War hero and for­mer Ap­peal Court judge Ul­ric Cross died yes­ter­day, aged 96.Cross died in his sleep around 2 pm, at home in Port-of-Spain, the day af­ter he re­turned from the hos­pi­tal."I don't think we will get any­one like him again....Any­one with the breed like Ul­ric Cross. There is no more Ul­ric Cross to come," said for­mer Chief Jus­tice Sat­nar­ine Shar­ma in a tele­phone in­ter­view yes­ter­day.

Up­on hear­ing of his death, Shar­ma said it was a colos­sal loss, and Cross–who re­ceived the coun­try's high­est ho­n­our, the Or­der of the Re­pub­lic of T&T, in 2011–was a true hero.Cross was one of the most dec­o­rat­ed West In­di­an squadron lead­ers of World War II."What a loss to the re­gion and the world. He was tru­ly a great hu­man be­ing. He made his­to­ry in al­most every­thing he touched."

For­mer Chief Jus­tice and past pres­i­dent of the Caribbean Court of Jus­tice Michael de la Bastide said al­though death comes to every­one and even though one ex­pect­ed death to come at Cross's age, it was still a shock and a sad ex­pe­ri­ence when "some­one we know, ad­mired and loved dies."In a tele­phone in­ter­view, De la Bastide said Cross had a very full life and made con­tri­bu­tions at dif­fer­ent lev­els and ca­pac­i­ties and his achieve­ments would con­tin­ue to be chron­i­cled.

"He was an ex­treme­ly well-round­ed per­son who had some very valu­able gifts which he used for the ben­e­fit of oth­ers. He was a true hero of our na­tion and will al­ways be re­mem­bered as one," he said.At­tor­ney Gen­er­al Anand Ram­lo­gan is­sued a state­ment which said Cross, "served the peo­ple of T&T with dis­tinc­tion in his many en­deav­ours on the na­tion­al and in­ter­na­tion­al are­na."

Ram­lo­gan said af­ter Cross re­turned from serv­ing in the Roy­al Air Force dur­ing World War II, "While oth­er men would have rest­ed on their lau­rels, Jus­tice Cross ex­plored oth­er ar­eas where his unique tal­ents would best ben­e­fit the peo­ple of T&T."Ram­lo­gan said af­ter his le­gal ca­reer, when oth­ers would have qui­et­ly re­tired, Cross start­ed the NGO Cot­ton Tree Foun­da­tion in April 1993.

"He is on record as stat­ing that his mis­sion in life was to work to­wards the com­bat of high lev­els of pover­ty and un­em­ploy­ment through coun­selling, self-help, ed­u­ca­tion and train­ing projects. On his 90th birth­day in 2007, the Ul­ric Cross Cot­ton Tree En­dow­ment Fund was launched, to ex­pand the work of the Cot­ton Tree Foun­da­tion to in­clude a le­gal aid clin­ic, com­mu­ni­ty sports pro­gramme and an art and mu­sic pro­gramme.

"Cross will be re­mem­bered for his bril­liant le­gal mind, but most of all for his ser­vice to hu­man­i­ty at the time when T&T and the world need­ed cit­i­zens like Jus­tice Cross to step for­ward for democ­ra­cy and lib­er­ty," the state­ment said.T&T film­mak­er Frances-Anne Solomon has been work­ing on a doc­u­men­tary film of Cross's life, Hero, along with Cross's younger daugh­ter Nico­la. It is sched­uled to be re­leased next year.

His old­er daugh­ter, arts ad­min­is­tra­tor Sue Wood­ford-Hol­lick (La­dy Hol­lick) lives in the UK. His son, Richard Finch, is an ed­u­ca­tor.

LIFE OF A LEG­END

Philip Louis Ul­ric Cross, born on May 1, 1917, at­tend­ed St Mary's Col­lege. In 1941, he vol­un­teered to serve in the Roy­al Air Force dur­ing World War II.As a nav­i­ga­tor at Bomber Com­mand, he rose to the rank of squadron leader and made 80 op­er­a­tional flights over France and Ger­many.

Af­ter com­plet­ing his le­gal train­ing in 1949, he worked as a state coun­sel in Ghana, at­tor­ney gen­er­al in West Cameroon, and a High Court judge in Tan­za­nia. He was a pro­fes­sor of law and dean of the fac­ul­ty of law at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Dar-es Salaam, Tan­za­nia and a mem­ber of the ex­am­in­ers board in the Fac­ul­ty of Law at Haile Se­lassie Uni­ver­si­ty. When he re­turned to T&T in 1974, he served as a judge in the High Court judge and the Court of Ap­peal. He was lat­er chair­man of the Law Re­form Com­mis­sion.

He al­so served as high com­mis­sion­er to the UK.