Tributes have been paid to well-known local author, journalist and historian Roscoe Howells, of Amroth, who died last week.

As briefly reported in our last issue, Roscoe sadly passed away at Park House Court Nursing Home, Tenby, where he had been resident for the past year. He was aged 94.

Always a colourful and sometimes controversial character, Roscoe was born in Saundersfoot in 1919 and began his working life as a full-time dairy farmer.

This early grounding stood him in good stead as he went on to combine his farming with a successful career as a prolific writer, producing many books as well as newspaper and magazine articles.

He wrote both novels and factual accounts of people and places, drawing on life in his home area, and his work always had as its hallmark a love of the countryside.

Indeed, Roscoe remained active for many years in agricultural spheres, being a past president of Pembrokeshire Agricultural Society, and a former chairman and president of the Welsh Guernsey Cattle Breeders Association, of which he was the first honorary life member.

As a journalist, he was also proud of the fact that he was the first Welsh member of the British Guild of Agricultural Journalists, and the first Welsh member to feature in the Annual Fisons Awards.

He wrote for many years for Welsh Farm News, while many of his articles and letters also appeared in the columns of this newspaper.

In fact, his most recent book, published when he was 90, was 'There 'Tis Then' - an entertaining rural miscellany compiled from his writings between 1957 and 1994, and named after the trademark phrase that he would use to sign off his articles.

Brought up in Saundersfoot during the years of depression when the village's Bonville's Court colliery closed down, Roscoe was also a keen historian.

He was a vice-president and former chairman of the Pembrokeshire Historical Society, of which he was a founder member, and was also a founder member and chairman of the old Pembrokeshire Records Society.

Indeed, many of his 20 or more books drew on the rich history of the area, which he undoubtedly loved with a passion. He was a noted authority on Caldey Island, with publications such as 'Total Community: The Monks of Caldey Island', whil other works included the likes of 'Old Saundersfoot from Monkstone to Marros', 'Across the Sounds to the Pembrokeshire Islands' and the intriguingly titled 'From Amroth to Utah' - a study of the parish of Amroth, and of the people who belonged to the Church of the Latter Day Saints who emigrated to Utah during the great missionary movements of the mid-19th century.

His knowledge of this small corner of Wales was vast and his wide-ranging writings will be a lasting legacy of one of Pembrokeshire's true characters who will not only be missed by his loving wife Margaret, but by the community as a whole.

Roscoe's funeral took place yesterday (Thursday) when Requiem Mass at St. Bride's Catholic Church, Saundersfoot, was followed by cremation at Parc Gwyn, Narberth.