Epiphany III

Saturday 6th January 1951

Bunny, Paul and I here alone. The park and gardens are infested by deer who destroy the shrubs – it is mild and the swans have come back … I arrived with a carload of pictures from Belgrave Square, the Matisse … the Bonington … etc.

(“Chips” Channon)

6 January 1956

In office John Betjeman wandering dismally round the passages looking for a telephone. I lead him to my room, where he telephones Slough! Apparently a doctor there gave shelter to his wife stranded in the fog. ‘Come friendly bombs, and fall on Slough … ‘!
Get a note from Michael Berry soon after 4.30 to say Jim Thomas’s new title is Lord Cilcennin. I ring Admiralty but find he has left for Paddington. Telephone stationmaster’s office, and manage to get on to him a couple of minutes before his 4.45 train leaves. He gives me correct pronunciation of Cilcennin.

6 January 1957

To Albert Hall to hear Malcolm conduct The Messiah. Bob Boothby is also there, and we spend a whole interval in political talk. Macmillan, he says, will succeed Eden as PM before Parliament assembles. He expects to be taken into the Cabinet as Secretary of State for Scotland or Special Minister for European Affairs. All who opposed the Government’s Suez policy may also expect jobs – Edward Boyle and Nigel Nicolson; Head and Selwyn Lloyd will go. But Bob does not expect the change to take place immediately. He leaves tonight for a week in Monte Carlo.

6 January 1963

Dine at Pratt’s. Old Lord Goddard there. I ask him to dine with me later this month, and he gladly accepts, ‘If I am still alive’.
More talk with him about Chequers. The Prime Minister who did most for Chequers was Neville Chamberlain. Winston once told Goddard that the £15 given to a Prime Minister for each weekend he is in residence was on the whole enough to pay for the food of the guests and other such expenses. What really made Chequers expensive was food for the guests’ chauffeurs.
When Eisenhower came to stay at Chequers in 1959, the United States Secret Service men were so anxious for his safety that they insisted on taking up the floorboards of his room.

6 January 1970

Lunch with Nicky Gordon Lennox. He is returning to Spain later today. So far, he says, Don Juan Carlos has conducted himself well as the nominated successor to Franco as Head of State.
To my astonishment, I am sent a wonderfully generous review of my Curzon book in the Sporting Life of all publications!

6 January 1978

Train to Exeter to stay with Jeremy and Marion Thorpe. Jeremy tells me that he has never had such a nightmare time as during the past few months – and the year ahead may be no better. He is being accused, either directly or or by implication, of involvement in a murder plot against Norman Scott. Jeremy fears that although he will not be charged with personal involvement in the conspiracy, many will assume that he must have had some knowledge of it, even approval. There have been times, Jeremy tells me, when the sheer mental agony of not knowing what venomous rumour or accusation would next hit him has almost driven him to suicide.

6 January 1981

Cabinet changes. Norman St John-Stevas is sacked, having rightly spurned an offer to retain responsibility for the arts, though in an inferior post as Minister of State.
Give Jack Plumb dinner at Claridge’s. He seems desperately worried about the political outlook, which he sees solely in terms of how a left-wing Government will confiscate his money. He is certain that Wedgwood Benn will one day come to power. Again and again he returns to the topic of his possessions: wine, silver, furniture and Sèvres china.

(All, Kenneth Rose)

Tuesday 6 January, 1981.  Zermatt

Had a very bad night – compounded (of course) by rage at once again boys not coming in until 1 a.m. Thought we would just go back to England today. I felt so sad at losing the ‘double’, perhaps finally both my love and friendship with the boys – reduced to Bonny papa’s state, i.e. more or less a nuisance, but got to keep in with him for inheritance purposes – and any possibility of doing something for my country. Woke, dragged up from 4 hours sleep at about 6.15 in a kind of ‘was-it-really-a-dream’ recollection, and its certain dreamlike qualities – Biffen to Trade, Nott to Defence, John Patten a minister (as a gesture to the new intake etc). No, it was not a dream. I still feel very uneasy about 1981. ‘Flagellation Year’ its provisional title.

(Alan Clark)

6 January 1987

Jonathan Aitken immensely interesting on his trial at the Old Bailey on a charge under the Official Secrets Act. The judge was wildly biased on his side. Jonathan also helped his own defence by going to earlier cases to study the prosecuting counsel. ‘I made up my mind not to be too exact, not to be trapped.’
Quintin Hailsham has said of the trial about secrets and MI5 in Australia ‘Now I know what a kangaroo court is’.

( Kenneth Rose)