Lindsey Hughes, Professor of Russian History at University College London, died from cancer on 26 April, aged 57.
Professor Hughes graduated with first class honours in Russian Studies from the School of European Studies in 1971. She became an internationally recognised expert on 17th- and 18th-century Russian history, culminating in her magnum opus, Russia in the Age of Peter the Great (1998).
Her interest in Russian history and her love of the country, its language and culture, began at Sussex, and she retained close links with her friends here. Professor Hughes returned frequently to lecture to the Russian Society and to attend the reunions of former Russian students.
She was one of the most successful and distinguished of Russian graduates from this university.
Beryl Williams, Emeritus Reader in History
Sandra Koa Wing’s death from cancer on 13 May, aged 28, has shocked all her many friends and colleagues at the University.
Sandra came to Sussex as an undergraduate in 1997 and was awarded a first in English in 2000. She went on to do an MA in Life History Research, winning the Asa Briggs History Award. Typically, her dissertation topic was ‘The social meanings of humour’; typically too, she was awarded a distinction for it.
After spells working in the main Library, first in Teaching Support and later as a research assistant in Special Collections, and in SPRU, she was appointed Mass Observation’s first Development Officer, which she described as her dream job.
And Sandra was the dream colleague - smart, creative, and totally committed to Mass Observation. Intellectually rigorous, she was at the same time a brilliant communicator, just as comfortable with groups of schoolchildren as with academic colleagues. (The Folio Society is about to publish her book Mass Observation Britain in the Second World War.)
But above all the Sandra we shall remember was a dear and much loved friend - gentle, thoughtful, and irrepressibly cheerful. (She really was always smiling.) She had a tremendous future ahead of her, and her untimely death is almost unbearably cruel. We shall all miss her dreadfully.
Her husband Pete Simmons, who worked in the University's Press Office from 2000 to 2003, was - in Sandra's own words - "literally my rock" and was at her side throughout. We offer him, her parents and her brothers Mike and Adrian our heartfelt sympathy.
Debby Shorley, Librarian
Robin Street, who left Sussex in 2003 after working at the University for more than 30 years, died suddenly in France on 11 May. He was 64. A tribute to Robin will appear in a future issue of the Bulletin.