This page is a small tribute to my late sister.

The Home Coming was written by my Mother. It is worth explaining that my Father was in the Colonial Service in Kenya and Sophia was born just prior to the Mau Mau uprisings.

Sophia was born in Kenya at the time of the Mau Mau rebellion.

She had many talents, notably for Music and Literature, and an infectious and lively sense of humour. It was while studying at Warwick University that she met her husband Robert.

The marriage was cut short when in 1977 Robert died in a road accident, leaving Sophia with two young children.

In due course she returned to her studies, gaining an honours degree in English and American Literature.

She was studying to become a Teacher when she was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis. Sophia fought a long and brave battle with this cruel, progressively debilitating disease. Ultimately it had deprived her of her independence and forced her into the comparative indignity of a Nursing Home, and she suffered the further bitter blow of the death, from leukaemia, of her son Gareth who was just 20.

Despite all this the sparkle never left her eyes.

Words cannot really do her justice, but these old photographs show a little of that sparkle.

The Home Coming

Sophia was born at about 1 a.m. on 5th August, 1952.

At 5.30 a.m. the previous morning, my husband and I, tired of waiting for her to arrive, rose and set off to drive to Nairobi National Park. We hoped the bumpy earth roads would do the trick!

Shortly after 7.30 we were rewarded by the sight of our first pride of lions: two male, two female and five cubs. As a result of this piece of good luck I nearly called my poor child Leonora!

Whilst I was in hospital, the first rumblings of the ‘Mau Mau’ rebellion were in the air, and the official state of emergency was declared shortly afterwards.

My husband was away attending an important conference concerning the emergency and the immediate action to be taken; and for some reason the hospital failed to get me onto my feet much before I was due to be discharged, on the tenth day, to travel the one hundred and twenty miles back to the bush station where Peter was the District Officer.

We had left Katharine and George, aged four and three respectively, in charge of a friend; who came out to look after them and our house while I was in Nairobi; and they were eagerly awaiting our return with the new baby sister.

On the day before our home-coming, a gang of Africans, probably Mau Mau, had tried to break into the safe at the D.C.’s office at Machakos, but had been discovered and got away. Road barriers, manned by Tribal Policemen, had been set up on all the roads in the district.

On the road home to Kitui, our headquarters in the southern half of the Wakamba Province, we were stopped and an excited ‘askari’ told us to keep a look-out as the same gang had made a second attempt to steal arms and ammunition from our own ‘Boma’ and were in the vicinity.

As we approached a native village a few miles further on, we saw men running a few hundred yards from us. Our askari shouted “Bwana! Bwana! There they are!” For a moment we sat staring..... then “Go ON!” I said. My mesmerised spouse needed no further encouragement! Before I had time to regret my words he was off, our askari at his heels, and firing a warning shot from his .45 service revolver as he ran. I watched the pair of them racing over the scrub towards the distant fleeing figures of the raiders.

Only when they were out of sight did I realise my own predicament! There I was, sitting in a Land Rover I couldn’t drive, in the middle of a lonely stretch of road at the back of beyond, with a brand new baby on my lap, and all the government wages money for the district in a tin box at the back of the car..... and feeling remarkably weak!

After an age in which I digested to the full my stupid urge to play Cowboys and Indians, a cloud of dust heralded another vehicle approaching from behind..... It was our boma doctor and his wife.

We left the Land Rover, cash and all, with a message for my better half, and I was eventually delivered home, safely but ignominiously, and rather near to tears, to face my small son and daughter; minus father and with no coherent idea of his whereabouts or state of health; and worst of all, minus all the spare nappies, which we had inadvertently left in the Land Rover also!

Much later that evening Peter arrived, and there was some comfort in the news that they had captured the safe-breakers. And later still, a short paragraph in our weekly Up-Country Newspaper honoured my small daughter with a mention of her part in the affair!

5^th May 2002

Not surprisingly, many of my earliest memories involve Sophia, who as a teenager was always very tolerant of her young brother, despite the fact that I was often, no doubt, something of a nuisance. I could probably recall any number of little anecdotes, ranging from Sophia washing thoroughly behind my ears (an occasion we never ever forgot) to my helping her back down Glastonbury Tor after she froze with what must have been a form of vertigo at the top of the steep slope.

But there are three things that will always make me think of Sophia, and these are music, photography, and laughter. It was not just my sister’s undoubted musical talent that made an impression, although I remember her playing the piano, clarinet, and guitar, often singing as well particularly with the guitar. Some of Sophia’s pop record collection are also indelibly imprinted in my memory, in particular the Beatles’ Penny Lane, and Georgie Fame’s Ballad of Bonnie and Clyde. With great patience she would often play that one at my request – I’m not really sure why I liked it but it is a very vivid memory.

It was Sophia who introduced me to photography, something that was at one time a very major interest of mine and which I still enjoy when the mood takes me. I was given a Brownie 127 camera, shown how to load it, and I remember her sitting cross-legged in a sunny field telling me how to compose the picture that I was taking of her. I can see that black and white photograph in my mind as clearly as the day I took it over thirty years ago. When I was in my keenest phase, and feeling at my most creative, Sophia was always a most appreciative audience, and, almost uniquely, always understood why a picture had been taken, no matter how seemingly obscure the subject.

And then there is laughter. Sophia laughed easily, never losing her sense of humour despite all that life threw at her. Indeed in recent years it was a pleasure to be able to get her to laugh with a wry comment, or a reminder of the ear-washing episode I mentioned earlier. When we were young she would dissolve into helpless, and infectious giggles, sometimes much to the annoyance of our ‘elders and betters’, which would only make it all the funnier. There have been occasions as adults as well when we laughed until we ached, usually at the silliest things.

I hope that she would be happy with this legacy to her little brother. I know that I am happy, and very proud, to have had such a talented, generous, and brave sister.