David Irving |
Documents on the International Campaign for Real History
Posted Wednesday, September 19, 2007
© Focal Point 2007
When Gerald Gable and his Merry Men returned that afternoon in 1963, with ropes, cutters, and other housebreaking equipment, I was ready for them, and so, a few minutes later, were the Metropolitan Police.
September 18, 2007 (Tuesday)
Windsor (England)ON the Internet there is an appeal that bears a familiar stamp, or in this case I may say odour: a body called STOP THE BNP is appealing for information about the location of my next university speech. The anonymous pamphleteer has picked up my note that a famous university has invited me for November 23, and this vociferous spokesman of the traditional enemies of free speech puts out the word to all his agents in academia to spy out which is the body concerned -- for example, asking the appropriate university bodies who is scheduled to speak on that day.
Since the pamphleteer gives an Ilford address, and his oily, nasal, illiterate style comes wafting through the text, it is not hard to detect the hand of Gerald Gable, left, the same hand that in November 1963 clutched a fake Post office ID, as he and his accomplices, a gang of cut-throats, arsonists, and burglars like himself marched brazenly up to my front door in North London, disguised as GPO engineers.
Forty-four years: how time flies! One day I must warn Gable not to let an obsession take over your life: the Story of H. W. Wicks.
Never having seen a Jewish "phone engineer" before, let alone three together, I phoned the local GPO manager within minutes of sending them packing: he confirmed they were phonies -- if you'll pardon the pun.
When Gerald Gable and his Merry Men returned that afternoon in 1963, with ropes, cutters, and other housebreaking equipment, I was ready for them, and so, a few minutes later, were the Metropolitan Police.Best to draw a discreet veil here over the rest of the story -- it is set out in my memoirs; suffice it to say that Gable and his gang drew criminal convictions at the Guildhall assizes, and he has thirsted for revenge ever since. Not the brightest shekel in the purse, he did not even know the name on his own GPO identity-card when challenged by the police. (He had stolen it, that's why).
As said, I speak to cheering students on November 23. Or was it October? Or the 28th? An American university, or British? Not Austrian, or German, that's for sure. We shall see.
COURAGEOUS Dulwich College students have today also invited me to speak: "I am an upper sixth student from Dulwich College," writes Max.
I'm writing to ask, on the behalf of the Dulwich College History Society, whether you could come and talk at our school this academic year? We have a group of very keen World War II student historians who are very eager to hear your views. . .That's nice. I reply: "The answer straight away is Yes; I speak at other schools like Oundle and my own old Brentwood School, and there are no complaints -- and nobody dies of boredom. Let's fix a date soon."
September 19, 2007 (Wednesday)
Windsor (England)I WORK fitfully during the day, completing the page make-up of Banged Up, and snooze on the get-well sofa for an hour at three pm. Later I go online at Starbucks, as we still have no phones connected at the Windsor house.
I find there's a nice compliment from an historian of the School of History & Archives at University College Dublin. (I have often spoken there.) He writes:
I am moved to commend you on committing the Guy Liddell Diaries so faithfully to the 'open archive' of the Internet, and indeed express my sincerest thanks -- I am currently in the process of writing a dissertation on British-Irish Intelligence Co-operation 1938-1941, and as such this resource is most invaluable. (I had visited Kew previously to research the Security Service's archives, but due to time constraints could not view the Liddell papers).I reply at once: "I am glad to have been of service; as for the Liddell diaries, that is what the Internet is best used for. I shall shortly post the Anthony Eden diaries the same way..."
Seventy other e-mails await me already, and it is only six pm: The online ordering system is now very healthy, and will soon turn a tidy profit, I hope. But I must cover my back too. . .
Hear David Irving speak in British cities. Register interest
Next city Halifax, buffet and talk, 7-10 pm
I understand that one of our students may have written to you yesterday with an invitation to visit the College. This was done without the knowledge of anyone in the History Department, although it has been the College's policy for some time that all invitations to outside speakers should come from members of staff.In the circumstances, we do not feel that it would be right for such an invitation to be issued, and that such a visit would be inappropriate [sic. appropriate?] in a secondary school.
I shall have to buy a stopwatch, to time the record-fastest withdrawal of an invitation. This one beats even The St Andrew's Withdrawal, mentioned last week -- that university student invitation lasted only two days before its withdrawal. It must be pure coincidence.
"Dear Dr Black," I respond,
How very sad. You have with indecent haste cancelled the invitation issued to me by your school's history society. So much for free debate. You write: "In the circumstances, we do not feel that it would be right for such an invitation to be issued, and that such a visit would be inappropriate in a secondary school."I . . . often speak to university societies here and abroad, and at public schools of high repute, including Oundle and my own old school and [school name] where my daughter is now a student.
Would you be kind enough to enlarge on your word "inappropriate," and why you believe the word is justified? I attach a number of remarks on my works by historians of high repute -- all of them professors (or Generals of the Army) -- of which you may not be aware.
I take the liberty of copying this message, as I warn him, to half a dozen of his history-teacher colleagues at Dulwich: "They may well share your beliefs; but perhaps they do not."
- 10 JIC codewords, wartime security, codeword documents removed from the Churchill [Chartwell] papers
- 11 JIC codewords, wartime security, codeword documents removed from the Churchill [Chartwell] papers: see again for vol. iii, much material on SENTINEL, Dalmatian islands Dec 1943, etc.
- 12 JIC codewords, vetting of Sir Winston Churchill's papers.
They contain stray items that greatly surprised me about the depth of collaboration between the Churchill government and the security services of De Valera. I read them for my Churchill biography back in January 2001. Other events have since then intervened to delay my work."
[Previous Radical's Diary]
Our dossier on Gerald Gable and his gang
Churchill, diarist: Admiral Sir Bertram Ramsay
