THE BODIES of poisoned wives on the lawn; dead babies in the swimming pool and the twitching leg of a female corpse … these are the scenes in a chilling amateur home movie starring Lord Beaverbrook in 1924, written by his former lover Rebecca West.

What on earth was going on at the press baron’s sumptuous mansion home Cherkley in the Surrey Hills where Prime Ministers, Hollywood stars, famous writers and editors often went on private weekends?

The Beaver’s parties were notorious, with guest socialites and aristocracy using the many bedrooms for more than just cocoa and sleeping and business leaders and politicians doing deals out of the public eye.

In a black comedy, called ‘They Forgot to Read the Directions’, written by West, who once admitted she had a passion for small men like The Beaver and author H G Wells, we see the newspaper magnate as the wealthy Jasper Habbakuk, kick his black manservant Abraham Lincoln, and later wheel the bodies of his three fictional wives in a wheelbarrow to his private graveyard after he had them poisoned. The little cortege is led by Wells playing the part of Rev Jeremiah Honeydew, Habbakuk’s parson friend.

Beaverbrook takes the body of one of his fictional 

wives to his secret graveyard.

The film begins with the three wives seen arriving at Cherkley in distress, hugging their newborn babies to their chests to intimidate Habbakuk who is having breakfast on the patio.

The idea for the film followed a weekend when Beaverbrook entertained his special friends at a house party including: West, Wells; Isaac Bell; Lady Hulton; General Sir Edward Hulton and others.

Over pre-lunch Martinis the topic turned to marriage, an institution which the Beaver apparently disagreed with. He was a champion for celibacy, especially in the Dominions. So, the guests finally decided to make a comedy film about the farce of marriage and what they thought of it so far. West went off to write the script over the following few days. She also played one of the jilted wives.

It resulted in ‘They Forgot to Read the Directions’ vaguely meaning that when Habbakuk’s vicar pal Jeremiah poisons the unfortunate wives as a favour to try and get him to join the village cricket team, he did not read the directions properly and didn’t give them enough.

The dolls in the swimming pool

The dashing Senator Snoot, played by Isaac Bell, saves the day by turning up out of the blue and giving the women an anti-dote. The women, now free of their dead babies, then head off to live with Snoot in his American mansion. We then see Habbakuk marry again to a woman without children.

One last clip however shows the Beaver walking out on the party apparently washing his hands of the screenplay! But there is no explanation for that, except I wonder why he agreed to make it in the first place … and how it manages to be filed in the archives of the British Film Institute! Bizarre.

As for his former lover Rebecca West, I have not read her books, but I can only hope that she is a better author than she is a playwright.

West, H G Wells and Beaverbrook in a break from filming

*****

ANECDOTE: In one of his last interviews Beaverbrook tells of his meeting with his host Joseph Stalin who was responsible for killing millions of Russians in the Gulags: “Ah, yes, he was a proper villain, but I liked him,” he said. “He was a very jovial man, full of fun. He made lots and lots of jokes. Yes, he was a fine fellow. Drank a lot.”

*****

Pick of the bunch

Rupert Murdoch never forgot the fatherly figure who taught him the basics of journalism on Express news subs table in Fleet Street. His mentor would stroll over, put an arm on his shoulder and ask: "How's it going, Rupert, everything OK?" That young sub was Edward Pickering, later to become editor of the Express and enjoy the favours of Beaverbrook, before a classic Beaver downfall.

Like others before him, he finally fell on his Crusader sword, when the cruel side of Beaverbrook took over and he suffered the indignity of being made farming editor after the heady days of power in the most famous Chair in Fleet Street.

But Murdoch never forgot the man who mentored him with kindness and skill and Pick, as he was known, was able to pick himself up, dust himself down and live without Beaverbrook’s stranglehold.

In 1953, Murdoch, fresh from Oxford with a third-class degree, was uncertain about his future and so his father, Australian newspaper tycoon Sir Keith Murdoch telephoned his chum Lord Beaverbrook, to ask if he could give his son some work experience.

The press baron saw the young Murdoch himself and told him: "I'm going to put you on the subs' table of the Daily Express where you will be looked after by our Mr Pickering."

Beaverbrook summoned Pickering and briefed him on his charge. "Take care of him, Pick, you never know where he might end up!" At the time Pick was second-in-command to Arthur Christiansen.

Portrait of Edward Pickering

Murdoch never forgot the fatherly figure who taught him the rudiments of journalism. Pick would stroll over, put an arm on his shoulder and go through his copy with him.

Pickering, a brilliant jazz pianist, who played at St Bride’s, finally became editor when the Express was selling 4,111,000 copies a day. Within a few years, in 1960, it reached a daily sale of 4,300,000 and, by the first half of 1961, the circulation was 4,313,063. It was a brilliant achievement.

But the Beaver wasn’t happy, and Pick fell from grace, just like Christiansen had. Too many people believed that the editor was responsible for the success of the title. Not so, the Beaver told everyone it was him — even the public.

In October 1961, a strange item appeared on Page One: It read:

‘The Daily Express continues to go from success to success no matter what happens to its staff in any department. Nobody moulds the Express, the paper moulds its staff.

‘There must be a happy gremlin at work, a good fairy who guides some newcomers and makes them do whatever they do in the manner in which the Express wants it done.

‘The secret must be with Lord Beaverbrook.’

For Pick, the future was still bright. When Murdoch took over The Times and The Sunday Times in 1981, he reorganised the boardroom structure and appointed two new independent national directors — Sir Denis Hamilton and Sir Edward Pickering, whom he made executive vice-chairman of the board in 1982, a post Pick retained until his death in 2003.

He became Murdoch's "man in London". He was Murdoch's ears, too, his filing cabinet, his adviser-in-chief and mentor on virtually all News International affairs in Britain.

*****

ANECDOTE: Beaverbrook was a strange, often cruel but brilliant newspaperman. A far cry from the poor assortment of some Express chairmen since. But there was nothing that he enjoyed more than putting his editors in their place and often humiliating them.

He would often see them in his bedroom at Cherkley, giving them a bollocking as he walked around stark naked; sometimes he would be in the bath and at other times on the toilet. Sometimes with a woman draped over his lap. His favourite trick was to ask the editor a question that needed a long answer. Then get in the caged lift at Cherkley and go up to his apartment, making the Editor take the long, winding staircase to the top, while answering the question over the stair rail.

*****

TERRY MANNERS

Terry will be on holiday next week, returning on Monday, September 2.

12 August 2024