Part 2 (Obituaries) - King's College - University of Cambridge

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OBITUARIES
meals to the aged and ill in the community and was always on hand to help
a neighbour in need. The parish enjoyed his musical skills; for Peter, playing
the organ in the church for his fellow men was not only an honour but also
a duty. He would perform this task even though he was infirm and had to
crawl up the last steps to the organ on his hands and knees. Peter was a caring
and loving husband, father and teacher. He was always modest, but he had a
strong and positive influence on the great number of people that he met
during his life.
Peter is survived by his wife and his two sons.
MICHAEL GEORGE CHRISTIE (1946) was born on 19 July 1923 in
Clevedon, Somerset, where his father was a dentist. At the age of seven,
Michael was sent to attend preparatory school in Warwickshire, and despite
finding the experience disagreeable he buckled down and studied hard,
eventually winning a scholarship to Winchester College.At Winchester he not
only had a better time, but also won a scholarship to attend King’s. However,
the outbreak of war meant that Michael had to defer his entry to Cambridge
in order to serve with the 12th/27th Lancers.
After the training regiment, Michael continued to Sandhurst to become an
officer. In the field, Michael was not keen on letting his men become aware of
his youth, hoping that they would think their Captain rather older than he
actually was. At the ferocious 1944 battle of Monte Cassino during the Italian
campaign, Michael was wounded and lost the sight in one eye. He was taken
to the beautiful Sorrento coast for convalescence, where he was cared for by
attractive American nurses.The loss of his eye led him to use a monocle rather
than glasses, which gave him an air of having stepped out of a London Club or
an old Officers’ Mess, although in reality he was far from a haughty aristocrat.
Michael was demobbed in 1946, and could finally take up his place at King’s
to study Science. At Cambridge he was influenced by the entomologist and
ecologist George Salt, and it was probably through Salt that Michael first
became fascinated by parasites, whose interplay with their hosts was Salt’s