Robyn was the younger of twin girls born to Kathleen Wood in a Canadian Mission Hospital at Palampur, a hill station in North West India. Her sister Eve recalls that Robyn was tiny, weighing just two and a half pounds and in those days she was not expected to survive. But survive she did, a very early mark of her determination to live life to the full and achieve the very best she could from everything she decided to undertake. As a she enjoyed playing hockey, netball and tennis. Long winter holidays gave the opportunity of learning to horse ride, ski and roller skate. A season in Kashmir offered long hours of enjoyment swimming in the lake.
Robyn’s father Cecil owned an Electrical Engineering business with branches in Lahore, Delhi and Agra. Her mother Kathleen, 16 years his junior was a teacher and the family lived in comfortable circumstances in Lahore and latterly Murree, another hill station just north of Rawalpindi where Robyn was taught by Nuns at the Catholic school. This life changed dramatically in 1946 when Robyn’s father died after a long illness involving several strokes shortly followed by the British Government decision to give India Independence. There was much bloodshed between Muslims and Hindus. Kathleen, now alone with Robyn and Eve, decided they had to leave when fire-raisers threatened to burn down the house and eyes were cast at two young eligible girls. They were given 200 Rupees and a passage to England. On the bright they were returning to the mother country which they idealised but had never seen. Whatever romantic notions they may have had were quickly dispelled by Tilbury Docks on a cold grey winter morning.
Arriving with nothing they were initially taken in by uncle Douglas, Kathleen’s eldest brother, and his wife who lived in a prefab in Aylesbury. Robyn and Eve both found work with the Milk Marketing board where they were each paid £1 per week, 10 shillings of which they gave for their keep leaving 10 shillings for everything else. For a time they led a rather nomadic life with Robyn finding better paid but potentially hazardous work at the Radiochemical Centre in Amersham but warned against the toxic radioactivity to which she was exposed she eventually moved to Cooper McDougal and Robertson in Berkhampstead researching sheep dips and other products for animals. In her element in the lab but quietly ambitious Robyn attended evening classes at Harrow for three years studying for her diploma and eventually become the head of the laboratory. This precipitated a major structural change within the company. No lady had previously held such status and the laboratory building didn’t have a ladies loo. They had to build one just for Robyn.
None of this came at the expense of her social life. She joined the Young Conservatives, well known in those days for fun and frolics which she enjoyed to the full but also where her ability to organise and quietly draw people in meant that she quickly became chairwoman of the Amersham branch with sister Eve as secretary. Impecunious, the sisters enjoyed holidays youth hostelling, riding their bicycles all the way to the West Country but happy, in those carefree days to ride in the back of a farm cart up the steepest hills. Younger cousin Babs, then around 6 recalls these two when they visited her grandmother in Somerset and how very glamorous they looked in their cycling shorts.
One of Robyn’s colleagues at Coopers, Peter Flanagan, owned a Merlin Rocket dinghy which he sailed at Cookham Reach. Recognising that Robyn was both game and intelligent for a challenge, he invited her to crew for him. So she had a new interest which, as ever, she decided to learn more about and went on a sailing course, first to Burnham on Crouch and then to Blue Water Charters at Salcombe where she met David, also savouring sailing as a new experience. Immediately they recognised something in each other and David’s moment of bliss came when Robyn, tentatively, asked if she could crew for him in the race that marked the last day of the holiday. From then on they sailed together with no little success winning their class in the Salcombe regatta on no less than 5 occasions and competing in the Enterprise National Championships where, at Helensburgh in the worst of the Scottish weather, Robyn won the Mary Arnold Baker trophy as the first lady home.
Despite all they remained two very independent people. Robyn as ever putting the needs of others first was devoted to looking after her mother, and they didn’t marry until 1966 when David finally stopped prevaricating and popped the question. They set up home in Windsor where, until Robyn’s untimely death, they continued to live to this day. Their son, Julian was born in 1969 but Robyn continued in her senior role at Coopers, now part of the Wellcome Trust until the birth of her daughter Cerian in 1973.
As soon as she was able Robyn typically decided that she must be more than a housewife and looked for work which allowed her to be a mother two children. After yet more training she joined the staff of Wexham Park Hospital as the phlebotomist where she was known as the 'blood lady'. From there she moved to Heatherwood Hospital A and E reception and finally, much to Cerian’s initial horror at having her mother working at her school, to Windsor Girls School as the head lab technician. There she not only prepared all the experiments for the girls but also tested out the practical papers set by the Examination Board. If there was a fault Robyn would find it and tell the Board what they had to do make the experiment work.
During this time Eve and her family had become wedded to golf. Eve became the lady captain and donator of the Eve Durham trophy at Iver Golf Club. She encouraged Robyn to play which she did with typical enthusiasm, inevitably became the Lady Captain and Committee Secretary. Sailing was not forgotten. Though no longer sailing in races she would still get in a boat and continued to support David who, for some years, was Commodore at the British Airways Silver Wing Sailing Club. Holidays were still taken with the family every year at Salcombe and the World Airline Sailing Competition offered the whole family the opportunity to visit Australia, Canada, the USA, Ireland, Germany, Italy and Austria where Robyn made many friends with whom we are still in touch to this day. Added to all this she was an avid reader of books, a lover of animals and a gardener with an encyclopaedic knowledge of plants, telling, for example, the owner of a shop in Sedona, names of all the flowers that were growing around their door.
Latterly Robyn suffered from Tachycardia. Eventually controlled by drugs and a pacemaker it was one of the few conditions which, when rampant, really frightened her. Four years ago she was diagnosed with cancer. Though had spread to surrounding tissue an operation to remove was successful and, as ever, she came through it with flying colours. this was not the end of her problems. Lung cancer and other diagnoses followed, again operated on with apparent success, the last only just before Christmas. Her surgeon visited her in convalescence to say he was happy with how the procedure went but alas, there were further complications. A month later she began to weaken and died at Wexham Park hospital on Feb 10th with Cerian and David at her bedside.
Robyn endured her failing health, as ever, with courage, fortitude and thinking of how she could help others. No-one outside her immediate circle and some it would ever have known she had a problem. As ever she put friends and family before herself helping with her two grandchildren until days before the end.
She will be remembered with love and affection as a very special and chirpy companion and a friend in need. May she rest in peace and her light continue to shine as an inspiration to us all.