Hugh Allen

Hugh Allen died following a street accident, but no one saw it.

It was thought that he had been involved in a collision with a motorcycle near Martyrs' Memorial. He had just left New College where he was an Honorary Fellow.

He was found in the street on Sunday 17 February 1946 and taken to the Radcliffe Infirmary in Oxford where he later died on the night of 20 February 1946.

The pathologist said that his death was due to laceration of the brain and a fracture of the skull.

An open verdict was returned.

He was the Professor of Music at the University of Oxford and had formerly been the Director of the Royal College of Music.

He was described as a keen humourist and was said to have delighted in unconventional actions and noted for having cycled to Buckingham Palace in 1920 when he was knighted to receive his accolade. He was also said to have entered into the spirit of a folk-dance festival at New College by conducting the orchestra wearing an old fashioned top-hat wreathed with roses. It was said that in 1930 he had been on the liner Tahiti when it had become disabled in the Pacific and had to be abandoned and had organised songs to keep up the courage of the passengers who had to wait 57 hours to be rescued. He was said to have regarded singing as an essential part of human life and to have said to pupils, 'You can't sing an alleluia in heaven if you haven't learned to sing it in joy on earth'.