Words: Mike Naish & Bill Hewitt

Photos: Ken Haydon; Mike Naish

The South West Classic Trials Association (SWCTA) was set up in 1983 when Pre65 trials were in the ascendancy. Its aim was to promote and assist in providing an ‘umbrella’ of knowledge and support to lay out suitable sections for the older bikes in local club trials. As a result the Classic scene in the South West areas of Devon and Somerset flourished and entries for local trials increased. As reported in the press at the time, the organisation of the Exmoor Classic Trial was the closest thing to a holiday in the highlands available for the older bikes. Centred around the holiday resort of Minehead, it meant the Dad could disappear off to Exmoor with his trials bike whilst the family made the most of a seaside break in an area with plenty to offer. During the three days of the event, there was a full programme of social evenings where riders, friends and organisers could get together for a noggin and a natter. The first SWCTA secretary was Neil Arnold who campaigned on a 250 Royal Enfield with chairman Bob Davis, an AJS enthusiast. Bob owned a restaurant in Minehead and as chairman kept them all in order.  With Colin Stoneman and Mike Palfrey and many of the current Pre65 riders they established a flourishing club. Many clubs up and down the country noticed the interest and copied the format and some two or three years later the Dartmoor Classic Trial was born. One of the enthusiasts who also ran the Exmoor for many years was Bill Hewitt from Stoke Canon near Exeter.

Bill was born in Flintshire in 1931 and moved to Exeter when he was four years of age when his father secured a job as employment officer for Exeter City Council. He was educated at the Exeter Technical School and after leaving got a job with Autoparts down by the Haven Banks and the river in Exeter. Bill’s career started back shortly after the war when he rode a 350 MAC Velocette in his first trial late in the 1940s before he was called up in 1952 and served his time in the Airforce with 6^th Flight, Y squadron. He did his training at Melksham and then two years as a mechanic at Dunkerswell, in all doing three years in RAF Transport. Bill managed to ride in at least one event at Broadhembury, on a 2H Triumph loaned from Ron Edwards of Cullompton, when in the RAF. Upon his demob it was Bill Boyce, from nearby Rewe, who enthused Bill to take up trials. Bill Boyce scrambled his ‘Mabsa’ in the summer along with Maurie and Reg Squires and kept fit in the winter by riding trials. His enthusiasm rubbed off on the newly married Bill Hewitt and he acquired a 197 DOT, and after a year or two he graduated to a BSA Bantam, a marque that he rode most of his life.

Bill was ever the enthusiast and spent a lot of his spare time modifying and fettling his bikes during the evenings and weekends, and the logo on his bike reflected some of his thoughts as it read: ‘BSA – Made in England-Ruined in Stoke Canon’.

Bill also keeping fit with line dancing with his wife at the local village halls where he got quite a reputation.  In fact Bill, according to a photograph in Derek Wylde’s column in TMX News, was ‘A dab hand on the dance floor and a dab foot in the stream’. The dab in the stream was somewhat of a feature of Bill’s riding as he is the first to admit, although he reflects that many a time he finished up underneath his bike. Never deterred he would always get up and with a friendly curse to the bike and section and then would carry on.

Bill was one of those unsung heroes, the clubman who was never going to be a consistent winner but who enjoyed his trials, and importantly put effort back into the sport by marking out events for his club, the Crediton Motorcycle Club. Later on when the South West Classic Club was formed Bill took over as entries secretary of the Exmoor Classic Three Day Trial at Easter, an event now coming up to its thirtieth Year, whilst also setting out the final days sections at Oakford near Tiverton. Bill represented the South Western Centre in Pre65 trials when teams would be formed to ride against the Wessex Centre. Together with Brian Trott, Ivan Pridham, Paul and Steve Hodder, Mike Palfrey, Dougie Williams, Vic Burgoyne and others, a good weekend’s needle match was always held in the Mendips and Bill very often would shine with a good ride on the limestone outcrops.

I first met Bill early in the early 1960’s when he sold me an ex-Brian Slee 250 BSA. If I thought that Brian’s expertise was going to rub off on me I was to be disappointed, but it gave me a lifelong friendship with Bill that lasts to this day. Moving to Bristol where I worked at Rolls Royce, we would always call in to see him wherever he was working with Devon County Council. We might practice at the sewer works at Stoke Canon or call in to the council yard in Exmouth with the kids to renew times. One year on the way to Cornwall for a week the car expired just outside Exeter. I gave Bill a call and immediately he gave me his car to continue our journey and he repaired our car during the week for us to pick up on the way home. It was the nature of the man who would help you without a second thought.

After a few outings in the trail bike class, Bill finally gave up riding about ten years ago saying that ‘he had been cured’. Cured that is of the affliction that affects a great many of us, that is the affliction of being a trials rider. That patently is not true of Bill from the myriad of photos that adorn his walls to the piles of trials magazines that he reads and the avid way he wants to know all about the trials scene and the riders that still come down to ride and enjoy both the classic Exmoor and Dartmoor trials in the Westcountry. Today at 81 unfortunately Bill is mostly confined to his bed and is on oxygen to assist his breathing, but he still has a strong spark for life with a twinkle in his eye, and enjoys a good laugh. Pat his wife of fifty-one years with their three girls still dote on him and administer his every whim, isn’t that right Bill? Of course there are and have been many others that have administered the comings and goings of events within the SWCTA and Bill Hewitt has just been one of them.

Finally during the run up to the millennium, Bill was honoured to be asked to erect a plaque onto the millennium stone donated to the village of Stoke Canon, and that sits on the village green. The plaque marks the importance of the stone and the turn of the century and the millennium and its impact on the village.  This he did for his local community, but Bill has his own thoughts on the usefulness of the monument for the village which he expresses in graphic Anglo Saxon terms. Yes Bill had not mellowed through the years but to my mind he was the salt of the earth and I am glad to be able to have called him a friend. –  Mike Naish November 2012.

‘Bill Hewitt by Mike Naish’ is the copyright of Trials Guru and Mike Naish.

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