Richard Charles Overton was born in Liverpool on 18th May 1923, educated at Sedbergh School and served in the army in Burma from 1942 to 1946. He studied at Magdalen College, Oxford, and then took the Colonial Service training course (First Devonshire Course) in Oxford and London.

Overton was posted to Nigeria in February 1950 and served as an assistant district officer in Calabar and Ikot Ekpene and as a district officer in Nkambe and Bamenda in the Cameroons. After a posting as district officer in Itu in the Eastern Region of Nigeria he returned to the Cameroons, to Kumba as district officer and then as Clerk to the Executive Council in Buea. He was a senior district officer in Mamfe and, after independence, was senior assistant secretary at the Ministry of Works in Lagos. He retired from the Colonial Service in September 1962 and, on returning to the United Kingdom, worked for the Commission for the New Towns until 1983. He died in 2007.

Susan Spurr was born in Oxted, Surrey, on 23 June 1933 and educated at Oxted Grammar School and Pitman's College. After working in London for eight years she joined the Overseas Civil Service in September 1955 and was posted to Southern Cameroons as secretary to the Commissioner of the Cameroons. She married R.C. Overton in November 1957.