Roger Castle MC

[Kate Wills]

My recent researches into Capt Hewitt RASC and RAF led me to chance upon a man called Roger Castle. There are so many interesting life-stories to be discovered from within the Great War generation, and Castle's life would make a good film, certainly he makes me feel excrutiatingly dull:

"Brother Roger Castle, CR (1895-1971), was partly of Jewish descent. His father was a timber merchant and shipbreaker, and married twice. His large family was educated by tutors and governesses, and so Roger never went to school. He had a deep and wide knowledge of European literature and art. He spoke French fluently and was able to correct an expert on the work of Jean Genet on the finer points of indecent French slang.

He ran away from home during his teens, and sold lemonade on a Rhine steamer. He spent some time living with a Lutheran pastor in Halle, and later lived in Paris in a flat below the starving and unknown painter Modigliani. There he joined a music-hall act which toured England. He served in the artillery in World War I, and was awarded the Military Cross.

After the war he became a teacher, and taught at Leominster Grammar School, and later at Victoria College, Jersey. He went to South Africa as a tutor, and encountered the Community of the Resurrection. He joined the novitiate, and the Community wanted him to become a priest, but he managed to convince them of his lay vocation. After profession he returned to Africa, and taught at St Peter's, Rosettenville and St Augustines, Penhalonga. He died on 4 June 1971."