Chapter 40: Eventful end to 1973

Includes a royal marriage and a train disaster

As with the majority of earlier chapters, this one is mostly an assortment of extracts from letters to my family and returned to me by my mother just before she died.

From a letter dated August 25, 1973:

Hovercraft trip to France

I’m trying to write this in the BBC World Service newsroom in spare moments as reports of IRA bombs and incendiary devices flow in. It’s getting a bit beyond a joke. All BBC staff are issued with identity cards because of the periodic bomb terrorism waves, but security in our building is somewhat haphazard. I think everyone is banking on the unwritten IRA rule that no direct attacks be made on the news media.

It won’t be long before mother-in-law Val Batson is on her way home again. She’s been having a marvellous time, and for the most part, the weather has been perfect. I don’t think we’ve had a rainy day now for more than three weeks. Yesterday I took her to Boulogne for the promised day trip there. Our friend Alma Kipner tagged along. Nat Kipner also planned to come but at the last minute found himself with an urgent music recording session to do. Rosemary needed to be home with the boys. We travelled by express train from London to Dover where we joined the Hovercraft. Val was most impressed by its size, and I must admit that it rather looks like a monster rising from the sea as it sweeps in across the water, kicking up a thick mist, and up onto the beach where is plops itself down with a giant wheeze. The Hovercraft used by British Rail carries 30 cars and 250 passengers and travels at up to 77 knots.

The trip between Dover and Boulogne took about 35 minutes. Once in Boulogne we were taken by bus into the town centre where we had a picnic lunch, a drink in a sidewalk café, then spent about three hours strolling about the shops and other sights. In all, we had six hours in France. We bought a few postcards in France, but couldn’t post them there because of the ban on French mail to Australia.

Steam train trip:

Earlier this week we drove into the Sussex countryside to a tiny village north of Brighton where an ancient “Puffing Billy” type train still runs. The journey was primarily for Harley’s enjoyment (his main interest in life is now trains rather than clocks) but we all had a good day out. We travelled through some very interesting countryside and some picturesque villages. The train, “The Bluebell”, is pulled by a quaint 1910 steam engine over a five-mile track, and Harley loved it.

Work:

The freelance work has been fairly busy over the past few weeks. I’ve been acting NZBC correspondent for the past five days during the busy IRA bombings. Fortunately NZBC takes much the same material as 3DB Melbourne, so it’s usually just a case of sending the same report or actuality twice. I recently had an item published by the London Evening Standard on Australian film censorship, pointing to something of a reversal in the Australian and British attitudes on this. What got me onto the story was the discovery in a Melbourne Sun that Val brought with her, that the film version of Oh Calcutta is being shown in Victoria, but is banned in Britain. I've also been busy with TV Week articles.

At the BBC I’ve been doing some shifts as an Acting European Duty Editor, which makes life a little more interesting. It has meant that I’ve been in charge of all the European bulletins. I can’t remember how many bulletins actually go out each day, but they’re broadcast in 16 languages.

Gardening:

I don’t think I could stand being a farmer. My allotment plot has proved to me once again that no matter how much correct attention you give a crop, Mother Nature delivers the final judgment. My crop of sprouts was recently reduced to three miserable plants because of club root disease. Then all my cauliflowers ran to seed before they could form a proper heart. This is not to suggest that I’m fed up with the allotment; far from it. If I lose an allotment crop, it’s little more than a disappointment, but to lose, say, a wheat crop, then this also means a financial loss (sometimes a disastrous one). Perhaps I’ve grown too used to receiving my regular pay packet. The gamble that is involved in farming would drive me potty. But back to the allotment: All is not bad. I’ve got a lovely crop of New Zealand and Queensland Blue pumpkins. Rosemary and Val assure me they taste very nice. Both Harley and Niall, discerning lads that they are, both have spat it out on the occasions Rosemary gave it to them. In contrast to my early potato crop (which produced thousands of ping-pong ball size potatoes) my second crop is a great success. I’ve been getting up to 15 large potatoes on each plant.

From a letter dated September 16, 1973:

Travel problems:

Val Batson finally reached home after a couple of hitches. When we took her out to the airport on the day she was due to leave, we discovered that she had not realised that it was necessary for her to confirm her return flight. As a result there was no room for her on the plane. She could have stayed at the airport on “stand by” to take the first available seat for Melbourne or Sydney but decided instead to get a confirmed flight the following day. She left OK the next day, but then we had a phone call from Jim Batson to say she had failed to turn up in Melbourne. She had been off-loaded in Singapore. There was a mix-up over her booking for the final leg of the trip. We haven’t yet got the details, but she apparently got home two or three days late. Presumably, she was put up in Singapore at the airline’s expense. We were sorry to see her go. She was an ideal visitor. She was a great help to Rosemary and was unobtrusive with it. Harley loved her and misses her quite a lot. He’s been rather unsettled over the past week, and we’re sure her departure is chiefly the reason.

From the letter dated September 30, 1973:

More flooding:

I'm getting quite neurotic about the subject of water because we’ve had more floods in our place recently. The worst happened at four o’ clock one morning during a bad thunderstorm. Harley had been disturbed by all the “bunder” and “boom booms”, and I hadn’t long got him settled down again when he began screaming his head off. Rosemary went in to find water pouring through the ceiling all over him. He was soaked through and his cot was awash. Naturally, he was terribly upset. We couldn’t do anything to stop the water coming in, so moved him to the spare bedroom. The cause of the leak was traced to perforations in the zinc valley between the roof tiles.

The previous day we'd had a less serious, but still annoying, flood from the central heating. I had drained the system to make a few minor structural adjustments, and unfortunately when re-filling it, I became a bit impatient with the process and completely removed a screw which allows air to escape from the pipes. Suddenly water began squirting everywhere and I found I couldn't get the screw back in again. Rosemary ran up into the loft but couldn’t find the tap to turn the supply off. There then ensued a somewhat heated shouting match as I bellowed instructions to her as water squirted everywhere. To complicate the scene, Niall began screaming, joined in by Harley who became frightened by the thunderstorms that subsequently flooded his room. Eventually, the water was turned off and the flood and the tempers subsided, but for a time it looked like some slapstick scene from a silent movie.

From a letter dated October 14, 1973:

A surprise guest:

We got the surprise of our lives last Friday afternoon when I answered the door to find an unshaven, dishevelled and exhausted step-cousin Johnny Mole on the doorstop. His firm had given him only a week’s notice to fly over here for three weeks to show the parent company some new bearings he’s designed. Because of industrial troubles at various places, the flight took 42 hours and he was quite shattered. He insisted on spending the first night at a hotel, but soon gave that up when be was charged more than £11 for a room with a door that rattled all night and a shower that produced only cold water. He spent the rest of the weekend with us and is now up north somewhere consulting with company big-wigs. He’ll be back next weekend.

We like Johnny enormously. We almost feel he is one of our family. It hardly seems three years since he stayed with us at Shepherd’s Bush. Harley thinks Johnny is the greatest.

Night with Nureyev and royalty:

Because of my reporting for Australian radio, Rosemary and I were invited to the premiere of a season by the Australian Ballet, but Rosemary was still breastfeeding Niall so couldn’t come. Instead, she offered the place to a friend visiting from Bendigo, Viv Holmes. This is my account of the evening:

The Australian Ballet premiere was fantastic. It was a terrible shame Rosemary couldn’t come. Viv Holmes’s eyes nearly fell out at it all. It was a fully formal affair and we found ourselves seated just 15 or so seats to the right of Princess Margaret and Lord Snowdon. Margaret, by the way, looked hideous. She hasn’t the slightest bit of dress sense. Anyway, although I’m not crazy on large slabs of ballet, I found myself enthralled for the entire performance. It was marvellous. And, of course, it was wonderful to see such people as Nureyev and Helpmann in action. The company was given a tremendous reception at the end, and I lost count of the number, of curtain calls. It was quite remarkable.

Afterwards, Viv and I attended an on-stage party. We were all handed a glass of champagne on entering and there was piles of food and other booze. It was a party and a half. Meg and Tony stayed for about two hours. Nureyev, Helpmann and the rest of the ballet company were also there of course. Among the others who were there were Ted Heath, Margot Fonteyn, John McCallum, Angela Lansbury (the actress – latest film “Bedknobs and Broomsticks”), Barry Humphries, Morris West and Whitlam’s son, Nicholas.

Film premiere:

Last week a mate and I went to the British premiere of “The Adventures of Barry McKenzie”. It was also a good do, with free Foster's lager being handed out in the foyer. Quite a few well-known people were there. I can’t remember them all, but I recall Robert Morley, Dick Bentley, Maggie Fitzgibbon, Barry Crocker and an assortment of starlets. I did a short interview with Barry Humphries (as Edna Everage) for 3DB. The reviews haven’t been too bad. Some critics hated it, but generally speaking it got quite favourable publicity.

Mortgage woes:

Inflation in Britain continues to gallop, despite the pay and prices freeze. The biggest problem is interest rates on mortgages, with the rate going up from 8% to 11% in the past 12 months. This has increased my mortgage repayments by more than £15 a month. I’ve had two wage rises this year, but I’m still £150 a year worse off than I was at the same time last year.

From the family letter dated October 27, 1973:

Family death:

I should tell you that Val Batson’s father, Dudley James (known to all the family a “Gramps”), has died. He was in his early 80s. Val returned from bowls to find him gasping for breath and called an ambulance, but he suffered a heart attack on the way to hospital and never recovered consciousness. As you probably know, he’d been ill on and off for many years. In fact his first real illness came on the night of our wedding when he had to be operated on for a swollen prostate gland. Val is quite upset by his death, even though she never got on with him particularly well. In his younger days he was a bit of a tearaway, and in his old age, he tended to be a bit cranky, but both Rosemary and I got on with him well. He adored Harley and we’re very sorry that he never saw Niall.

Commercial radio launched:

Commercial radio has arrived in Britain at last. Two stations have started up in London and about 60 others will be set up throughout the rest of the country. One of the London stations is all news and talk and the other is mainly music. One of the main readers on the all-news station is Ken Guy, an old colleague of mine from 3AW. Londoners now have seven radio stations to choose from — five BBC (one pop, one sweet music, one classical, one talk and news and one general) and two commercial. All but the general BBC station are broadcast in stereo, which is excellent quality.

Pop music:

Steve Kipner (Alma and Nat’s son) is being launched in America in a new pop group created by David Joseph who is behind the New Seekers. $250,000 is being spent on promoting the group in the States. They’ve issued an LP and a single, and the record company is already issuing T-shirts, badges and jigsaw puzzles promoting the group, which is called 'Friends'. Steve is a very talented songwriter and musician – and a very nice bloke and deserves to score a success.

From a letter to the family dated November 18, 1973:

Royal marriage:

I suppose you all watched The Wedding on TV. [Princess Anne and Capt Mark Phillips.] 3DB took it live so I didn’t have to do anything on the wedding itself, although I did several stories leading up to the event. I was on duty at the BBC for the wedding and produced Radio Newsreel which covered the affair at length. I’m afraid Anne leaves me completely cold and from my enquiries has very much the same effect on the majority of the British people. I thought that the interview she and Mark gave before the wedding might have shown a previously hidden side of her character, but if anything it confirmed suspicions that she’s an extremely shallow person. Mark seems pretty hopeless and seems unable to string more than two or three words together at a time. Even when interviewed on TV recently about horses, he could express himself only in the most basic of phrases.

The marriage was not a success and they divorced in 1992 after years of separation. Anne married Vice Admiral Timothy Laurence soon after the divorce. I fear that I was wrongly harsh about her in 1973. These days she is arguably the most highly regarded member of the senior members of the royal family.

From a letter dated December 4, 1973, written during the three-day week imposed by Prime Minister Ted Heath to conserve power during the coal miners’ strike.

Petrol shortage:

Cheers from the Land of Petrol Rationing! Well, rationing hasn’t actually been introduced yet, but it can’t be more than a week or so away. We’ll be lucky if there is any petrol left to ration. There are few garages left open and this morning I had to queue for more than half-an-hour to get served at one of them. I was limited to 2½ gallons. We are very fortunate that a car isn’t essential to our existence — that is, as long as the Underground keeps running.

Actor interview:

I did an interview for TV Week last week with Googie Withers. She is starring in a new British TV series about life in Holloway Women’s Prison. She was very nice. She struck me as a very intelligent woman. Her husband, John McCallum is appearing opposite Ingrid Bergman in a play in London.

Whitlam wedding:

I went to the wedding of Gough Whitlam’s son, Nicholas, last week. It was dreadfully cold, but the bride turned up coatless and braless in a lightweight 1920s outfit. I don’t know how she was able to stop shivering long enough to say “I will”.

Business plans:

Rosemary has been investigating ways to make some money at home and has been thinking along the lines of producing speciality products. One is almond bread. So many people have enthusiastically praised the recipe that she thought she might try to market it. As it is rather expensive to produce, she approached Harrods, the Knightsbridge store famous for its best known customer, the Queen. Harrods tried the sample and gave their approval. They told Rosemary to return in the New Year and see them about orders. Naturally she was thrilled about Harrods because it is THE store in London and fastidious about the products it sells.

Rosemary has also knitted some Grenadier Guard dolls which are in great demand and she is thinking of selling more of these.

Despite the interest shown in the biscuits and the dolls, Rosemary came to the eventual conclusion that she would not be able to produce and deliver the quantity required.

From a letter dated December 28, 1973:

Train derailment:

The big train crash, which I understand was a big story in Australia, happened only about a mile away from where we live. I was at home and as soon as I heard about the crash, I grabbed my tape recorder and raced to Ealing Hospital to speak to the survivors. I got some good interviews and transmitted these back to Broadcasting House where they were used a few minutes later on one of the main evening news bulletins, Newsdesk. I also transmitted the interviews back to 3DB which got them on air about half-an-hour after first reporting the crash. I also went to the crash scene and filed a piece for Radio Newsreel which is broadcast round the world and to the ABC. It is incredible that so few people were killed or injured. A BBC colleague was very lucky. He was on a train that went through the crash scene 10 minutes before the accident. He nearly fainted when he got home and heard the news.

Ten passengers died and 94 were injured in the derailment.

---

Earlier chapters can be found HERE