Tributes to Vernon Scott  RSS feed | About

By John Evans

Edward Vernon Scott was born July 1930, Milford Haven. He was brought up in Pill area and grew up in Milford during WWII - very impressionable time for youngsters. Member of Sea Cadets and as a cadet went to sea with Royal Navy. Also remembers the German aircraft coming over the Haven and the arrival of the American forces which set up camp at Hakin.

He joined West Wales Guardian in 1946 as trainee reporter at the Pembroke Dock office (then in Bush Street), working with Llewellyn Thomas locally and with other top class journalists including Lloyd Phillips and Bill Richards.

He worked for the Guardian until 1965 when he was recruited by Herbert Thomas to become senior staff member working from the Pembroke Dock office in Meyrick Street (then next to Catholic Rectory). He literally picked up his pen in Bush Street and walked round the corner to his new office.

It was the start of a 40-year association with the Western Telegraph, 30 of those years as a full-time reporter. Over the years he covered major stories and the minutiae of the weekly newspaper round, as well as finding the time to write many feature articles which were always so full of interest, humour and perception.

He travelled extensively for the Western Telegraph, noteable trips being to the British forces in Hong Kong, Malta and the West Germany, and he also visited several states in the USA to meet up with veterans of the US Army's 28th Infantry Division who had been stationed in west Wales, and noteably Pembroke Dock, in the lead up to the D-Day Invasion in June 1944.

Vernon had a great eye for a story and a wonderful way of communicating it, an example to generations of young reporters who were posted to the Dock office to work under his gentle guidance. He always took a great interest and pride in the careers of 'his' youngsters, wherever their paths took them later on.

A man with many and varied interests, Vernon was an avid football fan and could always be found at Marble Hall and later, the London Road ground of Pembroke Boro', for home games. He saw some of Pembrokeshire's finest exponents of the game grace these pitches - legendary names from a glorious era of local sport.

Another of his abiding interests was amateur dramatics and entertainment. As a young man, with friend John Bowen, he had done the rounds of the halls as an entertainer and he took part in many amateur productions both at Milford Haven and later Pembroke Dock (with the well remembered Penfro Players).

In more recent years he added yet another string to his bow, that of author. In 1980 he researched and wrote a series of articles in the WT to mark the 40th anniversary of the Luftwaffe attack on the oil tanks at Llanreath. The interest in the articles was phenomenal and led to Vernon's first book, Inferno 1940, published by the Western Telegraph which remains a remarkable account of a most trying time in Pembrokeshire's recent history.

Vernon followed this up with his evocative story of the war years as they affected so much of the county, entitled An Experience Shared, which he published himself, and he also wrote In Harm's Way, about the summer of 1940, and When The Poppies Bloom Again, a remarkable book on World War I.

In a very full and active retirement Vernon continued his associations with the Western Telegraph for another decade and more, penning a weekly column, Just a Thought (?), which had a large and loyal readership, not only locally, but among so many exiles. Latterly he wrote a monthly column in Pembrokeshire Magazine.

He was also a leading member of the local Probus club.

All of this was in addition to his role as a devoted husband and father to Joan, Helen and Paul and now grandfather as well.

Vernon never stopped writing from the day he joined the Guardian in 1946 and he leaves a tremendous legacy in the millions of words he wrote in the 60 plus years which followed.

As a local newsman they don't come any better.

11:56am Tuesday 12th February 2008

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