A MEMORIAL service will be held to remember a former mayor’s escort and local historian who did much for his community.

Fredy Litschi died in Weymouth earlier this year just before his 90th birthday and will be remembered by many for his good looks, continental charm and community efforts.

His daughter Isolde said: “Although German-Swiss, Fredy absolutely fell in love with Dorset when he and wife Joyce moved down here in 1966 and he became the local historian of Sutton Poyntz.

“His booklet Round and About in Sutton Poyntz and Preston, published in 1990, proved very popular and he was a regular contributor to the Dorset Year Book.

“He was one of the founding members of the Sutton Poyntz Society in 1968 and full of good ideas, enthusiastically supporting projects such as the Bicentenary Walk and the Village Stone (now in the bridge north of the pond).

“As one of the village theatre group, he was also game to put on a smock for a performance at the Pavillion or the local fair.”

She added: “Being a Thomas Hardy enthusiast, he suggested a chalk trumpet on the hillside to celebrate Sutton Poyntz’s fame as the village of The Trumpet Major. He was disappointed not to achieve that but he did have one of Hardy’s unpublished stories printed at his own cost.”

Isolde said some will also remember her father for his free German classes which proved very popular.

She added: “He also joined the Holzwickede Society and travelled with Joyce when she went to Weymouth’s twin town of Louviers as part of her civic role.

“A lot of his time was spent being supportive to Joyce during her 17 years as councillor for Preston and then during her year as Mayor of Weymouth and Portland, when they attended over 365 engagements, but he also served as a county councillor.”

Fredy was born in Germany in 1926. He fled to join his Swiss mother in Zurich during the war.

While working in Lucerne, he fell in love with Joyce, a young English tourist, and applied for a work permit so he could join her in the UK. They moved from the Midlands to London in 1952 and in 1966 he accepted a job as a child care officer with Dorset County Council and they made their home in Sutton Poyntz.

n Fredy’s family and friends are holding a memorial service for him at St Andrew’s Church in Preston from noon on Friday, May 6.

For more information contact Cotton and Son on 01305 767676.