A WELL-known Winchester photographer who worked regularly for the Hampshire Chronicle has died, aged 94.

Bob Sollars, who lived at Sparsholt, passed away on October 16. The funeral was due to be held at St Stephen’s church in Sparsholt on Tuesday. (OCT 30)

Mr Sollars served in the Royal Marines in World War Two and returned to his birthplace, Winchester, where he set up his photography business in 1952 with a studio on City Road.

As well as the Chronicle, he took photos for the Southern Daily Echo and many national newspapers.

Over the years he specialised in niches such as Winchester College and the military.

Talking to the Chronicle on his 90th birthday in February 2008, he recounted his nicest memory as a photographer. It came when the Queen opened the Sir John Moore Barracks, near Littleton, in the mid-1980s.

He had taken her picture some three decades earlier when she attended a Royal Green Jackets party at St Cross Cricket Club in 1955. He had finished taking a picture of Her Majesty in the officers’ mess after the opening.

“As she got up after I had taken the photograph, the colonel, Mike Dewar, was escorting her and suddenly I heard my name being called out by Col Dewar, who I knew quite well.

“He escorted the Queen up to me and we talked about when I first photographed her more than 20 years earlier. That was one of the best things that’s ever happened to me,” he said.