My friend George Montague, who has died aged 98, was a gay rights campaigner known affectionately in Brighton as “the oldest gay in the village”. He even wrote a book of that title, published in 2014. He was a regular and popular participant in Brighton’s Pride parade, latterly riding his mobility scooter decked out with rainbow flags and banners.
George was born in Hackney, east London, and brought up in Hitcham, Buckinghamshire, the son of Nellie (nee New) and George Montague. Both his parents worked on the Hitcham House country estate – his father as a gardener and his mother in the laundry. George left the village school in Taplow, near Maidenhead, at the age of 14 and embarked on an apprenticeship in pattern making with the Machine Pattern company in Slough.
At the age of 18 he joined the RAF and served during the second world war in Southern Rhodesia (Zimbabwe) as a PT and drill instructor, training aircrew. After the war he completed his apprenticeship and became a fully qualified pattern maker in 1949. Then he started his own business, Montague Pattern and Casting, and ran it for the next 47 years.
George knew he was “different” from an early age, but the pressure to conform in postwar Britain, when homosexuality was illegal, led to his marriage in 1961 to his friend Vera Drye. They settled in Buckinghamshire, and had three children. In 1974 George was charged and convicted of gross indecency – a traumatic event that caused him to reappraise his the direction of his life.
In 1976 he became smitten with sailing and set about building his own boat, Woody. Then in the early 1980s, after the death of his mother and with his children becoming adults, George and Vera parted. They never divorced and remained friends until her death in 2001.
I first met George in 1982 when he joined the Sailing and Cruising Association, a national LGTBQ+ sailing group. George quickly became an active member of the club. Many cross-Channel trips to France followed from his base in Brighton marina, as well numerous trips along the south coast. Although Woody was sold in 2000, George remained a member of the club for the rest of his life.
In 1997 George retired from his business. In the same year he met Somchai Phukkhlai, and in 2001 they set up home in an apartment on Brighton sea front.
George was determined to heal the injustice of the past. When, in 2016, the government pardoned gay and bisexual men who had been convicted under historical anti-gay laws, this was not good enough for George, who believed that a pardon implied guilt. He drew up a petition calling for an apology, which he delivered to 10 Downing Street. Eventually, in 2017, George received a full apology from the Home Office, in a letter that said the treatment of George and others had been entirely unfair and was “a matter of the greatest regret”.
George and Somchai became civil partners in 2006 and married in 2015. George is survived by Somchai, his daughter, Paula, his sons, Martin and Edward, and three grandchildren.
