Content area
Full text
CHRISTOPHER NEWTON THOMPSON, who has died aged 82, won an MC during the Second World War and later became a prominent opponent of apartheid in South Africa.
He was born at Cape Town on February 14 1919. His father was a judge of the South African Supreme Court, his mother Joyce (nee Nettlefold) was a relative of Joseph and Neville Chamberlain, and the first woman mayor of Cape Town.
After the Diocesan College, Rondebosch, he went up to St John's, Cambridge, in 1937 to read Engineering. A natural athlete, he was soon well known as a rugby player on the fringe of the England side. In 1939 he was elected as the Cambridge rugby captain. He was heavy but fast, and able to jump higher in line-outs than university sides had ever seen. As a cricketer, he played against the West Indies at Fenners in 1939, hitting a six...