Peter Donovan, known to his many friends in the regiment as Dipper, joined the 4th Queen’s Own Hussars in 1954.
As a troop leader, he was immensely popular with his men, often ‘getting his hands dirty’ in assisting the squadron fitters, playing rugby for the squadron and training its boxing team. Anarchic by nature he found it difficult to accept uncritically the restrictive nature of military life and on amalgamation in 1958 he transferred briefly to the 5th Royal Inniskilling Dragoon Guards as its Motor Transport Officer.
Leaving the army he took with him his four primary addictions: Yorkshire, cricket, Bridge and beer. He had played Bridge in the 4th Hussars to such good effect that he seldom had a large mess bill. For fifty-seven years from 1966, he wrote the Bridge column of the Daily Mail, making him the longest-serving Bridge correspondent of all time and earning an entry in the Guinness Book of Records. His book Bridge Is Still an Easy Game was widely read and he was assiduous in encouraging the young to take up the game.
Despite his busy life (he also ran a marketing company and sat on the Bridge Committee of the MCC) he never severed his links with the regiments which succeeded the 4th and in later years became a substantially generous donor of funds to the Regimental Association and its benevolent fund. He also subsidised the publication in 2018 of the regimental history In Peace and War.
Peter was an unfailingly affable companion whose regular attendance at regimental and Association events will be much missed. To his wife Michele and his three sons go our deepest sympathy for their loss.
