BILL SMITH

1937-2019 (1948-1955)

By Marion Smith, his wife

Bill Smith was born in Truro, Cornwall to Ewart Smith a Unitarian, and Isobel Smith a Quaker. His maternal grandmother had come to Sidcot in 1891, as one of several nieces and nephews paid for by an old Scholar, Sir Richard Tangye. Bill came here in 1948 and loved every minute of it, even the cold bits.

Throughout his life he referred to the fun and friendship he’d had at school and the amazing freedom which he and all pupils enjoyed here in the 50’s, whether roaming the Seven Hills or going caving supervised only by prefects.

He remembered roller-skating in the Girls’ playroom, playing rugby and hockey (sometimes against the staff), Astronomy Club meetings, choir, drama productions, a series of interesting talks by outside speakers, and more snow in the Spring Term than seems to the case these days.

Most years seemed to start off cold and snowy with opportunities for snowball fights and sledging. Food also played a large part in his, and probably most pupils’ post-war recollections. The school grounds, converted into fruit and vegetable plots, provided produce for the school kitchens, while meat from wherever it could be obtained, was consumed by hungry pupils – including the whale meat.

The Sixth Formers apparently ate some Sunday meals with the staff, and rated the food accordingly.

Bill kept a diary all his life and his school boy observations give an idea of his interests and activities at that time.

Sun, 31st Jan. 1954 Went to Meeting. It was like an ice box. Went to Banwell ochre mine. 20 degrees of frost. V. cold all week.

11th Feb. 1955 Lecture by Spencer Chapman the explorer on Tibet and mountain climbing.

25th Feb. Snowed. Went tobogganing in the Coombe. Very cold day. Staff supper not too bad.

11th March Went to Callow Lime Works. Good fund. We were shown around by an old scholar.

20th March Did not go to meeting. Went up Shipham Level mine. Very dangerous. Staff supper very good for once.

27th March. Went to Meeting. Went to Blagdon Reservoir and saw a swallow. Staff supper awful.

Bill was a keen member of the Caving Club, and, accompanied by Malcolm Watts, George Tonkin and others would set off for Goatchurch or some other cave with rope ladders draped over the handlebars of their pushbikes and, supervised only by prefects, would climb down into the caves. Once underground they would eat sandwiches and shine their head-torches on stalactites and other limestone formations. On the way back to school they sometimes managed to get hold of a crafty bottle of cider to be consumed in the shelter of a hedge, before riding back, perhaps slightly wobbly, through the school gates.

With this early underground experience it’s not surprising that he went to the Camborne School of Mines to become a mining engineer and geologist. Geology was his first love and his interest had been encouraged by his aunt, a geologist, who took him fossicking on mind dumps and quarries from an early age.

After graduating from the School of Mines he spent a year with a china clay company at nearby St Austell, commuting daily from Truro on a battered old motorbike.

Then he learned that a geologist was required in distant Malaysia, so he applied for and got the job with the Pahang Consolidated Company – an underground tin mine. This was the beginning of seven happy years working in the mind itself and in the surrounding jungle. Part of the work consisted of spending days at a time in the jungle with his Chinese workmen, In order to map the area properly they went up rivers and s mall waterfalls taking tin samples and camping overnight in basic shelters which they constructed in an hour or so. These shelters consisted of a raised bamboo platform with perhaps a palm leaf rood in the rainy season. The campfire was on the ground and was used to cook the evening meal of rice, pork and vegetables, and was also useful at night for keeping away inquisitive animals, and creating smoke to discourage the mosquitoes. The jungle also contained monkeys, tortoises, spiders and snakes, but no-one seemed very worried about the latter. Snakes and spiders didn’t want to have anything to do with humans. Snakes in particular tended to slide away at the approach of human feet.

In 1967 he came back for a six month leave, having just completed a three year tour of duty. He met Marion in the Royal Cornwall Geological Museum, Penzance and impressed her with his gold panning skills by taking her on a first date to find gold in the Truro river. (That’s the way to win a girl’s heart – a cold river, wellington boots and a gold pan!) They married and went to Malaysia where Piran was born in 1971. He was technical a Malay until the appropriate documents were obtained from the British Embassy in Kuala Lumpur. Otherwise he would have been called up at the age of 18 for conscription in the Malay army which he probably would not have liked.

Their daughter Morwenna was born in 1974 by which time Bill thought it was time to return to Cornwall. He’d had malaria quite badly and was also suffering from back problems caused partly by bumping around on potholed tracks in a Landrover with primitive springs.

He worked at Geevor, one of the remaining working tin mines in Cornwall, from 1976, both as geologist and subsequently as a guide after the mine closed.

Afterwards he set up his own consultancy and spent the 80’s employed by various London companies chiefly prospecting for gold in the States and in South America “where the local jungles and bandits were more challenging than the Malaysian ones he had known previously”.

He was pleased to retire finally to Cornwall to grown camellias and take an active part in the local geological society.

The influence and memories of Sidcot remained with him all his life and were renewed every Easter when he and Marion came to Easter Reunion as often as possible for about 40 years. He died suddenly of heart failure on 4th February 2019.