Family Britain, 1951-1957

by David Kynaston

  It was a crisis that had shown many things: Britain’s inability to act independently of her American ally; the futility of clinging on to illusions of Empire; the ability of those in power to practise deceit, with the extent of the collusion not definitively emerging until well into the 1960s; and an undeniable waning of deference, symbolised by the Trafalgar Square demonstration. How much impact did it really have on people at the time? Certainly it is possible to construct a ‘high’ narrative that sees the Suez Crisis as a turning-point in British geopolitical-cum-economic policy, with for instance the FT’s gifted, left-leaning leader writer Andrew Shonfield blasting out a series of editorials calling for a fundamental rethink as well as a longer piece in the January 1957 issue of Encounter that strongly urged a downgrading of ‘considerations of prestige’ and a new realism about Britain’s overseas responsibilities. Yet for ordinary people? Florence Turtle, too preoccupied by the pre-Christmas rush at work, made no mention of Suez in her diary, while Panter-Downes at the very height of the crisis noted that ‘through all the shaking events and bewilderment of the past week, London has seemed a city of preternaturally calm people, who pause on the street corners to buy their papers and stand there a minute to stare at the headlines with a total lack of expression before tucking the things under their arms and marching on’. A mere three months later, at the start of February 1957, Crossman was much struck when he attended a by-election meeting in Lewisham in support of Labour’s young, middle-class candidate. ‘He talked far too much about Suez, whereas this election should be decided on rents and the cost of living, as nobody, at least in that audience, wanted to look back and discuss the merits of Suez,’ reflected Crossman afterwards. ‘We’ve settled down again in the most amazing way. Though the whole foundations of the country have been shifted by the earthquake, we are inclined to deny it ever occurred.’16

  Nothing after all had let up in the distracting national pageant. A week after the ceasefire, Gerard Hoffnung and friends gave at the Royal Festival Hall London’s first ‘crazy concert’, a sell-out affair aimed at making concert-going less solemn, though The Times reviewer found little amusing in ‘Mr Hoffnung’s private Tuba joke’ or ‘a septet of stone hot-water bottles and a quartet of household electrical cleaning devices’. Another week later, filming complete, Marilyn Monroe flew out of London Airport, telling reporters that ‘meeting your Queen’ had been her biggest thrill, ‘I didn’t manage to get any of your fish and chips’ her biggest disappointment. Granada TV on the 28th gave Look Back in Anger a full run-out, to complaints only from the Daily Express, while Amis on 6 December provided Larkin with a buoyant domestic update: ‘I have more or less got my wife back (no Henry for 6 months; resumption of marital relations; much increased cordiality between the partners to the matrimonial arrangement in question) for the time being, and that is sodding good-oh, believe me, sport.’ Henry St John remained impenetrable, inscrutable Henry St John. ‘Despite the vile weather,’ he noted on Sunday the 9th, ‘of 13 passengers of both sexes, mostly young, on the upper deck of the trolleybus on which I returned [from Southall to Acton], all but one were hatless, and the one exception had a scarf on her head.’ Two days later Fanny and Johnnie Cradock had their hour in the sun, presenting at the Royal Albert Hall, in front of an audience of 6,500 and the television cameras, the Bon Viveur International Christmas Cookery show, sponsored by the North Thames Gas Board. It turned out to be, more than ever before, a TV Christmas. ‘Now at least there is the television to fill in the boring hours,’ reflected Fowles, back home at Leigh-on-Sea; in St Pancras, the Heaps had only just acquired a set, which on Christmas Day itself was on ‘almost continuously’ between 3.00 and 9.00; and that day saw the first PG Tips ‘chimps’ ad, shot in a stately home with Peter Sellers doing the voices. On New Year’s Eve there was a hint of satirical times ahead, when at the very small New Lindsay Theatre Club in Notting Hill Gate, Michael Flanders and Donald Swann gave the first performance of At the Drop of a Hat, opening with a wry song, ‘A Transport of Delight’, about the peculiar ways of London buses and their drivers and conductors. The first controversy of the New Year concerned the Honours List, specifically the CBE for Stanley Matthews. Now that ‘our leading cricketer [Len Hutton], Association Footballer [Stanley Matthews] and jockey [Gordon Richards] have all received high recognition’, grumbled a Hampshire colonel to the Daily Telegraph, ‘is it too much to hope that the nation will recover a proper sense of values and reserve such honours for those whose services to it have been of greater moment than skill at games and horse-racing?’17

  On the genuine grounds of ill-health, Eden resigned on Wednesday, 9 January. It is a moot point whether he really had a political future, but the striking fact was that, at the point of resignation, 56 per cent of the public were, according to Gallup, still satisfied with him. ‘Here’s a pretty mess, the Prime Minister resigning like that,’ a taxi-driver said to Nicolson, while it was ‘no shock’ to Nella Last, given how ‘his photos have shown him as a very sick man’. She expected Rab Butler to succeed Eden, but it turned out to be Harold Macmillan who had the greater confidence of his party, having generally displayed greater vigour – in both offensive and defensive mode – during the Suez affair. He also had, observed Panter-Downes soon afterwards, ‘an extremely original mind, a bitingly witty tongue, and a touch of the showman’, though Last’s husband refused to believe the news, saying ‘now what qualifications has he got?’ ‘THE QUEEN SENDS FOR MACMILLAN’ announced the Evening Standard in its ‘Final Night Extra’ for the 10th, as the political wheel took another spin, but tucked away on an inside page its ‘Newsbriefs’ column was a pleasing reminder of the permanence of the local and particular:

  Bus fares at Lowestoft are to be raised to offset petrol rises.

  Final cost of a health centre on the Harold Hill estate at Romford is fixed at £35,270.

  15 budgerigars offered to Friern Barnet Council have been refused. Reason: no aviary.

  The Queen has sent a donation towards a new church on a housing estate at King’s Lynn.

  Police have been asked by Harlow Council to watch for hooligans smashing street lamps.

  Minimum charge fixed by Bexley Council for circuses in parks there is £10 a day.

  Complaints of increased noise due to shunting at North Chingford are being investigated.

  Elsewhere in Chingford, it was just another Thursday for Judy Haines, who made no mention of Macmillan in her diary. ‘Still pegging away at Pamela’s frock,’ she noted instead. ‘As my kitchen curtains are in ribbons, spared time to cut out material from new bought yesterday. I feel more confident with measuring since Dressmaking lessons.’18

  Afterword

  ‘Good food and plenty of it, full employment, well furnished homes – today’s generation knows what Good Living really means!’ began an advertisement for New Zealand butter (‘the perfect butter with the natural golden colour’) in Woman in the first week of 1957.1 Food, jobs, homes: such was the holy trinity of the 1950s, a formula for Tory votes and a widespread, almost wholly welcome sense of security after the tumultuous upheavals and painful privations of the 1940s. ‘Kitchencraft is the art of making your kitchen light, livable and labour-saving,’ declared the current issue of Woman and Shopping, before itemising ‘some good buys’ – including ‘a fluorescent light fitting designed specially for efficient, shadowless light at the cooker and sink’, ‘a spin dryer which will dry six shirts to ironing stage in six minutes’, ‘a chair in tubular steel with a foam rubber seat’, and ‘a “Mixidiser” that operates from a main tap and does your egg whisking, fruit pulping and creaming’.2 For most people the future, not just in the kitchen, was indisputably modern – yet modern, they hoped, within a familiar, reassuring setting. Modernists, by contrast, had little patience with the recalcitrant forces of social conservatism. The tensions between these two perspectives – one glancing anxiously over the shoulder at a disappearing past, the other forging ever onwards and upwards – would be played out in mo
dernity Britain.

  Notes

  Abbreviations

  Abrams Mark Abrams Papers (Churchill Archives Centre, Churchill College, Cambridge)

  Amis Zachary Leader (ed), The Letters of Kingsley Amis (2000)

  BBC WA BBC Written Archives Centre (Caversham)

  Benn Ruth Winstone (ed), Tony Benn, Years of Hope: Diaries, Letters and Papers, 1940–1962 (1994)

  Chaplin Sid Chaplin Papers (Special Collections, University of Newcastle upon Tyne)

  Crossman Janet Morgan (ed), The Backbench Diaries of Richard Crossman (1981)

  Crossman Diary of Richard Crossman (Modern Records Centre, University of Warwick)

  Dalton Ben Pimlott (ed), The Political Diary of Hugh Dalton 1918–40, 1945–60 (1986)

  Daly Lawrence Daly Papers (Modern Records Centre, University of Warwick)

  Fowles Charles Drazin (ed), John Fowles, The Journals: Volume 1 (2003)

  Fowles John Fowles Papers (Special Collections, University of Exeter)

  Gaitskell Philip M. Williams (ed), The Diary of Hugh Gaitskell, 1945–56 (1983)

  Golden Diary of Grace Golden (Museum of London)

  Hague Frances and Gladys Hague Papers (Keighley Library)

  Haines Diary of Alice (Judy) Haines (Special Collections, University of Sussex)

  Heap Diary of Anthony Heap (London Metropolitan Archives)

  Hill Diary of Jennie Hill (Hampshire Record Office)

  Hilton The John Hilton Bureau Collection (News Group Newspapers Limited Archive, News International Limited)

  Hodgson Diary of Vere Hodgson (held by Veronica Bowater, literary executor)

  King Diary of Mary King (Birmingham City Archives)

  Langford Diary of Gladys Langford (Islington Local History Centre)

  Lewis Diary of Frank Lewis (Glamorgan Record Office)

  M-O A Mass-Observation Archive (Special Collections, University of Sussex)

  Macmillan Peter Catterall (ed), The Macmillan Diaries: The Cabinet Years, 1950–1957 (2003)

  Martin Diary of Madge Martin (Oxfordshire Record Office)

  MNA Muir and Norden Archive (Special Collections, University of Sussex)

  Osborn Michael Hughes (ed), The Letters of Lewis Mumford and Frederic J. Osborn (Bath, 1971)

  Preston Diary of Kenneth Preston (Bradford Archives)

  Raynham Diary of Marian Raynham (Special Collections, University of Sussex)

  St John Diary of Henry St John (Ealing Local History Centre)

  Speed Diary of Florence Speed (Department of Documents, Imperial War Museum)

  Streat Marguerite Dupree (ed), Lancashire and Whitehall: The Diary of Sir Raymond Streat: Volume Two, 1939–57 (Manchester, 1987)

  Townsend Townsend, P., Family Life of Old People, 1865–1955 [computer file], Colchester Essex: UK Data Archive [distributor], September 2004. SN: 4723.

  Turtle Diary of Florence Turtle (Wandsworth Heritage Service)

  All books are published in London unless otherwise stated.

  The Certainties of Place

  1 All Madly Educative

  1. Streat, pp 581–2; The Times, 2 May 1951; Langford, 3 May 1951; The Times, 4 May 1951; Gavin Stamp, Britain’s Lost Cities (2007), p 133; Daily Express, 4 May 1951.

  2. Keith Waterhouse, Streets Ahead (1995), p 14; Richard Weight, Patriots (2002), pp 200–201; ‘Ralph Tubbs’, Daily Telegraph, 27 Nov 1996; The Times, ‘Hidalgo Moya’, 4 Aug 1994; Vogue, July 1951, p 59.

  3. Heap, 4 May 1951; Russell Davies (ed), The Kenneth Williams Diaries (1993), p 63; Hodgson, 20 May 1951.

  4. MNA, Box 7, Take It from Here, 3 Dec 1950; Bobby Robson, Farewell but Not Goodbye (2005), p 20; Bernard Adams, ‘Brian Behan’, Independent, 6 Nov 2002; Casson obituaries in The Times/Daily Telegraph/Guardian, 17 Aug 1999.

  5. Picture Post, 6 Jan 1951; Michael Frayn, ‘Festival’, in Michael Sissons and Philip French (eds), Age of Austerity (Oxford, 1986), pp 307–8; Becky Conekin, ‘“Here Is the Modern World Itself”: The Festival of Britain’s Representations of the Future’, in Becky Conekin et al (eds), Moments of Modernity (1999), pp 228–46.

  6. David Cannadine, In Churchill’s Shadow (2002), p 265; Candida Lycett Green (ed), John Betjeman, Coming Home (1997), pp 279–80; Charles Reid, John Barbirolli (1971), p 295; Vogue, June 1951, p 74; Dylan Thomas, The Broadcasts (1991), pp 246–51; Nigel Warburton, Ernö Goldfinger (2004), p 131; Lionel Esher, A Broken Wave (1981), p 304; New Statesman, 12 May 1951; Peter Mandler, ‘John Summerson 1904–1992’, in Susan Pedersen and Peter Mandler (eds), After the Victorians (1994), pp 236–7.

  7. Frayn, ‘Festival’, pp 324–5; Iona and Peter Opie, The Lore and Language of Schoolchildren (1959), p 105; Becky E. Conekin, The Autobiography of a Nation (Manchester, 2003), p 209; Christina Hardyment, Slice of Life (1995), p 37; Winston Fletcher, ‘1951: The Truth’, Guardian, 9 Apr 1998; Mary Banham and Bevis Hillier, A Tonic to the Nation (1976), p 180; Stuart Hylton, Reading: The 1950s (Stroud, 1997), pp 12–15; Chris Waters, ‘J.B. Priestley 1894–1984’, in After the Victorians, p 222; BBC WA, R9/74/1, June 1951; John Simpson, Strange Places, Questionable People (1998), p 33; Robert Hewison, In Anger (1988), p 64; Banham and Hillier, Tonic, p 176.

  8. St John, 11 Jun 1951; Heap, 17 Jul 1951, 19 Jul 1951.

  9. Alison Ravetz, Remaking Cities (1980), pp 214–15; Osborn, pp 194–5.

  10. Coventry Evening Telegraph, 15 Aug 1951, 17 Aug 1951; Nicholas Bullock, Building the Post-War World (2002), pp 80–82; Coventry Evening Telegraph, 30–31 Aug 1951; The Times, 12 Nov 1951; Coventry Evening Telegraph, 16 Jan 1952; Listener, 17 Jan 1952.

  11. Melody Maker, 21 Jul 1951.

  12. Fowles, p 131; Daly, Ms 302/5/3, 31 Aug 1951; Golden, 12 Sep 1951, 28 Sep 1951.

  13. Manchester Guardian, 29 Sep 1951; Juliet Gardiner, From the Bomb to the Beatles (1999), p 57; Listener, 4 Oct 1951; The Times, 1 Oct 1951; Daily Express, 1 Oct 1951.

  2 A Narrow Thing

  1. M-O A, D5353, 21 May 1951; Raynham, 17 Sep 1951; BBC WA, R9/9/15 –LR/51/2313; King, 29 Aug 1951.

  2. Radio Times, 25 May 1951; Roger Wilmut and Jimmy Grafton, The Goon Show Companion (1976), pp 44–5; BBC WA, R9/74/1, Oct 1951.

  3. M-O A, D5353, 14 May 1951, 27 Sep 1951; Radio Times, 13 Jul 1951; Daily Express, 17 Jul 1951; Western Daily Press, 26 Jul 1951; BBC WA, R9/4, 4 Oct 1951; Hilary Kingsley and Geoff Tibballs, Box of Delights (1989), p 10; Andy Medhurst, ‘Every Wart and Postule: Gilbert Harding and Television Stardom’, in John Corner (ed), Popular Television in Britain (1991), pp 60–74; Candida Lycett Green (ed), John Betjeman, Coming Home (1997), p 381.

  4. Gore Vidal, Palimpsest (1995), p 148; Evening Standard, 29 May 1951, 9 Jul 1951; Graham Payn and Sheridan Morley (eds), The Noël Coward Diaries (1982), p 177; Coventry Evening Telegraph, 5 Sep 1951.

  5. Guardian, 10 Jun 2005 (Frank Keating); Hodgson, 5 Aug 1951; Western Daily Press, 6 Aug 1951; Milton Johns, ‘Wally Hammond’, Journal of the Cricket Society (Autumn 2006), pp 4–5.

  6. Nick Clarke, The Shadow of a Nation (2002), pp 59–60; Daily Express, 21–22 Aug 1951; The Times, 21 Aug 1951.

  7. The Times, 18 Jul 1951; Port Talbot Guardian, 20 Jul 1951; The Times, 23 Sep 1999; Clive Jenkins, All Against the Collar (1990), pp 30–37; Daily Mail, 23 Jul 1951; Jenkins, All Against, p 37.

  8. Steve Jefferys, ‘The Changing Face of Conflict: Shopfloor Organization at Longbridge, 1939–1980’, in Michael Terry and P. K. Edwards (eds), Shopfloor Politics and Job Controls (Oxford, 1988), pp 66–8; Birmingham Post, 21–6 Jun 1951; Alistair Tough, ‘Richard (Dick) Albert Etheridge’, in Joyce M. Bellamy and John Saville (eds), Dictionary of Labour Biography, Volume IX (Basingstoke, 1993), p 76; John McIlroy, ‘“Every Factory Our Fortress”: Communist Party Workplace Branches in a Time of Militancy, 1956–79, Part 2: Testimonies and Judgements’, Historical Studies in Industrial Relations (Autumn 2001), p 82.

  9. Email from Michael Banton, 12 May 2006; Michael Banton, ‘The Economic and Social Position of Negro Immigrants in Britain’, Sociological Review (De
c 1953), pp 49–52; New Statesman, 11 Aug 1951; Guardian, 30 Oct 2004.

  10. John Lahr, Prick Up Your Ears (2000 edn.), pp 76, 79; Graham Lord, Just the One (1997), p 79.

  11. M-O A, D5353, 30 Jul 1951; New Statesman, 4 Aug 1951; M-O A, TC58/2/H.

  12. Carolyn Steedman, ‘Landscape for a Good Woman’, in Liz Heron (ed), Truth, Dare or Promise (1985), p 118; Christine Keeler, The Truth at Last (2001), p 114; George H. Gallup (ed), The Gallup International Public Opinion Polls: Great Britain 1937–1975, Volume One (New York, 1976), p 252; M-O A, D5353, 16 Aug 1951; Haines, 25 Aug 1951; Western Morning News, 1 Sep 1951, 3 Sep 1951; Michael Willmott (ed), Rev. Oliver Leonard Willmott, The Parish Notes of Loders, Dottery & Askerswell, Dorset: Volume I, (Shrewsbury, 1996), Oct 1951.

  13. Raynham, 19 Sep 1951; Kenneth Harris, Attlee (1982), p 486; Raynham, 19 Sep 1951; Hague, Box 3, 24 Sep 1951; Macmillan, pp 101–2; Roy Jenkins, Churchill (2001), p 838.

  14. News Chronicle, 12 Oct 1951; D. E. Butler, The British General Election of 1951 (1952), p 50; Luton News, 11 Oct 1951; West Herts and Watford Observer, 12 Oct 1951.

  15. Picture Post, 31 Mar 1951; Daily Herald, 12 Oct 1951; Butler, British General Election, p 108; Timothy J. Hatton and Roy E. Bailey, ‘Seebohm Rowntree and the Postwar Poverty Puzzle’, Economic History Review (Aug 2000), p 536.

  16. Lord Moran, Winston Churchill (1966), p 342; Nigel Nicolson (ed) Harold Nicolson, The Later Years, 1945–1962: Diaries and Letters, Volume III (1968),