Sam Kydd
| Sam Kydd | |
|---|---|
 |
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| Born |
Samuel John Kydd 15 February 1915 Belfast, Ireland |
| Died | 26 March 1982 (aged 67) London, England |
| Cause of death | Emphysema |
| Occupation | Actor |
| Spouse(s) | Pinkie Barnes |
| Children | Jonathan Kydd |
Samuel John "Sam" Kydd (15 February 1915 – 26 March 1982) was an English actor. His best-known roles were in two major British television series of the 1960s, as the smuggler Orlando O'Connor in Crane, and as a recurring character in Coronation Street. An early film was The Captive Heart (1946), where he had a non-speaking role as a POW.
An army officer's son, Kydd was born to English parents in Belfast, and moved back to England to London as a child. He was educated at Dunstable Grammar School in Dunstable, Bedfordshire. During the mid-1930s Kydd was an MC for various big bands such as the Oscar Rabin Band. He would warm up audiences with jokes and impressions and even some tap dance routines then introduce the other singers and attractions on the bill. During the late 1930s he had joined the Territorial Army serving with the Queen Victoria's Rifles and when war broke out he was called up for active service.
Early in the Second World War, he went to France with the British Expeditionary Force but was quickly captured, spending the rest of the war in Stalag XX-A, a camp near Thorn in German-occupied western Poland. Kydd later wrote of his experiences as a POW in his autobiographical book For You the War Is Over.
During his internment in the German prisoner-of-war camp, where he remained for the next five years, he took command of the camp's theatrical activities - devising and staging plays. He felt so strongly about his work there that, when he was offered repatriation after three years, he turned it down to continue with his theatrical work. In recognition of his valuable services during these years he was awarded a pair of drama masks, made by the Red Cross from barbed wire.
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