FAMILY and friends across nautical, educational and sporting spheres are poised to wave bon voyage to a shipmate who has reached his final anchorage after an 80-year sail.

One-time Able Seaman Sam Hill, of Eccleston, passed away at home after a lengthy illness. He leaves his wife Jean, daughters Elizabeth and Rebecca, plus grandchildren Stefan and Sofia.

Raised in Fairclough Road and an old boy of St. Teresa’s Junior and West Park Grammar Schools, Sam became a noted athlete and won the Victor Ludorum Trophy in 1944, in particular for his speed on the running track.

He enlisted as an 18-year-old national serviceman in the Royal Navy in 1947, serving on minesweepers, submarines and the battleship HMS Belfast, which now lies at anchor in the Thames estuary.

‘Join the Navy and see the world’ is perhaps a cliché, but seagoing Sam certainly did his best to meet that demanding criteria for he spliced the mainbrace in the Atlantic Ocean, Scandinavia, Ireland, Portsmouth and the Clyde.

Always a ‘jolly tar’ and never a confirmed landlubber, Sam continued to find his sea legs with the St. Helens Royal Naval Association as a founder member on demobilisation in 1949.

Employment-wise, Sam initially worked for Pilkington, before training for the teaching profession at Manchester University and went on to serve at Grange Park, where he was later appointed head of the lower school.

Reverting to a sporting theme, he was a nephew of brothers Jack, Tommy and Gerald Waring, all of whom played for Saints, while Sam himself was no slouch on the wing for West Park Rugby Union club.