Sue Brown, a HCSS member for over thirty years, passed away in early October 2023.
Sue loved her football, even more than her baking and jam-making, and was a regular at both City games and at Scotland matches, not only at Hampden Park but also on many away trips in recent years with the Tartan Army, from Oslo to Larnaca and many cities in between.
She had a mischievous sense of humour, a ready smile, an infectious throaty chuckle, and an inexhaustible fund of stories of transport disasters associated with journeys to watch football from Ipswich, where she lived with her partner Mike. No one who knew Sue was unaware of the phrase “replacement bus from Manningtree”, delivered with a roll of the eyes and a sigh of resignation. It never put her off wanting to watch City or Scotland. It was a truly cruel twist that it was at last season’s fixture at Portman Road that we learned, waiting to greet her in the pre-match HCSS pub, that she had been taken into hospital. She died the following weekend.
Sue was a gentle soul, a lovely person, always looking for the best in people. She will be missed – she is missed.
Steve Weatherill
Tribute by Marilyn Campbell
Two City gals at heart — one whose proverbial glass was half empty and one whose glass was always brimming nonsensically — but good friends who balanced each other out perfectly.
Sue and I always walked together from home and away pubs to matches and, away from the pub banter, we would talk at length about our respective lives away from the beautiful game.
I would listen to her accounts of exciting far-off trips to see solar eclipses or athletics meets and her views of the British transport system. She would lend a sympathetic ear to my not-always-successful attempts at forging an independent life now living alone, before offering some sage advice.
I was on holiday though abroad when I heard of Sue’s sudden illness and hospital admittance. On my return, I sent her a text asking how she was and whether she was home yet.
How long would it be, I added, before I got my walking partner back?
Sadly though my text had been sent on the very day Sue died and it was Mike who replied to it with the unbelievably awful news, asking me to inform others.
As with all losses in our lives, ‘life goes on’ as we come to terms with what’s happened
and gradually learn to cope with the changes these losses bring.
But the walks to the grounds will never feel the same.
I miss her.