Dennis Bentley correspondence

Edited by Dave Shotton
Following the sad passing of Derek Seddon last year, the club was contacted in December 2017 first by Peregrine (Perry) Bentley and then by his father Dennis Bentley. Dennis was a member of the KMC from 1945 to 1952 so was a member throughout the key formative years of the club, as described in his evocative email below. He is mentioned in a number of the first meet reports in the original handwritten Record of Meets from early 1945 and in the first club Newsletter of October 1945.

Peregrine wrote:
In conversation with my dad today he mentioned the passing of Derek and that there are photos on your website that include my father and his climbing pals at the time....
Dad married a Lancashire lass then came to Dorset to raise his family after their marriage.
Mum has just passed on but Dad still lives in Dorset. I live in BC Canada. My elder brother also married a Lancashire lass and lives in Whalley.
As an aside, my Canadian wife is an accomplished outdoors woman and amateur mountaineer and has even made a few 20,000 ft + peaks so she and dad have a love of the mountains in common.

Dennis later emailed in person and wrote:
Many thanks for your [Dave Shotton’s] email in reply to Perry’s enquiry. It has given me great pleasure to read your news. I had mentioned the photos to him on our Sunday evening FaceTime. He lives in Kelowna in the Okenagen Valley in British Columbia, he is surrounded by mountains currently under their first blanket of winter snow - you would be welcome to call!
I first became acquainted with the group of young men and women who would become the Karabiner Club in 1942/43. I was an engineering apprentice and had a colleague who told me stories of his adventures in the hills so I decided to have a go. One Sunday morning I boarded a train in Manchester without any clear idea of where I was going. There were three occupants in the compartment and we got chatting. One was Len Stubbs, his brother, and a middle-aged man named Jim Widdecombe. We got chatting and Len suggested since I had no plans why not accompany them for the day. That day was the first of many with Len, and the group of walkers and climbers who would become the K.M.C. We were a mixed group of young men and women from various backgrounds much as it is today I expect.
The thought of forming a Club was an ongoing subject over several weeks. One weekend after a day climbing on Windgather Rocks we landed up in the pub at Kettleshulme. A leading supporter of the Club idea was Plum Worrall. That evening he said we ought to make a move and called for a meeting to be held at his and wife, Robbie’s home. I was invited to attend as a prospective junior members rep on the Committee.

I have always regarded Plum (Norman) as the Founding Father of the Club - one of Nature’s Gentlemen. What a guy, pulled from the sea at Dunkirk with a bullet in the leg, and exhausted from the trek to get there. And that front room of theirs!...
I really had better call it a day there, such great memories.
Best wishes to you all from Dennis Bentley

Left: Dennis Bentley on a Lakeland 3000s attempt. From Len Stubbs’ photo collection