Tribute to Pendennis Brass player Arthur Allen from Falmouth

For the greater part of his life, he was active in various sports, first as a player and then behind the scenes, notably in cricket, golf, football, snooker, badminton and squash.

Apart from a three-year spell with Mawnan, he was a playing member of Falmouth Cricket Club, mostly in the first team, from 1956 to 1985. As a solid and dependable early-order batsman, his highest innings was a century for the Seconds – 127 not out against St Gluvias in 1978 – and a 99 for the first team against Penzance in the early 1960s.

In 1959, although work commitments prevented him from playing in the final, he helped the Seconds on their way to arguably Cornish cricket’s biggest-ever shock, when they became the first and only reserve side to win the Vinter Cup 20-over knockout competition.

A few years later, with Wilf Perham, Arthur coached youngsters joining the club and co-founded a very successful Colts side. Arthur also served as a Falmouth Cricket Club committee member.

Arthur played for Falmouth Cricket Club from 1956 to 1985 (Image: Family picture)

He took up golf in the mid-1970s, starting with the Budock Vean club and becoming its captain in 1975.

He joined the Falmouth club in 1981, at the start of a 41-year association. Here, too, he was a committee member, and he played his last game just a few months before his death.

He was a winner of the club’s 36-hole Ryder Cup competition and was captain and president of Cornwall Golf Captains Society, for whom he played on tour.

In football, Arthur played for Perranwell but more memorably for Flushing as one of the last players to take part in an organised match on the narrow, sloping, uneven field beside the sea at Trefusis Point by Falmouth harbour, fondly known as Trefusis Stadium, in the late 1950s.

Arthur died aged 83 after a short illness (Image: Family picture)

Arthur, who moved from Truro to Falmouth in his late teens, began his footballing life as a goalkeeper but turned scorer when playing in the outfield and his father promised to pay him half-a-crown a hat-trick – an offer soon withdrawn when he realised how prolific a scorer his son was turning out to be.

In later years, Arthur played snooker first for Falmouth Working Men’s Club and then Woodlane Social Club, where he was also on the committee, and badminton and squash for the Falmouth Club.

His musical interests stretched back to early childhood when, at the age of nine, he began playing the cornet alongside his father in Truro City Brass Band.

After a break of some 30 years through his multiple sports activities, he resumed his involvement in music in 1998 when he joined the Pendennis Brass Band, playing the euphonium as well as cornet and remaining a member right up to his death.

With this band, he played at various national competitions all over the country and also took part in Pendennis’s annual Christmas concert in aid of charity. For around a dozen years, he was musical director of Pendennis Youth Band.

Arthur played euphonium for Pendennis Brass (Image: Family picture)

Apart from a brief spell with a building company on leaving school, Arthur was employed by the Packet for all of his working life, for almost 40 years. He served primarily as a compositor but also assisted with proof-reading.

Latterly, he organised an annual Christmas lunch get-together for former Packet employees. This ran for about ten years and pre-pandemic was consistently growing in numbers.

Also in the social sphere, he was a long-serving member of Falmouth’s Athenaem Club. Shortly after he had been taken ill, he was notified that he had been voted 2023 Clubman Of The Year for his long and loyal service.

He leaves a widow, Ann, to whom he had been married for 57 years and with whom he enjoyed travelling all over the world, and one sister, Elizabeth.

His funeral will be held at Penmount Crematorium in Truro at 11am on Wednesday, November 22.