A rather sombre end to the tour as we gathered with his family, his friends and his colleagues at the funeral of Roger Baynton-Williams in Chichester. A large turn-out for a widely respected and very much liked man. Standing-room only in the chapel – and many of our own were present: Philip Burden (Clive A. Burden Ltd.), Desmond Burgess, Philip Curtis (The Map House), Raymond Kilgarriff, Stephen Luck (Tooley Adams & Co.), John Orde, Jonathan Potter, Ray O’Shea, Nigel Talbot (Grosvenor Prints), and more.
A brief and simple ceremony at his own request, but time enough for some moving tributes. We may perhaps stand in danger of forgetting how prominent and influential a figure he was in shaping the modern map-trade – worldwide. He and the late R. V. Tooley were the great men. They were the ones we looked up to, the ones we tried to emulate. Theirs were the books we followed.
We shall miss his knowledge, his expertise, his lightness of touch and his diffident charm. “One of life’s gentlemen”, as one the tributes so succinctly and so aptly put it. Our thoughts are with his family.
The Bookhunter on Safari 