ABSTRACT
The son of a clockmaker, RICHARD PASSMORE was born in Sidmouth, Devon in 1918. He attended a ‘small, very good’ grammar school eight and a half miles distant from the family home and then trained with the two-partner Exeter firm of John Orchard, qualifying as a chartered accountant in 1939. After war service he became the third partner in a previously incorporated firm, Bishop Fleming, in Torquay in 1946. Largely thanks to Richard’s efforts the firm expanded remarkably, rising to 12 partners and over 100 staff, with offices in Torquay, Paignton, Exeter and Plymouth. A leading light in the Institute in the West of England, at one time he served as a member of a national sub-committee dealing with the small audit and lectured on the subject throughout the country. He retired in 1982.
