Marsden, Alan

OT 34 - West

Date of Death: 03/06/2021

Alan and I joined the school on its very first day. He was OT 34 and I OT 35. Our school careers, while rather different, ran parallel for five years. Alan was always the leading sportsman, playing rugby, soccer and cricket in the first teams and eventually becoming captain of all three. It was only under his captaincy and with his active encouragement that I, when a very senior boy, achieved membership of those teams. In my last year I played a few games for the 1st XV and even scored a try (just one!) and kept goal for the soccer XI, of which Alan wrote, “Despite the eccentricities of our goalkeeper, we had a good season!” I had been an occasional cricket XI player throughout my time at school but only in my last season did I play regularly, still with limited success. In one of my last games I made a score in the high thirties, which provoked Jake Buttery into saying to Alan, “For God’s sake give him his colours, we’ll never have another excuse!” Despite that accurate, if unflattering, assessment of my cricket, I was intensely proud of the colours cap Alan gave me and, during a club cricket career which was rather more successful, never batted again without wearing it.

We grew up together as classmates and through the school hierarchy such as it was in those days, becoming house and school prefects at the same time and, when I left school in 1953, Alan succeeded me as captain of West house and of the school.

It was a close and rewarding association which I greatly valued. One incident that I have for some reason always remembered relates to Alan’s more laid-back approach to life, which was a frequent help to me. I was very upset because Jake, when I was house captain, had given me a dressing-down because of some misbehaviour by the house prefects.  When, as a result, I tried to lay the law down to these colleagues, Alan, in his unperturbable way, said, “Don’t get so worked up, he’ll soon get over it!” Events, of course, showed Alan to be absolutely right!

Alan and I last spent time together after we left school. When we were still both in the army, I as a national serviceman and he as a regular, the two of us had a most enjoyable holiday in Skye at the invitation of Tom Weston.

I have fond memories of the last time Alan and I met. It was in the lower bar at the RAF Club, where we usually gather before reunions. I did not know he was there until I felt a hand on my shoulder and heard him say, “I’ll get you a drink!” A few minute later I saw him approaching across the room with steady step and a determined look, for his Parkinson’s had set in by then. He arrived, triumphant, with a full, unspilt glass of beer in each hand.

Alan’s career was one of service to his country as an army officer and, in retirement, to his community in many ways. Of those ways he told me most about his long service as Chairman of his Parish Council. We had common ground there for I had for many years been a Parish Council clerk.

A life of service was just what Arthur Foot and Ottershaw School hoped for and encouraged in the pupils. Alan fulfilled that hope with distinction. He left his mark on the school, the army and his community, and our sadness should be tempered with great respect.

Malcolm Pratt
(OT 35 – West)