Kentish Express Ashford & District
Tribute to unflappable ex-journalist
A former KM journalist renowned for his craft, unflappable temperament and gentlemanly demeanour has died.
David McDine, who was 82, spent much of his long media career as a senior communications officer in the Armed Forces.
He played a key role during the Gulf War in handling a 2,000-strong international media pack during Operation Desert Storm. He went on television to announce to the world that the air war had begun - a moment, he would later say, would stay with him forever.
David, who lived in Stelling Minnis, was married to Sue, had a son and daughter, Amanda and Neil, and three grandchildren.
Born in Milton Regis near Sittingbourne in 1938, he attended the Simon Langton Grammar School for Boys in Canterbury and the Harvey Grammar School in Folkestone before joining the Folkestone Herald as a cub reporter in 1954.
After a spell on the Leicester Mercury he returned to Kent when he married Sue. He worked at the Chatham News before becoming an Admiralty information officer in 1963, and later an information officer for the Ministry of Defence.
He became deputy director of naval (and later Army) PR, and the MoD’s chief information officer in Northern Ireland during the peak of the Troubles in the 1970s.
He was awarded an OBE in 1978 for services to the Government Information Service.
Returning to journalism,
David worked at our sister title the Kentish Gazette from 1983 to 1988, before becoming a public affairs consultant, working for companies including Vickers Defence Systems and Land Rover.
Back in uniform as a Territorial Army colonel, David ran the tri-service British section at the Coalition’s Joint Information Bureau in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia, during the first Gulf War in 1990/91.
He even roped down with special forces from a military helicopter onto the roof of the British Embassy in Kuwait city to re-occupy the building following the liberation of Kuwait.
Latterly David worked as the Lord Lieutenant’s media officer for both the late Allan Willett and Viscount De L’Isle and was appointed as a Deputy Lieutenant of Kent in 2006 alongside the musician Jools Holland.
A resident of Stelling Minnis for 40 years, David was closely involved with many village organisations over the years.
Writing was always his first love and David wrote Unconquered – The Story of Kent and its Lieutenancy, which was published in 2014.
His time in the Admiralty sparked his interest in Royal Naval history which led him to write a series of naval thrillers set in the Napoleonic era based in his home county.
David had been treated for Hodgkin lymphona but later developed a brain tumour. He died at the Pilgrims Hospice in Canterbury on February 27.
■ His funeral is at Barham Crematorium at 12.40pm on Monday, March 23, followed by a wake at The Jackdaw pub in Denton. Family flowers only. Donations to the hospice.