Alastair Miller, soon to be known to his brother officers as Dusty, joined ‘C’ Squadron of the Irish Hussars in Borneo in 1963.

Lt Col A. Miller, O.B.E.
Lt Col A. Miller, O.B.E.

Thrown in at the deep end, this period of active service took him and his troop to Sabah (North Borneo) where, in a whirl of Gurkhas, long boats, jungle and expected Indonesian incursions, all his military fantasies came true. He loved it and loved the opportunity it gave him to climb (alone) the 13,000-foot Mount Kinabalu – the highest in Malaysia.

From this, he developed a lasting taste for climbing becoming a qualified instructor. His tour in Malaysia over he went up to Oxford University where he acquired both a degree and a wife before rejoining the regiment at Bovington from where he did a six-month posting to Northern Ireland, travelling to work in Lisburn on an ancient moped and wearing a tent hat.

Dusty’s evident taste for eccentric vehicles was given full rein on his arrival at Paderborn in 1970 as instanced by the appearance of several ancient Volkswagen Beetles and a lurid collection of hand-painted mini-buses.

In the mid-seventies, he went to Cyprus during a Greek/Turkish fracas as an emergency operations officer (the bulk of the regiment was also there as United Nations troops) and then commanded in turn Administrative Squadron, Command and Support and ‘A’ Squadron before becoming an instructor at the Armour School at Bovington and subsequently joining the Armoured Trials and Development Unit bringing Challenger I into service.

His final regimental tour was as second-in-command in Munster, taking a battle group to the Suffield training area in Canada at a time when the commanding officer was unwell.

On promotion, Dusty took command of the Armoured Corp’s gunnery wing at Hohne where he had the misfortune to be chief judge in a year when the British astonishingly came last in the international tank gunnery competition known as the Canadian Army Trophy. But out of this calamity came the burgeoning of what became a most successful second career. The Ministry of Defence demanded an investigation into this failure, and Dusty’s work in carrying out a detailed review – a process which involved analysing every shot fired during the competition – resulted in far-reaching changes in tank gunnery techniques, widespread admiration for his work and the award of an OBE.

On retirement he and his wife bought a hotel in Lulworth Cove, generously hosting regimental reunions, but Dusty also continued his work in the technical gunnery field, setting up with Major Albert Hogg, another former Irish Hussar, a company to develop simulator training.

In 2013 he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, heralding an inevitable and progressive decline in his health. Ten years later he died.

Alastair Miller was not only an accomplished soldier and technician but a man universally respected and admired by his peers. To his devoted wife, Catriona, their three sons, (one of whom, William, followed his father into the regiment) and their families go our deepest sympathy.

Related topics

  1. A Short History of The Queen’s Royal Irish Hussars
  2. Timeline: Malaya and Borneo 1962-64