King’s Road – derrickjknight

A Knight’s Tale (60: I Come A Cropper)

Towards the end of 1972, I spent a short period alone in another of Tony’s properties, this one in Gillespie Road, near Arsenal’s then football ground. One weekend at that time I returned from visiting Matthew and Becky to find my Ford Corsair concertinaed. Its front and back had each been pushed in a bit. Apparently there had been an attempted murder in which another car had been used to run down a pedestrian. Things had got rather out of control and the murder weapon plunged into the car parked behind mine which was shoved into the one in front.

My readers are probably hoping that the story would finish there. No such luck. There was more. David Hignett, one of the social workers in my Southwark Area Team, with Pat Benge at his side, offered to tow me in his very solid Volvo, to Raynes Park which still housed my garage. We set off after work, and drove at a rate of knots through London from north to south. The chosen route took us into Chelsea’s King’s Road. In the ’70s, this was the place to be noticed. I certainly was.

David drove at a good thirty miles an hour, and didn’t seem to slow down for bends. As we turned left into King’s Road, the towrope became entangled around my nearside front wheel. When we stopped at traffic lights I alighted from my car and waved to my friend who repeated the gesture. Pointing to the underside of the vehicle I crouched down and began to tackle the rope. The lights changed. Off David sped. I leapt to my feet and started running. Between two motors tied together. The one following had no driver.

Fans of Stephen Spielberg’s 1971 TV masterpiece ‘Duel’ will know that it is possible to be chased by an apparently driverless vehicle. There was no question about mine. It was driverless. The driver was running down the road in front of it.

Naturally, I yelled a bit at David. Pat screamed at him to stop. He did. My Corsair didn’t. I turned to see it bearing down on me. Bracing myself for the impact I caught my car in my hands by the front bumper and actually managed to stop it. Unfortunately the front of the Ford also caught my leading leg, ripped it a bit, and my trousers even more.

As I limped to the kerbside after we’d all come to a halt, I might, I thought, have been justified in being disappointed that no-one in the crowd that had now gathered seemed inclined to offer sympathy or concern for my health. They were all looking for the film crew. After all, why else would a young man wearing a brown velvet suit come a cropper in such an unlikely manner?

For anyone who is actually concerned, I simply suffered a little bruising, with my bones intact.

Published by derrickjknight

I am a septuagenarian enjoying rambling physically and photographing what I see, and rambling in my head as memories are triggered. I also ramble through a lifetime’s photographs View more posts

Rambling Round Chelsea And Pimlico

A CLICK, WHICH CAN BE REPEATED, WILL ENLARGE ANY IMAGE

Today I scanned a dozen colour slides dated May 2008 from my Streets of London series.

Wikipedia has these snippets to offer on Pelham Place SW7:

Pelham Place is a street of Grade II* listed Georgian terraced houses in South Kensington, London, England.
Pelham Place runs north to south from Pelham Place to Pelham Crescent.
2-14 is a circa 1825 terrace.^[1] 1-29 is an 1833 terrace, designed by the architect George Basevi.^[2] 1-29 is similarly grade II listed.^[3]
In 1950, the British-born American winemaker Peter Newton met his future wife, Anne St. Aubyn at a party in his house in Pelham Place.^[4]
Mel Brooks briefly lived in Pelham Place in the 1950s, while working at the BBC on the Sid Caesar show.^[5]
In 1967, Cecil Beaton photographed the model Twiggy wearing a yellow velvet dress by John Bates for Jean Varon^[6] in the residence of 8 Pelham Place, for an editorial for Vogue^[7]

A couple of years after I photographed this Chanel Store in Pelham Street, the Swedish fashion store rejoicing in the delightful name of Acne moved in next door. And Chanel is still there!

Kenzo, on the other hand, no longer seems to be resident in Ixworth Place, SW3. Perhaps the scaffolding drove them away.

Strong sunshine has burnt out the name of the street sharing this corner of King’s Road, Chelsea, where the mens’s and women’s clothing chain was having a sale.

You would need a few million pounds to buy one of these houses in Durham Place SW3.

Wikipedia tells us that ‘The Royal Hospital Chelsea is a retirement home and nursing home for some 300 veterans of the British Army. It is a 66-acre site located on Royal Hospital Roadin Chelsea, London. It is an independent charity and relies partly upon donations to cover day-to-day running costs to provide care and accommodation for veterans.
Any man or woman who is over the age of 65 and served as a regular soldier may apply to become a Chelsea Pensioner (i.e. a resident), on the basis they have found themselves in a time of need and are “of good character”. They must not, however, have any dependent spouse or family and former Officers must have served at least 12 years in the ranks before receiving a commission.’

Across the River Thames from Chelsea Embankment lies Battersea Park in which stands the Peace Pagoda. http://news.bbc.co.uk/local/london/hi/people_and_places/religion_and_ethics/newsid_8091000/8091765.stm contains this information:

‘At a time when the Cold War and the fear of a nuclear attack were escalating the offer of a Peace Pagoda to promote world harmony seemed appropriate.
It was offered to the people of London by the Nipponzan Myohoji Buddhist Order as part of the 1984 Greater London Council (GLC) Peace Year.
Nipponzan Myohoji is a religious movement that emerged from the Nichiren sect of Japanese Buddhism.

They have been constructing Peace Pagodas, as the spiritual focus to unify the movement for peace, since 1947 and they exist all around the world including Europe, Asia and the United States.
The pagoda in Battersea was built by monks, nuns and followers of Nipponzan Myohoji at the behest of The Venerable Nichidatsu Fujii (1885-1985), founder of the organisation.’

Turpentine Lane and Peabody Avenue SW1 lie in the Peabody Trust’s Pimlico Estate.

The Trust’s website, detailing all the estates describes Pimlico thus:

Pimlico is one of our oldest estates. The first 26 blocks date from 1876 – and we can learn about the early tenants from the national census taken every 10 years. In 1881 around 2,000 people lived there, many of them working in the nearby Chelsea Barracks. There were also lamplighters, messengers, charwomen, policemen and plumbers, while Charles Sutton, who lived in C Block, was employed as a porter at Buckingham Palace.
Pimlico is one of four of our estates to have a plaque commemorating those who died on active service in the First World War. In November 2005 a Channel 4 TV series, entitled Not Forgotten, featured the war memorial. Presenter Ian Hislop interviewed the granddaughter of William Buckland, the first man on the estate to be killed.
During the Second World War, the estate received a visit from Prime Minister Winston Churchill, who came to see the damage caused by an air raid.
New blocks were built on the Pimlico estate in 2011. They were officially opened by HRH the Duke of York in November 2012.’

‘The White Ferry House brings a traditional country pub vibe to the centre of London. The venue is housed in a stunning Victorian ‘flat-iron’ building and comes steeped in history, with a network of passages historically used to smuggle baccy, rum and gunpowder to the river buried below its foundations.’ It stands on the corner of Sutherland Street and Westmoreland Terrace SW1.

the iconic Battersea Power Station, visible across the river from Ebury Bridge SW1, now has a quite different purpose than originally envisaged.

Buckingham Palace Road SW1 runs from the South side of Buckingham Palace towards Chelsea.

This evening we dined on Jackie’s tender heart casserole topped with sauté potatoes; creamy mashed potato; sage and onion stuffing; roasted butternut squash, yellow peppers, and vary-coloured carrots; with crisp cabbage. The Culinary Queen drank Hoegaarden and Elizabeth and I drank more of the Rioja.

Death Of The Brown Velvet Suit

Yesterday I mentioned my mother’s postwar ingenuity. Not just making all our clothes, but manufacturing her own toilet paper. Of necessity, her squares cut from knitting patterns were not very comfortable, but they were at least strong, and did the job once you had done yours. We are now inundated with numerous brands of this household necessity, all claiming to be soft and strong. Having been engaged in extensive research in recent months we were relieved to discover the only one that lives up to its claim. It is four ply. Not like other producers’ slender slivers of loosely connected paper each of which disintegrate the moment the slightest finger pressure is applied. Four strong sheets guaranteed to stand firm. Forget the rest. Floralys super soft is the business. And where can you buy it? Where else but Lidl? (I’ll take my commission now, Mr. Lidl).

Before our guests arrived for Sunday lunch, we paid a visit to Totton’s finest emporium, in order to acquire a few supplies. The convenience of shopping on the Sabbath was not available in that bygone era when Mum was making do. I have mentioned before how much you could buy with a penny during my childhood. But we couldn’t go out and spend one on this day.

Helen and Shelly, Bill and Ron, joined us for lunch which was taken at a leisurely pace. Jackie presented a most impressive roast beef meal followed by spicy pumpkin pie or lemon cheesecake, or both. Those who like red wine enjoyed Bill’s Carta Roja gran reserva 2005; the white wine drinkers preferred Palastri pino grigio 2012. With our coffee we were treated to Turkish delight Helen and Bill had brought back with them from their recent holiday.

Ron brought a memory stick containing his video of John and Stephanie’s wedding. After a few teething troubles I got it to work on the iMac and we all relived the day.

With this particular group there is always an exchange of stories. At one point we got onto the subject of bizarre motoring accidents. This took me, and therefore the others, back to late 1972. One weekend at that time I returned from visiting Matthew and Becky to where I was living in Gillespie Road, near Arsenal’s old football ground, to find my Ford Corsair concertinaed. Its front and back had each been pushed in a bit. Apparently there had been an attempted murder in which another car had been used to run down a pedestrian. Things got rather out of control and the murder weapon plunged into the car parked behind mine which was shoved into the one in front.

My listeners were probably hoping that that was the bizarre accident and the story would finish there. No such luck. There was more. David Hignett, one of the social workers in my Southwark Area Team, with Pat Benge at his side, offered to tow me in his very solid Volvo, to Raynes Park which housed my garage in those days. We set off after work, and drove at a rate of knots through London from north to south. The chosen route took us into Chelsea’s King’s Road. This was then the place to be noticed. I certainly was.

David drove at a good thirty miles an hour, and didn’t seem to slow down for bends. As we turned left into King’s Road, the towrope became entangled around my left front wheel. When we stopped at traffic lights I alighted from my car and waved to my friend who repeated the gesture. Pointing to the underside of the vehicle I crouched down and began to tackle the rope. The lights changed. Off David sped. I leapt to my feet and started running. Between two motors tied together. The one following had no driver.

As I limped to the kerbside after we’d all come to a halt, I might, I thought have been justified in being disappointed that no-one in the crowd that had now gathered seemed inclined to offer sympathy or concern for my health. They were all looking for the film crew. After all, why else would a young man wearing a brown velvet suit come a cropper in such an unlikely manner?

For anyone who is actually concerned, I simply suffered a little bruising, with my bones intact.