Village People
These pages bring together a wealth of information about people living or who have lived in King's Sutton. It is intended to increase this page as and when residents bring forward stories about their own families, relatives and friends.
1. Olga Kevelos
2. Arthur Halestrap
3. Nicholas John Nice
4. Cyril Wheatcroft
5. Gerald Radbourne
1. Olga Kevelos (Nov 1923 - Oct 2009)
( By kind permission of David Bridson )
Olga Valerie Kevelos was born on 6th November 1923, the first child of a wealthy Greek financier and the English widow of an Indian Army doctor who had died of wounds sustained in the 1st World War. Olga’s birth was followed two years later by the arrival of one brother, Victor, then in 1932 by another, Raymond. Growing up in the family home in Edgbaston, Birmingham, Olga attended the King Edward VI High School for Girls, an academic hot-house where she was more than capable to holding her own intellectually. After going on to study metallurgy, and with the country at war, Olga worked for a time in the laboratories of William Mills, manufacturer of the famous Mills Bomb.
Like many of her generation, Olga found liberation in the 2nd World War. Recalling her feelings many years later, Olga said: “...I give thanks for the war, otherwise I would never have escaped from home. Although I loved it, I wanted to live in the outside world.” Always passionate about astronomy, Olga was lured to London by the offer of a job at the Royal Observatory at Greenwich. Unfortunately, enemy bombing forced the closure of the Observatory soon afterwards and Olga was evacuated along with other members of staff to the Admiralty at Bath. Her arrival at the Admiralty dismayed at least one of its senior managers, Donald Sadler, who later recalled in his memoirs that “Olga Kevelos... could not do arithmetic and terrified people by stalking around with a large knife in her belt...” He did concede, however, that “she seemed an interesting woman...” Olga wasn’t especially pleased to be working with Mr Sadler either. There was no star-gazing to be done, just endless piles of paperwork.
One day in 1943, though, fate intervened to change her life dramatically. Her eye was caught by an advertisement placed in the Times by the Department for War Transport inviting women to train for work on the canals. Olga spent the next two years with the all-female volunteer crews who manned barges carrying vital war materials along the Grand Union Canal between London and the Midlands. Olga and her fellow crew members were nicknamed the “Idle Women” after the initials IW on their badges. Officially, IW stood for Inland Waterways, but the traditional boat people alongside whom they worked called them idle women and the name was to stick. Interviewed by a journalist from the Independent newspaper almost 50 years on, Olga made it clear that life had been far from idle for these extraordinary women: “[It was] hard work with no respite at all... We worked an 18- to 20-hour day, and nobody ever stopped.” Nor did the Idle Women receive the extra rations enjoyed by the more celebrated Land Girls. “We subsisted on cocoa with condensed milk, national loaf and peanut butter,” Olga remembered. “I was always hungry, all the time.” (See Article from the Telegraph) and and item from (The Waterways Trust)
After her momentous war, Olga was awarded a government grant to study French medieval history at the Cité University in Paris. She recalled having a “smashing time” during this period, bicycling all over Paris and travelling extensively in other parts of Europe as well. “I was one of the first backpackers,” she later quipped to a magazine journalist. Returning to Birmingham, Olga started her own travel agency on the back of her new-found knowledge of Europe. She also helped her father and other members of the family run the Cherry Orchard restaurant in the centre of town.
From there on, Olga’s life might well have returned to some semblance of normality if it hadn’t been for another twist of fate. A motorcycle racing boyfriend encouraged her to try her hand at the sport herself. Despite having received only a few basic lessons in riding, Olga soon impressed everyone with her natural aptitude and was immediately offered a bike and sponsorship by the James Motorcycle Company. The following year, she rode down to San Remo in Italy to take part in the International Six Day Trial. Once there, an accident left her with a broken wrist and a broken ankle. Undaunted, she rode back home with her wrist and ankle still in plaster.
Olga went on in 1949 to win the first of her two Gold medals, riding a 500cc Norton in the International Six Day Trials in Wales. She was to ride with varying degrees of success in every Scottish Six Day Trial until she finally retired from the sport in 1970 and in every International Six Day Trial until 1966. During that time, she won the backing of virtually every major British motorcycle manufacturer, and the Italian and Czech manufacturers Parilla and Jawa/CZ respectively. It was the imposition by the Czechs of a strict fitness regime lasting some six weeks, to which Olga later attributed her second gold medal in 1953. Her close links with Czechoslovakia led Olga 40-odd years later to be invited to a Foreign Office reception held to celebrate the Czech Republic’s accession to the European Union. The then Prime Minister, Tony Blair, apparently spent some time discussing with Olga her views on Ghengis Khan. “He probably wanted a few tips on how to invade other people’s countries successfully,” she commented afterwards.
During her days as a professional motorcycle racer, Olga turned her hand also to competition on four wheels. She regularly drove Kieft Formula III cars at Brands Hatch and Thruxton, and went on to race cars designed by her great friend, the legendary Irish engineer Rex McCandless.
(see also www.britishpathe.com/record.php?id=48140 )
Her career as Britain’s leading lady motorcyclist was destined to turn Olga into something of a celebrity and like all such people, she attracted a great deal of press attention. During one of the Scottish six day trials, for example, Olga and one of the race officials, one Allan Jefferies, were reported to have found themselves banged up by the police in Fort William for general rowdiness around the town. They were apparently only released after dire threats that the six days event would be moved to a different part of Scotland if they weren’t let go. Then there was the time Olga drove her Italian Parilla motorcycle over a cliff during the International Six Day Trial at Lake Como in northern Italy. She lost two teeth as a result and also wrecked her bike. The headline in leading Italian daily newspaper, La Stampa, the following morning read: “Olga has lost her smile.”
In 1964, Olga risked the wrath of the East German authorities by handing out to local children some fruit they had expensively imported for her fellow competitors. Unbeknown to Olga, such luxuries were verboten as far as the local population were concerned and, in any case, these children didn’t have any idea how to unpeel a banana. Olga raced in several other countries behind the old Iron Curtain – including Poland, Czechoslovakia and Russia – and she retained a great deal of sympathy for the collective sufferings of their people for the rest of her life.
Olga eventually gave up racing and settled down to help her younger brother Ray run his pub, the Three Tuns in Kings Sutton. The pair were to stay at the Tuns for some 26 years. During that time they ran an orderly, if somewhat unconventional, house. It was not uncommon, for example, to hear thirsty customers shouting and banging on the pub’s door at seven thirty in the evening, well after official opening time, trying to get a drink. In those days, before the arrival of late opening shops, the Tuns would also be invaded by children looking to buy chocolate from the pub’s “off licence”, a hatch to one side of the bar. Unsurprisingly, a lot of those same children later learnt how to hold their beer under Ray’s and Olga’s tutelage.
In 1978, Olga famously took part in one of the BBC’s most popular TV programmes, Mastermind, specialising in Ghengis Khan. She won her first round and progressed to the next, narrowly failing to go further. For the rest of her life, Olga continued to participate in assorted quizzes, achieving considerable success with her various teams, notably winning the Oxford Mail Trophy and the Northamptonshire Inter-Village quiz (twice). After she and Ray had to let the Tuns go, Olga became involved in local politics, working tirelessly on the Parish Council and helping to get the Kings Sutton Times out every month. “When you’ve run a village pub,” she said, “you know better than anybody what issues the community is most concerned about.”
Olga Kevelos could light up a room with the gleam in her eye, and leave people in convulsions of laughter with her mischievous sense of humour. She was a woman of firm convictions but never allowed seriousness to interfere with her sense of fun. She was open about what was by any standards a remarkable life but never boastful. It’s no exaggeration to describe her as a legend in her own lifetime and her passing leaves Kings Sutton a sadder and poorer place.
2. Arthur Halestrap (Sept 1898 - Apr 2004)
(Article re-printed from BBC History pages)
Arthur Halestrap: Walked the deck of the Titanic and survived Spanish flu.
Before the war
I remember the ceremonies connected with Queen Victoria’s death … and I also remember very well the celebrations at the coronation of King Edward VII. And in Southampton, I remember the horse trams, and then there were electric trams.
We became very patriotic and at school we were taught a song, ‘Flag of Britain proudly waving over many distant seas, flag of Britain boldly braving distant fog and constant breeze, now we salute it and we pray God to bless our land today.’ That was the sort of song we were taught to sing at school.
Aboard the Titanic
I did go on the Titanic before she sailed. My next door neighbour was one of the engineers who developed the engines of the Titanic and on the first voyage … he was given a sort of honorary position as third engineer. Of course, he was drowned. When the Titanic disaster became known in Southampton, it was a terrible thing for the town because so many of the crew had their homes in Southampton. My mother knew many of the stewardesses. We were all mourning together at the same time. It was a terrible blow.
Volunteering
In 1914, I was 16 years of age and secretary of a bible class. The first lecture I gave after the outbreak of war, I criticised the Church of England for not protesting that two Christian nations were fighting one another. That is my first recollection of the war. Although I had volunteered at the age of 16 for the army but my parents had refused me permission to go.
Casualty lists
At the beginning of the war, the casualty lists were published in the daily newspapers, which … after a very short time was found to be very, very bad for morale. This was because ever so many volunteer regiments belonging to one particular village or town were very, very badly shelled and so many of them were killed. A whole town perhaps would have half its members killed in the war. Eventually, they said, ‘We will not publish the casualty list and when we send reinforcements to regiments, it will be people from all over the country.’
Long after the war, we were all together again and my sisters had married. The greatest boyfriend of one of my sisters who we couldn’t trace at all and we thought had been killed, came to see my father to ask if they could marry. In truth, he had been made a prisoner-of-war, and when he was released he came back to us and wanted to marry her. Of course, my father told him that she was already married and that it would be best not to contact her. And he agreed not to contact her, which was very fine of him I think. I think he went to Australia eventually.
Under fire
We’d been marching in the dark, of course. We had to because that terrain was very open and we had to do everything in the dark, at night, and we were marching up there and suddenly a Verey light [a type of flare] exploded. It has a very, very eerie sort of light. Then another Verey light exploded and then another, and then the shells started dropping and of course the horses started panicking. Horses were screaming all the time. Strangely enough, I was interested but not frightened because this was my first experience of shellfire. There was corpses all over the place. I remember that very, very clearly. That was my first experience of shell fire.
Shell shock
The discipline was so strict. I had to do what I was told. That is why I believe that discipline was the reason why we were so successful, because everyone felt like that. Not everybody though. One signals chap had shell shock and he was useless on the floor of the trench. We had the order to go over the top and the corporal looked at me and said, ‘Well, we can’t do much about him so we’d better get on with the job.’
We had to erect our wireless station and we did that despite the barrage that was coming over. Then the barrage lifted, but shells were still coming over. Afterwards, we went to get the shell shocked comrade chap and we helped him through and he recovered. He didn’t remember a thing about it, and we never mentioned it to him and the corporal didn’t mention it to anyone. I much admired that corporal because he could have reported him and he didn’t.
It was possible for those people to be shot by an officer for cowardice because they’d dropped their rifles and were what was called ‘cowards’. That was very debatable. I didn’t agree with it anyway.
Infected with lice
I asked my corporal after I went up to the trenches about how do I get rid of these lice? He said I should get a lighted candle and run the candle up the seams. Of course, the seams came apart because the candle burned the stitches. So I wrote home to mother and said, ‘I’ve got these body lice, what can I do?’ She wrote back and said, ‘You silly boy, you’ve got some Lifebuoy soap, use that. I’ll send you some more, rub the Lifebuoy soap up the seams of your clothing.’ Lifebuoy soap in those days was very strong disinfectant soap and I got rid of the lice that way.
Working in signals
We [the signallers] weren’t in the trenches all that time but we did go up to the trenches in support of operations and if the telegraph lines were down. When the lines were in use, we weren’t required. We had to find a place to erect our aerials and our station. We did it in holes in the ground, because the infantry said that we drew the enemy gunfire. So we had to find a place where we could hide ourselves and our equipment [masts]. When the masts were seen, of course, it would draw the shell fire, so we had to get out of the way of the infantry and away from the trench. We had to go onto the open ground where we could be spotted by the enemy planes when they came over.
Life in the trenches
I was walking in the trench which was so narrow. There was some barrage coming over so I daren’t show my head above. I had to walk on dead bodies. All I could say was to the chap who was dead was, ‘Sorry chum,’ and I didn’t think anything about it. He was dead and happier than I was. So I used to walk on the dead men and just apologise to them, and I felt like that.
Fear
The only fear I’ve ever experienced is when I was in the Second World War. I remember on one occasion I was in London for a week. I was in bed at night and I listened to the planes coming over and the bombs dropping all around me. In the morning at 5am, I came across a young girl and I said,‘Where you are going at this time of day?’ All around, there was water pipes, hoses, broken bricks and glass and all sorts of things. She said, ‘Oh I’ve been driving an ambulance all night,’ and she was quite calm. I’d been in bed all night absolutely shivering with fright at all these bombs coming down.
A close shave
There was a brewery in which we’d found a suitable spot to set up a radio station, just under the window. The floor was about five feet below the window, but we had to barricade those windows, so we spent a long time filling sand bags and building a huge barrier outside the window. It’s just as well we did. I know that we were sitting in the radio station, when all of a sudden there was a huge burst of sand bags through the window and we were buried underneath a mountain of sand bags and earth. The shell had a direct hit on our window.
A conscientious objector
On my first leave, [a friend had] been arrested as a conchie [conscientious objector] and sentenced to work on the land. He was working on the south coast somewhere near Brighton and I went to stay with him for a few days, and I found their conditions were worse than we were used to in the army. They were housed in just a wooden building with tiers of bunks and hardly any bedding. I stayed with him all the time and lived with him. They were just ordinary people, nice people. I think they were genuine. I know my friend was very genuine.
He had his views and I had mine… I didn’t believe in interfering with anyone else’s views, because I sympathised with them. I didn’t believe in war. War is a terrible thing. Even now, when I go out to speak, often the first thing I might say, is tell people that I don’t believe in war.
In the barrage
As the infantry advanced, the German gunners would alter their range to prevent supplies getting up to the front. Since we were always behind the infantry, we would sometimes be some way behind the infantry - until we caught up with them again - and then we would find ourselves in the barrage.
The barrage was something indescribable. It was all the small arms that you could think of, and the shells were also coming over. The shells were not only dropping in our area, but they were for different districts. The larger guns were sending shells to prevent supplies getting in.
Going ‘over the top’
I remember the infantry sergeant coming round with rum and giving it to each man before the over the top order was given. But he wouldn’t give the three of us any rum because we didn’t belong to him for rations. And so we had to go without our rum. But that was not long before the order to go over the top was given.
The Armistice
I took the signal for the Armistice, yes. And, from that moment the silence was - I can only describe it as terrible. It was. We seemed to have everything, well, as far as I was concerned - everything dropped away from me. I thought, ‘Now what will I do now, there’s no objective, there’s nothing in front of us. I’ve just got to wait.’ There was an absolute silence. It was indescribable really.
When you have, everything you’d been working for, for years, several years, suddenly disappear. No future. What is my future? What am I going to do next? Just wait for orders. And I had to wait for orders. I felt a sort of helplessness. What future? What do we do next? What do we do next? We had to wait to see what we’re going to do next.
Spanish flu
I became ill. And my corporal was very worried and he called the infantry corporal and the corporal called the sergeant. And he was worried and the sergeant called a sergeant major. And the sergeant major called the major and the major said, ‘Oh, I don’t know where the nearest medical unit is and if I did, it wouldn’t be in time. Fill him up with rum and let him take his chance. He’s got Spanish flu.’
The flu was killing millions in the world at that time. So I remember being hoisted up on my seat. I’m sitting on the floor on a blanket, that was all. And I remember taking rum and that’s all I remember. And the next thing I remember was when I said to my corporal, ‘Could I have a cup of tea?’ and he said, ’My God, we thought you were dead. You’ve been completely away from us for three whole days.’ Just like that. And from that moment I was better. I can’t bear the smell of rum now and I wonder whether that has kept me alive for so long now.
Serving in World War Two
I was in SOE [Special Operations Executive] then. I was chief signalmaster. I trained people of every nationality in Europe and across the world. And I made plans for them, signal plans and that sort of thing. But I haven’t mentioned World War Two yet. That’s a different matter. I should keep quiet about that. I understand that I’ve still got to keep quiet despite the fifty-year rule.
See also... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Halestrap
3. Nicholas John Nice (Aug 1946 - Dec 2007 )
( extracted from the Obituary section of the Independent Dec 2007 by Richard D North )
Nicholas John Nice, bomb disposal officer: born Chelmsford, Essex 7 August 1946; MBE 1989; married 1968 Ann Marie Pomfret (one son, one daughter); died Banbury, Oxfordshire 25 December 2007.
Nick Nice was one of the most highly regarded bomb disposal experts of his generation. To see him in a room was to feel completely safe. He was a big man and, at first sight, it did not seem likely that his hands were made for delicate or refined work. According to Nice himself, however, the manual dexterity required for dismantling booby-trapped bombs is similar to that needed to change an electrical plug; he did not dwell on the hazards and responsibilities of his job.
Nick Nice was born in Chelmsford in 1946; his mother was a nurse and his father, who died when Nick was 15, was a musician. He trained at first as a butcher, but, having abandoned work in an uncle's butchery chain, he became an army caterer and saw ordinary street patrol duty in Northern Ireland, beginning in 1972. Retrained in explosive ordnance disposal (EOD) by the Royal Army Ordnance Corps, he was back in Northern Ireland during the Seventies and early Eighties, dealing with the terror of IRA bombs. Insofar as you could get Nick to talk about these things, he would volunteer that the IRA were extremely ingenious. A soldier for most of his career, towards the end of his 22 years in the army he became Warrant Officer, Class 1 and was known as "Mr Nice", which he could be, when he felt like it.
During the 1980s, Nice trained EOD specialists in the UK, Oman and Zimbabwe and he especially relished his overseas tours of duty. In Bulawayo in 1982-83, he became fond of Joshua Nkomo, the ZAPU leader, during the period when the African politician was losing his dangerous battle with Mugabe and his ruling party. Such a friendship was typical of Nice's indifference to diplomatic niceties, or even his own career. He wouldn't often admit it, but he loved the Army and even its pomp. His bosses kept reporting that he was officer material, but one way or the other, the commission never happened. Probably he simply wasn't clubbable in the right way. He had an insatiable taste for social life, but it was catholic to the point of carelessness. More quietly, at home in Banbury (near a famous ordnance depot) or in much more exotic places, he was very happy propping up a bar, Marlboro in hand. In the end, after an unfulfilling and short five years' retirement, drink more or less did for him.
No-one is immune to the wear and tear of the kind of life he lived. Still, for much of his career, he did seem indomitable, and was proud of it. He was also capable of tact and was occasionally singled out for sensitive assignments with special forces of one kind and another.
Just after the first Gulf War, Nice's role was to liaise with the much larger US EOD teams based in a series of warehouses on the edge of a Kuwait City rendered temporarily Stone Age. He did himself rather well, occupying a spacious if improvised office-cum-bed-sitter in which it was usually possible to get highly prized and wholly illicit whiskey. His colonel talked of him with some awe. His American colleagues were clearly aware that they were dealing with the mother of all Brits. He could get pretty well anything one wanted, a proposition which was tested when a journalist required a helicopter to ferry him and a photographer around the burning oilfields. Three phone calls, the last of which was to a mate on a Royal Navy ship, and a Sea King was soon pounding its way through the near-impenetrable smoke, on temporary taxi service.
Though he could be snooty about officers, the US special forces, and even the SAS, Nice liked nearly everyone, and he and his infinitely forbearing wife Ann Marie had a wide and closely supportive circle in Oxfordshire, including a farrier, a horticulturalist, farmers, an expat Saudi and a shotgun dealer. For a while, he had an antiques stall in Banbury, but he didn't quite pull it off commercially. For some time, he was in love with a horse and the restored cart it pulled through the local lanes. He was a born countryman.
But it is hard to deny that he lived for his dangerous work. In 1989, he was appointed MBE for (his family guessed) his work in disposing of a dangerous cache of First World War mustard gas found at Bramley, the old Army School of Ammunition near Basingstoke. It was part of his enquiring nature to be interested in the history of his craft, and he much admired the 1982 book on chemical and germ warfare A Higher Form of Killing, by Robert Harris and Jeremy Paxman. Towards the end of his service, it was clear to him that an EOD specialist needed to understand every kind of "dirty" bomb, whether chemical, biological or nuclear.
In 1992, he went to work for the Metropolitan Police's anti-terrorist squad, just by the Ministry of Defence in Whitehall. In 1994, he was admired for his handling of several IRA incendiary devices left in Oxford Street. Off-duty, the Red Lion, opposite the Houses of Parliament, became a second home. At work, he shared a room with another officer, a pair of desks and the disreputable sofa on which they snatched rest. There was a display comprising an AK47, hand grenade and assorted shrapnel to remind him of soldiering.
Up the road, in Soho, there were several restaurants where his money didn't seem to be much use, at least after he was pictured in the papers with the Prince of Wales following the IRA's February 1996 Canary Wharf bomb outrage. He had arrived at that "shout" with his usual driver in their usual Range Rover, both the latter being damaged in the explosion of a 1,000lb bomb 80 metres from their vantage point. Nice said he nearly finished them all off when he thought to light up a steadying cigarette, before someone decided that the rushing noise nearby might be a burst gas main. There were some fierce exchanges with uniform branch during which Mr Nice felt he had to turn nasty on the need for immediate evacuation. A month or two later, that April, he had another shaker when called to the biggest IRA Semtex device ever deployed on the mainland. It had been planted at Hammersmith Bridge: there were civilians around, which complicated things. Nice was in time to hear the detonator pop, and to be heartily glad that the rest of the bomb malfunctioned.
It wasn't obvious, but Nick Nice was a very committed as well as a passionate and intelligent man. He was well-known for mentoring the younger people around him. He trained the Met police drivers who were paired up with the EOD specialists so that they could, for instance, work the X-ray and robot equipment in the back of the car. It meant the teams were much more like partnerships, and were more effective.
In the wake of the Kosovo war, in July 1999 Nice joined the teams investigating mass graves and it is a fair guess that those weeks finally shredded what little remained of his nerves. He and his colleagues had miserably sordid work to do, and Nice defused at least a couple of grenades used to booby-trap burial grounds. Typically, the locals made a big impression on him.
He suffered some sort of breakdown and retired in 2002. No-one really knows what this extraordinary person felt. He said that talking about it would probably make the work impossible. In later years, when talking might have helped, it was too late to open up, and a great teacher and inspiration was lost to his profession. Instead of returning to Hertford he joined the Colonial Service and was posted to the Treasury Department in Tanganyika, (now known as Tanzania), travelling out in an elderly ship via North Africa and Kenya. He remembers Tanganyika (formerly a German colony) as a surprisingly large country whose chief industries were the production of tea and coffee and the mining of diamonds. Cyril was based in the capitol, Dar-es-Salaam, (which translated means “Haven of Peace”) and learned Swahili, also the language of Kenya, Uganda and Zanzibar. During the war Mombasa was an important naval base. Both East and West Africa were very involved throughout the wear in the movement of troops and supplies to the British Army in Africa. Cyril had met and married his wife, known to friends affectionately as ‘Georgie’ before going out to East Africa. Cyril went ahead and his wife and baby Susan followed. Their two boys, Paul and Mark were born in Tanganyika. The family lived in Dar-es-Salaam for 19 years. Susan, Paul and Mark all went to school in the highlands of East Africa, the boys returning to the U.K. to finish their education at Ratcliffe College in Leicester.
Cyril and Georgie came to live in King’s Sutton in 1964. A keen dancer and bridge player, Cyril made many friends locally. He was a prime mover in the creation of St.James’s Lake, Brackley and was involved in a number of charities. We asked Brackley Councillor Caryl Billingham, a long-time colleague of Cyril’s, for a resume of Cyril’s activities on the local government scene and she has very kindly allowed us to quote largely from the vote of thanks which she gave on his retirement as Chairman of South Northants Council in 2007. Cyril was always one of the “maybe I’m right, maybe you’re wrong” brigade. Tolerance was not really the byline for Wheatcroft. But beneath the tough exterior lurks a heart of gold and a wonderful personality, and he has brought those qualities to the role of Chairman of this Council for the past year. He can be acerbic and he doesn’t suffer fo ols gladly, but he has fulfilled his duties with warmth, with aplomb and with a very positive spirit. Cyril has always striven to ‘cut the Gordian knot’, to curtail discussion when it descended to waffle and this year has even managed to control the Council with good humour and without losing his temper – much! We shall miss the Wheatcroftisms – who else will talk of being ‘cast aside like the proverbial half-sucked orange’? Who else will ‘talk of rice pudding’ when they wish to change the subject – subtly or unsubtly? Who else would say to his employers ‘you don’t know how lucky you are to have me’ – and mean it? A hard-working, devoted, public-spirited gentleman. A true friend, loyal and caring. A Peter Pan of local government. They really did throw away the mould after Cyril was created. I feel that we shall not see the like of Cyril Wheatcroft in local government – but in all his duties and in particular in his role as Chairman of South Northants District Council during the past year, he has shown all the enthusiasm and freshness that one would expect from someone half his age.” And that just about sums it up. A truly genuine Character. Not many of those about these days. Cyril, warmest congratulations from all of us in King’s Sutton on reaching your “four score years and ten”. Thank you for all that you have done for so many individuals and for the village as a whole, and many, many Happy Returns. 5. Gerald Radbourne (1924 - Apr 2011) Gerald Radbourne, a well-known village personality, died on 28th April 2011 aged 87. Gerald was born in Richmond Street, attended King’s Sutton School and lived in the village all his life. A hard worker, he began by helping his father on the allotment at a very early age. His first job at the age of 12 was collecting papers off the train at 6 a.m., sorting them and then delivering them round the village. He also worked two nights a week from 4pm to 9 pm in the fish and chip shop. On Tuesday afternoons after school he delivered fruit and vegetables to Walton Grounds and the local farms. Saturday was spent doing the butcher’s meat round.
Gerald left school at 14, starting work immediately at Adderbury House His job was to prepare the furnace in the morning, fill all the wood baskets, water the greenhouse plants and collect and post the letters. In summer he maintained the tennis and squash courts and in winter he potted the plants in the greenhouse and cut back the peach trees and grape vines. He also showed visitors round the grounds. This job ended when Adderbury House was requisitioned by the War Office at the beginning of World War II. Gerald then went to work at the King’s Sutton Co-op which was then on the corner of Astrop Road and Mill Lane. To begin with he delivered bread and milk on a bicycle with a basket at its front. Later he worked behind the counter, not easy in those days as it was wartime. Everything was rationed and had to be weighed. There was no such thing as packaged food. At 17 Gerald acted as model for an artist who had a studio at The Old School Housein Astrop Road. In 1944 dances were held there. These were very popular with the RAF boys stationed at Hinton-in-the-Hedges. It was while acting as doorman for the dances that Gerald met his wife Doreen. Gerald continued to work for the Co-op at various branches and was Manager of Souldern until 1954. He and Doreen had five children, four girls and a boy. Gerald decided he wanted to branch out on his own and, with the help of his wife, took over the fish and chip shop in Richmond Street. They also sold fresh fish, fruit and vegetables. Gerald bought a travelling shop and made deliveries to the far end of the village, the outlying farms and Charlton twice a week. Every Wednesday lunchtime he delivered 50 bags of fish and chips to Hinton R.A.F. Camp! In 1960 he decided to have his own shop built and called it The Richmond Stores. (Everyone else called it “Radbournes”). It was where the Co-op is now. Gerald and Doreen worked hard, employed staff from the village and managed to find time to spend with their family as well. In 1984 at the age of 60 Gerald decided to retire but kept the Newspaper business which he ran from home with his son Clive until he finally retired at 82! Everyone in the village knew Clive, who not only delivered the newspapers but had a terrific line in repartee so that one actually found oneself enjoying the day Clive came to collect. Now there’s a first! Gerald loved telling his life story and his is the stuff that village history is made of.
See also...Banbury Guardian Article
4. Cyril Wheatcroft (June 1921 - to Date)
(Copied from a Tribute in the 2011 June issue of the King's Sutton Times)
We all recognise Cyril, tall, upright, followed at a respectful distance by Otto, his tiny dachshund, as he walks round the village, taking note of what’s what or isn’t as the case may be! Always happy to listen to what people may have to say and above all to have a friendly chat. He will be 90 on 25th June.
Cyril was born in 1921 in Newcastle-on-Tyne but was brought up in Hertford. His father, who had served in World War I and been twice a prisoner-of-war, was a civil servant in the Department of Education there. Cyril won a full scholarship to the Richard Hale Grammar School where he became a member of the O.T.C. When World War II broke out, Cyril was a trainee accountant in London. He joined the Light Infantry as a trainee officer but was unfit to serve after injuring his knee badly while playing rugby.
“Cyril Wheatcroft has lived a lifetime of public service, both paid and unpaid – having retired from the Colonial Service he became Financial Officer for Brackley Town Council, then its Deputy Town Clerk and then its Town Clerk, and then he retired – again. Additionally, he has served on this Council, on King’s Sutton Parish Council, on Northamptonshire County Council, he has been a School Govenor (and still is of King’s Sutton School) and is a Trustee of the Brackley United Feoffee Charity, having served for many years as its Treasurer.
(Copied from the Tribute in the June 2011 issue of the King's Sutton Times)