Hilda Swinney obituary

Here Echo editor Diarmuid MacDonagh remembers a woman who gave so much to so many people over countless years.

Journalist, raconteur, playwright, producer, director and friend. But most importantly mother, grandmother, great-grandmother, sister and an inspiration to all.

Hilda during the Portland bomb evacuation

I KNEW I would like Hilda from the moment I picked up the phone.

‘So you’re the new boy’ she said in that lilting Scottish tone that she held as close to her heart as her family, despite decades away from her beloved homeland.

‘When are you coming to see me? I have to give all the new reporters the once over to see if they are up to scratch. And you don’t come on to my patch without telling me first’.

An invitation and a warning in one. Her patch was Portland and she was mightily proud of her status as Echo correspondent. The Echo had but one correspondent and would probably not have dared to anoint another.

So my first visit to Portland was to New Street and an audience with Hilda. She lit a cigarette, made coffee and we fell into easy conversation. It stayed that way for 27 years.

Hilda was born in Dundee in 1927, brought up surrounded by Jute mills and love although times were tough. She left school at 14 to work in a baker’s shop where she eventually became manageress. Other jobs in her early life ranged from being a window dresser in a fashion store to positions in a fish shop, a shoe shop and the Timex factory as a clerk.

She left Dundee in 1959, the year she married husband Ernie, who was an airfitter in the Fleet Air Arm. There followed a peripatetic existence taking in Newcastle, Arbroath, Gosport, and Dundee again before Ernie left in 1970 to join the prison service.

Never one to rest on her laurels, Hilda decided to take night classes and secured a top pass in A-level English.

She had been involved in a concert group in Arbroath and when they moved to Wiltshire when Ernie took up a position at Erlestoke detention centre, she started another one. She was soon writing, producing and directing and her love of the written word, combined with her natural curiosity and unrelenting charm, nudged her towards journalism.

She became the Lavington district reporter for the Wiltshire Gazette and Herald and a memorable career was born.

In 1978 Ernie took a job at the then Portland Borstal and Hilda managed to secure her position on the Dorset Echo.

She said: “I took it easy at first but I made sure I went to every event and from each event I would make another contact and very often pick up another story.”

Soon she knew everyone and everyone knew Hilda. She swept away any perceived notions of Portland insularity through her force of personality and intrinsic kindness.

Hilda made the headlines herself when one of her stories became a local emergency and a national fascination after an unexploded Second World War bomb was discovered beneath the pitch of Portland United Football Club.

The national and international press descended on the isle as a mass evacuation was ordered. But Hilda was always one step ahead as she had the contacts, the trust and the respect of everyone on the isle.

She had her own inimitable style that was undoubtedly due to never having to suffer the constraints of a newsroom. Her written words spoke to the people as she would converse with them. Many prospective journalists think all they need to succeed is a talent to write well. However, if you don’t possess the natural ability to persuade people to talk to you, you don’t have a story to write.

Hilda always had the story. If it happened on Portland it appeared in the paper.

Hilda knew most things and most people. If we needed information about something relating to Portland we would ring Hilda. If she didn’t know the answer she would provide it after a few calls had been made.

And she helped many young reporters over the years. They had their audience, their appraisal and were enriched by the experience whether they realised it at the time or not. But Hilda had experience in nurturing. She was enormously proud of her three sons, her 10 grandchildren and great-granddaughter. We would speak for hours about family, asking for the latest news on someone we had never met, and most probably never would, but we asked because it mattered.

Hilda didn’t do idle chat. She didn’t suffer fools gladly or otherwise and made a difference without realising she was doing so.

Hilda’s achievements were of course rightly recognised when she was awarded the MBE. She was nominated by the people she proudly spoke for and they had now spoken for her.

Journalism was just one part of her life and she was involved in organisations and events too numerous to mention. She wrote pantomimes and plays and brought people together in ways that enriched their lives also.

She won awards and was made an honourary member of innumerable organisations.

She would say: “I have no idea why they want to do that’, but she was always inwardly pleased and proud.

She questioned everything and everyone and never settled for the easy or expected answer.

When she was forced to give up her role in 2002 due to her failing eyesight she was devastated.

She said: “Working for the Echo has been like working for a family. It has been my hobby, it has been my life, it has been my everything. How many people are fortunate enough to be paid for their hobby and make a lot of friends as well?”

But there was an upside to every setback.

She added: “There are advantages to losing your sight because when I look in the mirror I don’t see any dust around the house and I don’t see any lines on my face.”

I had my last audience with Hilda in hospital just a few days before she died. She was still full of life, though we knew it was silently and insidiously ebbing away. She was directing operations, berating staff and making plans to return home.

I didn’t think she would make it but, yet again, she proved me and many others wrong. She returned to New Street and passed away a short time later in the arms of her son.

The way it should be and the way she would have wanted it. Most probably the way she would have written it.

Hilda at the Portland Pancake Day races in 2007

Our mum, MBE 

As you would expect we have so many endless memories of mum from when we were infants through to our last treasured moments with her.

In our eyes we had the best Mum anyone could wish for, perhaps we were the chosen ones to have been blessed with having Hilda Swinney MBE as our mother.

Our upbringing was quite a tapestry to say the least and enriched so much by our parents with mum undoubtedly in the lead and ‘wearing the trousers’ without leaving our father in the shadows. Considering mum was forced/ had to leave school at 14 in order to bring in much-needed income for her family, look what she achieved and gave.

Mum’s generosity was endless in all aspects, her love for us was enduring and limitless, as is ours for her. The high standards she set herself we hope have rubbed off on us and we can take forward and through our own children leave her mark and a forever legacy of ‘our mum’.

Through thick and thin, and irrespective of the time and distance between us, mum was the fabric that held us all together. Without doubt she was, and will remain, as the matriarch that brought the McGurty and Swinney families together, from which mum’s family has grown further and hopefully will reach through generations to come.

We are humbled by the love and pride she had with us all spanning three generations through her grandchildren and her great granddaughter Elsie, who, when she held in her few days put such a smile on mum’s face, sheer and absolute delight and love, a picture that will live with the family forever.

Mum never put herself first, her three ‘laddies’ and subsequently our families were first and foremost in all she did. She was so proud of her family and she made sure that everybody knew it.

This ‘others first’ attitude extended beyond her own family. Her contribution to the wider population was renowned and so well received, again this was something mum was so proud of and rightly so, something she was humbled by through the recognition and many awards she received over the years.

Mum was accepted and made her mark, though she shrugged her shoulders and stated that it was not deserved because it was just ‘what she did’.

Loving, caring, devoted, proud, loyal, generous, inspirational, confident, forthright, humble, independent the list goes on……..Most of all mum was our Mother, who we loved dearly, we were and remain so proud of her in everything she did and stood for. Her legacy will live on. Our love for Mum was and remains endless, we know that she will continue to look over us and remain as a loving, guiding mind.

Mum, although she probably never showed it, was so grateful and thankful for the friendship and love extended to her throughout her life, none more so than that received from her adopted home of Portland.

Portland is a place she fell in love with, not only for the rugged beauty but for the warmth of the people, her dear friends who made Portland her home.

By her sons Eric, Kevin & Doug 

Hilda aged 18

Hilda was the “firstborn”...then there was Rose, David, Marjorie...and me, Dorothy; Raymond was the youngest born four years later.

I was born 12 years after Hilda. So why did she make such an impact on me?

Looking back, it was as if she was not only my sister but my personal teacher and mentor through all my schooling and beyond.

Almost before I started school she would tell me lots of stories ...e.g.” You were only a few weeks old when we all moved to our house (Wellburn Street). Then later...”you were born 10 days after the war was declared. ...and “See that Anderson shelter in the back garden” another story.

Then I was acquainted with the library in Lochee where they had ”lots and lots of books.” She made it sound like an Aladdin's cave and there was a children's corner.

I didn’t care that a lot of the books were worse for wear; Hilda would go and choose her library books while I sat all by myself..and I loved it.

I could hardly wait for my seventh birthday so that I could have a library ticket of my own and I became a regular visitor. There were also visits to the museum and reference library in the city centre and in time I was allowed to go by myself.

In the school holidays, Hilda organised visits to the Edinburgh Zoo with the famous Orang Utan Gand the Sir Walter Scott Monument (you had to climb all the stairs to the top.) Time passed....

Then it seemed there was room for improvement in my speech and grammar in readiness for a next school and the 11 Plus examination. So...I could speak in the local dialect with my pals or in the playground - but not in the classroom or when speaking to a teacher. Then I would score better marks for my written work.

She also announced when I was ten years of age that in her view I would make a good nurse.

I never resented any of her advice and I took it as “Gospel” so 12 years later I followed in her footsteps and passed for Lawside Academy.

Some of our teachers were nuns as was the headmistress, Sister Mary Joseph.

I grew accustomed and was proud to be asked by a number of staff including the headmistress if Hilda (McGurty) was my sister and I was proud to say yes.

And the rest is history... yes, I did become a nurse.

Hilda had the ability to show me how to acquire the skills and love of learning which she already possessed and they have never left me.

I will miss our (long) conversations by phone, to bridge the gaps between visits – but treasuring the joys of having had a sister like my Hilda.

Hilda’s sister Dorothy MacDonald

My earliest recollection of my sister Hilda’s community spirit and organisational prowess was when she orchestrated a musical concert in our back garden during the Second World War, to raise money for our brave soldiers. Hilda must have been all of 12 years old. No wonder Hilda was so good at these sorts of things throughout her life. She started young and had years of practice.

I remember from time to time I would say to Hilda "you are so good at doing all that charitable work and shows/ pantomimes" and she would answer, in a tone that many would recognise "No I'm not, I'm doing it because I want to do it and anyway, I get to choose myself as Leading Lady, how many people can do that?" We would both laugh. We very seldom ended a conversation without finding something amusing. I will certainly miss my big sister who I loved dearly.

Hilda’s sister Marjorie Smart

Obviously I have so many memories from the last 30+ years but I can claim fame for being typecast in many an entertainment as 'The Floosie' - no protests accepted because 'It has to be you as I can't ask anyone else!'

So you can imagine my relief one year as another Burns Night approached and Hilda said, 'I know you're busy so this year you've only got to mime as I'm going to read it all'. I was still none the wiser when advised I was Cutty Sark in Tam O' Shanter and too rushed to worry where a ship came into it! Only at the costume stage did it become clear that Cutty Sark /cut skirt was the original mini-skirted floosie of them all.

I did protest that at over 50 I could hardly run like a dervish round the hall half naked but to no avail as obviously 'I can't ask anyone else'. The resultant humiliation raised mirth and money aplenty as she knew it would and my reputation was permanently sealed.

Friend Lucy Hornby

Everyone knew Hilda as she was such a community-spirited lady. I used to go to Hilda’s for the traditional Burns Night celebration and I have fond memories of the pancake races and of course the pantomimes. She has such a zest for life, it was sad that her failing eyesight put a stop to these, though she did bravely soldier on for as long as she could. She must have made lots of people happy with her articles she wrote in The Echo about their special celebrations – one of the old school journalists. She will be sadly missed by all of her friends on Portland and wider afield.

Friend Pat McLuckie

I find it very difficult to put into words what I want to say. I wish Hilda was here as she would be able to put it in to words for me. I used to look forward to when we used to meet, we would sit and have a coffee and start chatting, we would talk ourselves around the world for hours often losing track of time. She was such a knowledgeable person so interesting and engaging I am going to miss her dearly.

Friend Terry Shakespeare