The force that through the green fuse drives the flower
Drives my green age; that blasts the roots of trees
Is my destroyer. . .
There was really nothing wrong with Brian Pearce, these past months: nothing that medicine could sovereignly arrogate to its pathognomy - or cure. It was simply that he was falling prey to that build-in obsolescence devised by the same universal force that quickens us and crouches in ambush for us even in the womb. In plain and simple language: he had quietly grown old.
The Pearces originated in Cornwall, but Brian was born in London. His father was of Wesleyan/Methodist stock; his mother, Congregationalist. Both held freethinking, humanitarian, non-conformist views. Brian, though never a churchgoer, was a deeply Christian man and a humanist, which made him highly charitable and tolerant all his life.
On the sands of Bognor Regis, he rode ponies in summer, thus leading to his lifelong love of horses, his riding instructor's certificate, and his acquisition of a riding school in Surrey. At this time, he met and married his first wife, Daphne Pitt-Johnson, with whom he had two children, Robbin and Peter.
When the second World War came, Brian enlisted in the Royal Artillery and was assigned to the Army Fire Service. In Cairo, he edited and produced a monthly journal for the entire fire-fighting service, at home and abroad. There, too, he met his lifelong friend Johnny Tomiche, a Frenchman and later a brilliant journalist in Paris and Geneva. After the war, Brian worked briefly in Fleet Street, editing the same army magazine and then a similar commercial publication.
In 1947, Brian and Daphne moved to a farm outside Lismore. Both became Irish citizens and threw themselves into community life. Brian became deeply involved in Macra na Feirme, and later was a founder member of Waterford branch of the NFA (now IFA), of which he became secretary and organiser. In 1967, Brian and Daphne divorced.
The friendship between the Pearce family and Dervla Murphy led to Brian's visit to Ethiopia (his farm then under management), where he became assistant to the governor of Tigre province. His agricultural knowledge proved invaluable. He was also centrally involved in publicising the Ethiopian Orthodox sixth-century rock churches, just then rediscovered.
Back in Dublin (with his farm sold), Brian wrote for the Farmers' Journal and did some public relations; but the 1973 Ethiopian famine saw him leading the first Concern medical team there. On arrival, he was asked to administer CRDA (Christian Relief and Development Association). He was the perfect choice - a citizen of neutral Ireland, of British birth, and a humanist by faith and deed.
In Addis Ababa, Brian and Eilish returned to Ireland, where Brian became deputy director of Concern. When he retired, in 1980, he acted as project director for Aid-Link. Invited to join the Board of Self Aid Development, he brought invaluable experience to it, and he edited the organisation's magazine for some years.
In retirement, Brian had more time for his lifelong involvement in the steam age of railways. He and Eilish went on several skites (as they called them) all over Britain in search of the steam age. In this period, too, Brian made time for his serious interest in photography. He was proud of his published pictures in, among others, Horse and Hound and the Farmers' Journal.
Brian devoted his years in retirement to his wife Eilish, to family and friends, and to his garden in Monkstown, where he grew vegetables and tended his flowers and apple trees. He was a staunch support to Eilish in her demanding work in RT╔.
The two of them were hosts one visited without feeling an intruder or a stranger. The conversation they generated was well off the beaten track. They were a matched pair - united in humanity and consideration.
The hand that whirls the water in the pool
Stirs the quicksand; that ropes the blowing wind
Hauls my shroud sail. . .
T.