Lieut-Comm George Pearson Glen Kidston, RN

 mini_-_glen_kidston.jpg photo: 1928, aged 29

 

 

Known as Glen. Survived being torpedoed in WWI on the cruiser 'Hague', had several narrow escapes when motor racing, and in November 1929, he was the only survivor when Junkers tri-motor D-903 crashed near Caterham and caught fire. He "escaped through a hole in the side of the aeroplane almost immediately after it struck the ground, and Prince Eugen [zu Schaumburg-Lippe] fought his way out a little later; but by the time would-be rescuers had arrived there was no hope of saving the others." The Prince died the following day.

Glen spent the winter abroad, then in May 1930, his widowed mother having died, put his house up for sale; Nyn Park, Northaw, near Potters Bar, "nearly a square mile with a small mansion". And a lake.

And a 9-hole golf course. Oh, and 25 cottages. A few smallholdings....

In April 1931 he and Owen Cathcart Jones broke the England to Capetown record, but shortly afterwards (5 May) he was killed in the Drakensburg Mountains, Natal; the aircraft he had borrowed, while his Vega was being overhauled, broke up in mid-air during a storm.

Nyn Park was sold, and the estate broken up. The small (23-bedroom) mansion was bought after WWII by the Alexandra Hospital for Children but never used, and burned down in 1963.

 

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