Death of baron, 105, who lived life like a Boy’s Own adventure
ONE of Wales’ most colourful characters has died aged 105. Geoffrey Alexander RowleyConwy, the 9th Baron Langford, was famed for war exploits that included dodging Japanese bombs in a flimsy boat as he refused orders to surrender and sailed 1,500 miles across the Bay of Bengal.
He remained a larger-thanlife personality throughout his life, campaigning for the abolition of the new 50p piece in the 1970s and celebrating his 93rd birthday in 2005 by buying himself a new quad bike.
Born on March 8, 1912, he lived at the Bodrhyddan estate in Rhuddlan, which he inherited on the death of his unmarried and childless paternal uncle, Captain Rafe Grenville Rowley-Conwy, in April 1951.
He is perhaps best known for an incredible escape during the Second World War, when he, then a major in the Royal Artillery and based in Singapore, fled from the island after the Japanese took control.
The incredible feat is chronicled in the 1973 book Escape from the Rising Sun, by Ian Skidmore.
The Japanese forces invaded the following year when Rowley-Conwy was in command of an anti-aircraft battery which fought against the enemy bombers.
Once he was reprimanded for wasting ammunition when he fired guns to knock Japanese mortar battery spotters out of a palm tree on the Johore Straits.
In February 1942 the British garrison surrendered. But refusing to surrender and be captured, the major decided to leave, taking a handful of soldiers with him.
The group of 19 sailed 1,500 miles across the Bay of Bengal with few supplies in a frail sailing boat and dodging bombs before reaching safety in Ceylon.
The Daily Telegraph writes that Rowley-Conwy had only had experience of sailing dinghies before he set off on the journey, but managed to dodge two bombs from a Japanese plane as they crossed the Strait of Malacca to Sumatra.
According to the paper, when Rowley-Conwy arrived in Rengat, a local Dutch controller told him he should try to rescue people still stranded between Malaya and Sumatra.
Rowley-Conwy went on to make the journey from Rengat three times, rescuing more than 500 people from the advancing Japanese army.
According to the obituary, his only map was torn out of a school atlas.
But his rescuing efforts didn’t end there, and he took a crew of 17 on a 1,659-mile journey across the Indian Ocean in a boat so flimsy that, according to the paper, it had threadbare sails.
The paper adds that when a storm threatened to ruin the sails Rowley-Conwy was picked to climb the bowsprit to furl the jib.
After several storms, nearly being shipwrecked and machine-gun fire from the Japanese forces, they arrived in Ceylon after 36 days, 13 hours and 31 minutes’ sailing.
Lord Langford, who held the title of Constable of Rhuddlan Castle, was married three times – he wed his current wife, Susan, in 1975 – and his heir is Owain, his third son from his second marriage.
He attributed his longevity to his genes, as his mother was 104 when she died in 1984, his father having been killed in Gallipoli in 1915.
Ann Davies, past chairman of Denbighshire Council, said: “He did much for the community of Rhuddlan and attended various events over the years.
“It was always delightful to visit Lord Langford at Bodrhyddan Hall and hear all about his interesting life experiences.
“It was poignant that his passing was on Remembrance Day.
“As past chairman of DCC it was a privilege visiting Bodrhyddan Hall to deliver a 105th birthday card to Lord Langford on behalf of the authority.
“This remarkable man will be sadly missed.”
A spokesman for the Welsh Ambulance Service said: “We were called at approximately 1.35pm on Sunday afternoon to an address on Dyserth Road, Rhuddlan.
“We sent a crew in an emergency ambulance and a paramedic in a rapid-response vehicle to the scene.”