Weymouth harbour death: Tributes to victim (From Dorset Echo)

Weymouth harbour death: Tributes to victim

10:00am Tuesday 9th March 2010 in

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A TALENTED actor and rugby player who was found dead in Weymouth Harbour has been honoured by family and friends.

Tributes have poured in for former Weymouth Drama Club member Glyn Watkins, 38, whose body was discovered last Thursday.

Mr Watkins, of St Leonard’s Road, Weymouth, also played rugby for Weymouth and was a member of The Black Dog pub rugby team.

He worked at Dorset County Hospital’s record office.

Weymouth held a minute’s silence before their game against Westbury on Saturday as a mark of respect for their former teammate. Club chairman Glyn Arnold said: “I grew up with Glyn and his death is a great loss.

“He was a lovely bloke and we used to spend a lot of time together when we were younger.

“News got around straight away at the club and everybody has commented.

“Glyn hasn’t played for the club for a number of years but everyone remembers him from his previous time here. It shows what an impact he had.”

Mr Watkins’s mother, Mary Le Breton, said her son had been ‘accidentally and tragically taken from all who loved him’.

She said: “The coroner says we’ll probably never know how Glyn died. There wasn’t any CCTV anywhere that they could pick up. It doesn’t look as though there was any third party involved.

“I found out about it on the Thursday from the police who were very swift.”

Mr Watkins moved to Weymouth from Portsmouth at the age of six with his mother, older half-brother Peter Le Breton, and younger twin brothers Garyth Watkins and Rees Cameron-Watkins.

Mrs Le Breton said the family lived on Portland for a while first and the brothers had a ‘wonderful time’ playing around the quarries until it got dark or she called their home using a fog horn.

Mr Watkins attended Wyke Regsi Infants School – then called Rainbows – St George’s School on Easton and the newly-built Southwell Primary School.

He then attended the Woodroffe School in Lyme Regis until the age of 18, when he joined the Royal Navy as a midshipman.

After a few years he left the Navy and returned to Weymouth where he worked at various pubs and bars across the town before working at Dorset County Hospital.

Mrs Le Breton said: “Glyn worked at the Rendezvous club when it first opened on the strength of his juggling skills.

“The advert, following the Cocktail film, asked for someone who could juggle cocktail shakers.

“He ended up being assistant manager there.”

She added: “Glyn had a lot of talent and could do anything he put his mind to. He could juggle, sing, act, play rugby and he loved pub quizzes.

“He spoke fluent Welsh and German and regularly helped to greet German exchange groups.”

He lived with his mother – who was taken ill eight years ago and is a dialysis patient – as her ‘helper.’ Mrs Le Breton, who has collected all the Echo cuttings of her son’s drama club performances, said: “He was very good. We went to see all of his performances.”

She said Glyn would be fondly remembered as an ‘eccentric’ who did not celebrate birthdays or Christmas, but enjoyed St David’s Day and St Patrick’s Day because it was a good excuse to socialise.

She said: “He was great with animals, children and old ladies, the one disappointing thing is he didn’t have a special person. It was my wish to see him happily married.”

The funeral arrangements will be announced in the Echo when they are finalised. Mr Watkins’s family said they intend to have him cremated in his Welsh rugby shirt.