Orders, Decorations and Medals

A Diplomat's C.M.G., O.B.E. group of five to Mr. John Boyd Denson, former British Ambassador in Nepal and charge d'affaires in Peking

ORDER OF ST. MICHAEL AND ST. GEORGE, C.M.G., neck badge in silver gilt and enamels, chips to two arms and enamel lacking from figure of St. Michael; ORDER OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE, O.B.E. (Civil) 2nd type; 1939-45 STAR; DEFENCE AND WAR MEDALS, with card box of issue addressed to 'Capt. J.B. Denson, Cambridge', his calling card as First Secretary, British Embassy, Helsinki, and a companion set of miniature dress medals, together with 1914-15 STAR TRIO awarded to his father (99525 Cpl. G. Denson, R.A.) unless otherwise described, very fine or better (13)

John Denson was Britain's charg6 d'affaires in Peking towards the end of China's cultural revolution. When he arrived at the start of 1969 the British mission was still a burnt-out shell after being sacked two years before by the Red Guards who had also beaten up his predecessor. Denson himself was once jostled and held for two hours by an angry, xenophobic mob until he was able to seek help from a police station. His three years as 'our man in Peking' will be remembered, however, as a period of developing rapprochement, not only between China and this country but between the People's Republic and the rest of the world. This was the time of 'ping pong diplomacy' and Henry Kissinger and one in which Denson himself scored something of a diplomatic triumph by being officially allowed to tour China. Among his happier duties during his first year in Peking was to welcome the Reuter's journalist Anthony Grey when he was finally released after more than two years under house arrest. Denson had to leave prematurely in 1971 for medical treatment for a back condition in Hong Kong.

But by then he had done the job expected of him by preparing the way for his successor John Addis to become the first fully fledged British ambassador in Peking. It was a job for which Denson was singularly well qualified. A fluent Mandarin speaker and leading Foreign Office sinologist he had spent the previous three years in Whitehall as assistant head of the Far East department. As such he had been involved in the negotiations which led to Britain's de-recognition of the nationalist Chinese government in Formosa and the re-establishment of full diplomatic relations with Peking. His appointment as chargé d'affaires in succession to Percy Craddock (later to become Mrs. Thatcher's special adviser on foreign affairs) was seen as a significant step forward. At one point in his career it seemed as if trouble was John Denson's business. He served in Laos throughout two coups d'etat (with fighting across the border in Vietnam) and was consul-general in Athens from 1973 to 1977 a period which saw the British embassy attacked by government-sponsored thugs following the Turkish invasion of Cyprus in 1974. He was Britain's envoy in Katmandu between 1977 and 1983, an unusually long appointment which reflected his suitability in the job. But his hopes of then returning to a Chinese speaking country were frustrated by the lack of a suitably senior vacancy. So instead he chose early retirement.

Born in Sunderland, Denson went with his family to Cambridge while still a child and was educated at the Perse School. He served in the Royal Artillery during the last year of the war, then was transferred to the Intelligence Corps and drafted to Malaysia where he interrogated Japanese prisoners of war. A gifted linguist, he read English and oriental languages at St. John's College, Cambridge, before entering the Diplomatic Service in 1951. His early postings included Hong Kong, Peking, Tokyo, Helsinki and Washington.