Bob Edwards
Richard Holledge writes: Bob Edwards (obituary, May 30) gave me my first job in national newspapers. Fearsome, punctilious — he could spot an errant comma at 100 yards — he was also something of a maverick. When the owners of the Mirror empire appointed the head of a building society as its chief executive in 1984, Bob was as impatient with his monochrome competence as the rest of us. Many believed he helped his old friend Robert Maxwell to buy the papers. “There won’t be a dull moment,” he said. But instead of the flair he hoped for, he was irritated by the constant interference from Maxwell, not least during the miners’ strike of 1984. Maxwell thought he could solve it and inflicted yards of tedious copy on the editors of his newspapers. A lifetime Labour supporter, Bob Edwards never flinched from addressing the serious issues of the day, but he knew a popular tabloid newspaper when he saw it and this wasn’t it.
King George Tupou V
Geoffrey Bourne-Taylor writes: During the Silver Jubilee and Commonwealth Conference at Gleneagles in 1977, I was personal protection officer to the Prime Minister of Tonga, Prince Tui’pelehake. Crown Prince George Tupou (obituary, March 20), who had recently graduated from Sandhurst, was part of the entourage. The whole week was great fun. Not only were we entertained by an eccentric manservant, whose party trick (when inebriated), was to eat a wine glass (I saw him do it), but Prince George was the life and soul of the party.
I particularly remember his tale of two pre-perestroika Russians meeting at Vladivostok railway station: “Where are you off to, Tovarisch?” asked one. “Oh, to Moscow,” was the reply. “Aha!” thinks the questioner, “he tells me he is off the Moscow, so that I shall think he is travelling to Leningrad; so he must be going to Moscow, the lying bastard.”
Advertisement
Sir Derek Wanless
Mrs Kathleen Phillips writes: At the age of 3 Derek (obituary, May 31) came to the beginners Sunday School at Robert Stewart Memorial United Reformed Church in Newcastle upon Tyne. I was in charge and recognised that, even at that early age, here was a young man with huge potential. I closely followed his career and felt proud that he was educated at the Royal Grammar School in Newcastle and proceeded to do very well indeed. His mother lived near me and would proudly tell me of his achievements.