When a national politician,
particularly a Government Ministers talks of the need to defend our way of life
they mean, my perception of the way of life we have or ought to have
and this usually means government by the ideology of the political Party they
are dependent upon for their power, their religion if they have one, their wealth
or lack of it, and their caste or social class. At times, the British can be
the greatest of hypocrites having imposed their particular way on large
sections of the globe often at the point of a gun and cannon and which at times
was used against defenceless men, women and children, and yet as Sir Patrick
Stewart reminds in a Youth Tube video to attack the European Convention on
Human Rights is absurd in that we imposed a whole raft of our good values on
Germany and the rest of Europe at the end of World War II and which one suspects
is why when we first attempted to join the European Community, the French
President who we had sheltered and then spilt our blood to free his land from Nazi
tyranny, he said Non.
For the greater part of the
last decade I have been attempting to relive the years from my birth to the age
of 65, researching ancestry and reporting on the experienced of continued
living from the perspective of the failures of experience. In truth, I never
anticipated living to sixty-five let alone to my present age of 78 but having
reached what is inevitably the last chapter I hope it will be a long one.
For the past month, my priority has been
collating as much information as possible over the murder of a friend in Dean
Street Soho one October evening in 1963. On Sunday May 21st, I
visited the street where her death occurred and photographed the places she was
said to have frequented, later through Google looking at images for the period
of the 1950’s and 1960’s, and then going through the Inquest papers and my
statement to the police at the time, I needed to visit again before referring
concerns to the appropriate authorities over why the crime has remained
unsolved. One of the places visited had been Carlisle Street which runs from
Soho Square and dissects Dean Street and where for a few sessions in 1961 I had
cleared tables in the basement of number 7, then the Partisan Coffee House
where on the first and upper floor was the New Left Review and New Left Books
Publishing house, with the notable book Out of Apathy. Number 7 is now known
for being next door to Private Eye at number 6.
Late on Friday 26th
while researching Google for information on the places my friend had frequented
I discovered that over the past month the Four Corners Learning, Production and
Exhibition Centre for Film and Photography at 121 Bethnal Green E2OQN had an
exhibition of photographs and material concerning the Coffee House from its
inception in 1958 which coincided with
the formation of the C.N.D, the Direct Action Committee Against Nuclear War and
the Committee 100, all of which I became actively involved and about which I am
researching to write about for potential
commercial publication in order to try and raise funds for some good causes.
The exhibition ended the following evening so I checked the available cost of
travelling by train with rail card and on impulse despite the forecast of a very
hot day booked a seat in the quiet coach of the 7.25 from Newcastle and with a
7pm return. I had hoped to travel free as earlier in the week I had received a
telephone call from Virgin trains to say I was one of the 24 people who had
each won 110000 nectar points in a raffle worth £550. But the amount was not
credited until a few days later and for the time being one cannot in any event
spend the points on buying Virgin train tickets.
I am using at Sainsbury’s so
the cash freed can be used for more train travel should the need arise. With
rail card the cost was £123.05 plus parking at the station at the special
weekend rate of £8. This compared favourably with regular day trips to the
capital in the 1980’s when I became a member of a Home Office Advisory
Committee and the first Committee where all the separate local authority
association in Britain. Then, it was cheaper for the local authority to
purchase a first class return which included cooked breakfast in the dining car
and an evening meal on return, with parking at the station than meet the cost
of overnight stay in a central London Hotel. Now it is possible also get food
free with the standard first class ticket, and mid-week this will include a
cooked English Breakfast with one or two rounds of toast and later some fruit, crisps
a muffin and even a round of drinks, with on return a hot cooked dish, a round
of drinks and with several more rounds offered for those not travelling home from
the destination station by car. In this instance, I was in for a major
disappointment as there is only a partial service on Saturdays and Sundays with
nothing hot and no alcohol, and with limits on the what is available such as
only two items, I chose a pain au chocolate and banana for the breakfast,
although followed by three cups of cup at intervals. There was also no
newspaper in the first-class lounge at Newcastle which has also stopped
providing biscuits. In the evening
having arrived at Kings Cross with a couple of hours to spare the newspaper was
the China Daily which I wondered if this was the shape of things to come when
we lose our European Citizenship and perhaps de facto Chinese is offered.
The following morning I had woken
just before the set alarm at 6 am and was on my way to the station at 6.30 able to take the
direct route out of South Shields which is closed overnight between 8pm and 6am
for road work improvements and for once all the traffic lights were green on
the way into the station so that I had parked and was making my way over the ramp bridge to the 1st
Class lounge on platform 3 by just
after 7am. It was only then looking at
the notice board I realised that the 7.25 was leaving from platform 2 and was
already in. There was time for a quick cup of coffee before crossing back and
boarding the train. I had booked a
single forward-facing seat in the quiet coach but on arrival noted that there
were three sets of four seats with table available and selected the one away
from the coach entrances.
Because I intended to do some
walking on what promised to be the hottest day of the year I did not bring a portable
computer having decided to take the opportunity of the journey to commence to
read Sir David’s Ormand Securing the State. David as he prefers to be known had
an important professional career in various major departments of state
concerned with security and defence including the Cabinet Office, the Home
Office and the Department of Defence. I have recently read many major works on
the role of security intelligence in countries with democratic forms of
government since World War II, including the Oxford Handbook on Security
Intelligence and Ormand’s book provides the thinking framework for what is and
should be done, especially on the balance in achieving security in an open
society. The train journey also provided the opportunity to think and make month
on an investigation which has been given priority over the past month and which
would form my first activity on arrival in London. One of the issues noted from
recent reading is that although MI5 and former spies such as David
Cornwall better known as John Le Carre
are open about the infiltration of the Labour and Communist parties, Trade
Unions, Universities and other left of centre groups and clubs, there is surprising coyness about the successful penetration
of the peace movements 1959 to 1964 and when one task was to provide
intelligence to disrupt our activities and to use assets in the media to turn
the public against and ways to blackmail or turn activists to work against the
cause they had supported.
Before setting off I read
through entries attached to the Facebook page about the exhibition and read the
Guardian article and which comprehensively
covered the photos and the role
of the Coffee House and where one evening when clearing tables I had noted the
Committee 100 organiser and personal secretary
to Bertrand Russell enter and encourage everyone to the sign the required 3000
pledges for the proposed mass sit down outside the Ministry of Defence
advising that by signing they did not
need to participate but the pledges were necessary to ensure the protest went
ahead.
The train was on time and it
was so good not to have the burden of the large case which includes the
breathing machine and with which I made the same journey the previous Friday.
On the Sunday morning 21stt May I had taken the train from East
Croydon to Victoria, arriving too late for a sausage and egg muffin with coffee
breakfast at Mac D’s in the food court so had taken the Victoria Line to Oxford
Circus to revisit streets and buildings in the Soho district of central London
that I first known since leaving school at sixteen in 1955 and working in the
motor licencing section of the finance department of Middlesex County Council
which was located at a seven story office bock at 20 Vauxhall Bridge Road,
close to the Thames Embankment. Now the building is part of the Penguin Random
House close to the MI6 building on the other side of the Bridge. Another recruit
to the local government service introduced me to Jazz clubs in Soho and pints
of mild and brown in surrounding pubs and salt meat sandwiches in a place
opposite the Windmill Theatre during the intervals between sets. From 1957 when
I had moved to work in the Finance Department of Croydon County Borough my
visits had become less frequent and between early 1960 and the autumn of 1961
when I went to Ruskin College the visits reduced further relying on family
financial support and generosity of friends. From the 1970’s my visits to Soho
itself became less occasionally for meals prior to a nearby theatre or walk
through when going for books along the Tottenham Court Road, and noteworthy I
do remember a walk through Golden Square when staying at hotel off Piccadilly Circus.
On Saturday, the 27th
I had intended to go back to Oxford Circus to re do the same route this time
with images of the district from the 1950’s and 1960’s fresh in mind that I had
found on Google and other information the fruits of further research over the
previous days. However, I decided to take the bus from opposite the National
Library which became snarled up for what seemed like ages over the short
distance before reaching Tottenham Court Road, so alighted and decided to
approach the itinerary from Soho Square and Carlisle Street where there is no
marker for the former Partisan Coffee House. I needed to confirm that the establishment on
a police street map with locations of places visited frequented by former
friend murdered in 1963, also a Coffee bar was on the other side of Dean
Street. The list of places is written in fading blue Ink so the name of the
coffee bar is unclear but from the mark on the map the venue could have been
number 17 which is now the Tucan which is renowned for its Guiness Irish Stew
and Soda bread and next to the Jazz at the Pizza Express next door at the
corner with Dean Street. Having solved this issue and then completing my
revisit of locations from the previous weekend including Golden Square and the
site of an infamous club in Carnaby Street I went onto to Oxford Circus and the
Victoria Line to Kings Cross when the Circle line was taken to Bethnal Green. I
have visited Bethnal Green before but then as now could not remember the
circumstances. The Four Corners centre is a little walk along Roman Road from
Underground with the gardens to one side. Passing the Fire station and various
stores, cafes and pubs on what was not as warm a morning as anticipated because
of a sharp wind and changing sky
If I have come across the Four
corners film centre in the past memory has also failed. The project was funded
by Channel Four in the 1980’s having been established in 1974 by four young
film makers to both make and show films in what became a small raked
theatre. When the funding ended with the
help of BAFTA and Turner prize nominees the centre trained unemployed people
for the film industry. In 2003 grants
from various bodies such as the Arts Council. London Development and the EEC
Regional Development Fund and the local authority of Tower Hamlets enabled a
move to the present location at 121 and which included a £1 million building
improvement.
The Facebook exhibition page had
reminded of an event during my two years at Ruskin College, which although not
a University college had an arrangement which enabled participation in the university
clubs and societies, the Oxford Union and which in my instance also enabled a
transfer at the end of the first year to the University Department of Extra
Mural Studies for tuition in the University Diploma of Public and Social
Administration. I had been asked by fellow students to represent the college on
a Labour Club committee set up to oppose our original proposal to join the
Economic Community because doing so was regarded as joining small elite group
of European states promoting their own economics at the expense of all others.
The group has commenced its first meeting when one of the leading young
socialists and Union speakers of the day Lydia Howard arrived, said what was
needed to be done and left to complete the essay assignment on which she had
been engaged. I believe this was our only meeting because soon after the French
president, General de Gaulle vetoed our application and at least one headline
in a Daily Paper was Non. I do not recall seeing anything subsequently about Ms
Howard until there she was photographed some fifty years late at the
exhibition.
Moreover, at the exhibition
were photographs of the posters for two series of meetings held at the Coffee
Lounge for teenagers at school and one separately for University students. The mother of Ms Howard was listed as giving
one of the talks. So too was the scientist
Ritchie Calder where two meetings of the Youth CND group with which I was
associated was held at his home as two of his sons both dead attended
meetings. Also of interest is what is
still known as the French House in Dean Street a short distance from the infamous
Colony Room at 41 where one of the witnesses could describe the attacker had
looked out of a third-floor window on hearing the scream; The French House at
49 then as now a public house is where General De Gaulle is said to have written
one of his great rallying speeches to the French people. Other notable regulars
over the year have been Dylan Thomas who left the manuscript of Under Milk Wood
under a chair, Brendan Behan who wrote portions of his play the Quare Fellow
and the playwright John Mortimer.
I checked out the book of
comments and was disappointed to find no one I knew and which at one level is
not surprising given that I was also one of the young(erg) people who visited
the Coffee Lounge. The aspect which caught my eye was a note on the wall
alongside one of the photographs of people playing chess in the ground floor
area. This made the point that is was assumed that among those involved would
be members of the police and security services. However, in addition to special
branch and MI5 were would have been those under cover from the Soviets on the
lookout for additional assets and from the CIA. I for one have speculated if
Russell’s secretary and Committee 100 organiser, said to have been a USA
student had a dual role for the CIA. I was not surprised when he reappeared in
an interview during the so called Arab Spring and the revolution by the
Egyptian people which alerted the world leaders to the potential power of the
Internet Social media.
In 1961, I had resigned from
the Committee 100 because of a series of situations when I queried the role of
its organiser. I had written of my concerns to Russell and received a letter
from his wife saying her husband had been upset by my comments and that she he
had full confidence in his secretary. I sent her letter to Christopher Driver,
the author of the Disarmers. Several years later Lord Russell wrote his Private
Memorandum denouncing the individual explaining how he had been taken in,
without mentioning the warning that I had given. The twelve-page apologia is
published in full as an Appendix in Ronald W Clark’s biography The Life of
Bertrand Russell.
I will confess that it is
sometimes difficult to confront what I wrote during what was a dramatic period
of transition for me from Local government clerk, to a British Olivetti office
machine salesman, to working in the Houseman’s Peace News bookshop, choosing to
go to Ruskin College rather than become the London region CND paid organiser.
Deciding that I did want to work in child care having had to agree to study social work and undertake
practical work placements in order to study Criminology and Psychology on the
Public and Social Administration Course, and then with the help of the Home
Office gain a place and Home Office funding to attend a child care
qualification course at the University of Birmingham where soon after my arrival the news of the murder
of my friend was relayed from family members after the police had called at the
home.
It is also important when
considering the behaviour of young people in the early sixties is to understand
the sense of freedom from the past
juxtaposition with the sense of
impending world catastrophe from fear of an atomic and then nuclear
holocaust It is only on reading the
inquest papers that I have become concerned at the implication of the police
statement that she contributed to her demise because of the places she
frequented, the people with whom she associated and her approach to
relationships, yet during the five years
since leaving school she had remained a civil servant with access to
confidential and classified information
One of the extraordinary
aspects of her death is the number of witnesses including one who gave a
detailed account of what he heard and saw where there were about twenty people
in the immediate vicinity with about 70 totals with her when the police arrived
within minutes. One of the things I wanted to do on the Saturday was to walk
from Dean Street, into Meard Street, where the attacker was said to have been
followed then crossing Wardour Street into Brewer Street passing the then Lex
garage where the man was lost in the crowd going into Great Windmill Street
towards Shaftesbury Avenue. On the
previous Sunday, I had first visited an address in Carnaby Street, then to
Golden Square where it was believed the Murder weapon may have been found early
the following morning and then headed for Great Compton Street where four of
the places listed as frequented were located. What struck me on the Saturday
morning is that given the location of the attack it was surprising the
assailant did not retreat into Bateman Street where he was seen to have come
and had gone into Meard Street rather than the nearby alleyway which would have
taken him direct into Brewer Street. Had he wanted to reach Shaftesbury Avenue
he would have continued along Dean Street. This suggest to me that he had lain
low for a while perhaps he had a room locally.
The other concern is that it
was someone on the third floor of 41, the Notorious home of Colony Room who was
quoted by the police at the Inquest. Perhaps no one else heard the cry and
looked out too engrossed in alcohol consumption and the other alleged goings on.
In establishment which at the time was used by artists, politicians, writers
and musicians, with many of clientele Gays during the period when homosexual
and lesbian sex was illegal. Among those
known to have frequented the out of licencing hours drinking and social club
were Francis Bacon, Peter O Toole and Lucian Freud. George Melly described the
owner as a benevolent witch. Molly Parkin described the room as a character
building glorious hell hole and that everyone left their careers outside before
climbing the stairs and plunging into questionable behaviour. Others who said to be members included Dylan
Thomas. Jeffrey Bernard. Tom Driberg, E M Forster. Christopher Hitchins. Trevor
Howard, Charles Laughton, Frank Norman, Will Self, Suggs, Tracy Emin, Sarah
Lucas, and Damien Hirst. There are dozens of photos available on Google Images.
Almost immediately opposite
the crime scene at the Corner Dean Street with Meard Street was the more
fashionable Gargoyle Cub with its ballroom and drawing room as well as
restaurant and bar. The clientele ranged from Fred Astaire and Noel Coward to
Graham Greene, the traitors Donald Maclean and Guy Burgess and included Dylan
Thomas, Augustus John and Francis Bacon. Today the premises and has been
converted in to the impressive Dean Street Town House and Hotel with a row of
tables behind railings which were fully occupied by those enjoying a later
breakfast on a Sunday morning. The Town House occupies buildings 69 and 70 Dean
Street.
At the North corner of
Batement Street was as it is today a Public House next to which is still
London’s most internationally known strip club and next to this the famous
restaurant which at the time was Leoni’s Quo Vadis where I was taken to dine
after giving a talk to the Albany Society on prison reform chaired by Hugh
Klare. At the other corner of Batement street was a restaurant. To-day close if
not immediately behind the crime scene is a walk in sexual health clinic.
The one establishment in the district
which I am surprised she is said to have frequented is that in Carnaby Street with
an extraordinary history of drugs, crime, and racism including a white only
policy in one period. and two if not three unnatural deaths associated in his history
from 1936. In fairness, the premises were
used by different managements for different purpose and it is unlikely that
those visiting, especially if they were taken by a partner, would be aware of
what had gone on before. I have been able to establish that it was only opened
as the Roaring Twenties Jazz Club in 1962 for Jewish young people by Jewish
owners and where there was a Whites only policy at the door. However, it is said that an Afro Caribbean
was hire as DJ and bouncer who commenced to let his friends in so that quickly
the clientele changed. One source claimed that the police checks for drug use
were perfunctory while another claimed that dozens of black’s kids went to jail
after raids. Among the groups said to have played there in the early sixties
were the Animals, the Rolling Stones and the Beatles.
In 1946 as the Blue Lagoon
Club, perhaps named after the original film of the same name, an exotic dancer
was shot outside and where claims she had been assaulted in side were reported
to the Inquest as false. Another young woman was found gassed the morning after
attending a birthday party at the club and I have seen anther report of an
unnatural, unconfirmed. In 1950 its life as a Bebop Jazz Club 11 was short-lived
closed by the drugs squad within six months. As the Sunset club frequented by
USA servicemen jazz was played until 7 am.
It was also in the 1950’s that serial Killer John Christie was hung and
where the doorman at the club, an ex-boxer was his landlord at 10 Rillington
Place.
With more time to spare than anticipated
I decided to take the opportunity to explore the new developments at Kings Cross.
I may have only been once to the station before going to the Underground
station there in 1959, and before the direct route from Victoria was created
and the journey involved a change at Embankment for the Northern Line, before making
the short walk to 5 Caledonian Road to work at Houseman’s bookshop Peace News.
I have no recollection of exploring the area between Kings Cross and St Pancras
up to the Camden Lock.
There are now two developed
areas on both side of the Regent Canal. The first consists of a large area
between the two stations office block towers including one for Google with restaurants
and bars at ground level. The major surprise was on crossing the bridge over the
canal and discovering huge space with low level water spouts which in the day
of my visit had become a playground for hundreds of young children watched over
by their parents. From here at one side there is park land which is being used
for the great part for a beer festival. There is also a mixture of preserved
former railway buildings and new apartment housing, plus a huge Waitrose, an
indoor shopping centre being developed and a large arts display area. There are
countless restaurants and bars packed with those enjoying eating out. The
Camden Lock market is but one of half a dozen in the area providing street,
organic and artisan foods, arts and crafts and fresh fruit and veg. There is
also a 32-armchair seat film theatre with food and drink able to be enjoyed alongside
each seat part of the Everman chain and premium prices with unlimited membership
at £600 a year compared to the £210 at Cineworld to which needs to be added the
additional part expenditure for event cinema, bringing the total expenditure to
around £300.
To understand the changing
nature of London it is necessary to explore the similar high-rise development
across from Victoria Station where the previous weekend I visited the one of
the new entrances to the Underground in Victoria Street with lifts and escalators.
I was making my way for a meeting at St James Park Station where in my judgement
is easier to walk than take the underground. I became familiar with the station
when attending meetings of an Advisory Committee at the Home Office across the
road and to one side of the Park. It is now the heavily fortified Department of
Justice. I swapped the train for bring the car for an overnight at the family home
and car park space at the Home Office until finding out the impossibility of
getting into central London for the meeting time. Then I had shown by letter at
the gate and followed someone else into the building before questioning if I
should be there unaccompanied given the security markings on the various office
doors and retreated and out to the front of the building and the main reception
where an escort was required to where the meeting was being held.
I am reminded of what happened
when a couple of years back I returned to the House of parliament for the first
time in several decades having booked tickets for relatives to take the tour
and have afternoon tea overlooking the Thames. In the days when I was the
Parliamentary Officer for the Association of Child Care Officers one simply
advised whoever was the main door of where one wan going or had arranged to see
and was nodded through, and this included a subsequent visit in the 1980’s when
as a Director of Social Services, I had arranged to meet the Labour Party
Deputy Chief Whip to attend a debate on the Butler Sloss report on the Cleveland
Scandal. I had sat where the Peers can sit if wish to listen in on debates and
this enabled the Deputy Chief Whip to sit within the House just in front and
comment on the contributions. Margaret Thatcher say in for the opening speeches
after the earlier P.M. Q’s and noticing my presence checked with her PPS who
went over to the civil servants to find out if I was the then Director of
Social Services for Cleveland, and who in fact I had known from before his
appointment when he worked direct to me as the area children’s officer for
Rotherham in the West Riding County Council Children’s Department.
According to ticket information
for the Tour and Tea there appeared to be a separate entrance to the heavily fortified
main public entrance which I could not find and therefore w steps a foot or so
through a gate to ask a policeman for guidance who was standing at the side of
the Houses. I was sharply ordered to get back and pointed to the main entrance where
I had to take off my braces and pout everything metal in a tray before going
through body scanner. On one hand the sense that the Houses of Parliament reflect
the equality of all in a democratic state, albeit a representative form of
democracy has significantly changed because of the terrorist threats. We have
lost and they have won in this respect. That more recently a terrorist did enter
the precincts and kill an unarmed policeman explains the need for the measures
being taken and if I had stepped over the line as I did two years ago, the
shoot to kill approach may have meant this would never have been written
Two weeks ago, my attention was
also directed to another huge development of office, retail, apartment,
restaurant and bars at the site of the former Metropolitan Police headquarters by
the entrance to the St James park station. I am also familiar with the
established developments at Canary Wharf the West India Dock and the former
Millennium Dome. and at Stratford where a family member lived for a time and we
would go to the Cineworld at West India Quay and where there is also a Cineworld
at the O2 centre and arena. I have only had a little explore around London Bridge
Station and on the same weekend noted the
proposed development at Waterloo station arising from the new bus route from
Victoria on my way to the National Theatre. The Train from East Croydon passes the
development around the former Battersea Power station. These and no doubt there
are other developments of a similar nature throughout the capital with West and
East Croydon a very good example explains how the city is changing for a new generation
for educated and trained new Europeans and workers of the world which explains
the reality of the Brexit decision. The contrast between the lives of the 21st
century Londoner is fundamental and extremely different from my life as
preschool child growing up in an area where more V1 and V 2 rockets fell than
anywhere in the capital and there is even a more extreme difference between the
lives of the young Londoner in work today and those of the common people in
Africa, the Middle and far East, Middle and South America, together with parts
of Eastern Europe. In Britain, there is still an outside possibility of
fundamental change from Thursday. In any event the genie is out of the bottle
and there are many who will work to ensure it is not put back.
