How suburban Reg became ‘Sexy Rexy’ of Sark

Press, 10 February 1982, Page 9

How suburban Reg became ‘Sexy Rexy’ of Sark

NZPA London Keg Callan yesterday was trying to recall his former life — _,ten years after he forgot it overnight. ' : The story of one, man’s two lives emerged when the “Daily Mail” related how Reg, from the London suburb of Norwood,.-became “Sexy Rexy” ; of Sark. ' Mr Callan disappeared for 10 vears and eight months after total loss of’memory.

Twelve days after Mr Cablan, an electrical draughtsman and a - happily married father of two sons, disappeared in May 1971, he booked in"as Rex Duke at a guest houses on,.the Channel island, qf Sark to' become’ a bachelor,’: Y ’ harman who dressed in style to wine and

dine girls. Now friends and workmates are helping piece together part of the mystery of the lost years since he walked out of his south London home. Rex Duke seems to have been born when he strolled from the harbour at Sark with his possessions in one small hold-all to find board and work.

The boarding house proprietor, John Goodwin, said: “He came to Sark for a week, stayed for two years and became one of the family. He got no pay but he waited at tables and did chores.

“We called him Sexy Rexy because he was always talking to women and was al-

ways very well dressed.” Then the suave Mr Duke, who smoked French cigarettes in a black and silver holder and whose favourite drink was campari and soda, moved to the Petit Champs Hotel on Sark, where he was manager for four years. After leaving Sark he worked as a barman in London and Berkshire as well as a foreman at Britain’s largest Christmas tree plantation, the Yattenden Estate.

Having built up a new life, Mr Duke formed some longstanding relationships with people quite apart from his former life.

But a week ago last Friday, Rex Duke bagan to recollect something of .Reg Callan.

He told how he suddenly “woke up” in Leicester Square tube station and realised his true identity only after his brother-in-law’s name flashed through his mind, the “Daily Mail” said. Successive photographs of Reg have been recognised by Rex's friends as the same person they knew. Now Reg Callan is counting the costs of being Rex Duke. He has found that his two sons are now 19 and 17 and he has lost his wife, Julia. She gave up all hope of seeing him, and got divorced and remarried. In the meantime he has been prescribed drugs by a psychiatrist at a London hospital to help him remember some of his past life.