Francis Peter BeckCVO (27 June 1909 – 17 May 2002) was an English soldier andschoolmaster.
In the 1930s Beck was apeace campaigner, but in 1938, a year before the Second World War, he joined theBritish Army. After the war he became headmaster ofCheam School, serving there from 1947 to 1963.
The son of Arthur C. Beck CVO, ofHeydon, Norfolk, nephew ofCaptain Frank Beck, Beck was educated atGresham's School (where he was a cadetCSM in theOfficers' Training Corps)[1] andMagdalene College, Cambridge.[2] There, he graduatedBA in 1931[3] and proceeded toMA in 1944.[4] In 1932, while working atSandringham, he became a member and local representative of theNew Commonwealth Society, a group campaigning to secure world peace by giving theLeague of Nations a military capability.[5] This led to his working closely withSir Norman Angell, the Labour member of parliament, winner of theNobel Peace Prize for 1933.[6]
In December 1938 Beck was commissioned as a second lieutenant into theRoyal Norfolk Regiment.[1] During theSecond World War, he continued to serve in the same regiment, becomingadjutant of its 1st Battalion. In 1942 he passed theStaff College,[7] and from 1942 to 1946 wasbrigade major of the 35th and1st Army Tank Brigades.[2]
In 1947, Beck was appointed as headmaster of Cheam. On 23 September 1957, he found himself at the centre of intense press interest whenPrince Charles, Duke of Cornwall, then aged eight, arrived at his school, accompanied by his parents,Elizabeth II andPrince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh.[2] Beck called a press conference at the school and made an appeal to the news media to be left in peace, but in the eighty-eight days of Charles's first term, no fewer than sixty-eight of them saw stories about the prince and the school carried in national newspapers.[8] Beck twice caned Charles for "ragging".[2]
In 1959, Beck resigned his commission in theRegular Army Reserve of Officers.[9] In 1962, he was appointed a Commander of theRoyal Victorian Order,[10] and in 1963 retired from Cheam.[2] In retirement, he lived at Hopton House, nearDiss, Norfolk, and died in 2002 at the age of 92.[2]
In 1946 Beck married Anne Frances, a daughter of Douglas Crossman, ofRoyston, Hertfordshire.[7] They had one son, Philip, and one daughter, Mary.[2]
In retirement, Beck became the Secretary of the West Suffolk Horse Show Society.[11]