Ian Uys

Ian Uys was born in 1942. He volunteered for and served in the SA Air Force Gymnasium in 1960, then attended the University of Cape Town and graduated in B Commerce. Uys captained the UCT Boxing Team and was selected as South Africa's first AIESEC commerce student to work in the USA and Australia. After marrying Barbara Bowers, a former Londoner, he qualified as a chartered accountant then lived in England where he did VC research. In 1973 he wrote and published For Valour, the history of...See more

Ian Uys was born in 1942. He volunteered for and served in the SA Air Force Gymnasium in 1960, then attended the University of Cape Town and graduated in B Commerce. Uys captained the UCT Boxing Team and was selected as South Africa's first AIESEC commerce student to work in the USA and Australia. After marrying Barbara Bowers, a former Londoner, he qualified as a chartered accountant then lived in England where he did VC research. In 1973 he wrote and published For Valour, the history of Southern Africa's Victoria Cross Heroes. Uys has been interested in the personal reminiscences of personalities caught up in military history and has written more than 20 books about them. He served in the Heidelberg Commando in the seventies. In 1977 he was a platoon commander in the operational area and was awarded the De Wet Decoration. In 1989 he ran for parliament as a Democratic Party candidate for Germiston District, a strong National Party Ward. Though he lost, he believes that in a small way it contributed to the change in the country the following year. Uys is a practising auditor in Knysna, Southern Cape, and has three children and four grandchildren. He is a former Chairman of the SA Military History Society, has completed ten Comrades' Marathon of 90km and was a private pilot for many years. He has developed his family's Bushman Valley Resort near Prince Albert and is a keen nature conservationist. See less