Page 40 - Sylvia Malt - Side by Side

The news was absolutely devastating to the young boys of the North Cray Troop,
who went into mourning for a month in memory of their late Assistant Scoutmaster.
They called their premises Geoffrey Hall in his honour. Their leader told the Kentish
Times: “He set by his example and keenness the highest ideals of scout craft, and by
none is his death more sincerely mourned than by the boys of his troop, who will
ever cherish his memory with admiration and esteem for what he did for them and
what he was to them.”

In Memoriam Geoffrey Vesey Holt is buried in the Bard Cottage Cemetery,
Belgium.

Very much a military family, the Holt’s more than made their mark during the First
World War.

MAJOR FELTON VESEY HOLT, Oxford and Bucks Light Infantry and The Royal
Flying Corps, received the Distinguished Service Order for his gallantry on 22nd
January 1915 in engaging single handed a group of twelve German aeroplanes who
were attacking in Dunkirk.

LIEUTENANT COMMANDER REGINALD VESEY HOLT, R.N. In July 1918, he
received the DSO for services in action with enemy submarines.

LIEUTENANT ALWYN VESEY HOLT was a Captain in the 1st Battalion, the
Black Watch and awarded the DSO in June 1918. He had been educated at Eton and
Sandhurst and a Lieutenant at the start of the War in the Black Watch. Wounded in
France in 1914, he recovered and returned to France with the 2nd Battalion, the Black
Watch.

Lt. Vesey Holt then joined the Royal Flying Corps and by 1918 was commanding a
wing of the Royal Air Force in France.

The Royal Flying Corps motto was “Per Ardua Ad Astra”

“Through adversity to the Stars”

40