Group Captain Kingsley Oliver

Kyt · Nov 10, 2008

Group Captain Kingsley Oliver - Telegraph

Group Captain Kingsley Oliver, who has died aged 79, was one of a select number of RAF officer cadets to be trained at the Royal Military College, Sandhurst for service with the Royal Air Force Regiment; he made a second career with one of London's oldest Livery Companies and gained a distinguished reputation as a military historian and author.

Oliver entered the RAF in January 1948 to train as a pilot but his eyesight did not meet the strict requirements. He elected to join the RAF Regiment and this took him to Sandhurst to complete the two-year officer cadet course. As a junior officer he made a robust impact from the start, earning swift promotion at a time when advancement was slow at junior officer levels.

He saw active service in Malaya and in the Aden Protectorate and was identified with potential for the higher echelons of the service as the RAF set out to develop a new generation of full-career RAF Regiment officers. To this end, he was selected to attend both the RAF Staff College and the Joint Services Staff College, an unusual distinction for an officer of his branch. Later he served at Headquarters Fighter Command and in Cyprus and Germany.

Oliver's strong intellect and interest in the wider aspect of military affairs was revealed in 1966 when he won the Army's Bertrand Stewart Prize Essay Competition, followed by the Royal United Services Institute's Trench-Gascoigne Essay Prize for 1968; the first RAF Regiment Officer to do so in both cases. In 1969 he wrote A Brief History of The RAF Regiment, intended primarily for the internal education of officers and men within the Regiment.

Oliver's empathy with people and his logical mind made him a fine instructor at the various training establishments where he served. He was particularly proud of his time as the Senior RAF Regiment Instructor at the RAF College Cranwell from 1961. He was charged not only with the practical leadership training of all Cranwell flight cadets, but also with the professional training of the first RAF Regiment flight cadets at Cranwell, resulting from the new Air Ministry policy for them to join the mainstream of officer training at the RAF College.

In common with others, Oliver did not relish staff appointments, of which he had his fair share. When he relinquished command of the RAF Regiment Depot, Catterick, where at every opportunity he had indulged his love of field sports, he deplored his move to the Ministry of Defence and retired from the RAF at his own request in 1978. He endowed the RAF Regiment Annual Essay Prize for Junior Officers, to encourage original and mature thinking on topics of major relevance, so preparing themselves for more senior appointments. Typically unassuming, he insisted that the competition was not to be named after him.

Kingsley Mayne Oliver was born in Durban on December 12, 1928 and educated in South Africa. He entered the University of Natal in 1946, subsequently winning a place to Lincoln College, Oxford to read history. On his arrival in England, he decided to join the RAF instead.

After retiring from the RAF, he first worked for British Aerospace in the UK and Iran until the revolution, but found a second calling when headhunted to become Clerk to The Worshipful Company of Saddlers, in the City.

He was ideally suited to this position with one of London's oldest Livery Companies. He researched and wrote his magnum opus of a two-volume history of the Saddlers' Company, embracing some 800 years of Livery and City history, and it was published under the title Hold Fast, Sit Sure, the company's motto.

He studied for an MA in Modern History at the University of London and was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts in 1988. This was followed by the award of an Honorary MA from City University, the Freedom of the City of London, honorary membership of The City and Guilds of London Institute and, finally, on his retirement from his second career, the freedom of The Saddlers' Company. Thereafter he made a major contribution to RAF history with Through Adversity, the first definitive history of the RAF Regiment, commissioned by the Corps to mark its 50th Anniversary in 1992. He followed this with The RAF Regiment at War 1942 to 1946.

A successful commander and a modest man of outstanding integrity, Oliver was an exemplar of officer qualities, popular and respected by his officers and men.

He was an ADC to The Queen from 1974 to 1977.

Kingsley Oliver died on October 5. His first wife predeceased him and his second marriage ended in divorce. His wife Audrey and a daughter from his first marriage and two sons from his second survive him.
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