Allan Leonard Dorney Skinner

From Alison Wright, New Zealand, February 2005:

Dorney was educated at Kings School, Canterbury. He said his family was the Ledbury branch of the Skinners. He had no children. His nephew was Lt. Col. Allan BOGGIS, (d. 1973) whose eldest son possibly still lives in the family home, a manor house in Rowde, Wilts.

The links that Dorney had to our family were not established then, but he thought, and we think, that there is a connection; this theory based on the strong family resemblance of the portraits Dorney had, to our father, Howard SKINNER (b. 1902 East Preston, Sussex, d. 1990 ) Also we see interesting likeness of our father to Allan Maclean SKINNER (1809 - 1885) pictured in document you sent.

Dorney had the same knowledge of family traditions that we knew and he also had a copy of the portrait of our forebear, Gen. William Campbell SKINNER R.E. (1700 - 1780) Chief Engineer of Britain who was of the Engineers branch of the Skinners. [?!!]

Ina, Dorney's widow, later wrote that Dorney's branch was not dying out. She said Dorney's uncle, Dr. Adrian SKINNER had a son, Bruce who was quite young in 1969.

Ina also said that a copy of the book 'A Short Account of the Families Chaplin and Skinner and Connected Families' was to be sent to Graeme SKINNER, Melbourne, Shirley Park, Surrey branch.
At the time, the reference to this did not mean much to us, but now we are very interested as we see it mentioned in your information.

Dorney's Obituary was in the Eastbourne Herald Chronicle, 22.4.61