WARM tributes have been paid to a homeless German man who made many friends during his years in Kendal.

Matthias Tank was diagnosed with cancer this summer and died on September 30. He was 49.

With his thick head of grey hair, he had become a well-recognised character in the town, especially at the Manna House drop-in centre for homeless and vulnerable people on Aynam Road.

A rough sleeper, he was able to experience the comforts of home-cooked meals and hot showers at Manna House, where an informal memorial service was to be held this week.

“We felt like he was part of our family,” said the charity’s chief officer, Andrea Aldridge.

A plasterer by trade, Matthias was also a popular customer at the People’s Cafe, off Blackhall Road. The £100 proceeds of two cafe events held last week have been donated to Manna House in his memory.

“He was a lovely guy and we all just wanted to remember him in some way,” said People’s Cafe volunteer Gillian Cowburn. “He was one of our longest-standing customers and we thought the world of him.

“He loved his cup of black coffee first thing. He was a good supporter of the cafe and we are all very sad he’s not going to be with us any longer.”

Andrea, of Manna House, said the charity hoped to use the money to create a memory wall for lost friends in the garden of its forthcoming new premises off Ann Street, in Kendal.

“He was not necessarily able to hold a conversation coherently, neither in German nor in English, but he was good at communicating and making friends and was quite funny, with a very dry sense of humour,” said Andrea.

“He was dependable and incredibly helpful; a very strong person, very wiry, so he was always helping us.”

Andrea said the pieces of Matthias’s life were not easy to put together, but it was thought he had moved from Germany to seek “a better life”, living first in Tebay and then Kendal.

In the colder months he slept nightly at the Manna House winter shelter, provided at churches around Kendal. He had been estranged from his family for 11 years, but a German-speaking member of staff at Manna House had established contact, and they were “overjoyed” to hear news of him.

Sadly he died before his brother and nephew could visit. Andrea said family members would be arranging a cremation and taking Matthias’s ashes home to Germany.