Page 61 - The Old Ratcliffian 2015 Magazine

OBITUARIES 61
LIEUTENANT COLONEL JOHNATHAN FREDERICK DYER
OLD RATCLIFFIAN 1977 - 1982
DECEMBER 4TH 1963 - AUGUST 19TH 2015
Lieutenant Colonel Dyer was also known as Johnathan, John,
Johnny, JD, JFD, Beaky or the Bald Eagle.
John’s early years were spent in Warwickshire, where the family
ran the Queen and Castle Hotel in Kenilworth. His parents were
Freddie (55) and Mandy. From a young age, Johnny had a wicked
and subversive sense of fun - the beginnings of the later wry
sense of humour which we all loved. Fortunately, he was also
blessed with an angelic face and manner, which usually got
him out of the trouble he created. But not always. As an altar
boy at Mass at St Augustine’s in Kenilworth, he was holding a
candle behind another server. He could not resist testing the
flammability of the other boy’s white surplice, and set him alight. promoted to captain and appointed as adjutant of 3 Queens in
The Mass came to a halt, with the priest beating out the flames.
Freddie was unamused to say the least.
John went to school at Arnold Lodge, before going to Grace
Dieu, following his father, Freddie. John and I then both went to
Ratcliffe, he a year after me. Ratcliffe proved to be particularly
important in Johnny’s life. He formed extraordinarily close
friendships with a group in his year (the Class of ‘82), James
Della-Porta, Andrew Hudson, John Armstrong, Mark Steele,
Brian McGrath, Warren Standerwick and Andrew Finan, which
have lasted and developed over forty years. The loyalty and
comradeship of the group is amazing. Every year, they meet and
have a new experience, which they call their ‘rat runs’. They have
climbed Snowdon and Scafell Pyke, and mountain-biked in the
Brecon Beacons. Insults would fly for the whole weekend, with
JD loving the banter and always adding his dry wit to the fun.
Johnny treasured their friendship and those trips. We were glad
that they could act as pallbearers for John, and that another Old
Ratcliffian, Nicholas Moser (82), read at the funeral.
The Cadet Force at Ratcliffe gave Johnny his first, somewhat
languid, experience of the military. I cannot remember him
paying special attention on Tuesday afternoons to Colonel
Robinson, nor of him spending a lot of time shining his boots;
however, something must have inspired him, because he had
decided on an Army career long before he left Ratcliffe. After
that, his Economics degree course at Queen Mary College proved
to be little more than an interlude for him before he could start
his Army career. He spent far more time at the OTC than in the
lecture room, and enjoyed the social life to the full.
Johnny entered Sandhurst on September 4th 1987, and was an
immediate success. As Colonel Charlie Thackway, one of John’s
contemporaries, said at the funeral, ‘He thrived on the military
training. With skin as thick as rhino hide, the rants of even the
most demented colour sergeant washed right over him, and he
flew through the intense training and was commissioned a lean
and lanky JD, ready to join the Queen’s Regiment.’
In the late 1980s, the infantry battalions were bouncing in John was known for his quiet, but monumental strength
and out of Northern Ireland on roulement tours of Belfast, of character, his steadfastness, his sense of loyalty and his
Johnathan with his late father, Freddie Dyer (55)
Londonderry and the rural border areas. This was where John
cut his teeth as a platoon commander, and he quickly grew up
to be a tough infantry officer. Charlie Thackway remembers
‘one particularly fierce firefight on the border, from which he
was lucky to escape with only a few bullet holes in his basher.’
Having survived the rigours of Northern Ireland, John emerged
a laid-back and unflappable infantry officer, and was quickly
Cyprus. Subsequent staff postings included HQ ARRC (Allied
Rapid Reaction Force) and Deputy Chief of Staff, 1 (UK) RECCE
Brigade.
In May 2008, John was in Iraq as the British Army’s Liaison Officer
at the Coalition Corps Headquarters in Baghdad. Charlie was
also in Baghdad, and he recalled that, ‘Suddenly, all hell broke
out when the Iraqi prime minister decided to expel the militia
insurgents from Basra city with his divisions, without informing
the US or Brits. The US led coalition was totally surprised, and
British officers were summoned to the Corps headquarters to
explain what on earth was going on. JD was the most senior Brit
in Baghdad at the time, and had to face the maelstrom from some
very irate US generals. Again, his unflappable nature came to
the fore, and he had also fostered good relations with the many
senior officers that he had hung out with for a crafty smoke!’
John served as an Army officer for twenty-eight years, but
in all the ways which most mattered to John, his most crucial
posting was with the Queen’s Regiment in Cyprus. It was there
that he met with a captain in the Queen Alexandra Nursing
Corps and fell in love. Anne and John were married in July 1993;
their relationship has been an inspiration to many, and their
kindness and devotion to each other was obvious. They survived
and thrived during difficult times of separation enforced by
conflicting postings, for John in the Army, and for Anne, as a
military and civilian midwife. They have two children, Charlotte
and Harry, of whom John was inordinately proud.
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