Tuesday 24th August 2021
From the Order Of Service booklet for the funeral of Terry Cross, of The Teasels, Warminster:
In Loving Memory of
Terence John Cross ‘Terry’
8th May 1942 – 28th July 2021
West Wiltshire Crematorium
Tuesday 24th August 2021 at 1.45 pm.
Order of Service
Entrance Music
Make Someone Happy – Jimmy Durante.
Opening Words
from Louise Jopling, Humanist Celebrant.
Tributes to Terry
personal tribute from David Cross.
A Letter From Terry
recorded by David Cross.
Committal
Visual Tribute
Music: What A Wonderful World – Louis Armstrong.
________
The Order of Service included the following printed tributes:
Memories from Friends and Family
We have so many brilliant memories of Terry, I could tell a tale that would last days. He was a wonderful raconteur and regaled us with such a cheerful and sassy demeanour that we used to be in stiches.
He was part of our lives since Zimbabwe days, when he took a central role in the expat community, making the experience of those newer to the exploration game than he was, a brighter, more fully engaged, truer observation of the situation and circumstances that we found ourselves in. We were enthralled by his wit, intelligence, empathy and ability to get along.
He has been an inspiration to us and our children, whom he treated so kindly, with regular updates of all his travels across the world and his insightful commentary on social justice.
He was a wonderful friend who taught the honesty of commitment. He will be sorely missed.
Just remembered an amusing event. Despite his experience of travel he could be just as fazed as any of us by life in the tropics. I always remember a situation when he was living on his own in a little house in Fern Valley, in which he was stung by a scorpion one night while undressing for bed. We arrived the next day on a planned visit, to find him looking ashen-grey, hair akimbo, and in a tense and nervous state. “Thank goodness you’re here,” he said, “I was stung by a scorpion last night and decided that the best course of action was to not move, to try to stop the poison from being pumped round my body, and to not allow myself to go to sleep, as I have heard that the poison makes you sleepy, but that you don’t wake up.” Poor Terry, he had spent the whole night sitting on the side of his bed too frightened to move. Glad to say, he was none the worse for his sting, with nothing more than a slight swelling and a big tiredness.
Alaric and Rosy.
______
I’ve known Terry for upwards of 50 years, although a lot of that time he was teaching abroad. In the 1970s we went to Brittany, camping in my old Volvo. Terry was a great motivator and during the last few years “suggested” or “told me” to go on various coach trips. So, we went to the Newcastle area, Gloucester Docks, South Wales, Madeira and the Italian Lakes. If it had not been for Terry I would never have gone. Terry was a great traveller.
Michael Cordon.
_______
In Kuantan, Malaysia, there was a restaurant called FPC (for Fish, Prawn, Crab), where we teaching colleagues would often meet for dinner. Re-naming it, Terry would arrange to meet you at the Family Planning Clinic.
When entering a lift once with Terry and another friend, my friend said, “You could get six in here.” Deliberately misunderstanding, Terry replied: “Sex? You couldn’t, could you?”
His politics and sense of humour, and literary appreciation, often at the forefront of memories.
Mel Tyers.
_______
Terry was a big influence on me from an early age, always recommending books and films. He often recommended books by African and Asian writers such as Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (Nigeria) and Arundhati Roy (India), now two of my favourite authors. Receiving postcards and letters from Terry was always informative and exciting. He opened up global travel for me as a child and I have since travelled to Kerala and recently worked in Spain, following in his globe-trotting footsteps. We would often have long discussions about books and politics and didn’t always agree which I think we both enjoyed, he will be much missed and his influence will be one throughout my life and future travels. He was a much-loved uncle and we will miss him greatly.
Gwen, niece.
_______
When my sister and I were young I always remember Terry would give us books for birthdays and Christmas. I’m really glad that he shared his love of reading with us. He never forgot a birthday, I’ll miss him.
Owen, nephew.
________
Terry was my longest lasting pen pal. We had stayed in touch ever since 1977, when we met on a train from Cusco to Puno in the mountains of Peru. I will miss getting his occasional letter and humorous e-mails. He had sent me 3 messages just a month ago that made me laugh.
Cathey and I send our condolences to you and to your family, and to Joanna as well (I will always remember Terry’s recounting of the story of how he learned of Joanna, and how he found answers to so many unanswered questions that he had about events in his childhood – it was very touching). Terry ended his letter to me: “Let’s try to enjoy no matter what outrageous fortune slings at us.”
Brek Plauche, Austin, Texas.
_________
Terry and I became friends over 65 years ago when I would call on him and we walked to catch the bus to school in Frome. He struck me as very clever, he seemed to understand all the finer points of our exam work and left me standing. Our class of 53 was successful and many have kept in contact for a lifetime – this was something Terry valued.
He was always considerate, interested in ideas and people. I think he was committed to politics from an early age – influenced by his Dad.
In 1960 we all went our separate ways – for many years I learnt he was teaching abroad. Often he talked about his teaching – his preparation was meticulous – he was diligent and had high expectations of his pupils. He was rewarded by contact with them still.
In 2010 at my Mum’s funeral, my sister nudged me and said, “Who is that sitting behind?” I turned – it was Terry and the friendship was quickly renewed.
He was devoted to caring for his mother, at that time, never wanting to leave her for long. He expressed huge love and respect for his parents.
He has always fostered an interest in politics and once said he regretted not following that as a career.
Recently we have met in London with visits to theatres and art galleries. It has always been enjoyable. In Warminster we have shared meals and I have introduced him to the secrets of Corsley which was fun.
Emailing regularly, he has introduced me to books, particularly those set abroad. I know he was a much valued member of the town library book club.
Terry was a person of principle, humorous, loyal and kind. I shall always value our lifelong friendship.
Thelma Woodhead.
_________
On meeting and getting to know Terry, I feel life shared one of her gifts. We met in Zimbabwe as new teachers employed by the government of the newly independent country in 1982. We were fresh out of university, and Terry stood out as one of the only people with true experience and knowledge of working abroad, and how to deal with the huge uncertainties and demands of trying to gauge the requirements and subtleties of working in a foreign land and very different culture.
His poise and composure filled us with awe. He helped anyone of us who appeared lost and uncertain, and spoke insightfully of all his own experiences, adapting to the many situations and circumstances of all the different nations and political situations that he had encountered on his travels.
He loved social engagements and was always up for a get together or project, and loved coordinating activity and adventure. Terry instigated many of our sightseeing tours, parties and school projects. He seemed to have endless energy and a ‘joie de vivre’ that impressed us enormously. I remember long sessions discussing books, plays, music, art, history and of course geography, all of which fascinated and enthralled Terry for the whole of his life. I doubt there are many better-read people on the planet.
His empathy and compassion was notable. He was hugely motivated in his teaching to provide the widest, most inclusive and challenging experience that he could bring to his students, colleagues and fellow expats. It was he who organised the group of us to perform ‘The Crucible’, since our students were reading it as part of their English curriculum and he felt that they would better understand it if they could see it enacted. To him the important thing was the student gain.
I remember he organised day-field trips for his students of geography, introducing them to the mysteries and science of their own landscape, in a way that only someone of great knowledge can. I always remember his pupils ralking proudly of him as their teacher ‘Mr. T. Cross’, all pronounced together and very quickly, which lead to him having the nickname “Misty Cross”.
He loved company and social interaction and would always tease and make fun when in the company of women. One of his unmistakable phrases after having talked to a lady was: “I think she’s a little bit in love with me. Just watch her eyes looking at me.”
One of Terry’s most endearing qualities was his love and loyalty to his family and roots. He was fiercely proud of his working class background and would love to regale a soiree with tales of his upbringing and stories of characters that had filled the streets and businesses around his home. He was a consummate raconteur who would create a scene and situation with the clarity of a Dickensian novel. He had tremendous recall, and could tell tales of very early childhood, and memories of 40s and 50s Wiltshire. His mum featured hugely, and he was so proud of her work ethic and her fondness for soldiers of many nationalities in the barracks where she worked. This obviously spilled over into his fondness and respect for all the pupils that he taught, and his general regard for humanity. He was always a champion for human rights and anti-discrimination and was not afraid to speak truth to power when the powerful were ignoring the little man.
Terry was a great friend who took friendship very seriously. He never forgot you and always dropped you a line or a card from so many outlandish places. My eldest boy, who enjoyed collecting stamps, made a large collection of international stamps and Airmail letters from Terry’s contact alone.
Terry was always one to make humour central to any critical analysis of society. This continued to his dying day, and my email is full of jokes and witty observations that Terry seemed to dig out of all his reading. His observations of political and social ills were always so apt and intriguing.
I am going to miss Terry very much. He was a huge influence in the life of my wife and I. Fair thee well, ‘Misty Cross’.
Alaric and Rosie (Thierry).
_________
It is with great sadness that I learned of Terry’s so untimely passing. We met while teaching at Palm Beach-Currumbin High School on the Gold Coast, Queensland, Australia in early 1974. We were both ‘import’ teachers who were recruited in the early 1970s to fill a teacher supply shortage, Terry from the UK and me from Canada. So in that sense, we shared a similar experience of coming across the world to the unknown in search of adventure and he was indeed one for adventure!
Terry was immediately someone who became a great mate and close friend and we shared a wonderful larger group of Aussie and International friends. I recall many weekends spent partying at length, and others pursuing more ‘cultural’ events. His knowledge of the world and its wealth of artistic endeavours was second to none. He had an engaging sense of humour, a unique turn of phrase and was able to laugh at himself, always bringing a bright spark to the party and seeking out the next new foray.
One particular memory I have was an outing we shared driving my car (a tiny open air ‘mini moke’) from the Gold Coast to Brisbane to see the recently released Peter Shaffer play, ‘Equus’ at a very small theatre-in-the-round called La Boite. We were both enthralled with the play but unlike me, he was able to decipher the hidden equestrian meanings and the psychoanalysis and we spent the two hour return trip to the Gold Coast dissecting the play. From that day on, we always said our farewells with “Keep galloping, my friend”. Even our letters after 45 years reflected that unique ‘Equus’ experience we had shared.
Jan Gough-Watson, NSW, Australia.
_________
I first met Terry on my first day at Palm Beach-Currumbin High School. His desk was directly opposite, facing me. From the very first words, some throwaway comment, I knew he was going to be different. And he was!
Ter was the life and soul of our young, single and up for anything group. He was the centre of our little world and the instigator of most of the social events: parties (always with Terry’s ideas for a theme); dinner at each other’s flats (again, always a theme!), movies, theatre, picnics into the Hinterland, beach time, sneaking over to the Corrumbin Pub for lunch (forbidden during school hours but it had the most sensational view up the coast from the verandah). Everything seemed to be charged with his theatrics, sense of drama and the ridiculous. His hat was his signature (in the photos) and it went everywhere.
I think the highlight of his stay may have been the Cyclone we had on the Coast one year. It was heading our way, we were all sent home from school as the centre was expected to pass over the southern part of the Gold Coast. Terry decided his little flat was where we could all find shelter and safety: a solid little building with a small bathroom where we could wait out the power of the storm. Sadly, for Ter, the full force of the event was felt offshore, so instead of this huge, frightening event we got solid hard rain and some fierce winds. All an anti-climax. But it was Terry’s moment and he loved it.
Another party around at his place got a tad wild (think alcohol) and somewhere during the night he disappeared. Once we realised he’d gone we panicked as his flat was only a block from the beach. He’d managed to take himself off somewhere and from memory he was fast asleep.
When he left PB-C, it was a much more docile and boring school. The life and the fun had gone. We all went our separate ways that year. Jan moved north, I went to the UK and I think Ter either went to South America or Asia. He travelled so much I lost track of his whereabouts. But, we always stayed in touch with lots of letters and postcards.
While I was living in the UK in the late 70s, he returned home so we saw a lot of each other. Again there was always an adventure to be had, lots of movies and theatre. He was living down in Kent so I often used to go and stay down there and he’d come up to me for ‘cultural outings’.
When I moved to Israel, Ter paid a visit. For some reason I have no photos of his week there. He stayed with me on the Kibbutz where I was living at that time.
We didn’t see each other for around 15 years or so, but when I started travelling back to the UK, mainly for work, he always made the trip up to London. We’d usually just have lunch and sit and talk and talk and talk.
Terry was probably the most cultured person I have ever met – his knowledge of books, films, the theatre was unparalleled. Every time he wrote I received a run-down on what to read (or not read) and what to see (or not see). Every so often a book would turn up in the mail. Essential reading.
And then there were his politics on which we both agreed so could have lots of rants together. I think though that over the years, he saw me as heading perilously close to the decadent world of crass materialism!
Ter was a very, very treasured friend. His joy of life and ‘galloping’ will be with me forever.
Marjory, Queensland, Australia.
_________
I have known Terry since we were 5 years old. Terry was my best friend at school and on into adulthood. I think primary school was one of the most difficult periods of my life, through it Terry was my good friend and companion, intelligent, humorous, supportive, rarely critical and always interesting, amusing and different perspectives on many topics and the world.
When we attended the New Close and during the first years at Frome, Terry and I walked to school together, a distance of more than a mile. Every morning, Terry would walk up Bell Hill to our house at the top of the hill and wait in the kitchen while I finished breakfast so that we could walk to school together. I am ashamed to say that I do not know why Terry waited for me so patiently, confined to the kitchen and in fact walked in the opposite direction to the school to meet me. A true act of friendship.
Terry and I went with friends on several holidays, camping and youth hosteling. The holiday I remember most clearly was the last when we went hiking in the Pyrenees. We did not have a very good map and used a travel book by Hilaire Belloc which must have been written 60 years before as our guide. Despite this the trip was a great success, we camped on the trail, journeyed through unspoiled mountain scenery, waterfalls, different levels of valleys as we ascended, and saw ice caves and rugged mountain scenery. Terry, from his study of geography, identified all the geographic and geological features we saw, making it doubly interesting.
This holiday was in the summer of 1965, at Easter in 1966 I met my wife and after that our lives diverged. Terry to travel, me to home-building and family life. Terry gave us a good start as best man at my wedding, where he gave an amusing speech about Eileen and I exchanging gifts of electric toothbrushes (a novelty at that time).
Terry followed his own star in life and did not choose the domesticity most of us do. He travelled widely and educated children in other parts of the world, experiencing other cultures which gave him a rich and rewarding life. All I know is that I have lost a good friend who will be greatly missed. Farewell, my friend. Sleep well.
Peter King.
_________
David, here are just a few photos, some depicting Terry’s sartorial style, which is how I will remember him. He was very proud of the shirts and waistcoats hand-made for him during his many travels in India and the Middle East.
I was reminded of Terry’s love of all things geographical when I was recently re-reading his 1996 letter from Nairobi. Amid the most detailed description of his teaching activities he comments: “I must admit to being a ‘landscape’ man and once I’ve seen a zebra I cannot really work up much enthusiasm about others”. I can hear him saying it. Terry’s spirit is constantly in my head. May it remain there for the rest of my life.
Peter Hunt.
_________
Terry had been a stalwart volunteer prior to lockdown and gained a firm and quick rapport with the regular customers. His knowledge of literature was huge and he was happy to recommend a good read to one and all.
He was a very warm, engaging and knowledgeable gentleman with a very compassionate nature. He has been taken from us too soon.
Mrs. Paula Thorpe, Warminster Lions Bookshop.
__________
My late husband, Jim Bright, and Terry met when they both arrived at Bristol University in September 1960. Their rooms were on the same corridor of Wills Hall, and as two “Grammar School boys” they formed a friendship, amongst all the Public School boys who seemed to dominate there at the time. Jim and I maintained contact with Terry after they both graduated.
Terry was a teacher at Borden Grammar School, Sittingbourne, Kent, when we moved to Faversham, 8 miles away, in 1965. I remember one night, at about midnight, when we left Terry’s flat to go home our car wouldn’t start. so Terry started pushing us, but it didn’t start for about half a mile and when it did we dared not stop, so poor Terry had to walk back, in the dark, and the rain!
Terry would often visit us in Faversham. When our first son was about 18 months old, I remember Terry turning up with a tortoise, saying: “I thought it was about time he had a pet.”
On another occasion Terry decided to walk to Faversham along the Swale estuary, probably about 12 miles. However, when he arrived at our house, we were out. This was of course before the invention of mobile phones (although I don’t think he ever had one anyway!) and Terry had not thought of using a landline to check that we would be in. Fortunately, our neighbour took pity on him and gave him a cup of tea before he got the train back to Sittingbourne.
When Terry moved to teach at Homewood School near Tenterden he shared (with another teacher) the school house of the primary school at Biddenden, which is only a few miles from Sissinghurst. We often visited him, especially in the school holidays and I remember him saying to our three sons who were then early teenagers: “You can climb the trees in the orchard”, but unfortunately his housemate, unaware of this, returned and shouted at the boys who he thought were trespassing. On that occasion Terry also showed us the kittens who had been born on the sofa in the sitting room, Terry acting as midwife.
Terry went all over the world, sometimes teaching but also taking a range of different jobs. When Terry moved to teach in Africa we received frequent letters telling us of his experiences and adventures. I hink he might have stayed in Zimbabwe had it not been for a certain, subsequent, unfriendly Prime Minister there.
It is very much to Terry’s credit that he returned to Warminster to care for his mother when she became ill, and stayed to look after her until her death. During this time we often called in to The Teasels on our way to and from visiting our son who lives in Devon.
In recent years, Terry came to stay with us in Faversham several times and we have been on some nostalgia trips around Kent, as well as meeting him in London for theatre and cultural outings, and also we have met between Kent and Wiltshire for other outings and visits.
The pandemic persuaded Terry to finally get his own computer instead of relying on the local library, which had been a source of frustration both on his part and ours! I will miss his friendly and informative emails. Given Terry’s healthy lifestyle, one wonders just what it is that will stop people leaving this world early, as I think he has. It sounds as though Terry probably had no idea or warning of his sudden death, which must be the best way to go, but it is very difficult for all those who held him in high esteem and affection to know that he is no longer around. I will miss him.
Shirley.
__________
Terry became a much liked and admired friend. He was an interesting conversationalist and a great fundi on books and films. Terry might have recognised that old Rhodesian word from his time in the Vumba in Zimbabwe. It means a person knowledgeable on a subject, an expert, and he was certainly well read and loved films.
He was, too, a great letter writer. One wonders what ever the “Warminster Journal” will do for copy now that Terry has gone! He set a very high standard with his dress, perhaps considered a little old fashioned now, never appearing without a tie.
It is with sadness I think of his passing and only wish that I had known him longer. We had both worked in Zimbabwe and the Middle East, but our paths never crossed. Now the world traveller, for he had visited some thirty or more countries, has passed into the great unknown, to “that bourne from which no traveller returns”. All we can know is that he is now at peace and no longer worried about right wing politics and all the other concerns he had regarding the future of our world.
Maurice Devine.
_________
The family thank you for attending the service today and warmly invite you to join them for refreshments at The Cock Inn, 55 West Street, Warminster, BA12 8JZ.
Donations, if desired, made be made to Operation Smile.
F. Curtis & Son,
Funeral Directors,
11 Portway, Warminster, Wiltshire, BA12 8QG.
Telephone: 01985 212033.