Former Tayside charity stalwart Silvia Hazel Fallon has passed away at the age of 97.
Known as Hazel, she was a former county commissioner at Dundee Girl Guides, and also helped charities including Save the Children and Lord Roberts’ Workshop.
Born in Speldhurst, Kent on November 26 1922 after her only sibling June, she later moved to Invergowrie to be with her husband Martin, whom she married in 1950.
Martin had been appointed as a consultant chest surgeon two years earlier at the former Eastern Regional Hospital Board.
After settling in Tayside in Invergowrie, they had three sons, Charles, Michael and Nigel.
Sir Michael served as an MP for many years and later defence secretary in David Cameron’s Conservative government from 2014 to 2017.
Hazel’s charity work was inspired by her experiences during the Second World War, particularly while at the Royal Navy’s Voluntary Aid Detachment (VAD), a unit providing nursing care for military personnel.
While a teenager at the Royal Naval Hospital near Chatham, she lived through a month-long aerial bombardment by the Nazis.
As a resident of Tayside in later times, she was the head of Dundee Girl Guides for 10 years from 1965 to 1975.
Such was her passion for helping others, her volunteering and charity work only slowed down when she reached her 80s when she threw herself into her new role as a grandmother.
Known as a very bright individual, she had planned on studying English at London University before war disrupted her plans.
She was constantly outdoors, participating in hobbies such as skiing, fly-fishing, climbing, and walking, making Scotland her ideal home.
Having moved back to her home in Kent in her later years, the lure of Tayside’s natural playground quickly brought her back on a permanent basis in 1984.
Those who knew her would describe her as a lively, able, family-minded, inquisitive woman who loved gardening.
Having fought dementia for a number of years, Hazel, a much-loved grandmother, mother, as well as sister to the late June, passed away at Ochil Care Home on December 31 2019.
The funeral will be held today (Friday) at Perth Crematorium at 3pm.
