A TRIBUTE TO DANNY ALLISON  OF KINGSTON.

It was very sad to receive an email from the Esher club secretary, Mike Charlton, today informing the membership of the passing of our former member, Danny Allison. Our Danny was a smashing man and passed away after a long illness on the morning of Wednesday, 29^th June. He was a great worker with his pigeons and achieved countless premier results over his life time in the sport. He helped many other fanciers over the years and would never see anybody in trouble. Danny’s sad passing is a massive lost to the Surrey pigeon racing fraternity. Our sincere condolences from us all to Danny’s family at this very sad time.

With us both being Kingston lads, Danny Allison and I must go back well over 40 years to the late 1970’s when we both raced in the Kingston & District HS, which was at that time one of the strongest clubs in the mighty Surrey Federation. Danny was born in to the pigeon racing sport with dad being a fancier and they flew in partnership for many years. They were very successful and when his dad came out of the sport, Danny took over the pigeons at a very young age. He had always raced on the natural system and has won many premier positions in the Federation and Combine through the years; the best being 1^st open SMT Combine Bergerac (450 miles). In recent years he had been in partnership with Dennis Sheppard and Martin Penfold, both premier fancier in the Surrey area, but about ten years ago he decided to go it alone again and approached Trussler Brothers of West Molesey for some stock birds. Dick and Brian gave him 15 widowhood cocks with their mates and this generous gift by the brother is the base of Danny’s very successful team in recent years. Danny told me that he was very grateful to Trussler Brothers, who had also given him other good stock pigeons and never charged him a penny! He called them the ‘Godfathers’ of pigeon racing and said they are two brilliant blokes. Danny also told me they had been so generous with gift pigeons and advice, he owed much of his recent good success to them!

Danny had many great seasons through the years, but these were some of his most recent successful races. The Three Borders Federation held its first continental race of the 2014 season from Falaise in mid-May and the event turned out to be a hard slog home for some of the convoy. The 740 birds were liberated at 13.30hrs in a strong West / South West wind situation, but on the day there were a lot of very heavy rain showers in the south of England and they cut off and held up a lot of the birds. Danny Allison and his then new partner, Amgad Ibrahim, had an excellent race recording 1^st & 2^nd Federation, with both birds being bred by Trussler Brothers of West Molesey. The Federation winner was a yearling mealy hen and Danny told me at the time, that the blue hen that won 2^nd Federation was home 30 seconds before the mealy, but wouldn’t trap. Two years earlier in the 2012, the Three Borders Federation moved a bit further down the road for the third event of the new season, flown from Yeovil and members sent 2,055 birds. The Esher & Dist. RPC, sent 346 birds and the ‘Master’, Danny Allison of Kingston, won the club and the Federation with a yearling cock.

At the end of the Three Borders Federation 2010 racing season and I was delighted to write that my ol’ mucker Danny Allison had won the Federation Individual Points Trophy and was the 2010 Federation champion! The Federation was one of the strongest in the UK and our Danny won the championship with 48 points with his South Downs club mates, Colin Crook and Andy Iddenden, being runners up on 41 points. The Three Borders Federation sent 1,409 birds to the last and longest young bird race of the 2009 season from Yelverton, and with the convoy being liberated at 09.00hrs in a very stiff East / North East wind, made the winners performance even more outstanding. Danny Allison finished a good season by recording 2^nd Federation, 2^nd open SMT Combine (3189 birds) with his Trussler blue hen, ‘Young Connie’. Another of Danny’s best racing young birds in the 2009 season was the Trussler blue chequer cock, ‘The Show Man’, and he was also raced the Federation programme paired up.

What can I write about Danny Allison that has not been written before about his great performances over his many years in the sport! He was one of the lads, always having a bit of banter and was a very dedicated and successful pigeon racer. He worked so hard with his birds, being a relentless trainer, with early morning tosses down the line to the New Forest area. Just a few seasons ago I can remember, I was in the car park at Winchester training my young birds and Danny pulled in behind me with his van full of pigeons, training his and his friend’s birds. He was a lovely man and always helping someone out. Danny Allison RIP.

KEITH MOTT (29^th June 2022)