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No. 98. J. H. G. K. Mackie
James Mackie died in Grahamstown, South Africa, on 5th September 1973, aged 74 years. James joined the QVS in 1909 and left in July, 1913. He enlisted as a Cadet Pilot in 1918, but was discharged at the end of the 1914/18 War after only seven months service, he later emigrated to South Africa. On the outbreak of the 1939/45 War he joined the South African Air Force and served as a F/Sgt for 5^ years. On discharge he went into business on his own in Grahamstown.
The funeral arrangements were carried out by the South African Branch of the British Empire Services League.
To Mrs. Mackie in Grahamstown and his brother (No. 207) E. Mackie in Glasgow, we extend our deepest sympathy.
No. 92. Henry Findlay
Henry Findlay died at his home in Berwick-on-
Tweed on 12th December 1973. Henry joined the School in 1909 and left in 1913. He enlisted in the 11th Hussars in 1916 and was then transferred to KOS Borderers in 1917. He was severely wounded and discharged from the Service in 1918 owing to the effects of his wounds, and granted a disability pension.
Henry had no known living relations and funeral arrangements were carried out by his Regimental Association.
Mr. V. H. Le Maistre, DA
On the 21st June 1973, just as the School year and the Summer Term were drawing to a close, the School suffered one of the most grievous shocks and personal losses in its history, by the tragically sudden and unexpected death, from heart failure, of its much loved and greatly respected Senior Master and Head of Art Department, Mr. Le Maistre. Known to one and all as "Vie," and so referred to in the remainder of this tribute, he had for so long been a central figure, and indeed dominant influence, in the School that for a while after his death it seemed to many of us that it was almost impossible for the School to continue without him, so deeply was he involved in so many aspects of our life, activities, and work.
Before joining the School in September 1951, as one of the first four civilian Masters to be included in what had until then been an entirely military teaching staff, he had been Art Master at Arbroath High School.
Being of the generation whose early career had been interrupted by the war he had not completed his training at the Dundee College of Art, to which he had gone on leaving Lawside Academy where he received his earlier education, when war broke out. He immediately joined the Royal Engineers and
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served at the "sharp end" throughout the "blitz" as a member of a bomb disposal squad. He was later commissioned into the Black Watch and saw active service with the 6th Battalion of that Regiment in North Africa and Italy. This period of his life is commemorated by a picture done by him on the Italian front, which he presented to the School and which hangs in the corridor leading to the Library. The war over, he returned to Dundee College of Art to complete his DA course and then began his long teaching career which was for the greater part to be carried out at QVS.
As an Art Master he was widely recognized to be in the first rank. Not so much by his undoubted success in bringing on, and launching into a successful career in art, the comparatively few boys of real talent who passed through his hands. But chiefly because of his exceptional capacity, due as much to his personal qualities as to his own considerable artistic talent, to bring out the utmost creative capacity of the mediocre, and even to lead those of no artistic talent at all to some appreciation of, and interest in, form and beauty, and a sense of personal creative accomplishment, however limited.
In another artistic field, that of drama, he made a great contribution in the development of self
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