Mike, who was born and raised in Kenya speaking its native language Swahili, was conscripted to command indigenous troops in the King’s African Rifles as unrest began to spread throughout his homeland. It was after Mau Mau militants ambushed a police truck that a battle erupted between the rivals. A clash Mike so vividly recalls as it marked the last time he could appreciate the gift of sight before it was lost.
Remembering the battle, Mike said: “One of the Mau Mau threw a grenade at me and it landed by my foot. I jumped away from it and threw myself on the ground hoping that when it went off I wouldn’t get hit. The next thing I remember I was running flat out and I got a bullet in my right ear which came out of my right eye. My dad always said I didn’t have anything between my ears and now he’s got definite proof. The next thing I remember I fell over and as I picked myself up everything went black. I sat down and I can’t remember much more than that—not in a logical sense anyway.”
Dissatisfied with blasting their victim with a rifle—nearly killing him—the Mau Mau rebels returned armed with machetes to cut up Mike, who lay helpless on the ground nursing his wound. Powerless to defend himself, Mike has always owed his survival to an ally soldier, Reguton—with whom he still has regular contact—who shot dead the 7 rebels.
…Mike was transferred to a military hospital in England after the attack where he received the devastating news that he would never see again. Just a week before the shooting Mike had asked for his girlfriend’s hand in marriage, but following doctors’ gloomy prognosis he broke off the engagement. “After I was blinded I never thought I could look after a wife”, he said. “I didn’t think I would be able to look after myself let alone anyone else—it’s one of my biggest regrets.”
But anxious not to allow his disability to blight the years ahead of him, Mike began learning the art of braille at St Dunstan’s, a national charity for the blind. Soon after Mike enrolled on a physiotherapy course with the Royal National Institute for the Blind (RNIB) suggested by his dad who felt the career suited his structural interests.
It was during his training that he met his late wife Selma, and the couple eventually married in 1957.
For the past 45 years Mike has been running a thriving physiotherapy clinic at his St Albans home and he remains committed to his work.