by David Niven
‘Hello,’ she said, ‘wasn’t that wonderful?’
I persuaded her to have a sandwich with me at a nearby coffee shop…we were both on the point of being late back to work.
I discovered her name, the fact that she was the cypher clerk at the R.A.F. Reconnaissance Squadron at Heston just outside London and that she was billeted on a family friend who lived in the middle of Regent’s Park. There was never a shadow of doubt in my mind that this was the one, but with the whole world flying apart at the seams, there was no time for the niceties of a prolonged courtship. That night I called at the house in Regent’s Park and passed in a note saying that I was outside the door, was considering buying the Park from the King and would like some advice on the dredging of the lake. She appeared giggling deliciously and invited me in.
Two days later I was invited to luncheon to meet her mother and by the end of the week, I found myself shaking and sweating and being introduced to her father who lived apart. My mission was to persuade him to allow his daughter to become my wife.
Bill Rollo was an angel. Nobody has ever been able to say a word against him and this despite the fact that he was a famous divorce lawyer. When I met him he was, though over fifty, also in the uniform of the R.A. F…on his chest an impressive row of ribbons from World War I.
He worked all day at his law office and did night duty in a special war room where on a wall map, the Prime Minister could see at a glance the latest dispositions of flotillas, brigades and squadrons.
He protested mightily: ‘But, Primmie darling, you can’t put me in this position because I don’t know how to behave!’
‘Don’t be nervous, papa,’ said she, ‘leave everything to us.’
He handed me an enormous drink and helped himself liberally. ‘Oh, God!’ he said, ‘this is agony, isn’t it? I ought to ask you all sorts of questions…do you have any prospects?…well, that’s bloody silly for a start because the air raid warning has just gone.’
It was the night of a particularly heavy ‘blitz’ and bombs were soon raining down. It had been arranged that we would go out to dinner but there was so much shrapnel flying about that we decided against it.
‘I can’t think why you want to marry her,’ said Bill, ‘she can’t cook and she can’t sew.’
‘You’re a big help,’ said his daughter.
We opened some wine, some cans of beans and some cheese and as a particularly heavy bombardment made the high old building shudder and sway, with the three of us huddling under the kitchen table, Bill Rollo gave his consent.
War is a great accelerator of events so ten days later, we were married in the tiny Norman church of Huish village at the foot of the Wiltshire Downs. Trubshawe, now in the uniform of the Royal Sussex Regiment, was best man, and friends from far and near came by train, by bicycle or by blowing their petrol rations for a month—some came on horseback.
Primmie looked like a porcelain figure in a simple pale blue dress. The Battle of Britain on that cloudless September day, was raging in the skies above it—it was no time for veil and orange blossom. She carried a bouquet of pink flowers picked from her parents’ garden a hundred yards away. Half way through the service, as we were singing her favourite anthem, ‘Sheep may safely graze’, a small flock, as though divinely summoned, wandered in from the Downs and stood chewing benignly round the font.
Our first days of honeymoon were spent finding a place for Primmic to set up a home.
We had no money apart from my army pay so we were lucky to find a fourteenth-century, unheated, thatched cottage between Dorney and Slough. Primmie had left the R.A.F. in order to get married but she was determined to contribute to the war effort so she bicycled to Slough every morning at seven o’clock and worked at Hawker’s factory, building Hurricane fighters. She took in an elderly refugee from the London bombing who had just lost her husband and her home near the dock. Mrs. Wisden was a little birdlike cockney who wore pince-nez. She kept ‘Halfway Cottage’ tidy and cooked—after a fashion—but behaved rathcr strangely during air raid alerts. Hawker’s being an obvious target for the Luftwaffe, these were frequent. Thanks to a permanent smoke screen from smudge pots, the factory itself remained untouched but the whole neighbourhood became pitted with bomb craters to Mrs. Wisden’s apparent satisfaction. The moment the banshee wailings of the sirens started, she would rip down the blackout curtains, turn on all the lights and rush out into the garden, tearing at her blouse. ‘Let me ‘ave it, ‘Itler!’ she would scream, ‘rite through me bleeding’ chest…I want to join my ‘Arry…Roll on death!’
The Commandos were being prepared for offensive operations but these were held up while landing craft were designed and built. In the meanwhile, the danger of our own invasion by the German Army, poised across the Channel, was very real. A new and highly secret outfit within the Special Services was formed to help deal with this possibility and I was ordered to join it in Richmond Park. Before I went, I did something for which, in my opinion, the military has never adequately rewarded me. I suggested to my new uncle by marriage, Robert Laycock, that he should join the Commandos.
He was then a captain in the Royal Horse Guards and had just received a posting to India to become gas officer of a division and was due to embark in a few days’ time. He came to the War Office and I introduced him to Dudley Clarke who immediately decided that this was just the man he wanted. Bob and I paced the stone corridors of that dreary old building while Clarke dashed about, pulling strings as a result of which somebody else went to India and Bob formed N° 8 Commando, embarking on a career of legendary gallantry which included his famous efforts to blow up Field Marshal Rommel in the desert some 200 miles behind the German lines in Libya. It culminated, five years later, in his becoming Chief of Combined Operations with the rank of major-general.
Richmond Park was the headquarters of ‘Phantom’—the brainchild of ‘floppy’. ’
Colonel Hopkinson had realised painfully during the retreat to Dunkirk that if a general fighting a battle is not receiving a steady flow of reliable information from the front, he cannot contribute very much towards the outcome. In the heat of contact, normal communications frequently break down, radio transmitters get destroyed and dispatch riders get killed. ‘Phantom’ was composed of a number of highly mobile squadrons of ‘officer patrols’. These were deployed among the forward units, equipped with radios, endowed with expert dispatch riders and as a last resort, a basket of carrier pigeons. The commanding officer of ‘Phantom’ stayed at the army commander’s right hand and when the situation at a certain point on the map needed clarifying, a message went direct to the nearest ‘Phantom’ Squadron to find out exactly what was going on. In practice the answer usually came back explaining that the situation was unclear because the place was full of Germans.
After a brief period of intensive training, I was promoted to Major and for over three years I had the great honour to command ‘A’ Squadron. ‘Hoppy’ was a short, square officer with a fertile imagination and a great gift for extracting the maximum of loyalty and hard work from all ranks. Before he was killed in action in Italy, he built up a unit that again and again proved its worth in the reconquest of the Continent.
Hugh Kindersley, a handsome giant from the Scots Guards, was second-in-command and the officers and men came from every unit in the British Army.
During the threat of sea-borne invasion, the ‘Phantom’ squadrons were distributed along the southern and eastern coasts where, apart from our primary function, we also made ourselves ready to go underground and a large stock of disguises was earmarked for distribution if the invasion was successful. I, personally, was ready to re-emerge dressed as a parson. For a start ‘A’ Squadron was attached to 5 Corps in the danger area behind Poole Harbour. The Corps Commander was a dynamic little man who demanded a fearsome standard of mental alertness and physical fitness. Just inside his headquarters was a large notice board…
ARE YOU 100% FIT?
ARE YOU 100% EFFICIENT?
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DO YOU HAVE 100% BINGE?
We never discovered what he meant by ‘BINGE’ because nobody dared to ask him. His name was General Bernard Montgomery.
‘A’ Squadron was my pride and joy. The second-incommand was a sardonic Irish newspaper man and the patrol officers included a Cameron Highlander, a Frenchman, a Lancastrian, a weight lifter, the assistant Bursar at Eton College, an amateur steeplechase jockey and an interior decorator who frequently called me ‘dear’ instead of ‘sir’.
The Squadron Sergeant-Major was a Scots guardsman and the seventy other ranks were made up of bank clerks, burglars, shop assistants milkmen, garage mechanics, schoolmasters, painters, bookmakers, stockbrokers and labourers.
A rugged corporal told me he was ‘a lion tamer in usual life’ and of the two men who cooked for and catered to the officers, one came from the Royal Household at Buckingham Palace while the other, a Norfolk man, said he ‘liked a bit of poaching better than anything’. In action, of course, these two were ‘runners’ at Squadron Headquarters and once when General Montgomery visited us unexpectedly, I was waiting under his eagle eye for an important message to be delivered when I was appalled to see my ‘runner’ approaching with the message in one hand and a pheasant in the other.
In the autumn of ‘41, the Trees invited Primmie and me to spend my week’s leave in the comfort of Ditchley. Walter Monckton, Director General of the Ministry of Information, was there, also a charming American, David Bruce. As the Germans had radio beams from Norway and France pinpointing Chequers, the Prime Minister’s country retreat was considered a bad risk so Ronnie and Nancy made a large part of Ditchley available to Winston Churchill and his staff. It was fascinating to rub shoulders with the greats, with Sir Charles Portal, the Commander in Chief of the R.A.F., and Sholto Douglas, Chief of Fighter Command.
Churchill bade me take another walk in the walled garden. Things were looking grim—the war in the desert was at its lowest ebb with Rommel snapping at the gates of Alexandria and after their spectacular success in Crete, the possibility of an enemy airborne invasion of the U.K. had now superseded the threat of a conventional one. Food was getting more and more scarce and a glance at the map sent cold shivers down one’s back. The whole of Europe was under German domination and in Russia, Von Rundstedt had just captured 600,000 prisoners at Kiev and Von Bock another 600,000 at Vyazma…Leningrad was besieged and the road to Moscow appeared wide open.
‘Do you think, sir,’ I asked, ‘that the Americans will ever come into the war?’
He fixed me with that rather intimidating gaze and unloosed the famous jaw-jutting bulldog growl.
‘Mark my words—something cataclysmic will occur!’
Four weeks later the Japanese attacked Pearl Habour.
Months later, when we were once more enjoying the delights of a short leave at Ditchley, I asked in the walled garden if the Prime Minister remembered what he had said so long ago. His reply gave me goose pimples. ‘Certainly I remember.’
‘What made you say it, sir?’
‘Because; young man, I study history.’ When Primmie became pregnant in the spring of 1942, she stopped building fighter planes, left Mrs. Wisden baring her bosoms in the garden at the first sign of a German bomber and followed ‘A’ Squadron wherever it went, living in a succession of farms, stables and vicarages. We were wonderfully in love and spent a lot of time praying that Phantom would not be sent to the African desert, or the Malayan jungle.
In mid-August, the ambitious raid on Dieppe was carried out. About 8,000 men, mainly Canadians were employed. Commandos under Lord Lovat were also involved and a specially trained force from Phantom.
Though the raid taught many invaluable lessons that saved devastating loss of life later on the Normandy beaches, the cost was appalling with almost two-thirds of the attacking force wiped out.
Writing and re-writing letters I had to send to the wives and girl friends of the men lost from ‘A’ Squadron, I kept thinking of a scene from Dawn Patrol when the Commanding Officer was going through the same agonising ritual. The adjutant watched him for a while and then said, gently, ‘It doesn’t matter how you word it, sir, it’ll break her heart just the same.’ By autumn, Primmie was less mobile so she moved to London during the height of the blitz and calmly waited for the arrival of her baby.
I thought perhaps Philip Astley might let her stay in his comfortable flat and went to see him: The building had been demolished by a direct hit. Fortunately, Philip had been out at the time.
By a great piece of good luck, ‘Hoppy’ had recalled ‘A’ Squadron to Richmond to refit with new equipment so I was well within reach when Primmie was whisked off in the middle of a December night and admitted to the Royal Northern Hospital in Camden Town in North London. ‘floppy’ gave me permission to spend the nights in the hospital so, every evening after work, I borrowed a dispatch rider’s motor cycle and rode through the black-out across the whole of London to be with Primmie and her little boy. They were unattractive trips. Hitler’s full fury was raining down on the city and shrapnel from the anti-aircraft batteries was also falling like lethal confetti. I wore a steel helmet and too often aided by the light of the fires, chugged my way past bomb craters and debris, peering ahead at the glow-worm reflection from my dimmed-out headlight. Happily the motor cycle made so much noise that I could not hear the express train whistle of falling bombs.
I slept on the floor beside Primmie’s bed and marvelled at her serenity—she was totally unafraid. Camden Town, a working class district, for some reason had become a prime target for the German bombers…the devastation around the hospital was awful. The bombing started nightly, as soon as darkness fell, and continued till dawn. More than once, on hearing a bomb screaming down in his direction, the brave major on the floor had to steel himself against taking cover under his wife’s bed.
A few days after Primmie and the baby left for Dorney, the inevitable happened—the hospital received a direct hit.
During 1943, the soldier’s oldest enemy—boredom—attacked Phantom. It was quite evident to us that we were being prepared for the final assault on the continent of Europe, but like footballers, we were becoming overtrained, so ‘floppy’ sent his squadrons whizzing all over England. At one moment, ‘A’ Squadron found itself isolated outside the walls of Dartmoor Prison.
‘Keep the men interested,’ ordered ‘floppy’ by radio. ‘Think of novel employment for them—turn night into day—make front-line conditions.’ Obediently, I arranged three days on the moors of intensive manoeuvres and, at the last minute, to simulate what might easily lie ahead of us, I cancelled the ration trucks.
Naturally, at the end of seventy-two hours on a windswept escarpment, covered with nothing but heather, ferns and wild pony shit, ‘A’ Squadron, forced to ‘live off the land’, were in a sorry condition. All, that is, except their gallant commander who had taken certain precautions and Squadron Sergeant Major Lonsdale of the Scots Guards.
‘How is it possible?’ I asked him. ‘I am the only one who knew that the squadron would have no food or water for three days.’
‘Sorr,’ he replied, ‘I happened to have aboot my person one large fruit cake.’
The naval commander of a flotilla of motor torpedo boats in Darmouth contacted me.
‘We are made of three-ply,’ he said, ‘and we are fitted with last-war 2-pounders. The German E boats have twin Oerlikens operated electrically from armour-plated bridges and we are supposed to protect the convoys from the bastards—do you have any anti-tank weapons? If so, please come and help us.’
‘A’ Squadon spent many miserable seasick hours as a result of my quixotic acceptance of this dangerous invitation.
‘Hoppy’ finally gathered all the squadrons into Richmond Park and told me to arrange a concert. I went to beg the help of the Crazy Gang at the Victoria Palace.
Bud Flanagan’s response was typical. ‘Leave it to us,’ he said, ‘just provide the transport and we’ll provide the show bu
t you be Master of Ceremonies and give us some grub after.’
The concert took place at midnight, in the big movie house on Richmond Hill. It was a classic show business answer to an S.O.S. Flanagan and Allen showed up, also Nervo and Knox, Naughton and Gold, Debroy Somers and his Band, Teddy Brown and his xylophone, Sid Field, Zoe Gail, Frances Day, Naunton Wayne, Arthur Riscoe and Leslie Henson.
The show lasted for four hours and was wildly appreciated. Civilian morale on a small beleaguered island was also in constant need of bolstering and during the time I spent in the Home Forces, I was used for all sorts of capers. I was given four weeks ‘special duty’ and with a radio transmitter in my dressing room from which I controlled ‘A’ Squadron, I played a part in a film about the Spitfire, backed by the R.A.F.—The First of the Few with Leslie Howard.
Two years later, I collected a few more weeks of ‘special duty’ and played in an Army-backed film, directed by Carol Reed, written by Eric Ambler and Peter Ustinov—The Way Ahead—which was not only a huge public success but for ten years after the war was used as a training film at Sandhurst.
These short bursts of escapism were a bonanza and I was only too happy to sample the first marvellous fruits of a happy married life.
With my Major’s pay, Primmie had now left the numbing damp of ‘Halfway Cottage’ for the roaring draughts of a phoney Tudor villa nearer the centre of the village of Dorney.
It was always full of friends, bringtng their own food and drink of course. Larry Olivier did the carving, having been brought up in a low budget parsonage he could make a chicken do for ten people. He and Vivien lived nearby as did Johnny and Mary Mills, Rex Harrison and Lilli Palmer. Noel Coward was a frequent and greatly cherished visitor and all of them looked after Primmie while I was away and gave her a wonderful introduction into the strange, half-mad world of show business.
Del Giudice, the Italian dynamo who produced the pictures that took Arthur Rank out of his flour bags and put him at the top of the film world, was another neighbour. A popular guest at Del Giudice’s house was the then Minister of Labour and later, one of the greatest Foreign Secretaries that Britain has ever known—Ernest Bevin.
