conditions. charity beyond just texting £5 to a television £20,000 with the support and help of advert. I wanted to help make a real family and friends. This has been ringfenced If we can identify just one youngster who difference. I had no idea then what fate had to provide cardiac screening events in may be at risk and save one life, then I will in store for me. On 7 February 2012 at our area. feel we have really made that bit of a 7.30pm on a freezing cold night, we found difference and prevented another family An average day will screen 100 young going through what we have. our 18 year old son, Adam, collapsed in the people and the resulting statistics are garden. He was not breathing and was surprising: If you would like to support us, please visit certified dead later that evening. www.virginmoneygiving.com/AdamGreenCRY If you have not experienced this, you cannot (The following statistics relate to the Or you can contact CRY directly for more begin to imagine how our world was turned CRY screening programme as a whole) information at www.c-r-y.org.uk or inside out. How do you tell his brother, his telephone them on 01737 363222. grandparents, his close friends? This was • 1 in every 300 young people that CRY a time that we will never forget, and tests will be identified with a They are a fantastic bunch of people, very wouldn’t want to, but neither do we like potentially life threatening condition friendly and understanding and provide a to remember it. • 1 in 100 will have a condition that is great support to anybody that contacts them. Thank you for taking a few minutes We already knew about the charity CRY less serious but could cause to read this, your help and awareness may (Cardiac Risk in the Young) due to the problems in later life save a life, and it may just be somebody untimely death of another teenager in our • 5-10% will require an ECHO on the that you know… area. I contacted them and they had already day (of approx 100 people per day) heard about Adam from their network of Tom Green (Walpole 75)

The Teaching Staff from 1923 A photograph of the first teaching staff at Stowe appeared in the last edition of The Corinthian, accompanying the Headmaster’s article. Former Master, David Arnold, wrote in to ask who the fine gentlemen were. Although the Stowe archive can shed a little light on this, we are unable to name some of the teachers, so if anyone recognises any of the faces below, please get in touch with us so we can place names to faces. Back row, from left: None listed. Front row, from left: 1.? 2. Rev. EH Earle (Bruce Housemaster), 3. JF, 4. IM Cross (Temple Housemaster), 5? If you can help, please email [email protected] or call 01280 818349. 54 Ollie’s Odyssey around meant a 4 hour detour and as it was already late in the day, it wasn’t an option. I must have waited for 20 minutes with the feeble hope that the rock fall would stop and when it didn’t, I did one of the more reckless things on my trip. I started the bike, ignored the shouts from the police, closed my eyes and opened the throttle. Well I made it. Tackling four borders; Honduras, El Salvador, Guatemala and Mexico, consisting of a lot of 2 Camping out in the mountains of Peru documents and a lot of sweaty bike leathers, during a challenging off-road section. and covering over 2,000 miles in three days was about as hard as it got but once arriving I remember having the ‘gap up at a Christmas party with some of into Mexico, I felt like it was only going to get easier. year’ chat one evening sitting Argentina’s top supermodels. I had a faint suspicion that this wasn’t exactly going to th with my Dad at the kitchen By 20 May 2013, 10 days after my 19 set the style for the rest of my trip! birthday in Mexico, I had reached America. table. But, it was all the wild, wacky and unrealistic ideas: Wednesday 2 January 2013 was the official Once entering the US and the civilised world, start day of my trip, with 24,000 miles of I encountered my biggest culture shock. The road in front of me. A daunting task but, by “How about you sail around Scandinavia?” disparity between the two countries was this stage, I truly felt ready to face the world. he said. greater than any and it really unsettled me. Little did I know of the potential hazards that The rest of the journey up the US and Canada “Dad, I’ve never sailed properly before! lay ahead: rock falls, bandits, drug cartels, is probably easier for you to imagine but, in I think walking the Ganges sounds pretty grizzlies and, of course, once I reached particular, the Pacific Coast Highway was a amazing…” Alaska the chance of meeting Sarah Palin. real highlight as it meandered along the “What, and you think Duke of Edinburgh is After I made it through Argentina, I crossed mountains with the dramatic coastline to enough practice for that?” Chile and the thousands of miles of the my left. “Well...no probably not. What other ways Atacama Desert, the driest place in the On 7 July, exactly seven months after leaving can you travel?” world. Then, in late January, I crossed into Ushuaia, I reached Prudhoe Bay, Alaska and “Car, balloon, bicycle?” Peru with the obvious highlight being the effort all seemed worth it. I stripped Machu Picchu. “What about a motorbike?” I asked. down into my boxers, ran into the Arctic Over the next few months, the motorbike During my trip, I met a lot of police. On the Ocean and completed my hope of swimming angle really took a hold of my imagination. whole I did anything I could to please them, at both ends of the Earth and becoming a I started pulling out maps, reading travel although I learnt that the hard way. Three member of the Polar Bear Club – the boxers articles and picking out the dream bike of months in and crossing over from Peru into thanked me for the wash too. my choice. I was hooked on the idea but still Ecuador, one border official decided he wanted to search me. He picked the most I can confidently say that I wouldn’t have only as a fleeting thought, never in my made it without the hundreds of people who wildest dreams did I think it would become inconvenient place on the bike, to which I each did their own bit to help and I am a reality. politely asked him to look somewhere else. No sooner had I said it than I realised my eternally grateful to everyone who has By a stroke of luck, I was awarded £3,000 mistake. I had made myself look like I was donated to Fisher House UK. by the Old Stoic Society and Stowe Parents’ carrying something illegal; he proceeded to I’ve hardly scratched the surface as to what it Association to get me going on my adventure. rip apart my whole pannier, opening was like, but the real importance of the Overnight my trip had gone from revelry to everything from packs of dried soup to whole trip has been to support Fisher House reality, it shocked me more than anyone! The digging through my dirty underwear bag – important thing about the money wasn’t only UK, which provides a home-away-from-home good luck to him! I have to admit though, for the families of wounded soldiers. the huge financial help but also that it now I was scared. Scared as to what he would do had to happen, there was no turning back… when he didn’t find anything or whether he When their CEO sat me down and said that The next eight or nine months were a bit of was planning to plant something. Well, we should aim to raise £100,000, I thought a blur. I had to get my exams out of the way although not the nicest guy, he wasn’t that it was a steep ask, not of me, but of the before cracking on with everything from corrupt and when he didn’t find anything, he generosity of the public and I am absolutely buying sturdy tent pegs to actually learning let me go. amazed to say that to date we have raised £98,444. With one final push, we can raise how to ride a motorbike! My Dad was so After having crossed Ecuador, by early March enough to help Fisher House build one room. concerned about my safety: he ended up I was in Colombia having covered about It is the chance to be a part of helping a investing in a Kidnap and Ransom policy! 10,000 miles. It was here that I hit some family stay close to a loved one and help in Luckily though, it seems he covered his costs serious traffic. Weaving through the cars, I their rehabilitation, only a few hundred by placing an each-way bet on my survival at drove up to see what all the commotion was Ladbrokes. By the time 7 December came about. It was a land slip on the right side of metres away in a hospital ward. I would like around, I was about ready for anything the the road. The mountain was shedding layers to thank everyone who supported me unknown world was going to throw at me… of rock and debris of all sizes which were throughout my trip. It was a life changing or so I thought. exploding on impact with the tarmac and experience and I am honoured to have Within three days of arriving in Buenos Aires, then carrying on down the cliff face to the raised money for such a worthy cause. I bumped into a couple of friends and ended left. Looking at my map, I knew turning Oliver Plunket (Grafton 12) 55 The Stowe Beagles During the 2012/2013 season the (Grafton 11), Charles Dedman (Chandos 10), Tuesday 18 May: The Stowe Beagles Stowe Beagles celebrated their 50th Rose McKie (Nugent 11), Michael Leyland Hunter Trials at Primrose Hill Farm, Gawcott, Buckingham, MK18 4HT organised by Lawrie anniversary and this was done in (Walpole 10), Charlie Shirley-Beavan MFH (Grenville 03), Freddie Rolt (Grafton 07), Strangman (Bruce 57) and his family. style, on a very snowy evening, at a Henry Macpherson (Cobham 13), Hugh There is a class for Old Stoics. The entry Dinner held in the Music Room at Leyland (Bruce 73), Simon Shirley-Beavan form can be found on the Old Stoic website: Stowe on 23 March 2013. (Grenville 72), Lawrie Strangman (Bruce 57) www.oldstoic.co.uk This is a main fund and Alistair McGee (Lyttelton 73). raising event for the pack and any offers Over eighty guests attended from all eras, of help would be greatly appreciated. with the Headmaster, Jean Atkinson, Nat In December, hounds, Stoics and supporters Saturday 7 June 2014: The Puppy Show Thornton and John Fretwell as our special travelled to Shropshire for two very enjoyable at Stowe. guests. Michael Bannister MH (Walpole 51) days hunting as the guests of James Beazley, was the guest speaker and shared some the uncle of the Joint Master. July 2014: It is proposed to organise amusing reminiscences with us all about On Boxing Day, we were very pleased to the second London Dinner at the his time at Stowe and the involvement his welcome a gathering of over three hundred Caledonian Club. family has had with the Stowe Beagles, people on the North Front, over half of whom If any Old Stoics wish to join the Stowe more recently when he has hosted our visits then enjoyed a walk with hounds around Beagles Supporters Club, please email: to Yorkshire. the grounds stopping at various temples on [email protected] so your name In June, the Joint Masters, Oliver Beazley and the way. can be added to the list. Rory , took some hounds to The Colne A number of fundraising and social events are Details of all the above events and meets Valley Beagles hound show. It was here that planned for 2014 to which all Old Stoics and are available from Phillip Kennedy, KH. they heard the very sad news of the death, their friends are invited: Telephone: 01280 813489 or email the evening before, of Tom Bannister [email protected] (Lyttelton 82). Tom was a former Master of the Saturday 15 March: Hunt Ball in the Marble Stowe Beagles and a great supporter. Over Hall and State Rooms at Stowe. Tickets: £45 Alistair McGee (Lyttelton 73), Chairman twenty supporters of the Stowe Beagles per head. travelled north to attend his funeral. Tom will be greatly missed by us all. The Joint Masters also showed hounds at Peterborough and the Alcester Game Fair returning with rosettes from all of the shows. Hunting commenced in September with support from within the School and the hunt country remaining as strong as ever. Hounds and seven Stoics travelled to Northumberland where they were the guests of the Wailes- Fairbairn family. Three days’ hunting, in very windy conditions, followed with meets being hosted by Ian McKie MFH (former parent), George Shirley-Beavan (Grenville 06) and Simon Orpwood, (long time supporter). Rupert Gibson MH (Temple 73) welcomed us into his hunt country. Stowe parents, Old Stoics and supporters also travelled north resulting in over thirty sitting down for dinner one evening. Old Stoics present during the 56 week were: Edward Birch-Reynardson Dubai Drinks Reception The first Old Stoic drinks reception to be held in Dubai was hosted by James Bernard (Lyttelton 90) on 24 November 2013 at the Bari Bar – Mina Al Salam. The group represented Old Stoics from the years 1985 to 2003 and from a wide range of boarding houses. “The attendees were obviously rather eager, several had arrived before I had at 6pm. The party continued until 2.30am!” It was a delightful gathering and the vibrant atmosphere was a tribute to the calibre of individuals who come 2 Gavin Maxwell (Chatham 30) out of Stowe. It was interesting to find out what everyone had been doing and how they had ended up in the Middle East. They all agreed that they are going to be having many more regular events together. Ring of James Bernard (Lyttelton 90) Bright Water

This year is the centenary of the All the proceeds from the sale of the books birth of Gavin Maxwell (Chatham will help preserve the land under Skye Bridge, where the Gavin Maxwell Museum 30), one of Britain’s finest authors. is located. The funds will also help the To mark this anniversary, the Eilean Eilean Bàn Trust to maintain the island’s Bàn Trust has produced a limited historic lighthouse and animal hide as well edition of his most famous work, as the Bright Water Visitor Centre, located nearby on the Isle of Skye, close to the Ring of Bright Water. harbour, from which Maxwell travelled to and from the island. For more information Do we have The edition will be limited to two hundred, on this organisation please visit each individually numbered and hand www.eileanban.org signed by four individuals: Sir Richard your email Branson (Cobham/Lyttelton 68), who won the Maxwell Prize at Stowe in 1967; Virginia Mackenna OBE, who starred in the address? film based upon the book; Sir John The OS Office sends regular news Lister-Kaye, the noted naturalist who updates and invitations to OS looked after Maxwell’s affairs in the 1960s and Jimmy Watt, whose life as a boy events via email. If you do not features centrally within the book. receive emails from the OS Society, please write to Caroline Whitlock by Each gilded copy will be hand bound in leather with the cover blocked in 23 carat emailing [email protected] so gold, illustrated with unseen images and we can update your contact details. printed on extremely high quality layered paper. Copies can be purchased for the price If you change your email address, of £1,500, + £20 p&p. If you would like to please let us know your new details obtain a copy of this limited edition please by emailing [email protected] email, [email protected] 57 STOWE AT WAR At the 2013 Roxburgh luncheon, I had the good fortune to sit Singapore, when serving with the Parachute next to Anna Semler (Nugent 05), the OS Society Director, and Regiment. was able to congratulate her on the 90th Anniversary edition of February 1942 saw HMS Airedale, now The Corinthian – with one gripe: it had saddened me that so based at Scapa Flow, on escort duty on the Russian Convoy PQ11. On recall to base, she little space had been given to the contribution made in WW2 sailed for Alexandria via Gibraltar and Cape by Old Stoics. This short article reflects that meeting! Town to join the 5th Destroyer Flotilla. The months of May and early June saw continuous action, including supplying My Old Stoic Register shows that, of the On 17 November that year, whilst on a Nickel Tobruck and the final voyage to resupply 2500 Old Stoics up until 1945, some 1,900 (leaflet) Raid on Nantes and Strasbourg, his Malta under Operation Vigorous. On 15 June enlisted for wartime service (there was no Halifax was attacked by a night fighter and 1942 in the afternoon, HMS Airedale was doubt more than that, where war service was shot down; my father and 6 of his crew were singled out from the Naval Escorts and not recorded). By far the largest number killed, with one survivor parachuting to attacked by 12 Stukas, when direct hits blew enlisted in the Army, where the OS attrition safety and POW camp. My father and his off the stern section of the ship. One officer rate was over 11%, but it is not surprising crew are buried in a tiny farming village near and 43 ratings died, with Richard’s father’s that those OSs in the RAF suffered the Chaumont in France, where the villagers hold gun receiving a direct hit. While Richard has a commemoration service every year on 17 highest losses, with over 22% out of over no memory of his father, being a little under November; they have erected a memorial 350 who enlisted, killed in action. A total of 3 years when he was killed, he has a letter stone, showing the names of the crew, at the some 250 OSs gave their lives, with JF writing from his uncle, Admiral Edward Reeves, to entrance to the village. It is a terrible personally to the family of each one. By the his mother, where the Admiral mentions coincidence that No 158 Squadron, formed end of the war, OSs had been awarded 2 having spoken with a ship’s officer, who said in May 1942, lost 851 aircrew killed in action VCs, 28 DSOs, 21 DSCs, 111 MCs, 46 DFCs Richard’s father had been earmarked for an by the end of the War. and 34 other awards (taken from ‘Stowe’ by Officers’ Training Course. Brian Rees). I thought that it would be of interest to give details of two of the OSs who Manaton Lord (Bruce 26) Richard Lord comments also: “By a strange gave their lives. quirk when researching details for this short article, I found in my mother’s copy of Stowe Paul de G H Seymour (Chandos 28) Chapel – Book of Remembrance 1939-1945, alongside the page of my father’s entry, a loose leaf page entitled ‘Stowe – War Memorial Trust. Next of Kin may like to be reminded that funds are available for assisting in the education of the children of Old Stoics killed in the War.’ Simply, it was through that Trust and the fact that JF wrote on several occasions to my mother that I came to Stowe. In turn, that is why I consider it a privilege and duty to support the Richard Lord’s (Bruce 57) father was one of Roxburgh Society in its efforts to build a solid the original 99 boys who came to Stowe in base of bequests to Stowe.” 1923. He left in April 1926 and began a Richard’s circumstances and mine during our career with Lloyds Bank in the Black Country. young years are very similar, and I am sure My father, Paul Seymour, came to Stowe in Sometime in 1941 he joined the RNVR and, that a number of the OS sons of Old Stoics 1924, leaving in 1928 and becoming a Cadet following initial training, he travelled north (and it would be sons post-war) who were at the RAF College, Cranwell in 1930; he was with a draft of Ordinary Seamen on Boxing killed in action can echo our histories. I fully commissioned as a pilot in 1932 and was Day 1941 to John Brown’s yard in Glasgow to endorse Richard’s sentiments about the posted to No 26 (Army Co-operation) join the newly launched Hunt Class value of supporting the Roxburgh Society for Squadron that year. After duties in the UK Destroyer, HMS Airedale. the future of Stowe. with No 26 Squadron, including as a display A detailed diary he kept from Christmas Day These are 2 short stories of the many OSs pilot at the 1935 Hendon Air Display, he was 1941 to 28 February 1942 records the who lost their lives in WW2. For those current posted to India with No 28 (Army Co- endless days of working up the ship, the Stoics, please look left as you go into the Operation) Squadron, for flying duties on the incredibly awesome seas, with a Leading Chapel by the main door and consider the NW Frontier. He returned to the UK in Stoker being swept overboard and lost, board with the Roll of Honour; it is also mid-1939 and was streamed into Bomber major damage to the superstructure and instructive to linger and examine the Book of Command for operational duties with No 268 many periods of dull routine, interspersed Remembrance alongside the board. And for Squadron; I suspect his height of 6’4” meant with plenty of anecdotes of life between those OSs who go to the Chapel, pause, read he was too tall for fighters (he had been decks. Often discussed was the fate of sister and reflect. flying open-cockpit aircraft in India). Towards ships and the poor condition of the Lend the end of that year, he was grounded with a Lease USA WW1 Destroyers. He records Stowe should certainly be proud of those damaged lung for about 12 months, possibly meeting up with Roger Hammick (Grenville who fought in WW2 and in conflicts since because of oxygen failure in his aircraft, 40), an OS whose father, to the horror of then, and should honour those who gave before returning to operational duties with Richard’s father, was the Admiral C-in-C of their lives. No 158 Squadron as a Flight Commander in the Clyde Naval Base! Tragically, Roger was Air Commodore Andrew Seymour (Grafton 58) 58 July 1942. killed in action on 12 October 1945 in RAF (Ret’d) Wounded Warrior is a hub for creative projects designed to raise awareness and financial support for wounded soldiers and their families and the families of the fallen. Our intention is to organise a series of creative projects as a platform to achieve our mission. We believe that creative projects have a powerful combination of being able to deliver hard hitting stories to raise public awareness, whilst also generating financial support. The first project underway is an art exhibition of portraits of wounded soldiers at a major central London venue. The exhibition will be followed by an auction of the paintings. We will also make a documentary following some of the subjects through the process, using a multi disciplinary approach to get the most out of our resources and deliver the greatest benefit possible to the charities we support. Caroline de Peyrecave (Nugent 04) and Timothy Hart (Chandos 92) WOUNDED WARRIOR

WWW.WOUNDEDWARRIOR.CO.UK

59 REGULAR

8 Rev. Percy Warrington leading Sir Charles King- Harman to the left and Lord Gisborough to the right, along with HRH Prince George and JF Roxburgh, after Jeremy Jessel (Bruce 58) spotted a the opening of the Chapel on 11 July 1929. familiar egg on the programme aired on 6 January 2013 and has written in to shed some light on the extraordinary object, which is now in the Science The Revd Percy Laboratories at Stowe. “This is how I remember it though, no Warrington and Stowe doubt, others do so differently. It was The Revd Percy Warrington was “the greatest re-arrangements behind the scenes and a long time ago. Around 1954/55, my school-founder of the (twentieth) century”, Stowe, under Roxburgh, had earned an friend and I took to exploring the whose 14 foundations or acquisitions, unrivalled reputation. various monuments in the School including an Oxford and a theological college Stowe’s origin must be unique, perhaps the grounds after our thorough as well as Stowe, outnumbered those by only attempt to found a new leading public exploration of the roof spaces in the William of Wykeham, King Edward VI or school, if possible “among the top six”, main building. Nathaniel Woodard. In 1918, he became by a joint committee of the Association of vicar of Monkton Combe, Bath remaining In the loft space of the Doric Temple Preparatory Schools (IAPS) and the there for 43 years until his death. He was also we came across lots of cases of Headmasters’ Conference (HMC). Edward secretary of the newly combined protestant stuffed animals and this egg, which Montauban, head of the Hall School, and evangelical Martyrs’ Memorial and we took to be a dinosaur egg. We Hampstead, led the campaign for two years Church of England Trust. Perhaps inspired by took it as a trophy then, wondering and was the first to see Stowe as the ideal an earlier Monkton Combe vicar, who in 1868 what to do with it, used it as a rugby location. He failed, however, to raise the founded the public school at Monkton ball, passing it to each other as we finance: his £30,000 was outbid by Shaw’s Combe, he announced in 1920, aged 31, his ran down the South Front. By the £50,000 at Stowe’s 1921 sale, his intention to found a new group of schools. lake, a pass was missed and the egg subsequent negotiations were unsuccessful, He started with Wrekin College in 1921. landed in the lake where we left it. and his attempts to raise funds through Stowe followed in 1923 and Canford the next endowed places foundered. Shaw, therefore, A few days later, as I recall, an article week, with others later, like Westonbirt and put Stowe back on the market in 1922. appeared in The Times noting that Harrogate College. this unusual object had been found In contrast, within an hour of hearing this None of Warrington’s schools, however, was floating in the lake, how it got there news, Warrington wrote to express interest. A represented at his funeral in 1961. His vision being a mystery.” few weeks later he negotiated for the Wrekin and energy – he never took a holiday and Company to buy Stowe for £34,500, forming a Jeremy Jessel (Bruce 58) said he travelled 50,000 miles a year in the 1920s – became mired in micro- new company, Stowe School Ltd, with himself management, financial confusion and worse, as secretary. He treated the Martyrs’ Memorial compounded by an authoritarian tone which and Church of England Trust as means to his alienated many heads and governors. After ends. Lord Gisborough, a conservative dominating Stowe’s development for its first politician and Yorkshire landowner, was the decade, by 1933 he was a liability, buying figure head as chairman, supported by Sir church advowsons and supporting his Charles King-Harman, a former army officer theological college with school money, while and governor of Sierra Leone and Cyprus, the depression destroyed his weakest and others. Warrington was secretary and schools. To restructure the debts of over £1M organiser, acting unilaterally: “I did the work, at Stowe and the other schools, the Legal & got the schools going and formed the General Assurance Company replaced committees afterwards.” In 1923 Gisborough Warrington and from 1934 to 1980 Stowe, implied he had been “forced against his will” like the other Allied Schools, was run under a into becoming chair of governors at Wrekin, ‘Scheme of Management’ from L&G, Aldwych but admitted Warrington’s role in securing and then Banbury. Warrington’s subsequent Stowe: “There was someone with greater bitter accusations made him and his power and influence who was there to find associates an object of pity and even the money and induce people to lend their contempt to Roxburgh and others, who had aid to this new school.” Despite his serious to suffer his tirades while untangling his shortcomings, Warrington could still claim financial complexities and hoping to avoid that one of his greatest achievements the publicity of legal proceedings. was Stowe. 60 Meanwhile, few parents were aware of these Michael Bevington, Stowe Archivist OLD STOIC CORKSCREW In response to Nigel Milne’s article on Old Stoic bands, which appeared in the 2013 SOCIETY edition of The Corinthian, Barry Eaglesfield (Temple 42) has kindly sent in this 2013 was a wash out in many areas but in different shaped glasses was photograph of his line-up in the late 1930s! not for the OS Corkscrew Society. We had astonishing. Riedel were also very From left to right: two cracking events which kicked off with generous in providing a set of glasses an hilarious and informative tasting for everyone to take home. The feedback Mr Peter Clarke (Chandos 38), Mr Robert adventure into Spanish wine. The evening from the 50 odd guests was very positive Fairhurst (Chandos 40), Mr Timothy was hosted by wine expert, celebrity chef, and we will be engaging Riedel again this Aumonier (Temple 38), Mr Ronald Barnes food writer and TV regular Joe Wadsack, year to give us a similar masterclass in (Grafton 41) and Mr Barry Eaglesfield in a private room at Dean Street’s famous champagne and which stemware suits (Temple 42). hang out, Quo Vadis. The event was which fizz! oversubscribed and sadly we couldn’t accommodate everyone. Note to self. This year, with the support of John Fingleton (Chatham 66), we are planning The second event of the year was a an exciting OS Corkscrew trip to France. surprising masterclass by one of Riedel’s It’s time OS Les Rosbifs carried out a experts, Matt Knight. Riedel has been weekend raid on Les Bleus, hopefully to making wine glasses for 250 years and return with plenty of bounty. Full details they know a thing or two about ‘varietal of this year’s Corkscrew events will specific stemware’. If you’re a chap like be announced soon. To join the OS me, I can assure you this is nothing to do with ladies’ clothing! It was a fascinating Corkscrew mailing list to ensure you evening on ‘why shape matters’ and, are informed of forthcoming tastings, blow me down it really does, but then, the please email [email protected] difference in taste in the same wine made Timothy Hart (Chandos 92)

Investor Morse Investing in Confidence

STOWE LODGE (No. 9002 in the register of the United Grand Lodge of England)

Stowe Lodge is the Masonic Lodge for Old Stoics

We are a charitable and sociable London- Specialising in offshore investments and with over 30 years experience, Investor Morse based Lodge which meets three evenings a provides a personalised service tailored to year in London and once at Stowe. We very your individual needs. much welcome new and joining members FREE INITIAL CONSULTATION! and for more information, please contact Email: [email protected] the secretary: [email protected] www.investormorse.com

Gerald Morse (Cobham 60) 61 OS Sport Stowe Templars In sharp contrast to the fold and Ashley Pearson scoring the first the way in which the Templars Cricketer Cup century since Rob’s England cricket team last one against Uppingham in 2005. The ended 2013, we’ve second round against eventual finalists had an exciting and Old Cranleighans was less successful, but we successful year of have good cause for confidence with some of sport on which the the younger cricketers we now have. Old Stoic Society looks to launch us into 2 Charlie Clarke (Cobham 80) and The Cricket week was, as ever, both hugely 2014 with plenty of enthusiasm. Jamie Cameron (Bruce 85) – ‘seasoned’ Templars at Hurlingham. enjoyable and successful, with wins and One of the big success stories of the losses split equally and the banter as good year has been the rejuvenated football as ever. Huge thanks to Rupert Rowling After the wet miseries of 2012, the sun shone (Cobham 05), Ed Hoy (Cobham 06) and Tom team who have now qualified for the on us in 2013 and, as a result, the Templars Arthurian League, not to mention the had a thoroughly enjoyable year. We were Wilson (Cobham 08) for their enthusiasm and golfers winning the Cyril Gray pleased to add some excellent new recruits to good humour in running the week. Finally, tournament back in June. The reports the ranks, all our games were played and we the Templars season finished with a good detail some of these victories and many completed a good first round win in the win against Hurlingham. more, across a huge array of sports. Cricketer Cup. We look forward to another enjoyable year There really is something for everyone The pre-season supper at the Beaufort House in 2014 hoping that the weather favours us, whether it is clay pigeon shooting, on the King’s Road was really only intended to and we would like to encourage anybody cross-country, tennis, fives, cricket or be a biennial event, but it proved so popular who would like to be involved to get in squash. One thing that is still absent is that we held it again in 2013 with the same touch with any of the following, a ladies’ team. I would still love to success and good attendance. In 2013, some Adam Cossins (07545 590710), see one take on the School at netball, of the blowhards from the 80s came along to Rupert Rowling (07833 694336) or hockey, tennis or lacrosse or even a swell the numbers and they have threatened Oliver Croom-Johnson (07909 962076). friendly at a mutually convenient venue. to bring a side down to play the ‘yoof’ on the Nets are on Tuesdays from 8.00-9.00 at Lord’s Please do get in touch if you would like Saturday of the Cricket week, which will make and start on 18 March, for 6 weeks for those to get involved: there are funds for an historically nostalgic occasion. within striking distance of London and we available to support both nascent and The main event of the early season was the expect to hold our pre-season supper at the well-established teams, even for emphatic victory in the Cricketer Cup against Beaufort once again in April, date tba. one-off matches. the Old Cholmeleians, with Rob White back in Mr Oliver Croom-Johnson (Temple 69) The teams are always on the look out for new players and, if you’ve recently left either School or university, then the games, we do struggle to put out a side for sports field is a great way to meet others the Barber Cup, where the side has to be exclusively old boys. I would like to in the OS community. Equally, if you’ve encourage anyone who fancies some been meaning to get back into a sport or Fives gentle exercise, be they young or old, to get simply want to play more, then please in touch with us, as we can organise a contact the OS office or relevant captain, The Old Stoic Fives Club started the season with a game against the current Stoic boys game to suit all levels in a friendly whose contact details are on the OS on Speech Day. It was encouraging to see non-league environment. website, and we will do our best to some familiar faces amongst the boys as, As far as the League table is concerned, we make sure you get back on the pitch, too often in the past, boys would only play are currently sitting in the middle which, court or field of play. for a year and then drop the game. As a having only played 3 matches, is not too Lastly, I am really excited to announce a result, there was much improvement in the bad and I expect we shall climb to our rd tour of Roger Charlton’s yard at Stoics’ abilities and I think it is fair to say usual position of 3 by the end of the Beckhampton, near Marlborough in May that everyone thoroughly enjoyed the season. It is with sadness that I have to match. Under the guidance of Mr Skinner, which I hope lots of you will be able to report that we have lost our secretary we have now set up a match vs the School Jurgen Hütter (Lyttelton 90), who has attend. Further details to follow but we once a term, something I know our Club moved up north and therefore doesn’t get are particularly keen to gauge interest looks forward to, as it allows non-London to play as much as I would have liked him for a possible horse racing syndicate at based players to come in from across the to. We have, however, gained Charlie this event. If you are interested in the country to play. Our next school fixture will Robinson (Walpole 99) who, having got syndicate but cannot come to the yard be on 1 March 2014. married earlier this year, has moved back tour, please email [email protected] As a Club, we still find it hard to recruit Old down to London and is once again a firm for more details. Stoics back to the game. Although we are fixture in the squad. Hannah Durden (Nugent 01), Old Stoic Sports not short of numbers to play our league Mike Skjott (Lyttelton 90)

We would like to raise a team for the 2014 as well as current Stoics. We are hoping to competition, which takes place in the gather a team of players who are interested Squash autumn. In order to do so, we will be in forming an active Old Stoic Club to play against each other and take part in the In 2012, an Old Stoic team entered holding a friendly squash tournament Londonderry Cup annually. the annual squash tournament, the for Old Stoics at Stowe, on Speech Day, Londonderry Cup, for the first time in Saturday 24 May. Old Stoics who are If you would like to play on Speech Day, 15 years. Unfortunately, our team was interested in playing for the OS side are please email [email protected] for out in the first round and in 2013 we invited to come along for a morning of full details. 62 were unable to raise a full team. Squash against other Old Stoic players, Anna Semler (Nugent 05) leavers to get involved in OS Clay Shooting OS Clay Pigeon by creating more year-round involvement. A New Event Golfing Shooting We are in the early stages of planning a pre-Speech Day event for Old Stoics, Speech Day 2013 saw the Old Stoic teams suffer a defeat (albeit narrow) by the School, currently expected to be on 17 May 2014 at Society which retains the prestigious Galitzine Cup. the great new shooting ground run by Atkin The great thing about Stowe is that all sports Grant & Lang in Markyate, Hertfordshire. The Team Competitions are encouraged and supported and the plan is for this to be both a clay pigeon The year started with the Halford Hewitt in School teams practise competitively, on a competition and a social event, involving April, where our Team lost in the second weekly basis. Once we arrive in the world competitions and a BBQ. This promises to round at Royal St George’s to Eton, who outside Stowe, we lose that gift of time and, be a great day out and a chance to catch up went on to win the final. Charles Rotheroe of course, top class tuition! However, we with old friends, so we need to know if you (Walpole 85) then helped the team to have plans. are interested and to estimate numbers. qualify for the Grafton Morrish finals in the Please let Harry or me know well in advance autumn at Hunstanton. We drew the A New Secretary and Captain so we can commit to this. More information holders, Uppingham, who beat us in the will be posted on the website as and when Harry Hay (Grafton 03) has enthusiastically first round. The highlight of the season was we get it and the website will be regularly volunteered to take on the role of Secretary Stewart McNair’s (Grenville 71) team win in updated throughout the year. and Captain of Old Stoic Clay Pigeon the Cyril Gray Tournament at Worplesdon, in Shooting and he is in the process of taking We wish Harry success with his plans and June. There were 3 Scottish schools in the over from David Pickavance (Walpole 72). look forward to 2014 being an active and semi-finals and Stowe. Merchiston beat His contact details are [email protected] or via social year for Old Stoic Clay Pigeon Fettes and Stowe accounted for a strong the website at www.stowe.co.uk/old-stoics/ Shooting. side from Edinburgh Academy and then sports-clubs/clay-shooting David Pickavance (Walpole 72) beat Merchiston in the final. We will field a Harry is a cracking shot and is also from the putting team at Royal Wimbledon again in era when clay pigeon shooting at Stowe The Old Stoic Society would like to thank June 2014. really became popular, with top class David for his dedication and enthusiasm for Matches training and the School achieving significant the OS Clay Pigeon Shooting Team whilst The Society played the School team success in competitions. He is an active Old under his captaincy; we are delighted the pre-Micklem at Woking, at Stowe on Speech Stoic and aims to encourage the more recent club continues to flourish. Day and again in the autumn at Stoke Poges. There is some rising talent in the It was great seeing that sort of turn out.” School. We lost to R.C.P.G.C in March before the Hewitt. We also lost to Aldeburgh in the This report concentrates on the ‘away summer and Haileybury in November. fixture’ held in December and organised However, we beat Canford at Sunningdale by Thames Hare & Hounds on their and the Gregorians at New Zealand. Wimbledon Common 5 mile course. Only 6 toed the line but that was without Other Society Meetings several stalwarts, absent for good The spring meeting produced an excellent reasons. The young old boys team, scratch score of 73 at Woking by Ollie Howe Simon Gardner (Temple 95), Johnny Legge (Chandos 06). The warm weather in Suffolk (Bruce 98) and Al Rykens (Cobham 98), was the feature point of the well attended OS CROSS-COUNTRY th took us to 8 place out of 21 teams, by far summer meeting, whilst the weather stayed our best result for at least 10 years. There good for our autumn meeting at Brancaster are also competitions for older age groups in October. The course at Brancaster REPORT but we didn’t have enough runners for suffered damage in the recent tidal surge, complete teams. RACE v THE SCHOOL – 10 MARCH 2013 covering the course with lots of sea detritus THAMES HARE & HOUNDS INVITATION In the December race, mention must be and damaging the Clubhouse building. We RACE – 14 DECEMBER 2013 made of Neil Harvey’s (Grenville 70) hope that the clear-up will not be too achievements. He has competed in at expensive. We will play our autumn This has been a year of considerable least the last 9 consecutive events. In all meeting at Hunstanton in 2014. The Fixture achievement for the OS Cross-Country those years, he has had times between List for 2014 will be finalised shortly. Club. In March, we fielded no fewer than 41.27 and 44.15, a spread of less than Charles Dimpfl (Chatham 66) Hon. Secretary 15 runners to tackle the School’s 4.5 mile 2 minutes, with an average time of 42.50, course. Regrettably, this was against a which he beat this year with 42.15. very poor Stowe turnout of only 4, although they did provide the winner in To our captain, Simon Gardner (Temple Harrison Dockerty (Fifth Form, Chandos) 95), for the closing words: “We have a in a time of 23 mins 28 seconds. Jonny small yet strong core of regular runners OS Tennis Suttle followed him home (23.43) with spread throughout the age groups at both Johnny Legge (Bruce 98) (23.55) and of our events, usually supplemented by Matches against the sixth form took place on Oliver Selway (Grenville 94) (24.10) the occasional new face. We really need to Speech Day again in 2013, with the Old Stoics all under 25 minutes. get the numbers up somehow. With the winning overall. A number of the OS Tennis ever increasing popularity of marathon members play individually for the Public School Johnny Legge kindly contributes the running and triathlons, people need to following: “Running back at Stowe Old Boys’ Lawn Tennis Association, which was be aware of the massive strength training founded in 1929. www.psoblta.co.uk conjures up fantastic memories of when benefit of cross-country running.” I was there as a pupil, running and If there are any Old Stoic girls who would like to competing against other Stoics and other If you would like to join the OS challenge Sixth Form girls to a match on Speech Cross-Country Club please email schools. I think the most memorable Day, please email [email protected] [email protected] race for me was last year when we had a We have funding set aside to support new number of Old Stoics come back and run. Richard Weston (Chatham 65) OS teams, so if you would like to be part of a girls’ OS Tennis Club, please get in touch. 63 OS Football Team 2013 witnessed the re-emergence of the Old Stoics 2014 Gift Collection as a footballing force with the team gaining entry This page features some of the growing range of Stowe and to the prestigious Arthurian League. Old Stoic merchandise available in the Shop at Stowe – a blend of Under the new management of captain James traditional apparel and some new clothing and gift items that we Robson (Walpole 05), Hamish Eggins (Temple 09) have introduced in the last few months. We would be delighted to and Rupert Rowling (Cobham 05), the football team serve you in person, or to deliver an order to you by post. has built on the stellar work of former skipper Will Dudley (Walpole 00) and developed into a To order, please call 01280 818211 or email [email protected] fully-fledged regular league side. You can see the full gift collection on the OS website: www.stowe.co.uk/old-stoics The more youthful tilt of the side, with an average age in the low 20s and oldest player yet to have celebrated his 30th, has resulted in performances full of energy and intensity but equally replete with Stowe Monopoly some horrendous tactical errors and, in the early Featuring all of your stages at least, an inability to convert leads at favourite landmarks at half-times into wins come the final whistle. Stowe, this special version of Monopoly has Nonetheless, our performances, in the cup been produced competitions and friendly matches that the exclusively for Stowe. Arthurian League committee entered us into to £30.00 87834 test out our suitability and quality for full league membership, were sufficiently impressive for them to enter the side into Division Four, one above the bottom tier from where our fellow newcomers were forced to begin. Playing in the famous Stowe colours, the team resembled the great Brazilian sides of yore with Stowe Pyjamas their yellow shirts and blue socks and shorts. The Available in blue/pink and white performances so far have done justice to such candy stripes. Made from 100% illustrious heritage with the Old Stoics going into fine cotton with elasticated Stowe the Christmas break in second place and well in waistband and pockets. Silver-Plated the hunt for immediate promotion with more than £28.00 half the games played. Blue and White in mens fit Compact Mirror Star performers have been Kyle “Killer” Jordan Sizes S 8898, M 8899 or L 8900 A stylish gift with double mirror and engraved crest. (Grenville 07) who has shown an assassin’s touch Pink and White in ladies fit up front and is our top scorer. Close behind on the Sizes S 8895, M 8896 or L 8897 £30.00 84130 goal chart, despite having played fewer games, is the equally clinical Jamie Hirst (Walpole 08). Both strikers have been skilfully supported by Archie de Sales La Terriere (Bruce 08), whose dead-ball delivery combined with some stunning lobbed and volleyed goals has added a touch of real class to the team. Old Stoic House Ties The midfield generals of brothers James (Walpole Old Stoic Ties 05) and Ben Robson (Walpole 02) have been No man’s should be without one of these Two, recently refined, fine quality silk splendid Old Stoic House ties made from 100% complemented perfectly by the Duracell-esque ties. One with a black background, silk. running and harassing of Harry Benyon (Grafton known to some Old Stoics as the ‘Town’ colours and the other with a £30.00 (Left to right above): 08), ensuring that the opposition never has time brown background, known to some Walpole 12256 Cobham 49160 Grafton 12249 to settle into any rhythm. as the ‘Country’ colours. Temple 123950 Bruce 12188 Lyttelton 27601 On the few occasions any attacks have not been £30.00 Black 12164 Brown 12171 Chandos 12218 Grenville 12201 Chatham 12232 nipped in the bud higher up the pitch, Stowe’s defence has calmed the ship with Mark Thompson- Royds (Chatham 07), aka Moobs, outstanding between the posts and growing in confidence with every game, ably shielded by the centre-back pairings of either the other set of siblings, the classy duo of Dom (Chatham 07) and Charlie Farr (Chatham 05) or the more visceral combination of Luke Brewin (Temple 02) and Ed Edsell (Grafton 02), Old Stoic Cufflinks with flanked by the steady wing-backs of Charlie Hodson Oval Colours Stowe Umbrella (Chatham 05) and Rupert Rowling (Cobham 05). Old Stoic chain-linked double-sided Superior quality traditional 2013 has been a year full of promise and progress cufflinks. The Stowe crest in colour golfing umbrella, with plastic on one side and the Old Stoic mounted handle and spike. but it is in 2014 when the prizes will be handed out, colours on the other. including a fixture against a School side now taking £30.00 4208 football a lot more seriously. So, if you want to get £28.00 84543

involved, there will be plenty of opportunities to All cufflinks are boxed as seen above. showcase your talents. Those interested, please contact James Robson on 07971 504482 or Rupert Rowling on 07833 694336 Rowling. To order telephone Open to all Old Stoics. 01280 818211 or email Rupert Rowling (Cobham 05) [email protected] 64 2014 Events Ca le n d a r We have endeavoured to organise a wide range of events in 2014 that will appeal to Old Stoics of all ages. To make enquiries or to book any of the events below please call the Old Stoic Office on 01280 818349 or email [email protected] Full details of each event can be found at www.oldstoic.co.uk To see more photos visit the OS Event Gallery at www.oldstoic.co.uk

Sunday, 23 March 2014 Thursday, 1 May 2014 W/C 13 July

Cross-Country, Old Stoics v Stowe Old Stoics in Singapore Drinks Reception Templars’ Cricket Week Stowe Singapore Polo Club, Singapore Stowe

Saturday, 29 March 2014 Saturday, 17 May 2014 Wednesday, 10 September 2014

40th Anniversary Reunion Dinner Racehorse Trainer’s Yard Tour Business Networking: Medicine Leaving years 1973, 1974, 1975 Wiltshire Chandos House, 2 Queen Anne Street, Stowe W1G 9LQ £25 Friday, 23 May 2014 Thursday, 3 and Friday, 4 April 2014 Wednesday, 24 September 2014 Russian National Orchestra OS Corkscrew Trip to France 50th Anniversary Lunch Stowe £50 France £390 Leaving years 1963, 1964, 1965 Stowe Sunday, 27 April 2014 Saturday, 24 May 2014 Saturday, 4 October 2014 Dinner for OSs in the Pacific North West Speech Day and the Old Stoic Classic Old Stoic Day The Shaughnessy Restaurant, Vancouver, Car Meeting V6M 4H1 $60 Stowe Stowe

29 April – 3 May 2014 Tuesday, 3 June 2014 Thursday, 20 November 2014 Annual Dinner and AGM Old Stoic Art Exhibition Roxburgh Society Lunch Middle Temple, EC4Y 9AT £60 Clarendon Gallery, 46 Dover Street, W1S 4FF Stowe Friday, 12 December 2014 Tuesday, 29 April 2014 Thursday, 10 June 2014 Ice Skating for Leavers Old Stoics in Hong Kong Drinks Reception Old Stoic Summer Party Somerset House, Strand, WC2R 1LA £20 The Hong Kong Club, Hong Kong Kensington Roof Garden, W8 5SA £40

Thursday, 1 May 2014 Tuesday, 14 June 2014 To make enquiries or to book any of the events above please call the Old Stoic Office on OS Corkscrew Wine Tasting Career Fair 01280 818349 or Email [email protected] Please note, payment for events must be made Clarendon Gallery, 46 Dover Street, W1S 4FF Stowe in advance to secure your place.

1 Face painting at Old Stoic Day. 6 Nostalgic at Ninety at the Park Lane Hotel. Old Stoic Society Committee President: Sir Richard Branson (Cobham/Lyttelton 68) Vice President: THE MAGAZINE FOR OLD STOICS Dr Anthony Wallersteiner (Headmaster) Chairman: Simon Shneerson (Temple 72) Issue 4 Vice Chairman: Patrick Cooper (Chatham 86) Director: Anna Semler (Nugent 05)

Members: John Arkwright (Cobham 69) Peter Comber (Grenville 70) The Art of Giving Colin Dudgeon (Hon. Member) Gordon Darling (Grafton 39) is one Hannah Durden (Nugent 01) of Australia’s most significant living John Fingleton (Chatham 66) philanthropists and was instrumental Ivo Forde (Walpole 67) Jerome Starkey (Chandos 99) talks to in establishing the National Portrait Jonathon Hall (Bruce 79) our new President, Sir Richard Branson Gallery of Australia. Tim Hart (Chandos 92) (Cobham/Lyttelton 68). Katie Lamb (Lyttelton 06) Stowe: A Place Nigel Milne (Chandos 68) Ben Scholfield (Temple 99) of Influence Jules Walker (Lyttelton 82) James Furse-Roberts (Grafton 95) discovers the effect Stowe had on the work of two of our most acclaimed Old Stoic architects.

Old Stoic Society Stowe School Stowe Buckingham MK18 5EH United Kingdom Telephone: +44 (0) 1280 818349 Email: [email protected] www.oldstoic.co.uk

www.facebook.com/OldStoicSociety

ISSN 2052-5508 (Online) Design and production: MCC Design, mccdesign.com