As a child Harold attended St John’s School. At this time the schoolboys each maintained a vegetable patch teaching Harold skills which he used his whole life, tending beautiful and bountiful gardens right into his 90s.

Leaving school aged fourteen, Harold joined a local engineering company before signing up with the Royal Navy to serve in the Second World War at just eighteen years old. Serving on mine sweepers between 1942 and 1946 Harold travelled to Canada and Singapore, saw horrors he would refuse to talk about but made lifelong friends.

Returning to Midsomer Norton after being de-mobbed wasn’t easy. Money was tight and property scarce, so Harold, his new wife Joan and baby daughter Anne shared the two-up-two-down on Chilcompton Road with his parents until moving to Providence Place and eventually to North Road.

Harold worked for a number of years for EMI before making the brave move into self-employment in the 1960s, setting up the St John’s School of Motoring. As one of the very first driving schools in Midsomer Norton, Harold taught a generation of our town to drive.

At this time Harold helped to develop the local ‘Penguins’ into the successful Norton Radstock Swimming Club. As Chairman for a while, Harold and the team of volunteers lobbied relentlessly for an indoor pool and were instrumental in securing the Midsomer Norton pool we enjoy today.

Harold had many interests and was a founder member of the Chilcompton Art Club and Chilcompton Poetry Circle. Harold and Joan worshipped at St. John’s Church in Chilcompton and the Midsomer Norton Methodist Church, making lifelong friends at both Churches.

Harold was able to use his hobbies for St John’s Church in Chilcompton, producing the carved wooden figures for the Easter Garden and the scaled model of the proposed new Church hall. His talents were widely shared with friends and family.

Harold’s family grew around him and he delighted in being visited by any of his eleven great grandchildren.

Harold was a quiet, thoughtful man, considered by many a true gentleman. He had a wide and wonderful circle of friends in Midsomer Norton, Chilcompton and further afield in Lyme Regis and Noss Mayo, where they frequently holidayed, notwithstanding the many friends Harold made around the country through his hobbies and family connections.

He touched the lives of many and will be dearly missed. Harold’s family warmly invite all who knew him to his funeral, which will be held at St. John’s Church in

Chilcompton on Tuesday, 3rd May at 2pm.