1710 Our Way My way

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 21^st, 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 26^th 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 1^st 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 21st^t 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 27^th 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 21^st 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.