So Long Ago - So Clear

© Copyright P Crawford 2010

For Title Video go to: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ax5ArubCcyI For Peter's 1950s Movie go to: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qbB-6XH54Zo

Published as the 'The Land of Lost Content' – a line from one of A E Housman's poems – here used in reference to the 1950s

The original chapters have been expanded, and new chapters added __________________________________________ Now includes excerpts from

'THEBES of the 1000 GATES'

see

Chapter 2 – 'In the Beginning'

for the full publication 'Thebes of the 1000 gates' see http://www.scribd.com/doc/27406343/Thebes-of-the-1000-Gates describing Peter's adventures in Egypt

for video go to: http://www.youtube.com/user/CrawfordPeter#p/a/u/2/GIAmkbKFZWI for more photos of Peter's childhood go to

CONTENTS CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

CHAPTER 2

IN THE BEGINNING

CHAPTER 3

EARLY DAYS

CHAPTER 4

NEW ELIZABETHANS

CHAPTER 5

NEW HORIZONS

CHAPTER 6

FORBIDDEN PLEASURES

CHAPTER 7

STRANGE ADVENTURES

'However old we become, we yet feel within ourselves that we are absolutely the same as we were when we were young.

This thing, which is unaltered and always remains absolutely the same, which does not grow old with us, is just the kernel of our inner nature, and that does not lie in time.

We are accustomed to regard the subject of knowing, 'the knowing I', as our real self. This, however, is the mere function of the brain, and is not our real self. Our true self is that which produces that other thing, which does not sleep, when it sleeps; which also remains unimpaired when that other thing becomes extinct in death.

The Will itself is still exactly the same now as then. The Will itself, alone and by itself, endures; for it alone is unchangeable, indestructible, does not grow old, is not physical but metaphysical, does not belong to the phenomenal appearance, but to the 'thing in in itself'.'

'Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung' ('The World as Will & Representation')

Arthur Schopenhauer

AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION The task confronting the authors was to describe as clearly as possible the childhood and youth of their subject.

All the information found in this biography was provided by the subject himself, and so the book can hardly be described as an unbiased or objective account.

This, however, may well be a strength, rather than a weakness, for it is the study of a child's remembered experiences – the joys and sorrows, hopes and fears. Maybe the memories have been distorted by the passage of time – but they are, essentially, the subject's memories, rather than the memories of those around him, and very suitably, as you will probably understand subsequently, the subject therefore become the centre of his own universe, with family friends, and even social, cultural and historical events orbiting round him.

The authors have made no attempt to insert invented dialogue or any descriptions or judgements other than those provided by the subject.

Far from being a 'post-modern', self referential piece of literature, this study is a simple, traditional biography, plotting one individual's progress through a world that had just emerged from one of the most shattering events in history – the Second World War.

PLEASE NOTE Certain chapters contain text which features explicit descriptions of adult themes.

So why is this book dedicated to Peter and to J M Barrie ?

What is childhood ?

The introduction reviews childhood and children's literature, and considers the significance of the family, parents, time and death.

And eventually we meet the subject of our story - Peter.

'Tell me the stories of long, long ago...' - 'so long ago, so clear' "I always want to be a boy - and to have fun."

The bright summers were warmer, the grass was softer, and the drowsy summer days stretched almost into infinity.

There was always soft, powdery snow at Christmas, and the fire was always warm and inviting on those cosy, quiet evenings.

People were more friendly, and life was gentle and easy.

Was it really like that ? Well, we shall see - perhaps - as we look back on a childhood that now seems to have been 'so long ago, and yet so clear'.

But to begin at the beginning - and possibly answer two questions ?

Why is this work dedicated to J M Barrie, and who is Peter ?

Well, to really find out about Barrie and Peter you need to read the whole book, - but here's a little attempt to give some sort of explanation.

Take a gentle stroll through Kensington Gardens on a soft, sunny summer afternoon.

As you walk away from the glittering gold of the neo-gothic spires of the Albert Memorial, down the avenue of tall trees to the Watts statue of 'Physical Energy', you can make a little detour towards the cool limpid waters of the Serpentine.

There, by the lake, you will find the statue of a pretty young boy who is playing on some pipes.

This statue is unique in London in that it portrays not an idealised personification of some 'virtue', or a famous historical figure, but rather a fictional character from a 'supposedly childrens' storybook.

The statue is by the eminent Victorian sculptor Sir George James Frampton, and is of Peter Pan, the eponymous hero of J M Barrie's play, (because the model for the statue was a boy called James Shaw, and not Michael Llewellyn-Davies, - of who more later- Barrie was very disappointed with the result, and commented, "It doesn't show the devil in Peter,").

'Our Peter', (as we shall call the subject of this study), first saw the statue when he was about five or six years old, with Jane Crawford, his adoptive mother, and 'Auntie' Joe, - and you will hear more about Jane and 'auntie' Joe later.

They were on their way to Selfridges, one crisp, sunny December afternoon, to do some Christmas shopping.

Strangely, on that day, our Peter was bought two presents in the toy department at Selfridges, - a plastic pirate's cutlass and a toy telescope - which, of course, should make us think of Captain Jas. Hook, and if you don't know who Jas. Hook is, then you have had a misspent childhood.

At that time, of course, Peter had no idea who Peter Pan was, or Jas. Hook for that matter, as no one had read him the book, and he had not seen Barrie's play or the Disney cartoon.

Now if Peter (that is our Peter) met J M Barrie, who created Peter Pan, today, I don't think he'd like him very much, despite the fact that Barrie was very much like Peter's 'Uncle' Jack.

'Uncle' Jack was Peter's adoptive father's brother-in law; - Scottish, (as Barrie was), very short, dark and swarthy, - he was always smoking a pipe, played the violin and loved Verdi. As a boy Peter adored 'Uncle' Jack, and was apparently inconsolable when he died when Peter was eighteen.

Now, many years later, however, Peter doesn't like short people, and particularly short people who smoke pipes.

It was thanks to another 'uncle', however, - 'Uncle Walt', that Peter was introduced to J M Barrie and Peter Pan in 1954, at the local Odeon cinema at Hounslow West, through that infamous and desperately kitsch cartoon 'Peter Pan'.

The only things that really attracted Peter to his namesake then were the sentimental song, 'The Second Star To The Right', the flying (had our Peter ever flown before ?), and the idea of never growing up.

But Peter apparently did grow up, and forgot about the other Peter, and his creator - no, not 'Uncle Walt', but J M Barrie, the little Scottish man with the awful cough and a way with words.

Then came a flurry of films about 'Pan', including one film, called 'Hook' (1992), directed by Steven Spielberg, in which a grown up Peter, (and how could Peter ever grow up ?), played rather bizarrely by Robin Williams, returns to Never Land to rescue his children, who have been captured by captain Hook, equally bizarrely played by Dustin Hoffman.

Another film dealing with Peter Pan, 'Finding Neverland', featured a ridiculously handsome and tall J M Barrie, minus the moustache, who doesn't seem to have any of the pedophilic tendencies of the real man. The film mainly dealt with the relationship between Barrie and the Llewelyn-Davies family, although the chronology was so distorted that the story made very little sense.

To make matters even worse, a very strange pop star named his home 'Never Land', and made some serious problems for himself by 'entertaining' children there, - unlike Barrie, who never seemed to arouse anyone's concern by spending suspiciously inordinate periods of time playing with little boys.

But the magic was still there.

Then, a film, simply called 'Peter Pan', with the Duchess of York providing a commentary, was released in 2003, financed by Mohammed Fyad, and dedicated to the memory of Dodi; Fayed's wastrel son who died in Paris in mysterious circumstances.

The film had a real, and stunningly handsome boy, Jeremy Sumpter, looking considerably younger than his fourteen years.

Wendy was the deliciously sweet Rachel Hurd-Wood, and Hook and Mr Darling were played the same individual, as required by Barrie, the actor in question being Jason Isaacs.

The story was almost completely true to Barrie's original, but much revised play, and the absence of American accents in the cast was particularly pleasing - giving the production of this quintessentially English fantasy a truly English flavour.

Just prior to this release, our Peter had also, just out of sheer curiosity, read a couple of biographies of Barrie.

Much to Peter's surprise he had discovered from reading these biographies that there was a strong connection between Peter Pan and Kensington Gardens -

This was the same Kensington Gardens where Frampton's statue of Peter Pan, which little Peter had starred at somewhat uncomprehendingly all those years ago, still stands gazing out across the Serpentine - and the same Kensington Gardens where our Peter had spent some wonderful times with his own 'marvellous boy'.

On reading Barrie's biography it also became clear to Peter that the adventures of the other Peter were based on the curious relationship that Barrie had engineered with a group of young brothers, the Llewelyn-Davies boys.

Barrie, although he was married to Mary Ansell, had no children, - although they did have a big St Bernard dog, Porthos, who reappears in Peter Pan as 'Nana', the canine nanny to the Darling children.

Shortly after his disastrous marriage, Barrie befriended a young couple called Llewelyn-Davies who lived near by, in South Kensington. At the time Sylvia & Arthur Llewelyn-Davies had three sons, George, Jack and Peter. Eventually two more sons were born - Michael and Nicholas.

Barrie seemed to 'steal' these boys from their parents, endlessly playing with them, telling them stories and photographing them, (occasionally in the nude - when they were swimming).

The boy's father, Arthur Llewelyn-Davies, not surprisingly, gave every sign of disapproving of this somewhat strange state of affairs but, being a gentleman, he never made a fuss.

Equally, Arthur never made a fuss when Barrie made him the prototype for the ineffectual and spineless Mr Darling in 'Peter Pan'. Strangely, however, Barrie insisted that in the play the same actor who played Mr Darling should also play Captain Hook so perhaps Barrie had a divided opinion about Arthur.

After some years of being persistently neglected by Barrie, Mary took up with a much younger man, and Barrie was forced into a divorce. With Barrie then spending even more time with Sylvia Llewelyn-Davies and the boys, Arthur conveniently died of cancer of the jaw, leaving Barrie to maintain what then became a paternal interest in the late Arthur's sons, and their widowed mother, Sylvia.

A short time after Arthur's death, the distraught, grieving mother; the beautiful Sylvia Llewelyn-Davies, who was Barrie's model for Mrs Darling in Peter Pan, also died of cancer, which we may speculate was exactly what Barrie secretly wanted.

After having clandestinely, but clumsily 'doctored' Sylvia's will in his favour with regard to the boys, Barrie was left as the boy's guardian, and it is from those boys, and particularly Michael, that Peter Pan, 'the boy who never grew up', emerges.

Strangely, Barrie, who was a rather sickly man, and addicted to tobacco, outlived two of the Llewelyn boys, George and Michael.

George was killed at 'the front', in France, during the 1914-1918 war.

Michael, (Barrie's true favourite, and probably the actual model for Peter Pan), was younger, than George, and missed the War, but he died in his last year at Oxford University, probably committing suicide when he was drowned with his young lover, Rupert Buxton, so Michael, like Peter Pan, did not in fact grow up.

Peter, who became a successful publisher, also committed suicide some years after Barrie's death, throwing himself under a train, and only the youngest brother, Nico, lived into relative old age.

It seems that the idea of never growing up, which is the main theme of a number of Barrie's books and plays, and is the central theme of 'Peter Pan', cast an ominous shadow over at least three of the boys.

The lines "death would be a great adventure" are spoken by Peter in the book, 'Peter & Wendy', and in the play 'Peter Pan', - and perhaps it was that sentiment that echoed rather too forcefully in the minds of these brothers, causing George to raise his head over the parapet at the inopportune moment, Michael to take a morning dip with his boy-lover, when he couldn't swim, and Peter to step off the platform into the path of an oncoming train.

Those three boys died prematurely but Peter, the immortal boy, obviously lived on in endless revivals on the stage, in books and eventually in films.

As the years passed people puzzled over what it was that each generation found so fascinating about the 'marvellous boy'.

Some critics have suggested that the fateful character, Peter Pan, is not a 'real' child because he doesn't want to grow up, and of course 'real' children, we are led to believe, are only too keen to grow up. This is true to an extent.

I think our Peter looked forward to growing up, and probably so did his friends, but as he came closer and closer to 'childhood's end', in his late teenage years, I think that he began to look to the future with more apprehension, and began to look back to his boyhood, and the 'young Peter', with a certain amount of nostalgia and longing.

Another mistake that many critics make, however, is to suggest that 'Peter Pan' is a book and a play, about a boy, or about children. Perhaps those who have considered the matter a little more deeply would suggest that 'Peter Pan' is a work that is essentially about adults – or at least for adults. It is, in truth, about adult's thoughts and feelings about childhood - and has been described as a 'profound meditation on childhood, beginnings, time and death'.

One thing is certain; 'Peter Pan' is not a 'children's' book' in the generally accepted sense of the term.

As we shall describe below, 'children's' books' are uniquely a product of the nineteenth and twentieth century. Peter Pan, of course, was written during that period, so it could, arguably, fit into that category.

If, however, we compare it to a more recent 'children's' book', we shall see that it in fact occupies a completely different genre.

J K Rowling shot to fame of the basis of just one book about the boy-wizard, Harry Potter. Subsequently further books, featuring the same character, were produced, until eventually the character and the plots were played out.

Now Harry has a couple of similarities to Pan. First he is a boy; not an adult. Next, Harry has no parents, although, rather than being unknown, they are dead.

Equally Harry has special powers, like Pan, although these powers are not intrinsic to his nature, like Pan's, but are instead simply learned.

What Rowling cleverly, or maybe cynically, did was to adapt the traditional 'school adventure', which originated with 'Tom Brown's School Days' and continued with 'Stalky and Co', 'Just William' and 'Billy Bunter'. The genre had become essentially outdated, as few modern children would attend a private boarding school of the kind described in such stories - and so Rowling simply added a magic ingredient; - that ingredient being, of course, 'magic'.

So we had the same rambling Gothic building, the same prefect system, the same arcane customs and rituals, and the same eccentric teaching staff - but with the added attraction of magic, to breath new life into a thoroughly decrepit literary form.

Critically, however, Harry Potter has practically no appeal to adults, who see through Rowling's sham, and recognize the books as weak pastiches, which make excellent 'children's books', but have very little depth or substance.

Now take 'Peter Pan'. Far from being a pastiche, or a reworking of another genre it is, in itself, quite unique, having no antecedents. And while 'Peter Pan' does appeal to children, much of the text is way beyond their understanding, and is obviously aimed at adults. Barrie was quite obviously not writing just for them, the children - but for us and, of course, himself !

But what we often don't realises is that 'childhood' itself is a very odd concept. For example, before the nineteenth century there was no such thing as 'childhood' - children were just 'miniature adults'.

Equally, no one would possibly think of writing a book about 'childhood' or children before the nineteenth century.

You can look through all the literature of the Ancient world, the Medieval world and the Renaissance and you will find almost nothing about children. The only significant literature about children before the Enlightenment are poems by Greek and Roman authors about their young boy-lovers, and pederastic poems are not particularly popular in contemporary society.

It is only with Jean Jacques Rousseau, (1712 -1778), that we get our first 'modern' view of children and childhood in 'Emile', the story of a boy and his education.

Right up the end of the 19th Century children were dressed as and treated as adults, and this included the fact that they were expected to work from an early age.

It is only with the publishing of 'The Water Babies' by Reverend Charles Kingsley in 1863 that the Victorians began to think of childhood as a distinct and unique period in an individual's life.

Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, the mathematician and author, better known as Lewis Carol, continued the trend of romanticizing childhood in his most famous works, 'Alice's Adventures in Wonderland' and its sequel 'Through the Looking-Glass'.

Interestingly Carol was similar in some ways to Barrie in that he did not just write for and about children, but was rather besotted by them, photographing them in various states of undress, and forming deeper relationships with them than with his contemporaries.

Like Barrie he escaped any censure at the time with regard to these activities, but unlike Barrie, Carol was attracted to little girls rather than little boys.

To us a more acceptable writer would be R. M. Ballantyne, who established the 'boy's adventure story' genre, and is best remembered for 'The Coral Island' (1857), a work aimed specifically at young boys, and a story that almost certainly influenced Barrie when he came to create the Never Land, which was an island, and the pirate ship and Captain Hook.

Robert Louis Stevenson was not only a contemporary of Barrie, but also a close friend. While 'Kidnapped' (1886), may be critically acclaimed as one of his best novels, 'Treasure Island' (1883) is undoubtedly his most famous, and Long John Silver seems to be undoubtedly an antecedent and model for Captain Jas. Hook in 'Peter Pan'.

By the time Barrie and Stevenson were writing, childhood had become for the Victorians a unique period in a person's life.

Amongst the upper and middle classes children were seen a being little lower than the angels, particularly in regard to children's purity and innocence.

Later writers, like Edith Nesbit (1858 - 1924), author of 'The Railway Children' (1906), and Alan Alexander Milne (1882 - 1956), author of 'Winnie the Pooh' (1926) and 'When We Were Very Young' (1924), continued the trend of children's book which described children as sweet, gentle and innocent.

What is surprising about Barrie, however, is that the Lost Boys, and Pan in particular, are not at all sweet gentle and innocent.

Now while Barrie, partly because of his own nature, and partly because of the times in which he was writing, could not show that Peter was lacking in innocence, (particularly with regard to sexual matters) he did make it quite clear that Peter and the Boys were in no way sweet or gentle. Peter and the boys were incredibly violent, and Peter even 'weeded out' some of the Lost Boys when they began to grow up by simply killing them. (remember Barrie's comment about the statue in Kensington gardens - "It doesn't show the devil in Peter.")

Peter, by his very nature could not love, had no idea of the difference between truth and fantasy - and for fantasy we could substitute lying - and he had not the slightest empathy or sympathy with or for anyone other than himself. So Barrie 'bucked the trend' in children's literature to some extent, but significantly he did valorise childhood in the same manner as his contemporaries, giving it a status far above the dullness and dreariness of adult life.

One of the reasons why the Victorians and Edwardians were so enamoured of the child was because of the appalling rate of child mortality that existed at the time. Unlike in the West today, death in childhood was not something rare and unusual, and in fact is was almost the norm. Children were lucky to survive childhood. The children who did die were of course the ones who stayed forever young and, like Pan, never grew up.

Caught in the eternal innocence of childhood or adolescence these individuals took on a god-like status and were mourned with an intensity and a ferocity that we would find hard to comprehend today.

When Darwin's daughter Annie,(1841-1851), died at the age of ten Darwin was heartbroken, and the girl's death resulted in him completely losing his religious faith.

Now Darwin, of all men, having been one of the first to clearly see Nature as being 'red in tooth and claw', should have been able to deal with the death of his daughter with a certain degree of equanimity. Quite the reverse was the case, however, and seeing this innocent 'angel' cut off in her prime, Darwin gave in to the most extravagant grief.

Barrie mourned George with a ferocity that frightened his friends, but that was as nothing when compared to his grief when Michael died.

Michael, Barrie's favourite, drowned in 1921. After Michael died Barrie was never the same, and almost all the fire and creativity left him. George was dead and would never grow up, but the boy who was the real Peter Pan, Michael, was also dead - and yet Peter Pan couldn't die - and Barrie simply was unable to 'square the circle'.

And that brings us back to 'Peter Pan', which is arguably, one of the most significant books written in modern times, because it deals with not just childhood, but with all the important aspects of life, such as fathers, mothers, children, growing up, growing old, dying, time, (the clock in the crocodile - Barrie's symbol of our decay and death), feelings, and above all love, as symbolised by 'the kiss'.

Interestingly, Peter Pan, when offered a kiss by Wendy, doesn't know what a kiss is, and so he holds out his hand.

Wendy, not wishing to embarrass the strange, but fascinating boy, gives him a thimble. There is, of course, another kiss in the story, Mrs Darling's kiss, which is concealed in the right hand corner of her mouth and is, significantly, out of reach of all three children and Mr Darling.

But perhaps we still haven't answered the question of why this book is dedicated to Peter.

Well of course 'our Peter' and Peter Pan share the same name, but that is not enough in itself.

However, there are other similarities - both Peters have no mother, and perhaps less crucially, no father.

Both have a penchant for flying, as you will discover later, and both stubbornly refuse to grow up.

THE ETERNAL CHILD So that is why this little book is dedicated to J M Barrie and Peter - but what kind of book is it ?

Well I suppose it could be described as an 'biography', but really it is closer, in a way, to Barrie's 'Peter & Wendy', being a meditation or perhaps an etude, - although maybe not so profound - on a particular childhood - But it tries also to be an extrapolation to childhood in general, as we now understand it, and also on the beginning of things and their loss.

It may be argued that most biographies and autobiographies are somewhat strange for a number of reasons.

The first is that the chapters about the subject's childhood and adolescence are almost always remarkably short. Now of course if an individual lives to seventy-five or eighty, then their childhood and adolescence only amounts to twenty-five percent of their life in terms of years. Even taking this into account, however, most biographies and autobiographies only allow a maximum of ten percent, (if you are lucky), of the narrative to cover this part of an individual's life.

If, however, we ignore the purely temporal significance of the first twenty years, and instead consider the emotional and psychological importance and significance of this period of a person's life, we can see that most biographies and autobiographies leave many areas of their subject's character and personality completely unexplained and unexplored.

Of course many biographer's do not have access to information regarding an individual's early life, as this is usually far less well documented that the subject's later life - especially if they are dealing with an 'important person'.

With regard to autobiographies, however, this is not an acceptable excuse - we all know what happened to us when we were young, unless we have suffered brain damage or some other event that has caused amnesia. Most of us, however, if we ever come to recount our life history, prefer to dwell on our triumphs, or even our disasters, if they make us appear heroic or interesting, rather than the seemingly strange and possibly embarrassing events of our childhood and youth, and it is probably for these reasons that childhoods are so thin on the ground, at least in literary form.

The significance of childhood, of course, brings up another consideration.

There is a fascinating theory, forming the centrepiece of 'The Eternal Child' by Clive Bromhall, that suggests that human beings are 'neotenous apes'. The theory basically derives from the remarkable similarity between a pre-natal chimpanzee and an adult human, which implies that humans are basically immature apes, not only in terms of biology, but also in terms of behaviour and psychology.

So, to a certain extent, we are all 'Peter Pans' - all children masquerading as adults. But more of that theory later.

Another area of life that is so often neglected or ignored in biographies and autobiographies is sex.

Now this may be understandable in biographies originating in the nineteenth and early twentieth century, but since the advent of Sigmund Freud's and the rise of psycho analytic theories of human sexuality it seems strange that contemporary biographies and autobiographies should give those matters such little attention.

While Freud's convoluted ideas regarding the Oedipus and Electra complexes may be far from proven, and subject to much revision, and even rejection in some quarters, there is general agreement about the importance of infant and childhood sexuality, simply because there is so much evidence to confirm much of what has been suggested.

Equally Kinsey's researches into childhood and adult sexuality in the USA showed, much to the consternation of American society at the time, that sexuality was an important part of most individual's lives, and the great variety of sexual activity that Kinsey recorded shows that there is not a standard or normative set of sexual responses to which the majority of individuals adhere.

With adolescent males thinking about sex every ten minutes or less, it does seem strange that such an important aspect of individual's lives is often almost completely absent from the majority of biographies and autobiographies. Such an absence, of course, removes the motivations and emotional and physical 'well-springs' that are responsible for so much of what makes us the persons that we have been, are, and will become.

Something else that is often left out of biographies and autobiographies is the matter of 'things'.

Our lives are made up of all sorts of 'things', some of them important and significant, and others that are peripheral. Some would say that we put too much store by material possessions, but that is to misunderstand the situation.

It must be remembered also that this is the story of Peter's childhood, and for Peter 'things' have a significance that they may not have for other people. Take for example the white rocking horse, that will appear later in this story. Now it may not have even been real, but it was a very significant 'thing' when Peter was very young. There are no memories of people, - adults or other children, - just the wooden, white painted horse, and it was this 'thing' to which Peter related - and maybe even gave his love - if he was capable of giving love.

As we will see later, Peter was unable, for very profound reasons, to relate to other people, and so it was his relationships with 'things' that were particularly significant for him.

Take, as a number of examples, such 'things' as a 'wireless', some Bakelite egg cups, a 'Dansette' record player.

Each of these items needs to be seen, or at least described, and such items can have a poignant significance for the lives of those that used them.

The radio, for example, is powered by valves, which means no computers, no Internet and no mobile phones.

The luminous, glowing dial on the front, with its pointer for tuning, is inscribed with the names of such places as Paris, Cairo, Amman, Moscow and Leningrad, to name just a few. Such a radio is like a magic carpet, taking one to all those exotic and far-away destinations.

The egg-cups are Bakelite, and Bakelite, invented not surprisingly by a Mr Baekerland, a Belgian, in 1922 was the world's first synthetic substance.

Bakelite, of course, means a world without modern plastics. A world where things are heavy, and have substance - have gravity, and the colours are limited. And Bakelite has a distinctive aroma - the aroma of the past.

The Dansette record player is a gateway to a teenager's private world of music, and a private and new culture - the culture of youth.

It means that there are no cassettes, no CDs and no MP3s. It can play 78 rpm records, which are 12 inches in diameter and are made of shellac, and if you don't like them you can smash them - which is far more satisfying than deleting an MP3 from your I-Pod. 'Things' tell us about the world that we inhabit. 'Things' are important.

Now before we settle down to look at our Peter's 'early days', it may be useful to consider what the world was like in nineteen fifty, when Peter came to Hounslow.

The fifties and sixties were a period of very rapid technological change, but for the purposes of this study it is not the science that we are interested in, but rather the effects that the science and the technology had on ordinary people's lives.

There are a number of important inventions that are very significant and influential in the twenty-first century that had little or no effect on the middle years of the twentieth century.

For example, the electronic computer, (and here we must ignore Babidge's invention, which was a purely mechanical machine), was invented during the Second World War, by Alan Turing, with the purpose of breaking the German 'Enigma' codes, yet 'computing for all' only really became a significant force in society in the last decade of the twentieth century and the first decade of the new century.

Equally, colour photography was invented in the middle of the nineteenth century, but only became available to the great mass of people in the nineteen-sixties.

Another example would be recorded music, which was an invention of the American inventor Edison in the nineteenth century, but then underwent a number of modifications and transformations in the intervening decades, and eventually emerged in the twenty-first century as the incredibly portable MP3.

So, in nineteen-fifty we should realise that the technology of the time limited people's ability to see, record, enjoy and interpret their world.

In Peter's biography there are a considerable number of photographs, but this is in some ways surprising. In nineteen-fifty, to take photographs one needed to buy relatively expensive 'roll-film'. On most cameras this meant that one was limited to eight or twelve pictures per roll, unlike the almost infinite number of photos that can be taken by the digital camera. More significant was the fact that photos could not be 'previewed', and then either deleted or retained. The only way to see one's photos was to take them to a photographic shop, or a chemists, and then have the film developed and printed - a process that usually took about a week.

In addition, until the nineteen-sixties, most people were restricted, on purely financial grounds, to taking 'black and white' photos, as colour was prohibitively expensive, and difficult to use. Also, photographs could only be stored physically, either by being kept in envelopes, in drawers or cupboards, or mounted in expensive albums. And if one wanted to share photos with other people, one had to have additional, and expensive 'prints' made, which had to be physically given, or sent to the other person in question.

Finally, one had to be careful with regard to the content of photographs. Nudity or any image that could be interpreted in a sexual or explicit manner would either not be printed or, in extreme cases, would be reported to the local constabulary. The only way round this problem was to develop and print one's own photos, or find, usually at some considerable extra expense, an individual who would develop and print the photographs with 'no questions asked'. The result, of course, was a distinct lack of amateur pornographers.

Moving pictures, of course, were only for the seriously wealthy, or the odd enthusiast.

And what about music.

Well in the early fifties, amazing though it may seem, many people still owned clockwork powered 'gramophones', which had to be wound up with a handle, and would only play a four minute, 78 rpm, 10 inch shellac record. Peters neighbour's, the Downings, who you shall meet later, had an electric 'radio gram', but this still only played what were known as 'seventy-eights'.

It was only in the sixties that electric 'record players', that were capable of playing the new thirty-three and a third rpm vinyl 'microgroove' records became common,and then later still before people started buying stereo 'sound-systems'. So, we went from the gramophone to the record player to the soundsystem. Then came the cassette, which brought recorded music to the car, (and, of course, the Walk-

man), and finally there was the great miracle of the CD, which supposedly banished hum and hiss.

These, however, were all variations on a theme, being mechanical systems, with all the imperfections that such systems entail.

Finally, however, there was the MP3 - apparently perfection in sound. Sound that could be edited, and sound that was so ethereal that thousands of pieces of music could be stored in a device no larger than a packet of cigarettes - not that carrying a packet of cigarettes was approved of in the health conscious twenty-first century.

And this, of course, brings us to the computer. Not that many people use the computer to calculate, as the naively 'gay' mathematician, Alan Turing, munching on his lethal but financially lucrative Apple, foolishly imagined they would. Instead, computers are used to watch films and videos, look at photos, communicate by email, make purchases at un-godly hours, and peruse pornography.

In fact, your are probably reading this now on a computer !

Equally, cars were an invention of the nineteenth-century, but were still the preserve of the affluent in the nineteen-fifties.

Also, all sorts of consumer good, from telephones, to washing machines, to fridges, to vacuum cleaners, to televisions were still rarely possessed by the average person immediately after the war.

And the result of all of this apparent 'austerity'. Well, people's lives were a lot simpler; their expectations were a lot lower, and their horizons were decidedly limited. But they did talk to one another, eat together, and judging by all the most recent an reliable research - they were happier !

But what about our Peter - who grew up in the nineteen-fifties ?

Well - Peter has the same name as Peter Pan, and you may say, 'So what !' But how many Peters do you know ? But Peter Pan and our Peter share many other traits.

Both, to many, seem to be amoral, lacking in empathy. Both seem to be egotistical, and both Peters seem, essentially, to want to 'always be a boy and to have fun.'

So this is why, this little story is dedicated to Peter Pan and his creator.

For 'our Peter' it now seems that Peter Pan had been flying around in his mind since he was nearly eight, and first saw the Walt Disney cartoon with Jane and John Crawford at the local cinema.

Like Peter Pan, 'our Peter' did not know the identity of his parents. Peter Pan forgot, and 'our Peter' was never told, and like Peter Pan, Peter had always thought of mothers as 'very over-rated persons'.

On occasions, when things have looked very hopeless, Peter had the sneaking thought, like Peter Pan, that 'death might be a great adventure', although as time passed, Peter was not so sure.

Like most young people, Peter was very keen on growing up when he was a child, but when he got older he began to have doubts, and sometimes thought that maybe the best part of life had already been lived. Barrie, after all said that 'nothing much of any importance happens to you after you are twelve', and Salvador Dali made the same comment, but upped the age to sixteen.

As the years passed, the conviction that the best part of his life had already been lived became stronger and stronger, and eventually Peter gave up on the aspirations that mature adults are supposed to have, and started to try and fulfil his childhood desires - and childhood desires, especially for boys, means 'play'.

Our Peter cannot be like Barrie's Peter Pan and stay young physically, but mentally it is possible to retain the optimism and sense of wonder that is the hallmark of a boy - a boy like Peter Pan, who could cry triumphantly, 'I am youth ! I am joy !'.

In some ways, however, Peter - that is Peter Pan, was not just an immature boy.

Peter, as Barrie described him, did have feelings, and these could be as intense and profound as any adult's, although he always tried to vehemently deny it.

These feelings, denied but real and intense, were yet another part of Pan's paradoxical being, which remained a mystery to both Wendy and Hook.

Wendy said perceptively, 'You say so, but I think it is your biggest pretend.', when Peter denied his feelings.

Undoubtedly Peter felt strongly about Wendy, and was heart-broken when 'Tink' was dying.

He thought that death might be 'a great adventure', and was sad when he watched through the Darling's nursery window, and saw the family life of which he could never become a part.

Peter, however, remained childish, although not typically childish, in one very significant way, - and in this he shared something with both 'our Peter', (the subject of this book), and Pan's great nemesis, Captain J Hook – Peter could not love !

And why ?

Well perhaps it was because he had never known a mother, and a mother's love.

Having escaped from his nursery, Peter Pan lost this mother's love.

Hook, equally lost his mother's love when he was bundled off to preparatory school, and then to Eaton.

'Our Peter', of course, had no memory of his real mother, and probably no mother at all for his first four years.

Maybe this was the reason for Peter Pan's, Hook's and 'our Peter's' inability to love, - and maybe not but sufficient to say that all three characters are essentially tragic characters because of this lack of love.

Peter, in 'Peter & Wendy', says to Wendy, "Don't have a mother", and Barrie carefully adds, 'Not only had he no mother, but he had not the slightest desire to have one. He thought them very over rated persons. Wendy, however, felt at once that she was in the presence of a tragedy.' And that is probably what many people instinctively feel when they are in the presence of 'our Peter'.

Richard Wagner, (who will appear later in our story), that great explorer of the some of the most profound human emotions and motivations, tells us that – 'fear of our end is the source of all lack of love'. Here, for once, he may be wrong.

Lack of love is not a problem of our end, but of our beginnings, and while we can probably alter the path to our end, about our beginnings we can do nothing, and that is why an inability to love is so very truly tragic. And what is the essence of a lack of love. Well it's a lack of empathy; a lack of sympathy and essentially an inability to accept the reality of others. It is a monstrous form of egotism, which may fill the soul with a triumphant sense of delight, echoing Peter's cry, 'I am youth ! I am joy !'.

And so the individual in question exalts himself above all other things as being the only true reality, yet it locks that individual in a tragic torment of loneliness. As Barrie wrote in 'Peter & Wendy', 'Peter had ecstasies innumerable, that other children can never know, but he was looking at the one joy from which he must be forever barred' – the companionship and love of a family. Peter could neither belong to a family, nor would he create a family of his own, so Peter was condemned to be fundamentally alone.

When our Peter, little Peter, was nearly eight years old, some months after seeing the Disney cartoon version of Peter Pan, he was lying in his little bedroom singing himself to sleep, as was his custom at that age. There was a song from the film 'Peter Pan' called 'The Second Star to the Right'. The song was very popular, and was played regularly on the radio. Peter had learned all the words, and was singing it quietly to himself in bed. As Peter sang the song to himself tears came to his eyes, and he involuntarily choked on some of the words. Jane Crawford, lying in bed in the other bedroom, must have heard, and came to the boy's door. 'Are you all right ?', she asked, which was just the sort of inane question that mothers are so good at asking. Peter said yes and stopped singing, unwilling to bring any more attention to himself.

But what was going on in that little mind, to make a choking sadness in the empty darkness of the night out of a children's cartoon ?

A longing for Neverland ?

A longing to fly - once again ?

A vaguely remembered place of true happiness, - briefly known and now lost forever ?

And how do you find Neverland ?

'Easy !'

As Peter said, 'Take the second star to the right, and fly straight on 'till morning !

THE SECOND STAR TO THE RIGHT 'The second star to the right, Shines in the night for you.

To tell you that the dreams you planned, Really can come true.

The second star to the right, Shines with a light so rare, And if it's Neverland you need, Its light will lead you there.

And when our journey is through, Each time we say 'goodnight', We'll thank the little star that shines, The second from the right.' for this song go to: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=auJZYRv7vcU

This chapter tells of Peter's arrival in Pears Road, gives information about his adoptive family, and their history, and describes how Peter slowly adapts to his new life in the setting of the early fifties.

see video link for Dedication at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mXNPVldikRQ

PETER'S NEW FAMILY 'Not in entire forgetfulness, And not in utter nakedness, But trailing clouds of glory do we come...'

Wordsworth Well, what else could we call the first chapter ?

How our Peter began, or exactly where he came from for most people is a now a mystery.

As Kahlil Gibran, a poet often quoted by those who wish to sound profound when saying nothing, says, 'Vague and nebulous is the beginning of all things - Life, and all that lives is conceived in the mist and not in the crystal !'.

Well in Peter's case this is undoubtedly true, and like some mythic hero he springs into the world fully formed, with no conception or gestation; no father or mother.

John Stokes, of course, knew where Peter really came from, but he would never tell. And now he is dead.

There was probably a time when some people could have explained what had happened, but by now all those people are certainly dead. Perhaps there are some yellowing pieces of paper in some file tucked away in some cabinet in some archive - but that's unlikely.

From the present perspective it seems that Peter just appeared.

There was a birth certificate, but this was issued in 1950, and Peter was born in 1946 This certificate was issued at Brentford Magistrates Court, gave the name of the child as Peter Crawford, the son of John Stokes Crawford and Jane Crawford, who was born on the 31st December 1946.

And what are the first memories to which Peter will admit ?

They are of huge, silent, empty, white rooms, and a big white rocking horse beautifully painted, which only Peter used.

Now this could be described as a 'false memory', but that may not be so. It is a memory that Peter had from his earliest days, and Peter sometimes wondered if it was a real memory of if perhaps the real memories were blocked out.

If we are prepared to believe in the existence of the soul, then there is the possibility that it comes into being at conception or birth. It is also possible, however, that if the soul in fact exists, then it may have some pre-existence. To quote Longfellow, 'we come trailing clouds of glory'. Perhaps these large, white empty rooms are all that a child's mind can make of that other place, 'before the beginning' - a place to which we may also return ?

And there is one other memory that Peter is prepared to recount. It is not a cold, empty memory, like that of the white rooms, but a joyful memory.

It is on a hill, covered in grass and purple heather, and there is a beautiful red sunrise, or sunset, and Peter is with a group of other children - the 'lost boys' perhaps ? The children are all happy and beautiful, and very young, and they are walking purposefully toward the brow of the hill, and toward the glowing, red and purple clouds.

And then a journey by train, with two people that Peter didn't know, which ends up in a 'living-room' in a strange house, and a nice meal.

Peter's adoption, as far as we can ascertain, took place in 1949, so Peter's childhood took place in the nineteen fifties, in a London suburb called Hounslow, near Heathrow Airport, (which was at that time just emerging form its wartime guise, to become an international airport), and Peter was adopted by a couple called Mr & Mrs Crawford.

Jane and John Crawford were lucky – they had survived the War, despite John Crawford spending his war service in the Middle East, and Jane Crawford having to cope with the bombing in both Hounslow, Newcastle and central London.

Their wartime experiences undoubtedly caused them some significant emotional scarring, but in nineteen fifty, like so many relatively young people who had survived the war, they were hoping to start a new life in, what was for them, a safe and peaceful, post-war world.

But the world, that to our Peter seemed perfectly normal, was a world that had been traumatized by years of war, and almost all the adults in that world had been equally traumatized.

'Nine eleven' may have traumatized many people, both in New York, and in many other parts of the world, but what we must imagine was a 'nine-eleven' almost every day for years on end, culminating in the London Blitz , the fire storms of Dresden and Berlin, and the destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

And on a lesser scale it was a world, for many years after that war, haunted by rationing, 'make-do-and-mend', and bomb-sites.

So the people who had decided to look after Peter, even although they had survived the war, were not like the adults of today. They had seen things and done things that most of us now would find hard to imagine, and hard to 'stomach', and had been forced to go through years of privation, danger and seemingly endless waiting.

So the peace was, to those people, very precious. Something that they had been barely able to hope for.

They were, for the most part, committed to make a better world for their children, but they would always be somehow disconnected and remote from those young people. Their experiences, about which they found it almost impossible to talk, would always separate them from those who grew up with no direct experience of the horrors and anxiety of war.

But who were these people - Jane and John Crawford ?

Of Peter's grandparents he only knew one. This was 'Granddad'; his adoptive mother's father. 'Granddad's' real name was Richard Walker, a master plumber & foreman of a small private company. Strictly speaking he was a Victorian, having been born in 1876 in Edinburgh. His work was one of the high technologies of the Victorian era, & his background could be found in the milieu which spawned many of those technologies; namely Scottish Presbyterianism, Although fond of his whisky, he was, moreover, committed to hard work & the pursuit of a respectable & good living which would grant him independence & the respect of his peers.

For him, as for most people during the Victorian & Edwardian eras, with the exception of the upper classes, leisure was a rare commodity taken, mainly for the children's sake, at Christmas, Easter & Bank Holiday. It was a precept of the Protestant Work Ethic that 'work, & success through work, were justified means for salvation - that Satan made work for idle hands & that to work hard, bring up your family & leave them with a skill, a trade or a business so that they could follow in your footsteps, was a man's privilege & duty'. The concept of working to finance periods of leisure & 'having fun' was totally alien to 'Granddad's' generation.

Although rather simply stated here, this attitude & philosophy was dominant among the lower classes during the decades around the turn of the century. When, inevitably, the Great War came, it undoubtedly shook the foundations of these working class values, although not to the extent that it effected political, intellectual & aesthetic endeavours.

Returning soldiers demanded 'Homes fit for Heroes', & there was even a General Strike in 1926, but still, as a result of education, the influence of the churches &, in many cases their own convictions, the majority of workers & small entrepreneurs continued to live by the values of the previous generation.

'Granddad's' wife, 'our Peter's' adoptive 'grandmother', Jane, was Roman Catholic, so their marriage, for that time, was unusual to say the least.

As was the custom, the children of the marriage were brought up as Catholics, which put an unfortunate barrier between Richard and his children.

When Richard Walker died, in the nineteen sixties, he converted to Catholicism on his deathbed, although as he was convinced during his final illness that he had won the Football Pools, and had taken to reading the newspaper upside down, this decision seems to have more to do with his rabidly Catholic daughter Mary, who was nursing him, rather than any rational deliberations or spiritual awakening on his part.

'Our Peter's' adoptive mother was born in Jarrow, in 1914, the youngest of a family of five.

The eldest child of Richard and Jane Walker was Margaret, always known as Maggie. The next was Richard, the only son. Then came Mary, and finally 'our Peter's' adoptive mother, Jane.

Two years after little Jane was born her mother, Jane – the mother - died, and it was left to Maggie to bring up the family. Richard never re-married, and the children undoubtedly missed the love and care that a mother could provide.

Peter's adoptive mother, being the youngest, and needing most care, was regularly farmed out to relatives, and most often to her great aunt, Sarah, who lived in a huge Victorian apartment in Princes street, close to John Knox's house, in Edinburgh.

Holidays were usually spent at the local coastal resorts of Cramond, Leith, Musselburgh or Port Seton, and on other occasions there were trips to Holyrood, the Castle and Arthur's Seat, and the Royal Botanical Gardens.

Interestingly, 'our Peter' met Great Aunt Sarah, his only Great Aunt, when he was a little boy, probably about six years old. Of course, Peter had no idea of who she was, and strangely nobody told him.

Jane, Peter's adoptive mother, deep down, thought of herself as being essentially Scottish, and in later life, after a few sherries, or whiskies at Hogmanay, she would become maudlin, and start singing sentimental Scottish ballads in between reminiscences of those far off days. Undoubtedly the most secure and stable times in her life were spent in the cultured air and tranquillity of Scotland's noble capital.

Peter's adoptive father was born in Gateshead, on the twenty-seventh of January 1906.

Oddly he shared his birthday with the German Kaiser, Wilhelm II. Although he boasted a Scottish surname of the finest pedigree, his links with Scotland were far more tenuous than Jane's.

His father's name was Joseph Crawford, and his mother was called Jane. The family was Protestant; Church of England, and this was to cause problems later on when he decided to marry.

Joe, as he was always called, died while John was very young.

Jane, (yes, another Jane), Joe's wife, had five children.

The eldest was Richard, then came Ralph, then Winney, then Molly and finally John.

Unable to support such a large brood, Jane quickly remarried.

He second husband was always referred to by John as Mr Wilkes. It said much about the relationship between son and stepfather that no Christian name was ever revealed. Mr Wilkes died after a few years & Jane was once again on her own. By then, however, the children were growing up, and the boys left school at fourteen and got whatever jobs were available.

John went to work for a butcher; started as a delivery boy but was soon preparing joints, and attending to the customers in the shop.

Eventually, however, with the coming of the recession, they all found themselves out of work.

The boys, in order not to be any burden on their mother, moved out each Summer, and camped at Frenchman's Bay, and it was there that John Crawford met Jane Walker.

In nineteen-thirty-seven Jane and John were married in Felling, near Gateshead. They then travelled south, and settled in Barrack Road in Hounslow, Middlesex, as John was stationed at the headquarters of the Army Southern Command in Hounslow barracks.

THE WAR There's no time for us.

There's no place for us.

What is this thing that builds our dreams And slips away from us ?

There's no chance for us.

Its all decided for us.

This world has only one sweet moment set aside for us !

Freddy Mercury It was in an atmosphere of growing gloom Jane and John began their life in their new home in Pears Road.

Inevitably they tried to shut out the horror of what might be, in the pursuance of a well ordered and pleasant life.

John had an excellent posting at the HQ Southern Command, and Jane kept house and did the odd part time job as an accountant.

They saved assiduously and carefully and in the summer of 1937 they returned to Northumberland in order to see relatives and friends. For them, at that time, it would have been a long and expensive journey. Arriving in Gateshead and Felling however, they could discretely show their new found 'Southern' affluence.

In 1938 Jane and John invited Jane's father, Richard Walker, and her sister, Mary and her husband John Faulkner to see their new home in Hounslow.

During this visit some of the few surviving photos of Richard Walker were taken by Jane and John, as Richard posed in front of Windsor Castle, and in Richmond Park.

Richard undoubtedly enjoyed the visit, although he gave every indication of thoroughly disapproving of 'soft Southerners' whose morals were questionable, to say the least.

On one occasion in particular it he suggested going out for a drink. The Tankerville Arms was close by and so my parents prepared to go out. Richard was staggered, however, at the idea of Jane accompanying them to a Public House, and John had to explain that 'down South' it was quite acceptable for women to be seen in a 'pub', and he was not prepared to go out and leave his wife at home.

Mary and John, not surprisingly, took the opposite view. Photos of the time give the impression that they thoroughly enjoyed themselves; the generation gap has always existed to some extent in recent times.

In addition to such major events there were also regular visits to local beauty spots such as Windsor, and areas by the Thames, such as Runnymead and Chertsey, Richmond park or Kew Gardens or various places of interest in London.

We, of course, know what the next two years would bring; they did not.

They could only guess, and this is another factor which makes the past so difficult to properly interpret and understand.

We always know, to some degree what is going to happen next, so for us their future is always casting a shadow on their present.

This, of course is not occurring for them, so our perception of them is radically different from their own self perception.

What would these particular characters in this story have done if they had had the knowledge that we now have of their future ?

Fascinating speculation perhaps, but of more importance to our story is the next event in the international drama being played out as John and Jane tuned in to the B.B.C in their new home in Pears Road, in Hounslow.

1938 was the year of the Anchluss. Adolf Hitler, the Chancellor and Fürher of Germany had originally been born in Austria, and it was one of his many ambitions, for he was an ambitious man, to unite Germany and Austria into a 'Greater Germany'.

The Anchluss took place on the 12 th. March 1938.

On the 13 th. of March, Seyss-Inquart, later Gauleiter of the Östmark, issued a proclamation to that effect, signed by Hitler, at Linz. The following, day Hitler entered Vienna in triumph, and four weeks later the people of Austria sanctioned the Anchluss by a plebiscite, which took place on the 10 th.

April. Austria had ceased to exist as an independent country, and was known from then until the end of the war as the Östmark; the Eastern province.

At this point the danger of war became palpable.

Air-raid shelters were dug in Inwood Park, and gas-masks were issued. As if anticipating the worst, John and Jane decided to take an extravagant and memorable holiday. In retrospect it looks suspiciously like 'one last fling'.

In August, a mere five months after the Anchluss, they bought a white painted, clap-boarded house boat engagingly called 'Puck'. The house boat was moored at Horning, on the Norfolk Broads, and they spent a quiet holiday fishing, exploring in their little rowing boat and relaxing. Today the Broads swarms with cabin cruisers and tourists, but then it was one of the quietest, most peaceful spots in the whole of the British Isles. The Broads is a place that can reassure one of timeless values; calming the soul and relieving the many tensions of the day to day world.

A holiday only lasts a few weeks, however.

And so - what did they do for a holiday in 1939 ? Nothing. In 1939 most people in Britain thought war would bring the end of civilisation. It was their ultimate nightmare. Their version of our nuclear holocaust, or more recently, ecological disaster.

Every age has this nightmare. For the Ancient Teutons it was GÜtterdämerung; for Saxon farmers, the Vikings emerging from the mists to lay waste to everything; for the pious of the Middle Ages the Second Coming or the Black Death; for the Incas the arrival of Cortes. Every age has its ultimate fear.

In 1939 the ultimate fear for the British was the immediate arrival of thousands of bombers, moments after the declaration of war, laying waste to every major city with millions of tons of high explosives, incendiaries and above all poisonous gasses, such as phosgene and mustard.

Contemporary newspapers and magazines were full of articles advising people how to make their rooms gas-proof, or how to deal with incendiaries, later endearingly nicknamed 'Firebomb Fritz', when the initial terror had decayed into mere routine. Whilst the average citizen was preoccupied with obtaining enough material for 'blackout curtains', or taping windows in order to reduce the effects of bomb blast, the government was panicking. Top secret memoranda were drafted, detailing how it was believed that the population of major cities would dissolve into total panic and hysteria, after the first onslaught of bombing, flooding out of the metropolitan centres, causing havoc to the proposed mobilisation of the armed forces, and causing the collapse of essential industrial output and government communications.

The Government, at the time, saw only one way out of this appalling scenario, which was to turn on the civilian population and use the most violent means to regain order and control.

Such was the opinion of the British ruling class of the 'man in the street', and how wrong would the war prove this view to be; not only in 'blitzed' London, but also in Dresden, Berlin, Tokyo, Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Such secret memos, however, were unknown to Mr and Mrs Crawford, and millions like them.

For them Dresden meant China and Nagasaki may well have been a character, a minor one undoubtedly, in the 'Mikado' or 'Chu Chin Chow'. What they did know, however, thanks to a good deal of propaganda, was that this war was going to make the Great War look like a side show, and that thanks to 'Mr Hitler' their new life together was very uncertain.

The nightmare, however, contrary to everyone's expectations, did not come, despite the sirens sounding in London on that first September day of the Second World War. Predictably, they were a false alarm, and symptomatic of much that was to follow, although Jane and John didn't realise that as they hurried down the narrow alley-way between Pears Road and Inwood Park, where they took cover in the public shelters which had been dug amid the flower beds and tennis courts.

Probably the main reason for the holocaust being delayed was because 'Mr Hitler' did not have thousands of bombers poised and ready to destroy the cities of England. More significantly, perhaps, Hitler did not, and never had wanted war with Britain.

Quite to the contrary, with the benefit of hindsight, it seems that once appeasement had lost its appeal the declaration of war by Britain upon Germany was just a continuation of Britain's manipulation of the balance of power in Europe. As if to confirm this, once war had been declared on the pretext of defending the sovereignty of Poland, no attempt was made by Britain to defend Poland by landing British troops, and ironically, one of the final results of the conflict was that Poland was taken over by the USSR. with Britain's tacit approval, despite Churchill's subsequent comments about the 'Iron Curtain' coming down over Europe.

At the time of the outbreak of war, John Stokes was at Headquarters, Southern Command and on the night after war broke out, as John and Jane were recovering from their first experience of an air-raid shelter, there was an ominous knock at the door.

An Army motorcycle courier had brought a message that John was to report for duty immediately.

Thereafter there were many long night of work for John, as the ill prepared army geared up for war.

It was probably about around 1940 John Stokes had to consider the possibility of being sent on active service.

It was September 1940 when Jane and John, for the second time, took a holiday in the tiny village of Wool. A holiday which, for all they knew ,might have been their last holiday together. And so, Jane and John, and John's mother, Jane, spent those days in Dorset, in the fading sunshine of Autumn, as the time of parting drew closer by the hour.

Eventually, a telegram was sent to Pears Road, shortly after Christmas, informing John Stokes Crawford, No 1757860, where and when he should join his unit.

John was sent to serve in Egypt. Meanwhile, Jane first returned to Felling, near Newcastle, presumably to avoid the bombing which was expected to completely devastate London. ______________________________________ Excerpt from 'Thebes of the 1000 Gates' - http://www.scribd.com/doc/27406343/Thebes-of-the-1000-Gates

EGYPT As soon as the war started, John Crawford was posted to Cairo.

This, of course, was a Cairo very different to the one that we see today. It was the 'jewel of the middle east' – an elegant and cultured city, ruled over by a half-Egyptian King, the infamous Farouk Fuad,and a British Ambassador to Egypt and High Commissioner for the Sudan, Sir Miles Lampson, 1st Baron Killearn. While Farouk was ostensibly king, with wide ranging powers to appoint and dismiss primeministers and cabinets at will, it was undoubtedly Lampson who kept 'the boy', as he derisively called Farouk, in check.

During the war Egypt was pivotal to Britain's strategy 'east of Suez', and it was essential for the war effort that the canal remained open, and available to the Allies, and that the Axis powers were prevented from gaining control of the oil reserves to the east of Egypt.

And it was for this reason that Lampson had to keep tight control of Egypt, and 'keep the boy in check'.

Farouk, who was the great-great-grandson of Muhammad Ali Pasha, was Albanian through his father's line, but Egyptian through his mother's line, his mother being Nazli Sabri.

He had come to the throne at the tender age of 16, while attending the , Royal Military Academy, Woolwich.

Generally neglected by his father, Fuad I, for whom he appeared to have litle respect and little affection, Farouk, as a boy, was mainly brought up by the Italian servants favoured by the royal household.

Because he had experienced a neglected, and possibly abusive childhood, when Farouk came to the throne, rather like the equally young Roman Emperor Caligula, he began with the best intentions, but very soon his lack of self control and egocentricity began his slow moral and physical decline, which eventually led to his downfall, and subsequent exile.

Egypt, at the time was politically divided between three main 'power-blocks' – the King, the Residency, (the High Commissioner Lampson), and the Wafd – the Wafd being the main, native political party.

Much of Farouk's time was spent trying to get control of the Wafd, - and Egypt's other political parties; Iskra, the Jewish dominated Communist Party, the Muslim Brotherhood and the Young Egypt Party, (under the leadership of Ahmed Husayn – and were known as the Green Shirts and were an extreme right wing party).

Later, of course, Nasser's brutal dictatorship, and the dictatorships' of his two successors put a stop to all such political squabbling.

With the outbreak of the war, however, Farouk saw the possibility of removing the British from the equation, although the thought that the Fascists or the Nazi's would undoubtedly be more of a problem than the British had ever been, never seemed to enter his head – he didn't seem to realize that to the Nazi's an Egyptian was as much a non-Aryan Semite as a Jew, and so the gas chambers would have a vast new influx of clients.

Undoubtedly Farouk was influenced by his Italian childhood mentors, and was in the habit, during the war, of sending Hitler little notes explaining how a German invasion would be welcome, and it was not until 1945, when the war was in it's final throes, that Lampson finally persuaded Farouk to declare war on the by then defeated Axis powers.

Farouk was not the only one in Egypt eager for an Axis victory – the Green Shirts, many in the Wafd and the Muslim Brotherhood, and also many in the Army, including Nasser and Sadat, who were at that time relatively junior officers, were also working, sometimes covertly and sometimes openly for Britain's enemies – who were also, paradoxically, Egypt's enemies.

And it was not only in Egypt that supposedly good Muslims were working 'hand-in-glove' with the Nazis.

The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, haj Amin Husseini, in British controlled Palestine, was busily creating anti-British feeling, while at the same time shuttling back and forth to Berlin, to take tea with Her Hitler and chat with Himmler.

So, when John Crawford arrived in Cairo, and took his tea in Shepherd's Hotel, there was plenty of work waiting for him.

In retrospect then, it seems that the recently described 'Islamic Fascism' is not such a new phenomenon after all, and that 'right-wing' extremism has had a long history in the Middle East.

And for those who now still long for the 'jackboot', they may be comforted to know that Fascism – either of the Islamic kind – (bin Laden, Sayed Qutb etc.), or the Arab kind – (Nasser, Saddam Hussein, Assad etc. ), is alive and well in the Middle East, despite all the spurious talk of democracy !

Of the five infamous individuals pictured above, only two were of any interest to John Crawford.

The first and undoubtedly most dangerous individual, Sayed Qutb (Kutb), was an effete, closet homosexual teacher, with a ridiculous moustache - giving him the appearance of a poor impersonator of Adolf Hitler, (with whom he shared many characteristics in common), or Charles Chaplin.

Qutb, however, had not yet had his formative experiences in the USA at that time that John Crawford was in Egypt, and so he was not politically active, and had not yet been noticed by the intelligences services.

Qutb was to be more of a problem after his death, when his seminal work, 'Milestones', became the inspiration for a whole generation of sexually, intellectually , economically and socially frustrated young Muslim men.

Gamel abd el Nasser, and his fellow conspirator, Mohammed Anwar Sadat were another matter. Hardly 'frustrated', they had both risen far higher than they humble origins would have predicted – (thanks to the British).

Both were junior officers in the Egyptian Army, and both men were suspected of supplying the Axis powers with militarily sensitive information which would be to the disadvantage of the Allies, and both were put under the surveillance of the British Military Intelligence.

Sadat, half Egyptian and half Sudanese, had been brought up with stories of Egyptian resistance to British rule as a boy, and had been particularly affected by stories and songs about the Denshway incident. In addition he idolised Kemal Ataturk, and admired what to him was the efficiency and modernity of the Nazis in Germany.

For these reasons Sadat was more actively involved in attempting to undermine the Allied war effort than Nasser, who was far more 'dreamy' and idealistic – at least in those early days.

The result of all this was an uncomfortable meeting between Sadat and John Crawford, when the latter was 'hauled in', and arrested by the British Military Intelligence.

Having already met 'the boy' (Farouk), this was John Crawford's opportunity to meet one of 'the boy's' supposedly loyal officers.

Actually John and Mohammed seemed to 'hit it off' – a surprising combination, to say the least – but this did not prevent Sadat from spending sometime in a British cell.

And Nasser ? Well they met, but John Crawford was unable to fathom Nasser. Nasser was too Siedee, too southern, and too idealistic, - rather like a somewhat aloof schoolmaster.

Now while all this high adventure was taking place in mysterious and exotic lands, what was jane doing ?

Well, for reasons which will remain, for the moment, obscure, Jane returned to Hounslow, but then 'rented out', (let), the house in Pears Road, and went to live with her sister-in-law Gladys Crawford, in York Street, near Baker Street in London.

Eventually the War ended in nineteen-forty-five. John Stokes returned from Cyprus, after having served in Egypt, Jordan, Palestine, Lebanon and Syria. Life seemingly and slowly returned to normal, and a new decade dawned - the fifties.

The Nineteen Fifties Nostalgia is now a burgeoning business. People look back with fondness and affection to past decades, particularly the 'Swinging Sixties', and it is easy to accuse someone of looking at the past through 'rose tinted spectacles'.

This is not always the case, however.

Life, for most of recorded history, (and probably even before that), has been hard, brutal and, for most people, short.

Wars, famines, illness and death were the common lot of all people, and people's place in society was generally fixed, and the chances for personal fulfilment few and far between.

John Crawford always viewed the latter part of the first decade of the last century, - the period of his boy-hood, - as well as the 'twenties and early 'thirties, as particularly unpleasant and hard times, and was always harshly critical of people who talked about 'the good old days'.

For, Peter, of course, the days of his boyhood and youth occurred in the 1950s. Surprisingly, the nineteen-fifties, unlike the 'sixties' have not always been thought of with warm nostalgia.

Now there are basically two ways for someone who lived through the fifties to evaluate that decade.

The first way is to study all the relevant books, memoirs, films etc. from the perspective of the twenty-first century.

The second way is to go back in memory and view it as a lived and personal experience.

Now the first way has been undertaken by many writers, sociologists and historians, with varying degrees of success.

The second way of viewing the decade in question is obviously in no way objective, and the lived experience of the fifties is unique to the particular individual, and the area where they lived, among the people of a particular class and culture.

Some have depicted the Fifties as a decade of social and sexual repression, cultural sterility and political stagnation. A gray, pinched time of rationing, shortages and the inevitable stiff upper lip. Others, and particularly those viewing the decade from the American perspective, have seen it as a 'golden age'.

Andrew Marr, a contemporary chronicler of modern British history, has succinctly described England at that time as the 'Land of Lost Content', taking the beautifully elegiac turn of phrase from a poem by Alfred Edward Housman.

Strangely enough Housman was one of J M Barrie's favourite poets, (later Housman was one of 'our Peter's' favourite poets also), and the line in question came from one of Barrie's favourite poems from the collection 'A Shropshire Lad', published in 1896, - 'That is the land of lost content, I see it shining plain, the happy highways where I went, - and cannot come again.'

Another line by A E Housman, 'the lads that will never be old', has an eerie ring to it, because it not only elucidates much of Barrie's enigmatic character, and the mystery of Peter Pan, but also looks forward to the fates of George and Michael Llewellyn-Davies, who both knew the line, and the poem well.

But back to the fifties.

Undoubtedly, in many ways it was a 'golden age', coming as it did after the carnage and misery of the war, and before the social disintegration of the late sixties and seventies, and the complete denial of society which occurred in the eighties and nineties.

For our Peter it was an oasis of calm, of security and of tranquillity, - but of course that is from a child's perspective, and probably many of the more unpleasant aspects of Peter's experience of that time have been conveniently filtered out.

While it was not such a secure era that everyone could leave their door permanently unlocked and open, in the assurance that everyone was basically good at heart, it was a time when people could 'pop out', leaving the door on the latch, and visit their neighbour, or the local shop. It was also a time when the 'school run' was unknown, and all children either walked or cycled, un-escorted by their parents, but accompanied by their friends, to the local school in complete confidence. While, when Peter was very young, there was still some rationing of food, paper and other items, it was also a time when every child was entitled to a free school meal, and all children were given fee school milk during the morning break.

In Peter's recollection, and this may only have applied to the kind of area where he lived, crime was practically unknown. Peter cannot remember hearing about anyone's house being burgled, or anyone being mugged or attacked in the street, or on the buses or trains.

The streets, it seemed, never resounded to the sound of drunkenness, despite the fact that Peter lived near a high street, and there were three or four pubs near by. Children went about the streets after dark without their parents being anxious, and apparently those children were completely unmolested.

Peter, himself walked to the local library in the evenings, and to choir practice after dark in perfect safety. Children went to visit their friends, or went to the park, walking alone and unaccompanied, and young boys, including Peter, even walked or cycled to the local swimming pool in the hot summer months, wearing just plimsolls and swimming-trunks, which makes one wonder what all the paedophiles, who apparently now stalk our streets in droves, were doing in the nineteen fifties.

This lack of public concern with regard to children, and particularly boys, being sexually interfered with is not just an impression that Peter seems to have retained.

An interesting article, recovered from an old copy of the 'Eagle' boy's comic, clearly demonstrates this attitude.

The article was entitled 'Enjoy the open air - cool off', and gives advice about the possibility of enjoying a swim 'when out for a hike or a cycle ride' unaccompanied of course. The two lads first talk to a middle-aged man on a bridge, apparently making inquiries about where they can swim in safety.

Then one youngster is shown swimming in the brief style of trunks then commonly worn by young boys.

It would be difficult to imagine such an article appearing in a young person's magazine (there are no longer any 'boy's comics' as this would be 'sexist'), today.

There was only one murder in the area where Peter lived during his entire childhood, and that was of an old man, set upon by teenagers with the reported motive of robbery.

In this way the Fifties were a very different, and possibly would say better decade than the decades that have followed and, although we are only looking back fifty or sixty years, some aspects of the fifties are sometimes difficult to imagine.

Wages, of course, were low by modern standards, but then so were prices, and undoubtedly people didn't have the modern amenities that they have now.

Although Peter's house was number fifty-five, there were not actually that many houses in the road, as part of the road was occupied by a factory, and part by a newly built school and its playing field. There were probably about thirty houses in all in the road but, when Peter was a boy, only a couple of people in the road had a car, and then they were only second hand models.

Also, Peter's house was one of the few in the road that had a bathroom, and none of the houses had running hot water or central heating - everybody at this time had coal fires.

A couple of houses didn't even have electricity, (that belonging to Mr & Mrs Draper in particular), and retained the old gas lighting.

In addition, when Peter was very young, refrigerators, washing machines and vacuum cleaners were few and far between, and so a 'woman's work was never done'.

The idea of mobile 'phones, of course, had not even been conceived, and even Dan Dare, (more about him later), living in the twenty-first century, managed to get by without one. Even private telephones were practically unknown for working-class people, although there were plenty of public call boxes, which were never vandalized, and almost always worked.

As a result, people were not constantly at the beck and call of family, friends, neighbours and employers, and people could settle down in the evening and be confident that they would not be disturbed by the unpleasant ring of the 'phone, or the bizarre 'ring-tone' of a mobile.

Everybody, however, had a wireless, and it was the wireless that for at least Peter's first three years at Pears Road was the only real entertainment, apart from books and comics.

Only a few people had a gramophone (record player), and most of these still played twelve inch records, which ran at seventy eight revolutions per minute, and were made of easily breakable shellac. As a little boy Peter would look forward to visiting his neighbours, Mr & Mrs Downing, who possessed a huge, (well it seemed huge to him), 'electric' radiogram, on which he would be allowed to play Mario Lanza singing songs from Sigmund Romberg's 'the Student Prince'. just before the outbreak of the Second World War the BBC had launched a television service, which was limited to London. With the outbreak of war, however, this service had been suspended, and was only restarted when hostilities ceased in 1945.

It was only around the time of the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in 1953, however, that reasonable numbers of people, including Peter's adoptive parents, started to buy a television.Because relatively few people owned a television there was only one channel, which broadcast for only a very limited period each day (from mid afternoon - Children's Television - until ten or eleven at night, with a break between five and six for 'tea' and kiddie's bedtime).

The decade of the Fifties was one when nearly everyone went to the 'films', and there were at least five cinemas in Hounslow - the Dominion, near the bus station, the Empire in the middle of the High Street, the Regal and the Granada at the far end of the High Street, and the Odeon, probably the most modern cinema in the area, situated at Hounslow West, near the underground Station. In the year two thousand none of these cinemas still exists.

A year after Peter was born the Labour party inaugurated the National Health Service.

Unlike today, if someone went to the doctor they didn't need to make an appointment a week - or more - ahead, but simply arrived, waited their turn, and were usually seen in about fifteen or twenty minutes, and it was a relatively simple matter to get the doctor to come to the house.

Milk of course was delivered in bottles to the door-step by horse drawn cart.

'Coin in the slot' meters were read by people from the gas and electricity boards, so there were no monthly bills, and the insurance man came round once a month from the Pearl to ensure that you had a decent funeral.

Finally, of course, although Peter lived in Hounslow, close to Heath row Airport, (or London Airport as it was then called), everybody who lived in the town was white.

'OUR PETER' As has already been indicated, the fifties were for Peter a golden decade, and Hounslow, where Peter lived during that period was like an English version of 'Bedford Falls'.

Bedford Falls, just in case you don't know, was the imaginary, perfect little town that featured in the James Stewart film, 'It's a Wonderful Life'; a film that was, by a strange coincidence, made in the same year that Peter was born.

Perhaps here a few words need to be said about Hounslow as it will figure significantly in this story. Hounslow, or as it was originally known, 'Hundeslowe' or 'Honeslaw', is first mentioned in 1086 AD in the Doomesday Book of William I, better known as 'William the Conqueror'.

Originally it was not a town at all, but rather an administrative area which included in its boundaries the ancient civil parishes of Heston, Isleworth and Twickenham. The name Hounslow itself seems to derive from the fact that it was the sight the 'hundred-ealdor', which was a council or court, which met at monthly intervals for the purpose of local administration and government.

The sight of this court was a modest hill; hence the word 'law', 'hlawe' or 'lowe', meaning hill.

When Peter was young this fact was dimly enshrined in the odd fact that the local authority controlling the town was called the Borough of Heston and Isleworth, making no mention of the now pre-eminent town of Hounslow, either in its charter or its arms. Now, however, the controlling local authority is called the London Borough of Hounslow and has engulfed a vast suburban area to the north-west of London, and the old borough has disappeared.

Hounslow's early claim to fame lies in the fact that the 'Friars of the Holy Trinity' came to Hounslow in 1211 AD, receiving letters of protection from the infamous King John in 1214 AD. A few years later, in 1217 AD, the followers of Henry II and those of the French heir apparent, the Dauphin, met in Hounslow, putting the small village near London on the international map.

During the Middle Ages the town, like many others, was the scene of a local fair, but other than that it sank into well deserved obscurity; a huddle of mean huts on the edge of a desolate heath.

In 1553 Hounslow became a manor, complete with manor-house, but it was not until the arrival of the Bulstrode family, as lords of the manor, in 1705 that Hounslow began to grow and develop. The name Bulstrode is significant, as you shall discover later in this story, and has many resonances, both in the town and for Peter. The purchaser of the manor was a certain Whitlocke Bulstrode, who's christian name is also both unusual and significant.

During the time the Bulstrodes were 'lords' of the manor, the area around Hounslow was both agricultural and rural.

Farms and market gardens abounded and scattered about were the great homes of the gentry; Osterly, seat of the Childs and Syon House, both decorated by Adam, also Kneller Hall, seat of Sir Godfrey Kneller, and of course Walpole's sham Gothic fantasy, Strawberry Hill.

As the century progressed the stage coach came into its own and Hounslow became a prominent coaching town. By the beginning of the next century Hounslow had stabling for at least one thousand horses and a plethora of drinking establishments. To add to the over crowding and rawness of the place, in 1793 the Army, which used the Heath for manoeuvres, built cavalry barracks, and less than a century later, in 1875, Infantry Barracks for the Royal Fusiliers and the Middlesex Regiment were also built in the town. In addition there were Militia Barracks and gunpowder mills. The Army was still an important influence in Hounslow when Jane and John Crawford settled in the area, and later it had a considerable influence on Peter's life as well.

Despite all this earlier development, the town, during the first half of the Nineteenth Century, was still small and grubby.

Worse was to come, however. As the nineteenth century progressed, the coaching trade declined with the coming of the railways. Hounslow became a depressed area, and only the agriculture and the barracks provided any employment for the inhabitants.

Hounslow was close to London, however, and Victorian entrepreneurs saw an advantage in manufacturing close to one of their largest markets. Pears, the soap manufacturers, was one of the first light industries to establish itself in the area and as the century came to a close many other companies followed.

The Twentieth Century was a time of expansion for Hounslow. The enlarging and modernising of the Great West Road, a precursor of the motorways was very important for Hounslow's economy. The Great West Road; a far more romantic name than the M4 or A2, was a large four lane dual carriageway linking London to the West. As it passed through Chiswick, Isleworth and Osterly it was lined, on either side with imposing Art Deco factories and offices, the most famous being Gillette, Hoover and Firestone.

More important still was the impact of civil aviation upon the area.

Firstly there was the establishment of an 'aerodrome' at Heston, made famous by Neville Chamberlain's arrival from his meeting with Hitler in Munich, in 1938, and later there was the the development of an 'airport' at Harlesden, later known as Heathrow.

The development of the airport and light industry in the area led to a building boom after the Great War, which gained momentum and reached a peak in the Thirties.

Medieval Hounslow has been long gone, but now it was the turn of Regency Hounslow to disappear under a welter of low cost, speculative building.

When Jane and John arrived in Hounslow in 1937 there were still large areas given over to agriculture, and when walking from Barrack Road, where they originally lived, to Heston, the footpath ran almost entirely through farm land. The 'Jolly Farmer', a small pub' which exists to this day, is mute testimony to the relatively recent agricultural nature of that area.

By the end of the Thirties, however, a sprawl of 'Mock Tudor Semis' had engulfed most of Hounslow, leaving only small areas of Victorian and Edwardian development in the area around the town centre.

The house Jane and John first acquired was built in the Nineteen-twenties and was in the centre of an area of Mock Tudor suburban sprawl.

The depression had had little effect on the areas close to London, and John Crawford had little difficulty finding work, and eventually found employment at the Headquarters of the Army Southern Command.

Later Jane and John moved into the centre of Hounslow, living in Pears Road in the Victorian part of Hounslow, where the Broadway and the High Street meet.

For them, at the time, it was idyllic. There own home, in a quiet road, yet within striking distance of both London and the surrounding countryside.

More immediately, just across the road was a school and a general stores.

A couple of minutes walk away there was the High Street with its shops and buses, and no further away, in the opposite direction was Inwood Park, with ornamental flower beds, tennis courts, a football pitch, and a children's boating and paddling pool.

A few times a day a large Imperial Airways airliner would drone lazily across the sky as it made its way to the airport, a potent reminder of the technological advances of the times.

At about the same time John's mother, Jane Crawford, some years after the death of her second husband, had bought a small cottage in the idyllic village of Wool, in Dorset. This cottage she named 'Burnside', (burn is a Scottish word for a small river or stream), as there was a stream at the bottom of the garden and a water wheel, although the mill no longer existed.

Wool, of course is close to Bovington Camp, famous by virtue of it's association with 'Clouds Hill', the Cottage used by T E Lawrence towards the end of his life.

There was an odd and coincidental link between Colonel Lawrence, Dorset and John Crawford which would become evident only a matter of years later. 1937, though, was a fine Summer, and Jane and John, 'honeymooning', made that particular holiday a cycling tour, from, remarkably, Hounslow, in Middlesex to Wool, in Dorset. The next time that John would be in Wool he would be in uniform.

Returning to Hounslow, just off Hounslow High Street was a short road called School Road, which led to Pears Road.

Number Fifty-five Pears Road was where Peter lived until he was twelve.

It was there that 'little Peter', whoever he was, slowly evolved into Peter Crawford - the boy named on the birth certificate issued in nineteen-fifty at Brentford County Court.

'Little Peter' was a timid, very sweet, pretty little boy.

He was eager to please although not particularly honest and, it seemed, he was rather dreamy, and seemingly distant from the real world. Being timid and sweet had obviously attracted John and Jane Crawford, and encouraged them to adopt the cute little chap.

The tall, slim boy with the olive skin, and the shock of jet-black hair flopping down over his forehead, who sat on the back of the removal van one grey Autumn day in nineteen fifty-nine, however, was very different.

With his piercing dark eyes, this Peter was far more confident, very self assertive, and strong willed almost to a fault.

Like his namesake Peter Pan, our Peter was by then cruel and lacking in any real empathy.

Barrie had said that he was very disappointed with the statue of Pan in Kensington Gardens because 'It didn't show the devil in Peter'. Well, by nineteen fifty-nine the 'devil' was definitely showing in our Peter. And he was by then a boy who assiduously hid his more gentle, dreamy and wistful nature.

He had, over the years, become a strange boy - unsure of who he really was, or - for that matter if anything, including himself, was really real - but more of that Peter later.

PEARS ROAD Fifty-five Pears Road was a detached, Edwardian house.

Next door to fifty-five Pears Road lived a family consisting of a husband and wife, Mr and Mrs Robinson, and their two sons Alan and Brian.

Unknown to Peter, until he found some photographs in his late teens, Alan and Brian had been John Crawford's favourites before Peter came along. Possibly John was practising for when Peter or some other little boy arrived, by sitting in the garden with Brian or Alan sitting on his knee. Peter, however, never managed to get to know these two boys as the family left about a year after he arrived, and the new resident was a Mr Wilkinson.

Now Mr Wilkinson was a very strange, and almost certainly a very interesting man, and Peter's adoptive father spent some considerable time chatting to him over the garden fence.

Mr Wilkinson must of been in his late sixties, and lived alone, his only companion being a huge blue Persian cat called Sheila. Apparently he had aristocratic origins, possessing monogrammed and crested silverware. It seemed that this polite old gentleman had led a very interesting, if somewhat strange life.

He had apparently known Charlie Chaplin, when Chaplin was relatively unknown, and before he moved to the United States.

Mr Wilkinson had also, it seems, known Alistair Crowley, (to whom he bore a striking resemblance), in his youth, although this was one aspect of Mr Wilkinson's life of which John Crawford thoroughly disapproved. John had no time for magic, (even when it was spelled 'magik'), drug taking or questionable sexuality.

Aleister Crowley had been born in 1875, and had died in December, 1947 - (one year after Peter was born).

Crowley was primarily an occultist, but was also an inveterate writer, a world class mountaineer, an ineffectual poet, and possibly a spy.

He was an influential member of several occult organizations, including the Golden Dawn, the A. A. (Silver Star), and the Ordo Templi Orientis, (O.T.O.), and is best known today for his magical writings, especially 'The Book of the Law' (Liber Legis), which is the central sacred text of his pseudo-religion known as Thelema.

He gained much notoriety during his lifetime, and was dubbed "The Wickedest Man In the World" and often attacked by the media.

But that's enough about Aleister, - let's get back to Mr Wilkinson.

Mr Wilkinson was always dressed in a black, three-piece suit, and wore a bowler hat when walking in the street. Peter, not surprisingly, was nervous, if not frightened of this strange old man, despite the fact that it subsequently turned out that Mr Wilkinson was kindly disposed the the cute little boy, as we shall see later.

The house which Peter was to call home for about eight years had a 'drawing room' in the front, reserved for special occasions and special visitors. In the rear was the main living room, where Jane and John relaxed, sat round the coal fire, listened to the wireless and ate. Two doors led out from the living room. One door, on the left, led to the bathroom, where the bath water was heated by a gas 'copper'. The door on the right led to the kitchen, and from there there was a door leading to the garden.

In the garden was an outside toilet and the coal shed, and at the bottom of the garden was John Crawford's wooden work shed, built on a mound which had originally been the Anderson shelter, a relic of the recent war.

Over the well kept garden, with it's lawn and flowers, about once an hour, and large dark shape would drone – and airliner coming in to land at London's new Heathrow Airport.

Of these aircraft, one in particular stayed in Peter's memory. It was the Brabazon, (named after Lord Brabazon, (the then Minister for Air), it was the largest airliner ever built at the time. When Peter saw it he was walking in Hounslow High Street with Jane. It was the 15th June, 1950, just a few months after Peter had arrived in Hounslow, and this huge shape almost blotted out the light as it rumbled overhead. That, however, was the last time that the ill-fated Brabazon flew, as it was hopelessly underpowered, and uneconomical to run. And, as we shall see, the airport was to play a significant part in Peter's life, - but for the moment, let's return to Pears Road.

Upstairs there were only two bedrooms. John and Jane's bedroom was over the drawing room, and Peter's bedroom was over the living-room, and therefore looked out over the back garden.

The furnishings of Pears Road did not seem to have changed much since before the War. Starting from the rear of the house, the kitchen contained a thirties style 'dresser' in cream and pale green, which was the equivalent of today's kitchen units. There was also a small gas-cooker, and a stoneware sink with a single, brass cold tap. Two things which would be found in almost every kitchen today, however, were missing – a refrigerator and a washing machine.

The bathroom contained a cast metal 'copper', for heating the bath-water – the water would then be taken out by the bucketful, and poured into the bath. There was also a wringer for squeezing the water out of the clothes, after they had been washed, and, of course an enamel bath, with a single, cold-water tap.

The 'living room' contained a dining table and three dining chairs in 'Jacobean' style, set against the wall by the window looking out over the back garden. There were also two arm chairs placed snugly round the thirties deco-style fire place, which was decorated with pale brown ceramic tiles.

There was, of course, no television, - that only arrived in nineteen fifty-three.

Instead of a TV there was a huge Bakelite 'wireless' (radio), set high on a wooden shelf, presumably to stop Peter playing with it.

The room had soft brown and green, geometric art-deco wallpaper on the walls, and was lit by a central bulb hanging in an opalescent art-deco bowel, suspended by chains from the simple ceiling rose.

Where the door opened into the 'front-room' there was a cupboard under the stairs. While this had probably been used as protection from air-raids, when the weather was too cold to brave the Anderson shelter, it was converted, on Peter's arrival, into the 'toy cupboard', and equipped with a light so that it could be a little refuge, and a place to play.

The 'front room' was decorated in a similar style to the 'living-room', but with better quality wallpaper.

As far as furniture was concerned, it contained a side-board, which matched the table and chairs in the 'living-room', plus two 'easy-chairs' and a heavy, oval upholstered stool.

The room had a similar, but larger, tiled fireplace to that in the living room, and of course another opalescent art-deco bowel, suspended by chains from the ceiling rose.

In the 'living-room' was a door by the fire-place. This door led to the stairs, which ran through the middle of the house. The steep wooden stairs were covered with a 'runner' - a narrow strip of carpet in maroon with gray and black stripes either side. At the top of the stairs was a landing. Turning to the left, as you climbed the stairs, was John and Jane's room, and to the right was Peter's room.

The master-bedroom contained a double bed, with an overhead light that could be switched on and off from the head-board.

The bed, which always seemed very large to little Peter, was covered in a dark red satin 'throw-over and a matching, heavily quilted and embroidered eiderdown. The other furniture consisted of a wardrobe, which included a full length mirror set in the main door, and a dressing table for Jane.

The dressing table had a beautiful oval mirror, with two adjustable side mirrors, and laid out on the dressing table were cut glass containers for make-up, and perfume, and a silver backed brush set. Both these items of furniture were finished in a strange, ebonised, matching late Edwardian style, which gave the whole room a very sombre atmosphere.

Peter's room was relatively sparsely furnished, with pale, creamy brown 'deco' wallpaper, dark brown 'lino', (linoleum') on the floor, a bedside rug in a brown, deco style, and a huge dark brown chest of drawers, which contained, in its three capacious drawers all little Peter's carefully chosen clothes.

There was also a cupboard, with a cream and pale green door, built into the alcove by the fire-place, which contained more clothes, and various items of bed linen and towels, and by the window, which overlooked the garden, was an Edwardian style table. And of course there was a single bed, with a wooden head-board and a tail-board, and a metal, sprung frame on which was placed a thick mattress.

The bed had a similar satin 'throw-over' and padded and embroidered 'eiderdown', but for this room these items were a bright golden yellow. And above the bed was a 'gas-mantle', a reminder of earlier times, as the house was by then entirely lit by electricity.

The 'front garden' had a tiled path leading to the wooden front gate. In the centre of the garden was a huge, blue hydrangea bush.

The 'back garden' was long and narrow.

Looking down, away from the house, on the left was a path, edged with bricks. On the right was an area of lawn, closest to the house, and beyond that, behind some 'trellis work', was a vegetable patch, which was all that remained of the wartime 'dig for victory' campaign.

Finally, beyond the vegetable garden was the wooden garden shed, built on the foundations of the old Anderson shelter, another relic of the recent war. The shed formed the rear of the garden, and to one side of it was the 'back-gate', which led out onto the 'back alley' which ran the full length of the row of houses in that part of Pears Road.

On the other side to the back alley was the garden belonging to Mr and Mrs Downing. Mr Downing was an old Cockney 'army man' who had served in India and Hong Kong.

In the Second World War he had been too old for the army, and had served in the Auxiliary Fire Service. When Peter arrived in Hounslow Mr Downing worked at Heathrow Airport as a store-man for BEA, (British European Airways) Mrs Downing was a kindly, deeply religious, catholic Irish lady who worked as a 'cook' for the managers of the Sperry Gyroscope Company, which had a factory and offices on the Great West Road.

The Downings had a daughter called Madeleine, (Mandy), who attended the local catholic, girl's grammar school called Gumley House. As time passed Peter became quite friendly with Mandy although she was about eight years older than Peter.

At the end of the back alley was an area of waste land, facing the Downing's front garden. By crossing the small area of waste land and climbing over a low brick wall it was possible to gain access to another

back alley which led out onto Inwood Park Road, and from there to the Park itself.

Peter's very early days at Pears Road seemed to be confined to the house, and Peter recalls well sitting in one of the arm-chairs in the 'living-room', with a tray resting on the arms to form a little table. On the table would be Peter's meal, with his food on a red plastic plate, and his drink in a matching cup.

A lot of Peter's time was spent playing with Chloé, the families' black and white cat.

To Peter Chloé seemed huge, but then Peter was very small. The cat was very good natured, and Peter and Chloé became very close. Originally, it appeared, the cat was supposed to have been named after the cat in the Walt Disney cartoon 'Pinocchio', because Chloé had exactly the same black and white markings.

Of course the cat in 'Pinocchio' was called Figaro, but for some reason Jane had become convinced that it was called Chloé, and so the poor cat was stuck with a wholly inappropriate name.

It is probable that Peter's first months at fifty-five pears Road were in the winter, as he seemed to spend most of his time indoors.

Subsequently Peter thought of that time as a warm, cosy and secure environment, and Peter was undoubtedly happy. Probably it was a significant change from his previous circumstances, and Peter had the impression, looking back, that his adoptive parents doted on their 'cute' little boy, at least for the first few years.

Most evenings, when John came home from work at about six o'clock, he would bring a little toy for his new son and, after a month or so, in the shed at the bottom of the garden he made a stout wooden box constructed from off-cuts to accommodate this ever increasing collection of toys. These, of course, were the days when father's 'made' things for their children, rather than just buying things, and John made many things for Peter in those early years.

After the 'toy-box' had been made, the cupboard under the stairs was cleared out, and was reserved for toys, and later it became a little, secret, play area, often 'doubling-up' as a space-ship or a submarine.

Friday night, of course, was 'bath-night', and always associated with 'bath-night' was the smell of Pears Soap - yes Pears 'Coal Tar' Soap. But Pears Soap was transparent, or rather translucent, and therefore it had to be pure, - and for Jane Crawford only pure soap would do - even if it was a little more expensive that ordinary soap.

And so the days and weeks passed, and it seemed that life in the 1950s for a young child was quite predictable, being composed of simple pleasures and a regular, if not particularly exciting routine.

There were, however, certain events that stood out, even in those very early days.

CHRISTMAS Of course Christmas was important for a little boy.

The first few Christmases for little Peter, however, seemed to merge together.

Christmas presents did not seem to loom very large in these memories. Instead it is the Christmas tree and the decorations that seem to have had the greatest impact.

The tree was always a real fir tree, which reached right up to the ceiling, meaning that for Peter the Christmas tree was immense. The decorations, which were probably left over from before the war, were mostly made of paper. Compared to later Christmases there seemed to be very little tinsel and glitter. Those things that did glitter were pre-war, German glass decorations for the Christmas tree. The only other glitter came from strips of lammeta, which were hung from the branches of the tree, in imitation of frost and icicles.

Christmases were always celebrated almost entirely in the front room, where there was a permanent fire roaring in the grate.

Even when the room was abandoned the lights, which were large, plastic and Disney style, were left lighted on the tree. Like most of the decorations, these lights were pre-war, and consisted of 'antique plastic' bells, in various primary colours, with applied transfers of 'cartoon characters' on the outside, and a small bulb on the inside.

The room itself was decorated with home-made, paper-chains of coloured paper, and swags of twisted, crepe paper. These chains and swags were run from the central ceiling-rose to the edges and corners of the room. Also, in the corners, were elaborate coloured paper decorations, forming balls and bells, which were quite large, being nearly a foot in diameter.

Three very noticeable features of the Christmas season were the presence of fruit, nuts and alcohol, as these were all items that were absent for most of the rest of the year.

Peter's presents were, in the early days, not very spectacular, being mainly clothes and books, as Jane was obsessed with getting Peter to read.

THE FUTURE BREAKS IN - THE EAGLE Friday, the fourteenth of April, 1950, when Peter was five years old, was one of the most important days in that young boy's life.

That was the day that the first copy of the Eagle comic appeared, and was dropped, along with the Middlesex Chronicle, through the letterbox of fifty-five Pears Road, by the paper boy.

Undoubtedly Peter was a bit young for a comic like the Eagle, but his adoptive parents presumably thought it would be good for him, and would probably help Peter with his reading - or more precisely his lack of reading, because at that time Peter could read very little.

In the 1950s the Eagle was a completely new kind of boy's comic.

The Eagle was the brainchild of the Reverend John Marcus Morris.

Morris was a rather unconventional, Anglican minister, who had started a parish magazine called 'The Anvil'.

Morris was unconventional in the sense that as a young man he took to canoeing down the Danube with a young friend in the nude; had a forty a day cigarette habit; and was rather over fond of alcohol. In addition, in later life, when he became successful, he regularly indulged in exaggeratedly long business lunches at the best London hotels, and despite being married with children, appeared to see nothing wrong in getting involved with a string of mistresses.

Before succumbing to such temptations, however, Morris developed high hopes for the Anvil, intending it to become a national magazine with the purpose of promoting Christian values in post-war Britain. Unfortunately for post-war Britain, but probably fortunately for a whole generation of boys, the magazine was a complete flop.

Undeterred, Morris turned his moralizing zeal to the question of children's reading material.

At the time the news-stands were awash with what were generally known as 'Horror Comics'.

These were essentially imports from the USA, which typically featured stories involving violence, brutal torture, excessive and unnecessary knife and gun play, physical agony, and gory and gruesome crime. Not surprisingly they were popular with many children, but were a considerable cause of concern to many adults.

Eventually a press campaign was mounted against these publications, and there was even an episode of Britain's most popular BBC television 'soap', the 'Grove Family', which featured the families' youngest child suffering nightmares after reading such a comic.

Eventually Parliament acted, and such publications were banned by law, but not before the Rev Morris had started work on his new style of comic, which was intended to undo any damage to young minds for which the dreaded 'horror comics' may have been responsible.

As a failed independent magazine publisher it was obvious that Morris needed professional help if he was to make a success of his new boy's comic.

Eventually a press campaign was mounted against these publications, and there was even an episode of Britain's most popular BBC television 'soap', the 'Grove Family', which featured the families' youngest child suffering nightmares after reading such a comic.

Eventually Parliament acted, and such publications were banned by law, but not before the Rev Morris had started work on his new style of comic, which was intended to undo any damage to young minds for which the dreaded 'horror comics' may have been responsible.

As a failed independent magazine publisher it was obvious that Morris needed professional help if he was to make a success of his new boy's comic.

Now Dan Dare preoccupied our Peter right up until 1959 but, surprisingly, some years after Peter first 'met up' with Dan there was a rival.

When Peter was eight, Jane, determined to improve his reading, bought him a book as one of his many Christmas presents.

The book was called 'The Adventures of Captain "Space" Kingley', and was written by Ray Sonic. Probably Jane thought that the Dan Dare comic book format was not encouraging Peter to read enough, and so she bought this book which, although it was well illustrated with 'black and white pictures by R.W.Jobson, was not in comic book format.

Rather like Dan Dare, 'The Adventures of Captain "Space" Kingley' were set in what was then the distant future, in this case the twenty-second century. The world had survived a nuclear war, and world government had been established. Sonin's vision of the future was somewhat totalitarian, although Utopian, and almost communistic.

Earth is defended by a force known as the Interplanetary Space Rangers.

The first story in the book was particularly designed to appeal to youngsters, as Kingley, still only a boy, 'stows away' on his father's space ship.

As a result of this first adventure, young Kingley decides to become a 'Space Ranger'.

The remainder of the book consists of a series of adventures, undertaken by the adult Kingley, accompanied by Shorty Rowe. Shorty Rowe is described the book as being small and wizened, and Kingley's batman, housekeeper, assistant and No.1 admirer. In this way he is very much like Digby in the Dan Dare stories.

Like Dan Dare's Digby, Shorty had an accent, tended to be illiterate and used phrases like 'guvnor' !

Both Shorty and Kingley fly the Inter-Planetary Ranger's space rocket 'Comet', on a number of missions to defend the Earth against the 'Flame Men of Mercury', and the 'Mechanical Animals of Mars'.

In addition they travel beneath the Atlantic Ocean and with upper lips ever stiff, put the solar system to right.

Although 'The Adventures of Captain "Space" Kingley' featured lavish and very attractive artwork throughout, the only colour was the front cover.

Inside, the all-text stories added to the dull feel of the book, and the opening political rhetoric had an oppressive ring to it.

Peter's attitude to the book was somewhat ambivalent. He liked the art work, and the stories he thought were exciting and interesting. The problem was that his private world could not cope with two alternative futures that were in many ways radically different.

It must be remembered that for Peter the future was real, so there could not be two futures. His criteria for deciding which version of the future to accept was quite simple. All he had to do was to decide which version of the future was the most realistic. By this criteria Dan Dare won 'hands down'. Dare's world had an internal consistency that was somewhat lacking in the world of the Interplanetary Space Rangers.

In addition there was something a little cold and distant about Captain Space Kingley.

Dan was a much warmer character. And Digby, as well, was decidedly 'love-able', compared to Shorty Rowe.

The other great attraction in the Dan Dare stories was Flamer Spry. Peter could identify with young Christopher, whereas in 'The Adventures of Captain "Space" Kingley' there was no younger character with whom Peter could readily identify.

PROBLEMS As we have seen, for some of the early Christmases Peter was given books as presents. These books were mainly Children's annuals such as 'Rupert Bear', 'Thomas the Tank Engine', some 'cowboy' stories, the significance of which may be clearer later, and of course the 'Eagle Annual' and later, when Peter was older, 'Space Captain Kingley'.

Right from the beginning, Jane had been buying Peter the 'Eagle' comic each week - but there was a problem - Peter couldn't read - and he was over four years old. Not only could he not read, but he couldn't learn to read.

Otherwise a bright, inquisitive, intelligent young boy; this was puzzling, although undoubtedly Jane had been pushing Peter too hard with regard to his reading.

After a number of arguments and tellings off, it was obvious that it was not just a matter of Peter being unwilling to learn to read.

In the end Jane decided that professional help was needed, and to that end she decided to take Peter to see the doctor.

The trip to the doctor soon brought an answer to this puzzle. Peter had something wrong with one of his eyes. And this was a serious problem, which meant an operation, and a stay in hospital.

Peter, of course, thought he was being abandoned by the kind people who had been looking after him.

Although the hospital; Hounslow Cottage Hospital, was only a mile and a half away from Pears Road Peter had no idea how close to home he really was, and as we have said, as far as he was concerned he had been abandoned by the nice people who had so recently taken him into their home.

The result - interminable hours were spent sitting on his bed with Teddy, his only real friend, staring at the door, waiting to be rescued from another big, practically empty white room. And there was no rocking horse to calm his fears, or pass the lonely hours, but only Teddy - and Teddy seemed just as upset and miserable as Peter.

Eventually, however, Peter arrived back at Pears Road.

The doctors now insisted that to make a complete recovery Peter had to 'exercise' his eyes.

Peter quickly learned to read moderately well, in a mechanical, uncomprehending sort of way, but once he could read he had to sit in the living room, in front of the fire with Jane, and practice reading every day with a black metal bar held in front of his face. This was intended to make him use and exercise his recently 'operated on' eye.

In addition he had weekly trips to the hospital, where his eye was exercised by 'playing games' with various optical devices.

These games consisted of such things as putting a bird in a cage, (superimposing an image of a bird onto an image of a cage), while the optometrist would deliberately move the cage each time Peter thought he had achieved his goal. For a young child all this was incredibly frustrating and tiring, and Peter would often sink into rages of frustration, unable to understand why he was being apparently tormented.

The main recipient of this rage was Jane, however, who was expected to get Peter to read for an hour each day, while holding this bar in front of his face. And this was obviously the beginning of the slow deterioration in the relationship between Peter and his adoptive mother.

She had almost certainly had a 'starry-eyed' dream of having a wonderful, cuddly cute little boy as a 'son'. Instead she now found that she was dealing with a little, screaming, scratching kicking monster.

In less than a year her dream had fallen apart.

John, however, saw nothing of this, and Peter was still the 'apple of his eye'.

This frustration and anger would plague Peter for the rest of his life - apparently a deep seated rage at being cast out of his sweet world of simple pleasures into a world filled with incomprehensible challenges.

SCHOOL As soon as Peter had physically recovered from his operation he had to start school.

The school was just 'round the corner' from the house, in the appropriately named 'School Road'.

It was, to Peter, an ancient - that is Victorian - dilapidated building; smelly, dirty and uninviting.

The school itself had been allowed to become run-down because, unknown to Peter, a 'spanking new' school was almost about to be completed just round the corner in the same street as Peter lived.

On the first day Peter cried when he was abandoned, yet again - but this is not an unusual reaction for young children when they first go to school.

School, of course, was an opportunity for Peter to make friends - which he did, with apparently very little trouble.

The real problems, however, were with reading and writing.

Peter still had problems, both with literacy and numeracy. His eyes were still not working properly, and in fact he probably needed glasses, but he would not get these until he was thirteen.

The result was that the teachers thought that Peter was a nice, compliant little boy, but that he was not, academically, very bright.

And so the rage grew.

Peter knew he was clever. Not just a little bit clever, but so much smarter than most of the other children, and very, very special. But his rage was carefully hidden under a surface appearance of 'sweet' compliance.

But Peter knew, and strangely enough the other children knew that he was different - and even then some were nervous of him, and some admired him, but they all knew he was not like them - he was different, very different and even alien.

For the first six months school days passed uneventfully.

Peter settled reasonably well into the Dickensian school with its nineteenth century cast iron framed combined desks and benches, old fashioned black boards and coal-fed stoves in one corner of the classroom.

Then, the move to the new school was made.

For Peter this was no problem. One morning he was simply take by Jane to the new school just 'down the road'.

But what a change ! Light and airy, with all new desks, chairs, fixture and fittings, books, gym equipment - in fact everything ! And the school was surrounded by beautiful playing fields, with flower beds and bushes - it was, indeed, a child's paradise.

And so life continued. The school was physically ideal, but Peter was still considered to be not very bright, and was sometimes put into a separate group, which was given less demanding work, which he found demeaning and boring.

If this had gone on, then perhaps Peter would have given up trying to learn and developed discipline problems as he grew older - but things were about to change - as we will eventually discover.

FRIENDS At home, after the regime of 'eye exercise' ended, things became a little more quiet and peaceful.

Peter made friends with some of the children living nearby.

They were nearly all girls - which was just a quirk of fate, but could have had serious repercussions.

Across the road, on the corner of School Road and Pears Road lived the Hicks family. They had a daughter, Janet, who had a father who was generally considered, in the neighbourhood, to be a 'bit of a tyrant'. She was two years older than Peter.

Next door to Janet lived the Chandlers. Sylvia was the only daughter, and her mother was still in the Royal Air Force.

Mrs Chandler, in her WAF, uniform was Peter's 'pin-up' from age six to ten, which may seen a bit 'kinky', but was true all the same. As for Mr Chandler, Peter has no memory of him, which is not unusual as, at that time, fathers, husbands - adult men in general, were almost invisible, - starting out for work early, returning late, and having very little to do with children or the more domestic side of life. Men in the fifties were aloof, quiet and withdrawn. Of course many of them had been deeply traumatized by their experiences during the war, and so were quiet and withdrawn for deeper reasons which, at that time, Peter could not possibly have understood.

On the same side of the road, but further down, away from the school, lived the Snowballs, (yes really and no relation to the Simpson's cat).

Linda was a sweet little girl who spent a lot of time with Peter, and she was one of the few people of whom Peter was really fond.

Across the road, opposite Linda, lived the Barnyards. Their daughter, Susan, was 'one of the gang', but was always considered a bit 'snooty' by the other children.

And of course there was Mandy.

Four years older than Peter, Mandy became a good friend, and someone who helped to introduce Peter to some classical music, and some of the 'finer things' of life.

There were also some boys, of course.

Going up towards the school was Keith's house. He had three brothers, but when Peter and Keith were six or seven, they were in their late teens.

Two more friends came into Peters life as he moved from the Primary stage to the Junior stage at school.

These were David and John.

Both boys had parents who had been in colonial service, David's father in the Kenya police, and John's father in BOAC in Ceylon, (now Shri Lanka). Both boys had been born abroad, and had grown up abroad, only moving to England when they were about eight.

David was red-haired, freckled - not very bright, but fun to play with.

John, on the other hand, had brown hair was slim, and very handsome for a boy of his age.

In addition John spoke with a strange accent, which was a combination of Ceylonese - he had been brought up by an ayah, (Indian nurse), and Aberdeen Scottish, as that was where his family originally came from. John had spent most of his early childhood frolicking in the warm waters of the Ceylonese coast, and it was his love of the water and swimming that got Peter addicted to swimming in his boyhood - but more of that later.

David was red-haired, freckled - not very bright, but fun to play with.

John, on the other hand, had brown hair was slim, and very handsome for a boy of his age. In addition he spoke with a strange accent, which was a combination of Ceylonese - he had been brought up by an ayah, (Indian nurse), and Aberdeen Scottish, as that was where his family originally came from. John had spent most of his early childhood frolicking in the warm waters of the Ceylonese coast, and it was his love of the water and swimming that got Peter addicted to swimming in his boyhood - but more of that later.

HOLIDAYS Holidays were next on the agenda.

Just before Jane and John had acquired Peter, they had had their 'last fling' with a luxurious holiday in Dorset.

This was in the days before ordinary people went abroad for their holidays, but as this option was not open to them Jane and John had taken the next best choice and had a holiday in a 'five star' hotel on the south coast, in Dorset.

The next holiday, now with a little boy 'in tow', was a bit more 'down-market', and involved a trip to Newcastle and Edinburgh to visit Jane and John's relatives.

Northumberland, of course, has some very beautiful coastline, and the nearest 'seaside' resort to Newcastle is Southshields and Whitley Bay. The real purpose of the trip, however, was to introduce the relatives to the new 'acquisition' - or supposed 'family member' - Peter. Of course, little Peter didn't go down too well - with his dark brown eyes, jet black, tousled hair and olive skin, and slightly upper-class English accent, this little boy didn't fit in with either Jane's family or John's family at all !

Despite this there were some happy days spent on the sands at Southshields - days which always ended with a wonderful fish and chip supper from 'Frankie's', the famous chip-shop on the sea front.

There was another event that was very significant for Peter - not a holiday but a very important day out.

In May 1951 the Festival of Britain opened on the South Bank of the Thames in London. undefined It was the brainchild of Gerald Barrie, and the Labour Deputy Leader Herbert Morrison, who described it as "a tonic for the nation".

The Festival Style was described as 'braced legs, indoor plants, lily-of-the valley sprays of light bulbs, aluminium lattices, Costswold-type walling with picture windows, flying staircases, blond wood, the thorn, the spike, and the molecule.'

It was undoubtedly a uniquely English take on the modernist International style, and echoes of the style could be seen in the new Junior School in Pears Road that Peter attended, and in the furnishings and interior decoration that Jane and John favoured in the coming years.

Unlike the Millennium Dome which was forced on an unwilling and disinterested country by New Labour, under the direction of Peter Mandleson, (the man who gave the name Peter a 'bad name'), the Festival of Britain was a resounding success, and there were over 10,000,000 paid admissions to the 6 main exhibitions in 5 months.

Three of those 10,000,000 were little Peter, and Jane and John Crawford.

Jane and John had decided to give themselves a summer treat and visit the Festival, and considered Peter old enough to go with them, (otherwise he would have had to have been looked after by Mr and Mrs Downing). For Peter the Festival was an amazing experience. Of course he didn't understand that it was the Labour Government's attempt to boost the morale of the people; morale which had been badly dented by the privations of the war, by showing them what the future might hold for them - a showcase, in fact, of contemporary British art, design, technology and science.

And little Peter obviously didn't realize that, in addition, the Festival was held on the centenary of Prince Albert's Great Exhibition that had been held in Paxton's Crystal Palace in Hyde Park in 1851.

No matter, Peter was captivated by the Dome of Discovery, and the Skylon, although he probably didn't notice Hugh Casson's Royal Festival Hall, where he would attend many concerts when he grew older.

What really thrilled Peter, however, was the 'Fountain Lake', the 'Grotto', the 'Tree Walk', and the 'Guinness Festival Clock'; and what was so amazing about the Festival was the fact that for Peter it was like walking through the buildings and cities which Frank Hampson had depicted in his Dan Dare stories in the 'Eagle'.

Unfortunately all that now remains of that day at the Festival are some black and white photographs, and a glass ashtray, emblazoned with the Festival logo.

Probably because Peter's debut with Jane and John's families had not been very successful, the holiday in 1951 involved a trip by train to the Isle of Wight.

Now Peter didn't know it was the Isle of Wight, but did remember very clearly a time spent in beautiful countryside, and at clean sandy beaches.

Jean and John stayed with friends on the Island, although Peter had no memory or knowledge of who those friends were.

This was an idyllic holiday, and although Peter had no friends of his own age to play with it didn't seem to matter.

It was during this holiday that Peter started to enjoy playing in the water, not only in the sea, but also in a beautiful a 1920's Art Deco style lido, that was near where they were staying.

And so, after the holiday it was back to school for Peter.

The Autumn came, and then the Winter, with it's inevitable fogs and snow, and then another Christmas, with its influx of toy soldiers, Dinky Toys and unread books.

And so 1951 ended, quietly.

The next year, however, would prove to be even more exciting - and strange.

The chapter opens with the death of King George VI and the accession of his daughter. The chapter is dominated by Peter's strange experiences with 'the visitors', and ends with intriguing information about the numerous 'skeletons in the cupboard' of Peter's adoptive family

EARLY DAYS Peter had been living at Pears Road with Jane and John Crawford for two years.

Having had his operation on his eyes, and having started school, things had by then began to calm down a little, and Peter was able to settle into the new year - 1952.

In 1952 we were truly into Andrew Marr's 'Land of lost Content' !

But first, early in the year there was a tragedy.

The King-Emperor, George VI, weakened by the stress of the war, and a very heavy nicotine habit, developed lung cancer and died on the 6th of February.

Peter was old enough to know that the King had died, and that his daughter, Princess Elizabeth would be the new Queen. This, however, did not mean all that much to Peter. On the newsreel Peter saw Princess Elizabeth, (technically Queen Elizabeth), and Prince Philip returning from their trip to Kenya by 'plane, and being greeted by the Queen Mother and Princess Margaret, and he saw the King's funeral cortège at Windsor. The Coronation, which would have a big impact on Peter, did not, however, take place until the following year.

Now while England might have been a 'Land of Lost Content', there was still crime, although the levels of crime had dropped significantly since the war.

During the war street crime, petty theft and racketeering had boomed. After the war things change significantly, however.

Armed crime reached a peak of 47 incidents in London in 1947, but by 1954 this had reduced to just four cases. The number of people sentenced to prison fell by 3,000 between 1948 and 1950 and overall serious crime fell by nearly 5 per cent per head of population in the five years after the war. To put the situation in perspective, a commentator at the time stated that, 'Perhaps the most peaceful single year was 1951, with a low level of crime, especially violent crime'.

One crime stood out in 1952, however, and that was the murder of a policeman by two teenage boys, one of whom, Derek Bentley, was hung.

Crime, however, for Peter, and almost everybody who lived around him was just something that made headlines occasionally in the newspapers - it was not something that impinged on most peoples' lives.

People had work, wages were good, prices were low, rationing was coming to an end, and there were more and more goods in the shops.

After years of deprivation and hardship, life was finally beginning to look good for the majority of people, and the 'majority of people' included Jane and John.

Peter was now taken by Jane and John to the cinema quite regularly. Always in the circle - Jane insisted on the most expensive seats - and always with a strawberry ice-cream tub in the interval.

And at the cinema there would always be a News Reel, as well as two feature films, a cartoon and some adverts - remember this is before most people had a television.

So Peter saw the news, and remembered well seeing the fat King Farouk, whom John Crawford had met during his service in Egypt, abdicating, and Colonel Gamal Abdel Nasser becoming president of Egypt.

Also in the news reels were pictures of British troops being sent to Kenya to deal with the Mau Mau uprising, and America testing the first hydrogen bomb.

Great events aside, Peter was still underachieving at school, but regardless of this he was continuing to make friends, and earn the somewhat nervous respect of his peers.

By now his collection of toys had become impressive, and he had started to build his army of toy soldiers, which would eventually reach about three hundred in number.

The 'Eagle' - remember Rev Morris' comic - continued to drop onto the mat behind the front door once a week, but while Peter devoured the images of space exploration in the year 200, he was still having trouble with the words.

1952 was a particularly significant year for Peter, however, although Jane and John never realized this.

It was significant not just because one King had died and another had been overthrown.

1952 was the year that the 'visitors' first appeared.

MYSTERIES OF THE NIGHT - THE 'VISITORS' The 'grown-up' Peter was browsing in Waterstones Booksellers, St Margaret's Street, Canterbury, one Saturday in 1988 when he saw a book with a vaguely familiar cover.

The cover design consisted of a portrait of a strange, oval face with huge dark olive shaped eyes. Peter felt that he had seen the face before but could not remember where.

He casually leafed through the book, reading a few passages here and there. It seemed, at the time, a rather poorly written science fiction tale by Whitely Streiber; an author who was unknown to Peter.

About a month later Peter was in the same book shop, and picked up the same book, having recognized the cover, and the title 'Communion'.

This time he read a little more and realized that the book was not science fiction, but rather purported to record the details of a series of episodes of alien contact.

Peter was interested, but was not prepared to pay the exorbitant price required for the purchase of the book.

A few weeks later, however, he found the book in his local library; borrowed it and read it from cover to cover - and that book stirred up some very strange memories. It wasn't that Peter had forgotten the events that he was remembering, but rather that they had gone to the back of his mind, and were only ever rarely recalled. And these are those strange memories of things that happened so long ago, but were remembered so clearly.

When little Peter had first arrived at Pears Road he seemed to have no fear of the dark.

At night he would happily go to bed, with the door to his bedroom left just slightly ajar, and often, quietly sing himself to sleep.

Whether or not the nights before he was brought to Pears Road ever held any terrors for Peter no one would ever know, as his memories of that time seemed to have been shut away forever.

Then, after about two years, towards the end of the winter of 1952, Peter became frightened of the owls.

Now there were owls in the large oak trees in Inwood Park - trees that could be seen from Peter's bedroom. But Peter was convinced that the owls were flying from the park and perching on the window-sill of his bedroom. Despite reassurances from Jane, Peter remained convinced of the presence of these owls at his window, and so he was allowed a night-light on the chest of draws in his room.

Gradually Peter seemed to be less alarmed at the prospect of going to bed, but in reality he had just come to accept that his parents were unable to protect him from these nocturnal visitors, and so his experiences of the night became a secret, only known to him.

As the nights passed the owls seemed to be able to get through the window and perch on the table standing under the window.

It was then that Peter realized that they were not birds but small 'people', about the same size as he was, but with big heads and very big eyes, and it must have been the eyes that had made him think initially that they were owls – or perhaps they had disguised themselves as owls.

These little people were extremely thin and in the dim glow of the night-light appeared to be greyish in colour. At first they just sat and stood around, looking at Peter with their huge, dark eyes.

Later they started to play and dance around in a strangely stiff, awkward manner.

Initially Peter was terrified, but as the nights passed he realized that the visitors meant him no harm.

Eventually Peter would sit on the edge of his bed and watch the little guys scampering about. Then he would get tired of their antics, get into bed a go to sleep. Interestingly Peter was never awake when the visitors left.

Now you may be asking yourself if all of this really happened (and there are even stranger things to come).

After all, many kids have rich fantasy lives and imaginary friends.

Peter, of course, did have his imaginary friends; Teddy, Doggy, Brumas and Judy, which were his stuffed toys - and one bear-shaped hot water bottle. But the visitors were not like imaginary friends they had no names, and no identifiable personalities.

Now while these nocturnal visitors seem highly unlikely, they are not necessarily impossible. It was Isaac Asimov who stated that it would be wildly improbable if wildly improbable things did not happen. Things that would be on the far end of Laplace's famous bell-curve. But if the visitors were not real, then where did they come from ? From what corner of little Peter's imagination did they emerge ?

Now it is true that Peter had been reading, or rather looking at the pictures of the science fiction comic serial, 'Dan Dare', for over a year, and it must be remembered that to a six or seven year old Dan dare was a real person, and his adventures were real events. But the aliens in 'Dan Dare' were the macho Treens; nearly seven feet tall, well muscled, with green skin, and wearing copper space suits. Nothing like the skinny, naked, sexless little gray guys that came to play in Peter's bedroom.

It is also true that Peter had seen 'Flash Gordon' and 'Buck Rogers', at the Children's Saturday film club, but equally the aliens in those two science fiction serials bear not the slightest similarity to Peter's visitor's, and the emperor Ming is hardly a model for Peter's gentle 'Nordic'.

There was one other film that had a strong impact on Peter during his childhood, and that was the well known American film 'Invaders from Mars'.

This film features a young boy who is woken from his sleep by the landing of a flying saucer. Subsequently he is abducted by aliens, but once again these are hulking, macho types, who bear little or no resemblance to Peter's 'grays'. Also significant is the fact that this film was not released in the UK until 1954, some two years after Peter's experiences began.

The only other source of fantasy, other than films, available to children at that period, apart from Rupert Bear, Andy Pandy, the Flowerpot Men and Muffin the Mule, were Disney characters.

None of these fantasy character, however, seem like good models for Peter's visitors, apart of course for 'Peter Pan'.

Now Peter Pan, as we have already have seen, was the boy who would not grow up. What made him even more special was the fact that he could fly, and also taught Wendy, Michael and John how to fly.

The trip to 'Never Land', flying among the stars, as depicted in the film, could be seen to be quite similar to Peter's night time escapades.

The problem is that the film was not released in the UK until July 1953, and Peter probably did not see the film until 1954, probably around Christmas. Peter, of course, met the 'visitors' in 1952, before the film was even released in America.

Today, of course, there would be 'Close Encounters', 'The X Files', 'Dark Skies' and 'Communion'; but their images, somewhat significantly, derive from writers who were young at the same time that little Peter was having his nocturnal visitors.

After some weeks of simply playing about in Peter's bedroom, the visitors finally enticed Peter from sitting on the bed to sitting on the table by the window.

The next step was to get him to sit on the window-sill. Peter was then encouraged to get onto a strange metal frame floating outside the bedroom window. Once safely on this frame, and accompanied by a couple of the visitors, Peter would be taken up into the starry sky, on a breathtaking and exhilarating journey.

These journeys had a profound effect on Peter, giving him a lasting love of the night sky and the stars.

There was more to these trips, however, than just having a sight-seeing tour of the starry heavens. The trips always ended in a small, featureless, gray room - a gray room that would come to haunt Peter much later in his life.

There Peter would meet a tall young man, whom Peter took to be a teacher or a scientist. Peter would have long conversations with this person, although after these experiences he could never remember what these conversations were about. While talking to this young man, Peter was always aware of a sinister looking robot standing in the corner of the room.

After Peter's meeting with the tall young man, the small, gray entities would take Peter back to the metal frame, which would then gently ferry him back through the starlit sky to his bedroom window.

Peter would then return to bed, leaving the little gray guys to caper around by the bed until he fell asleep.

If we accept Peter's memories as genuine, then he must be classed as an 'abductee' - one of that ever growing band of individuals who claim to have been contacted by alien entities, and spirited away to some extraterrestrial environment.

CONTACTEES While by now many hundreds of thousands, (perhaps even millions), of individuals claim to have been abducted, Peter's case is unusual for two related reasons. The first reason is the early date, and the second is the fact that it would have been almost impossible for Peter to have been influenced by any accounts of similar phenomena.

Peter's abductions began in 1952.

One of the earliest abduction accounts of the period was that of Villa Boas, which took place in Brazil in 1957. A later, and far more influential case was that of Betty and Barney Hill in the USA, which took place in 1961, and clearly described the 'Grays', who also appear in Peter's account.

Whitley Streiber, the author of the book that attracted Peter's attention in Canterbury, was the author who popularised the abduction phenomenon, in which the 'Grays' play a central part.

In addition, although Streiber's fame is based on the abductions which he claimed to have experienced in 1985, Streiber's initial experiences of abduction date from the early fifties, when he was a young boy in San Antonio, in Texas, and it is significant that Streiber is only one year younger than Peter.

It should be remembered, of course, that all these abduction accounts were published many years after Peter's first experience, and therefore could not have influenced him, unless we propose that Peter's subsequent knowledge of these accounts affected his memories of some other event.

As a boy Peter did have some knowledge of UFO encounters. These were the result of John Crawford becoming interested in contactee stories, and borrowing books from the Public Library by George Adamski.

George Adamski was one of the first, modern contactees.

Adamski was born in Poland in 1891, but he was just two years old his family emigrated to America to escape the crushing poverty and political uncertainty. As a young man he spent some years in the American Army although little is known of the details of his early life.

By 1944 he was calling himself 'Professor' Adamski and lecturing on Eastern Religions. He and a group of followers had set up a small colony near Mount Palomar, in California; site of the giant two-hundred inch reflecting telescope.

There they ran a tourist's cafĂŠ, and Adamski indulged in his hobby of amateur astronomy with his six inch Newtonian reflector.

In 1946 Adamski observed his first UFO through his telescope but, significantly, it was not until 1952 that he was able to successfully take his first photograph of a UFO through his telescope.

In that same year he experienced his first contact with alien entities. These entities identified themselves a 'Venusians' and appeared to be humanoid, looking very similar to Nordic earthmen, and similar to Peter's 'scientist' or 'teacher'.

Adamski was a prolific writer, and although most of what he wrote is now discounted, even by the most ardent UFO fan, in the 1950's he was a successful non-fiction author.

Peter, however, only got to read Adamski's books when he was about thirteen years old, and there is very little similarity between Adamski's Venusians and Peter's 'visitors'.

There is, strangely enough, a strong and rather haunting similarity between Streiber's 'visitors' and Peter's experiences, although it must be remembered that Peter did not come across Streiber's account until thirty-six years had passed.

Both accounts begin with the appearance of owls, and both accounts involve nocturnal visits by small thin, gray entities. Equally both accounts involve a small metal frame as the means of transportation away from the bedroom, and both involve a small room where further encounters take place. Where the accounts differ is with Peter's experience of the 'Nordic' and the 'robot'.

Streiber, however, when describing his childhood abductions, which were taking place at the same time as Peter's experiences, describes how he was taken to a room where he received instruction. Also, significantly, he describes how he saw a number of school friends at these 'lessons', although strangely these friends never discussed their presence at these 'lessons' when they met Streiber in the following days and weeks. Peter also had sessions of 'instruction', as he often thought of the tall 'Nordic' as a 'teacher', but he had no recollection of anyone else being present at these sessions.

Peter's experience differs in one other important way that from that of most other abductees, and that is in the matter of sexuality, although this is possibly not surprising, considering how young Peter was.

Villa Boas, a simple South American peasant, was abducted with the purpose of him impregnating a female extraterrestrial.

Betty and Barney Hill were both given intimate examinations, which involved taking ova from Betty and sperm samples from Barney, and Whitely Streiber, when abducted as an adult, underwent an examination involving an anal probe. Peter, however, had no conscious memory of any such activity.

Peter was never sure exactly how often the visitors came - after all, boys of that age don't keep diaries, or consult calendars. The visits did seem to be quite regular, however, averaging at least once or twice a week. Despite their regularity, Peter was never comfortable with the little 'grays', and in reality, despite the fact that they never hurt or threatened Peter, they always frightened him. It was different with the tall young man, and in retrospect, Peter felt that quite a deep relationship developed between the two of them, despite the constant and ominous presence of the robot.

So if we presume, just for the sake of argument, that Peter's memories of the 'Visitors' were genuine, and reasonably accurate; then just who were these little chaps that floated into his bedroom.

Early contactees, like Ballard, Adamski and King were convinced that their alien visitors came from Venus, Mars Jupiter, Saturn etc. Of course we are now pretty sure that the planets, apart from the Earth, are incapable of supporting life. When this became general knowledge, in the sixties, aliens were generally reported to come from other stars or galaxies.

An example of this was Betty and Barney Hill's aliens, who were supposed to come from the Pleiades, or possibly Reticulum.

If, however, the speed of light is taken into consideration then, unfortunately, it seems somewhat unlikely that aliens would travel for many years just to undertake gynaecological examinations of a small group of humans.

The result of all these speculations was that later contactees, and those who wrote about them, started to suggest that the visitors might not be extraterrestrials at all. The new possibilities were that these beings could be time travellers, multi-dimensional beings, and most alarmingly perhaps, 'The Watchers'. And who were or are the watchers ? Well this conveniently takes us into the realms of religion, and to the pseudepigraphical 'Book of Enoch', written in the Jewish intertestamentory period, where the 'Watchers', the Nephilim, were angelic or spiritual beings who mated with mortal woman, and were punished with banishment. Not demons, and not ghosts, but 'all seeing' guardians – who no longer guard – but may now have some other agenda.

If the little gray guys weren't the 'Watchers', then possibly Peter's tall young man was, but as to his purpose Peter was unable to tell, and we are equally unable to shed any light on this mystery.

Peter, himself, had no thoughts about who his 'visitors' were, and never spoke about them to Jane and John, or to his friends, as far as he could recall, but then that should not surprise us, for J M Barrie wrote that, 'Children have the strangest adventures without being troubled by them, for what troubles a grown-up will never trouble a child'.

Eventually, after about two years, the end came.

Quite suddenly the tall young man announced to Peter that the regular visits were now coming to an end, although this didn't mean that there would never again be any contact.

In one sense Peter was relieved. The presence of the Grays had always been stressful for him, and he welcomed the thought of undisturbed nights. On the other hand it was difficult to come to terms with the loss of his 'alien' friend. But at least there was the knowledge that they might meet again.

The tall young visitor kept his promise, but that story is for another time.

The coming of the 'visitors' was preceded by Peter becoming afraid of the dark. Oddly enough, after the departure of the 'visitors' Peter was never again frightened of the dark.

And strange to say, some months after the disappearance of the visitors, Mr Wilkinson, the old gentleman who lived in the neighbouring house, gave Peter two gifts. The first was a book; an old, Edwardian guide to the night sky, giving a description of the skies for each week of the year, plus a planisphere set into the back cover.

Rather more significant was the gift of a red leather covered brass telescope, in a leather case, complete with two extra eyepieces and a table-top tripod.

Now why such an extravagant gift, apparently coming from out of the blue?

As far as Peter could remember he had told no one about the 'visitors'.

But then just maybe he had said something to Mr Wilkinson - or perhaps the old man had seen something, late one night - or perhaps the old man just knew, after all, he had been a friend of Aliester Crowley.

Of course Jane and John were far too polite to refuse, on behalf of their little boy, this rather extravagant gift. Peter, however, was delighted.

Regularly, from then on, when ever the weather was warm enough, Peter would wait until the adults below thought he was asleep, and then slide open his bedroom window. He would then place the telescope tripod on the table where the 'visitors' had once sat, gazing at him with their huge dark eyes, and point his prized telescope at the bright southern skies, peering at the glittering Pleiades and nebulous glow of Orion, half hoping and half fearing that he would catch sight of his 'visitors' one more time.

And perhaps Mr Wilkinson, on some summer night, would walk out into his garden and see Peter at his bedroom window scanning the night sky, and smile to himself, for perhaps he knew what the boy was searching for - and maybe he had even searched himself, in the same way, sometime in the past - after all, it would be wildly improbable if wildly improbable things did not happen.

And so we should think back to the balmy summer nights; - the smell of freshly cut grass on the evening air, and the musty aroma of the warm earth; the endless reaches of the star-spangled sky, and the overwhelming anticipation of the approach of something alien and unsettling, and yet strangely compelling and familiar.

And all this can induce a profound nostalgia, and not just in young Peter, but in so many of us, for such reminiscences may be something that many of us hold in common - if we could but just grasp some of the memories of those strange, magical nights so long ago - 'so long ago, and so clear'.

SECRETS & MYSTERIES The 'visitors' were undoubtedly Peter's first, and possibly biggest secret.

There would be other secrets in Peter's life, but the visitor's were undoubtedly the strangest.

But Peter was not the only one to have secrets.

Of course many families have secrets - 'black sheep' and skeletons in the cupboard, and Peter's adoptive family was no exception. Early on Peter knew of at least three rather dubious facts about the family.

The first was about John Crawford's brother, who Peter was supposed to refer to as 'uncle' Ralph.

Peter only met Ralph, who was a merchant seaman, once, when Peter was about six, when Ralph visited Pears Road.

'Uncle' Ralph managed to amuse Peter by playing a tune on a metal accessory tube that was part of the household vacuum cleaner. He then spent the rest of the evening drinking and talking to his brother; Peter's adoptive father.

Peter never saw Ralph again, and Ralph never sent any letters, as far as Peter knew, and was never referred to by any member of the family.

In later life Peter wondered if Ralph was homosexual, as he was not married, and homosexuality, at that time was not unusual among seamen. The only photo that Peter ever saw of Ralph showed him with two young French men, in Calais, so there is a possibility that this was the reason why he was never referred to, and apparently disappeared from the family history very early on.

The second 'black sheep' was Peter's adoptive mother's brother-in-law, 'uncle' John, who was a recovered alcoholic. Many years later, long after Peter had married, 'uncle' John became completely mentally unhinged, and shortly afterwards he died.

Perhaps the 'blackest sheep' of the family was Peter's adoptive mother's brother's youngest son, 'cousin' Norman.

The first son, Richard, had been a boy, and Peter's adoptive mother's sister-in-law, Gladys, had then very much wanted a daughter.

Instead she had a son, whom she called 'Norma' and dressed in girl's clothes. Poor Norman grew up appallingly effeminate, and not surprisingly got himself a boy-friend, Jackie, as soon as he reached his late teens. But more about Norman and his 'boy-friend' later.

The most significant skeleton in the family cupboard, however, involved Peter's adoptive parents.

At the very centre of Peter's appearance at fifty-five Pears Road, as the apparently adopted son of Mr & Mrs Crawford, there was a dark, unspoken secret. It was not, however, the secret that Peter was adopted, and it had nothing to do with how Peter had been acquired, but rather it involved what had happened before his appearance.

Peter very quickly realized that in other families' mothers had babies, and that he had arrived at Pears Road by train, and was obviously not the son of Mr & Mrs Crawford.

Jane and John's explanation of this was quite clever. They made no secret that Peter was adopted, but made it clear that because of this Peter was very special, - because Peter had been 'chosen'. Now Peter was indeed special, but not simply for the reason that he had been adopted.

What Jane and John did not tell Peter, however, was why they had adopted Peter, and why they could not have a child of their own.

Of course they couldn't tell Peter that; not at the age Peter was in 1952. And so the secret was kept until 1985, which is well after this story ends.

To understand what happened we need to go back to the war - that is the Second World War. John had been sent to the Middle East, and Jane was left on her own in Hounslow.

Now Jane was not the dowdy lady that she later became when Peter was a teenager and a young man. Then Jane was incredibly fashion conscious, and inclined to put on 'airs and graces', which she would later condemn in others, including Peter, as she grew older.

Afraid of the bombing, Jane returned to Gateshead and her family, but did not fit in at all well with her already dowdy and unfashionable sisters, Mary and Maggie, who were strict Catholics, - after all there had always been a problem after Jane had married a Protestant boy.

So Jane returned to Hounslow; let the house in Pears Road to an Air force sergeant, and went to London to stay with her sister-in-law, Gladys. This, however, didn't last long as she felt that she was constantly under the surveillance of John Crawford's brother, Dick.

Jane then met up with Joe, a nurse, who was a friend of Gladys.

Joe lived with Tommy Kane, her boyfriend, who was an ex-soldier who had been invalided out of the army after being wounded at Dunkirk. They lived in a spacious basement apartment in Gloucester Place, quite close to York Street where Gladys and Dick lived.

Joe, Tommy and Jane went out regularly to the Scotch House, a local pub. There Jane met a presumably handsome, and possibly charismatic American Army officer - after all a good supply of nylons, during the war, could be very charismatic.

Soon a relationship developed, and the officer would stay overnight with Jane at Joe's flat.

Of course the inevitable happened, and Jane became pregnant.

Now although there were undoubtedly many women, during the war, who had affairs while their husbands were away fighting, at the time no one thought too much about it. In the 'blitzed' cities of England no one knew if they would still be alive after an air-raid – so it was very much a 'live for the moment' situation. All forms of illicit sex, including homosexuality among servicemen blossomed, and rates for venereal disease and unwanted pregnancies shot up. There was, however, a time to 'settle up' and count the cost, when the peace came.

At that time illegitimate babies were completely socially unacceptable, but then so was abortion, which was also illegal. Divorce was almost as much a social disgrace as an illegitimate child, so while the divorce rate did rise after the war, many married couples dealt with the facts of wartime infidelity by simply ignoring it, and trying to carry on as if nothing had happened, in the hope that friends, relations and neighbours would do the same.

Joe, being a nurse in Harley Street, was able to arrange an abortion for Jane, which the American Officer paid for, but the abortion went wrong, and Jane was unable to have any more children.

Jane presumably hoped that the anonymity of London would come to her aid, and the whole matter could be covered up when she returned to Hounslow. John, however, found out from a mutual friend, (or was it his brother Dick), while he was in the Middle East, and that's where Peter comes into the story.

So Peter seems to have been the 'solution' to a collapsing marriage, or perhaps he was the 'fantasy child', to replace the child - who would have been his brother - who was lost, or more accurately, killed.

In a strange way Peter and Barrie were to some extent similar in this matter.

Barrie lost a brother, and became for his mother the substitute, and therefore the 'fantasy' for the child who had died - the child who 'never grew up', like Peter Pan. And if Peter was a 'fantasy child', then was he really 'real', for what reality can such a 'fantasy being' really hold ?

As Smee says in the film 'Peter Pan', "Tragic, isn't it ?".

And of course Barrie, in Peter Pan, tells us that Wendy 'felt at once that she was in the presence of a tragedy.'

And yes, tragic it was.

Now Peter, as a boy was never told these facts, but a child does not have to have the facts spelled out to him to know that there is something secret and unsavoury in the air. To Peter, Jane and John were not like other mums and dads - the mums and dads of his friends. Their relationship was strange and stilted, lacking warmth and spontaneity. Equally, Peter was aware that the family in Newcastle, particularly on Jane's side were not only cool towards Jane, but had also taken an instant dislike to Peter, and seemed to view him as an interloper.

In retrospect perhaps they thought of him as a symbol of that illicit relationship that Jane had had, or perhaps they had no knowledge of the abortion and thought that Peter was the illegitimate child, the dead little boy, as his dark brown eyes, olive skin and black hair showed that he was obviously not John's son.

Equally when Peter later met Gladys and Dick, and Joe and Tommy Kane, it was obvious to him that there was some 'unfinished business' existing amongst these people, although they showed him none of the animosity that he had received form Jane and John's families in Newcastle.

So this was another factor that made Peter feel different, even if he didn't, at that stage in his life know why.

In this chapter the drive for reform and novelty, evident after the victory of 1945, is swamped by a heartfelt desire to return to the past as the Conservatives, led by Churchill are swept to power. We them look at Peter's developing psychology, before turning to the crowning of a new, young Queen amid a nostalgic revival of medieval piety and imperial pomp and ceremony.

A NEW ELIZABETHAN AGE ?

1951 had been the year that the Conservative Party, led by Sir Winston Churchill, had ousted the Labour Party.

At the end of the war people had looked to an end to rationing and shortages, and an end to a country divided by class and privilege. People had been able to pull together in wartime, and most people saw no reason why people couldn't pull together, in a spirit of equality, in the post war period.

So, unfortunately for Churchill, instead of being rewarded for his wartime efforts with a Conservative victory, he was unceremoniously given the sack by a grateful nation - they were grateful but wanted a change.

Despite their landslide victory in the first general election after the war, Labour, in the years immediately after the war had become associated in the majority of people's minds with austerity, rationing and a doctrine of central planning & control that was just vaguely reminiscent of the totalitarian regimes of Germany before the war, and the Soviet union both before and after the war.

Labour, to much of the electorate, eventually seemed in some strange way un-English and alien, despite the introduction of the Health Service and the New Education Bill.

People, above all, wanted a return to the comfortable way that things had been just before the war, when the country had been emerging out of the drabness and difficulties of the Great Depression.

At that time, at least in the south of England, there had been a mini-boom and there were jobs a plenty.

The suburbs, full of mock Tudor semis, had been expanding at an astonishing rate; credit was cheap and the shops were flooded with all kinds of new consumer goods, from electric toasters to three piece suites.

And in 1951 people thought that if a Conservative government was returned those time would come again - and they did.

Churchill was coming up to seventy-seven when he won the third post-war general election.

As a young man he had taken part in the last great cavalry charge of the British Army, in the Battle of Omdurman in the Sudan, and he had also fought in the Boer War in South Africa.

Born in the only non-royal palace in Britain; Blenheim, he was a member of the most privileged part of the British aristocracy, and the cabinet that he appointed were mainly made up of public school educated aristocrats, mainly from Eton and Harrow.

The naturally occurring recovery from the lows of wartime consumer productivity inevitably enabled this new Conservative government to gain the approval of the majority of the people, and eventually a successor to Churchill was able to regale the voters with the thought that they had 'never had it so good'.

Peter saw Winston Churchill at the cinema, when the news reel came on, but he paid little attention to the old man with the cigar, who looked a little like Mr Wilkinson. There were other more important things going on in his life at that time.

LIFE GOES ON 1952 had been the year that 'the visitors came' for Peter.

In addition to those strange goings on, there was another rather uncomfortable holiday in Northumberland, and of course the regular round of school.

One of the most important lessons in school during that year was learning the art of penmanship. It must be remembered that 1952 was a time when 'biros' were not readily available, and therefore most people wrote with a pencil or a fountain-pen.

Now in school, children were taught to write firstly with a pencil, and then with a 'dipping-pen'. A dipping-pen, of course, is just one step on from a quill. The pen has a wooden handle, in Peter's school fetchingly coloured either pink or apple-green, and a metal nib, and the pen has to be repeatedly dipped into an inkwell, as there is no reservoir in the pen. The great advantage of learning to write with a 'dipping-pen' is that it encourages the development of an elegant 'hand' (style of handwriting), which is something almost unknown today.

The prize for mastering the 'dipping-pen' was the gift, from the child's parents or relatives of a fountainpen, and fountain pens in this period had the same status and allure for children as a mobile phone has today, and it was important what make, style and colour of pen a child had.

In Peter's case he was promised a 'Parker' fountain pen by Jane, (Jane always insisted on the best - not for Peter's sake, but because Jane's boy always had to have better things than the other children), if he mastered his dipping-pen and developed a good hand.

To begin with Peter found writing almost as difficult as reading.

It was obvious that Peter was left-handed, but teachers in the 1950s weren't prepared to make allowances for individual differences, and so Peter was required to write with his right hand, like all the other children.

This made for some problems at the beginning, when writing was restricted to capital letters written in pencil.

Eventually, however, Peter got the hang of writing with his right hand, and strangely, although Peter was still a poor reader, he developed a very fine style of handwriting for a seven year old, and duly received his first Parker fountain pen, and a bottle of dark blue 'Quink', that Christmas.

So Peter began 1953 with a beautiful Parker pen that was the envy of all his friends.

Of course Peter's was the best kind of pen at the time and, having been bought for Peter by Jane, it was a dark, apple-green - green being Jane's favourite colour.

The interesting thing about the many 'rewards' that Peter received, was exemplified by the situation of the pen. Peter, despite being left handed, developed a fine right handed script, but not because he wanted to please Jane. Remember what that other Peter - who is so important to our story - thought about mothers - 'he had always thought of mothers as very over-rated persons'.

Well our Peter thought in a very similar way, and in fact he had little feeling for anyone other than himself. For what made Peter very strange was that, for him, other people were not really real !

So Peter developed his fine hand because he wanted the fountain pen, and not to please Jane.

For Peter the pen was just another 'toy'; another possession; an object of value that raised him above his peers, and gave him status.

He might be the strange little boy from nowhere, and the substitute for the 'real thing', the little boy, conceived by Jane, who had not really been born.

He might have no real mother or father, - but he would make up for all that by accumulating 'things' – material things, or ideas and knowledge. 'Things' of value and of status.

And it was this that drove him on, and caused him to conform to what adults expected of him.

Peter was also very good at pleasing adults, and particularly Jane, simply to get what he wanted; after all, Peter Pan told Wendy that, 'one girl is worth at least ten boys'.

Now quite obviously Peter – that is Peter Pan, - didn't believe that, but he wanted Wendy to go with him to Neverland, where she would be expected to tell stories to him and the 'lost boys'.

Equally, our Peter could be very gracious and accommodating, and even flattering, if he thought it would get him what he wanted, and just like Wendy, Jane, - and many other people, - would usually believe Peter.

Now Peter's efforts to write well had got him the fountain pen that he wanted, but not only did Peter have an excellent fountain pen – he was also a very smart little schoolboy, and much of that was due to his manipulating ways as Peter was always – even as a little boy- very fussy about his clothes.

Equally, however, Jane was always eager to see Peter looking his best, and to that purpose she always ensured that he had the best quality school uniform, with 'Banner' shirts, and shorts, and blazers of the best wool from the 'Co-op'.

The school uniform for Hounslow Town Junior school consisted of black lace-up shoes, (Peter's were always 'Clarke's'), grey socks, grey shorts, a white shirt, (with a grey pullover in the winter), a school tie of horizontal blue, gold and white stripes (horizontal stripes were very nineteen fifties, unlike diagonal stripes in the sixties), a navy-blue blazer with the school badge, and a navy-blue cap, also with the school badge.

This was quite a 'tall order', price-wise, for many families, and contemporary photos show that many of the boys did not wear the full, approved uniform.

Of course, the great event of the fifties, and the highlight of 1953, was the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II. This was the first coronation to be televised, and that meant that many people, as the great day approached, decided to buy a television.

So, of course, early that spring Jane and John decided to buy a television.

One bright sunny Saturday they took Peter to Hounslow High Street. They decided to go to the Co-Op, which had a large department store at the 'top' of the High Street, just past the 'Bell' public house. This store had the widest range of electrical good, and as the family were members of the Co-operative Society, they would get a 'dividend' on the purchase. John decided to buy a 'Bush' television with the biggest screen available - which was tiny by modern standards. It was on this occasion that Peter discovered something about Jane and John that never ceased to amaze him. When John had decided on the model of television, and agreed a date for delivery, he calmly took a stack of big, white, floppy five pound notes from his wallet and handed them over to the somewhat surprised shop assistant.

You see, from the time of the Great Depression, John had decided firmly against any form of credit, or borrowing money, and therefore he always made sure that if he needed to buy anything he would always be able to pay in cash.

So, the following Monday the television was delivered, along with an engineer who installed the aerial.

In 1953, of course, there was only one channel, the BBC, and the programs, such as they were, were in black and white, but that didn't matter, because now Peter lived in only the second house in the whole street to have a television. And, of course, the other person who had a television was our enigmatic neighbour, Mr Wilkinson, but then for him money was never a problem.

But there was some considerable time to go before the coronation itself, and the months leading up to the great event were a time of ever increasing anticipation, which almost reached the level of hysteria as the time steadily approached. Not only was the coronation eagerly anticipated and prepared for at school, with special lessons and projects, but the shops were also awash with coronation memorabilia.

When Peter stopped to look in the window of Poulton's Toy shop, which was on the corner of School Road and the Broadway, he eye was very quickly caught by some toy mounted Life Guards and some scarlet coated Foot Guards, made by 'Britain's'.

There was also a beautiful scale model of the gilded coronation coach, drawn by eight white horses with postilions in state uniforms, made by the same company.

Then it was just a matter of nagging at Jane until she eventually gave in and bought them for Peter.

And so, with his now remarkably large collection of toy soldiers, tanks, field guns and other military paraphernalia, Peter could mount his own coronation processions in the drawing room, long before the real coronation got under way.

Jane, however, was making different preparations for the coronation.

There was to be a 'fancy dress' competition with a coronation theme for the children of the local area, and Jane had come up with a winning idea for our Peter.

She had cleverly decided that he should wear what was possibly the most elaborate costume there was for a boy for such a themed fancy dress competition. Peter was to be entered dressed as a Yeoman of the Guard – the Queen's innermost bodyguard, if you exclude the Gentlemen at Arms. Not only was this a fiendishly complex and detailed uniform for Jane to make, but John was dragged into the project as he had to make a halberd of wood and aluminium. The only person who's opinion was not sought on this matter was Peter's, but he didn't mind as he was only to happy to dress up in a military uniform.

And so it went on. Books, magazines, commemorative cups, plates, tea towels and anything else that could be possibly stamped enamelled or painted with crowns, union jacks and portraits of the Queen were to be found in all the shops.

MORE PROBLEMS While, during those warm Spring nights, Jane was busily sewing the Yeoman of the Guard's costume, and John was working in the garden shed, cutting out the metal to make the halberd, Peter was still engaged with the 'visitors'.

The 'visitors', of course, didn't seem to know anything about the coronation – but then that wasn't really surprising. It seemed that they existed outside time, and were unaffected by all the mundane events of 1953 and, when Peter was with them, he also seemed to exist outside time.

In some sense, of course, our Peter always seemed to exist, to some extent, 'outside time' – whether the 'visitors' were there or not.

As Hook said of the other Peter, 'that was the mystery of his being', and in that way our Peter shared some of Pan's mysterious nature.

Yes, he aged and grew up in a way that Pan could not, but our Peter, it seemed, was never quite 'of his time'.

There was always something about him that seemed to hover mysteriously in that place where he originally sprang from – and that unknown time that he shared with the 'visitors' – the place and time of his mysterious origins - a place of glittering stars and dark skies.

As we have said, as far as Peter can remember he never spoke to anyone about these timeless 'visitors' when he was a boy, and had little idea of what they might actually mean.

Many years later, however, Peter confided some details about the 'visitors' to a counsellor – who immediately interpreted the events as a possible 'screen memory' to hide sexual abuse perpetrated by John Crawford. Wisely, Peter ignored these suggestions - and for good reasons.

John Crawford, you see, was a loving father, but not at all demonstrative.

The war and Jane's betrayal seemed to have made him very distant and aloof, and he found it very difficult to express his feeling to anyone, - Peter and Jane included.

It was probably for these reasons that John never bathed Peter, dressed or undressed him, never put him to bed, and never read him bedtime stories. In such a situation, there seems very little opportunity for any physical impropriety to have occurred.

It is also significant that when Peter was a little older, and Jane was ill for a considerable period, John was not prepared to look after Peter, and instead sent him to live with his brother Dick, and Dick's wife Gladys, in London.

But of course, faced with the alternative explanations that the 'visitors' were real, or that Peter was psychotic as a child, the only viable solution for the counsellor was the 'screen memory' covering childhood abuse, as aliens don't exist, and Peter was obviously not psychotic as a boy.

What is perhaps surprising is the fact that at the time Peter seemed outwardly to be a perfectly normal child, if a little self-absorbed, moody and unaccountably irritable, despite the fact that he seemed to be experiencing some very strange events in his life.

Now while our Peter was obviously not psychotic as a child, for this would have been so noticeable as to require him to receive psychiatric treatment and almost certainly be withdrawn from school, he was in some ways not completely 'normal', although that fact does not really explain the phenomena of the 'visitors'. And it was not really surprising that Peter was not completely 'normal' when one considers what may have happened to him during the first few years of his life.

Later in life Peter completed a diagnostic test for Asperger's syndrome, which produced a remarkably high score.

Asperger's Syndrome is one of the 'autism spectrum disorders' that was first identified by Dr Hans Asperger, an Austrian paediatrician, in 1944.

Symptoms include a qualitative impairment in social interaction, stereotyped and restricted patterns of behaviour, activities and interests, - onesided verbosity, and a certain degree of physical clumsiness.

In addition, individuals exhibiting this condition may appear to disregard other people's feelings, and may come across as cold, insensitive and even cruel, which certainly sums up ' the devil in Peter', as Barrie so beautifully described it. In addition, individuals with this condition may be unusually sensitive to sound, light, touch, texture, taste, and smell.

Now Peter certainly had some very definite and stereotyped interests; for example his obsession with building and maintaining his army of model soldiers, his interest in learning all the names of the constellations, stars and planets, his obsession with Dan Dare, and later his obsessions with ancient history, aircraft, films and cars.

With regard to clumsiness, Peter began as being left handed, and there is a slight correlation between abnormal chirality, (handedness) and Aspergers.

Equally, Peter, partly because of his handedness, had very poor hand/eye co-ordination as a young boy, although by intense effort he was able to improve his co-ordination to a higher than average level.

As a boy, Peter was very sensitive to noise, and his biggest problem was when Jane used her 'Hoover Junior' on the carpets. On those occasions, Peter had to either go out into the garden, or at least go into another room.

He was also very sensitive to the textures of materials; was unable to wear rough flannel or synthetic fabrics, and always had to wear very fine wool or preferably cotton next to his skin.

Equally, he was very sensitive to the texture, rather than simply the taste of food, and this caused endless problems as his diet became very restricted, and 'eating out' with Peter became very traumatic for Jane and John.

As time passed, however, Peter was capable of using his will power to help him overcome these problems, and give a convincing impression of almost complete 'normality'.

The sheer effort of doing this day after day, however, had the effect of making Peter very irritable at times, so that his main problem during his childhood was his appalling, and sometimes uncontrolled temper.

Peter could put up a good pretence of being amenable, interested and empathetic for short periods, but when the strain became too great he would either withdraw into a sulky silence, or explode in a tempertantrum, which appalled Jane and John, and often unnerved those around him who were not familiar with his sudden changes in demeanour.

THE CORONATION As Spring turned to Summer the Coronation grew ever nearer.

Now Peter did know a little about coronations because of one rather curious fact. Before the coming a television, John Crawford had bought a 'Pathescope Film Projector' - a strange, and rather expensive item to buy.

It seems that John had had a friend who was a film projectionist at a local cinema, and he had given John a number of unwanted reels of film. As they were not 35 mm film they were obviously not films that were shown commercially at the cinema, and where they had originated from is unknown.

A number of these films were Disney cartoon 'shorts' of Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck and Goofy. However, there were also some newsreels, including some of World War 2, including the War in the Desert, the Battle of the Atlantic and the Blitz.

Of particular interest, however, were newsreels showing the coronations of George V and George VI. Before the television made the film projector redundant, John would often 'black out' the stairs and mount the projector on the landing so that it could project a large picture on the wall opposite. On some occasions when John did this, some of Peter's friends were invited to watch the films.

So Peter had already seen newsreels of the coronation coach, and the coronation procession, and so had some idea of what to expect.

While many people were deeply saddened by the death of George VI, who had been viewed as a positive figurehead throughout the dark days of the war, almost everybody welcomed the coronation of the new young queen, who was seen as the symbol of a 'New Elizabethan Age'.

It must be remembered that rationing was still in force, and most people in Britain were still experiencing an age of austerity.

As a result, the coronation was seen as a welcome relief from the general sense of drabness and 'make do and mend', which was the lot of the great majority.

People were determined to enjoy themselves that summer, and to 'let themselves go', and the fancy-dress competition was just one of the many events planned to coincide with the great day of the coronation itself.

But for many adults 'letting themselves go' and enjoying themselves was not such an easy matter. As we have already seen, the war years had created a huge backlog of personal problems for many people, and not just with regard to relationships between husbands and wives, and those who were engaged to be married.

In particular, the men who had been away had led very different lives for those long years.

Some had been in prisoner of war camps, some had been in the thick of the bloodiest fighting, and some, like John Crawford, had been living in a strange fantasy world for all those years.

While London had been 'blacked-out' for the 'duration', and had suffered the Blitz, cities like Cairo, where John had been stationed, had been ablaze with light, and people had partied hard almost every night. Now there had been times when John's life had been in danger, most notably when he had been in Palestine, but generally speaking, he had had, what was described at the time, as a 'good war'.

Regardless of the relative lack of danger, John, like many other men returning from the war, had a great deal of difficulty dealing with the change to civilian life. Moreover, it was not just the fact that these men were now civilians once again. They also had to adapt to family life, and a society that had undergone many fundamental changes since the start of the war.

So the post-war society was peopled by individuals who were desperately coming to terms with what had gone before.

In many cases these individuals, both men and women, had not expected to survive the war, - and for some of them that would have solved many of their problems. Nevertheless, they had survived, and in 1953 they were trying to make the best of it.

So our Peter found himself surrounded by many adults who were unnaturally quiet and reserved, and who almost never spoke about their past.

They were, - particularly the men, - people who displayed the infamous 'stiff upper lip'. Men of few words, - and far fewer emotions.

Some, of course, would cheer in the crowd on the great day when the golden coach would be drawn through the streets of London. Some would have a laugh and a few beers during the street parties that were held up and down the country, but many would be like John, and view the whole affair quietly and distantly, as if it was really of little or no concern to them. Not that John was not a patriot. He was still dedicated to his regiment and the flag, - but Peter, even at that age, could see that the spark had gone out, not only for John, but for many of the men of that age and that time.

Now a coronation, if we leave out the processions and golden coach, is fundamentally a religious ceremony, and this brings up the question of religion in the nineteen-fifties.

Firstly, we have to remember that at that time religion in Britain meant, in the main, Christianity. There were very few Moslems, Hindus or Sikhs living in the United Kingdom at that time, and the only non-Christian place of worship in Hounslow, in the fifties, was an Orthodox Jewish Synagogue, although our Peter knew nothing of this place at the time.

The figures available seem to show that after the war religious observance declined in Britain.

Undoubtedly many men, because of their experience in the war, had lost their faith, although it is unlikely that many would declare that fact publicly. Equally, the awful revelation of the events in the German concentration camps, culminating in the Holocaust, shocked many people and made it almost impossible for them to believe in a loving and caring God. Superficially, however, Britain remained a Christian country.

Most people marked the main events of their lives with traditional Christian ceremonies such as baptisms, weddings, and funerals.

In addition, two great cathedrals were undertaken in the immediate post war years, those being Guildford, by Sir Edwin Mauffe and Coventry, by Sir Basil Spence.

More pervasive was the inclusion of acts of worship and religious teaching in the state school system. For our Peter every school day began with a religious assembly, which was essentially Christian. Hymns, prayers and a homily were the main features of these assemblies, and for the rest of his life Peter would remember, by heart, the words and music of all those hymns gleaned from 'Hymns Ancient and Modern'.

As you may remember, John Crawford was a Protestant, or more exactly a member of the Church of England.

Jane, however, was a Roman Catholic; a fact that lay behind some of the difficulties with their respective families.

What was interesting, however, was that neither Jane nor John attended Church. There was, however, a copy of the Old and New Testaments, in the King James translation of the Bible, and a copy of the New Testament, bound in olive wood, taken from a tree in the garden of Gethsemane in Jerusalem, which John had brought back from Palestine. In addition, there was a metal crucifix, which John, significantly, had brought back from Syria.

Even stranger, Jane and John sent Peter to a Baptist Sunday School every Sunday.

Not surprisingly, Peter didn't question the Bible stories that he was told at junior School or Sunday School, but these stories, hymns and prayers did not create in him any religious fervour or belief. Jesus was just someone – apparently a carpenter - who had lived in a distant place a long time ago, and God was just a word. After all, if Peter had problems believing that other people were real, then he was obviously not going to find it easy to believe that God was real, and in addition God couldn't give Peter any presents, unlike Father Christmas.

Undoubtedly the 'visitors' themselves were more real and more meaningful to Peter than God, Jesus or the individuals mentioned in the Bible, - after all Peter could see, hear and touch the 'visitors', and their lack of guile and deception made them more believable, and trustworthy than most of the adults with whom Peter came into contact.

So it was not the religious aspects of the coronation that fascinated Peter. Rather it was the 'pomp' and ceremony – the gorgeous uniforms, glittering regalia and glorious music that captivated him when the day of the ceremony finally arrived.

Interestingly, it was because Peter experienced this almost unique event when he was a very impressionable young boy that he retained, for the rest of his life, a fascination with monarchy and the ceremonies surrounding it.

For Peter the concept of monarchy took on a quasi-religious aura. It was not to the individuals concerned that he felt this reverence, but rather the concept of monarchy itself, so that not only would the British monarchy fascinate him but, in later life, he would equally make pilgrimages to the tombs and memorials of the Khedives, Sultans and Kings of the Middle-East, including the Sha-in-Sha and also such unlikely individuals as Ludwig II of Bavaria, the 'Swan King'. But that is another story.

Back in 1953 we are awaiting the great day, while Jane busies herself with endless fittings of Peter's 'fancy dress', while Peter himself indulges in ever more elaborate coronation processions on the drawing room floor.

Eventually, of course, the Summer came; Everest was conquered, and the day of the Coronation arrived – the second of June, - and it rained !

For Peter, of course, this didn't matter, as he was able to watch the day's events on the television.

And so, from early in the morning, Richard Dimbelby's sonorous, measured tones described, in almost excruciating detail, the events of the day.

It was all far too much for Peter to take in, but John watched avidly, noting all

the minute historical details of the ceremony which Dimbelby so lovingly described.

Peter, of course, wanted to see the coronation procession, with the serried ranks of soldiers, sailors and airmen marching past.

Then there was the ceremony in the Abbey, most of which Peter found rather boring, until the Queen, finally wearing the Imperial State Crown; a mass of glittering diamonds and platinum, made he way down the aisle of the Abbey, accompanied by the Duke of Edinburgh, the Arch Bishops, the Ladies in Waiting, carrying the immense, heavily embroidered, purple train, and the Gentlemen at Arms, with their glittering helmets swathed in swan's feathers.

Then the Queen returned to the 'golden' coach, and rode back through London to the palace, amidst the music of innumerable bands, and the cheers of the crowds who thronged the pavements.

There would not be another day like in Peter's childhood, and possibly there will never be a day like it again.

The final icing on the cake, with regard to the ceremony itself, was a trip to the cinema a few weeks later to see a film of the highlights of the coronation in colour. This was for Peter, truly spectacular, as the television picture had not only been small and blurred but, of course, was only in black and white.

The celebrations for the coronation were not only on the day of the crowning itself. Celebrations went on for a least a week, with many events in London, and throughout the country there was 'street parties', 'fancy dress' competitions, sports days, and numerous other events.

Much to Jane's disgust, Peter did not win the 'fancy dress competition'. Many of the neighbours, however thought that the competition had been 'fixed', and Peter was obviously very disappointed.

As 'runner-up' Peter won a prize of a very large 'Dinky Toy' bulldozer, which simply 'rubbed salt into the wound', as the last thing that Peter wanted was a bulldozer.

The only Dinky Toys that Peter was interested in were military vehicles and equipment, or 'staff cars'.

So, the competition simply confirmed again to Peter an already growing conviction that 'grown-ups' couldn't be trusted, and knew nothing about what boys really wanted.

And so the Yeoman of the Guard Uniform was put away, and vanished from memory, - probably thrown away at the time of the 'big sort-out' when the family moved away from 55 Pears Road - disappearing into that place where so many pieces of our childhood simply dissolve into nothing.

In the end all that was really left of the Coronation were some photos of Peter as a Yeoman of the Guard, a few platoons of model Grenadier Guards and Horse Guards, a model Coronation Coach, some books, a Coronation medal and a Coronation mug, - and of course the television, which would from then on play an ever increasing part in everybody's lives.

POLITICS & CULTURE And so the rest of the Summer, including another excruciatingly boring and embarrassing trip to Newcastle and Jane and John's relatives, passed rather uneventfully, in comparison to the turmoil and excitement of the Coronation.

What Peter didn't know; and nor did most other people for that matter, was that the prime minister, Churchill, had suffered a stroke a few weeks after the Coronation.

He seemed to recover, but he lost some of his previous verve and sparkle, and Anthony Eden, the Foreign Secretary, became ever more anxious to see the old man go, so that he could take what he considered his rightful place as the next prime minister.

1953 seemed a bad time for those who were exalted or powerful. Stalin not only suffered a stroke, but succumbed to a stroke, being like Churchill, practically addicted to strong drink and nicotine. Shortly after Stalin's passing, and the hysteria of his funeral in Moscow, Berria, the head of the Russian security services was executed, as Khrushchev slowly eased himself into an increasingly powerful position.

The television news, which was then becoming a regular nightly event, showed Peter images of the signing of the peace treaty ending the Korean War, and the beginnings of Senator McCarthy's 'witch-hunt' for communists and 'fellow travellers' in the United States.

While Peter didn't really understand most of these events, he registered the images, and was later able to weave them together into an early understanding of the momentous times through which he was living.

In the literary world there was a minor ripple when Ian Fleming published his first 'James Bond' novel, 'Casino Royale'. While Peter was far too young, and inept at reading, to read such a book, John Crawford bought the paperback, and it stood for a number of years on one of the shelves of the bookcase, waiting for Peter to reach the age when he would not only read the novel, but also be strongly influenced by the books heady mixture of violence, sophistication and upper class style.

In this year another, and even more important book was published, which Peter would avidly read in his late teens. This was Kinsey's Report on the sexual habits of American adults, which would 'take the lid off' an aspect of life that people like Jane and John seemed to think just didn't exist – at least that was the impression that they gave to Peter.

Up until this time, for Peter, sex didn't seem to be an issue, at least he had no memory of sexuality impinging on his life but, as we shall see, that was all soon to change.

By now, of course, Peter was growing up.

He was seven years old, at least according to his strange birth certificate which, as we have seen, had been 'cobbled together' at Brentford Magistrate's Court, and he was tall for his age, and slim.

Another year had passed.

As we have seen it was a year of momentous events.

For Peter personally, however, nothing really significant had happened.

Political events had swirled about him, but he was largely uncomprehending.

The new Queen had been crowned, and as a result a large television in a polished walnut cabinet now stood in the living-room.

The 'visitors' were still in evidence, but they would soon depart, along with our young Peter's innocence.

In this chapter we look at Peter's increasing interest in music and his continuing obsession with his hero, Dan Dare.

A more sombre note is sounded when Peter is subjected to serious sexual abuse by his cousin, and his cousin's 'boy-friend'.

PLE AS E NOTE This chapter contains text w hich features explicit descriptions of adult themes.

'Got no worries, - got no cares !'

The Christmas of 1953 was, for 'our Peter', just as wonderful as his previous Christmases at 55 Pears Road had been.

The important Christmas toy of that year was a large, clockwork Triang Mimic Sherman tank.

Not only could it roll over numerous obstacles on its caterpillar tracks, while the turret turned from side to side, but it also emitted puffs of white 'smoke' from the gun barrel, as if it were firing shells.

Now Peter had already had his Coronation Coach, and many new toy soldiers, but Peter was 'spoilt', so there were more soldiers, and also a rifle and a couple of pistols. And of course there was the inevitable 'Eagle Annual', featuring Dan Dare on the cover.

Despite the 'visitors', Peter was still completely 'taken with' Dan Dare.

For some reason, it seems, Peter had never connected up the 'visitors' with the aliens and the adventures of Dan Dare. It was as if he somehow realized that the 'visitors' were of another realm, but not the world of 2000 of Dan Dare.

For a start Peter was smart enough to understand that the 'visitors' were 'real' in a way that Dan Dare and the Treens and Venusians could not possibly be. Dan Dare and all the characters of his adventures always stayed firmly on the comic page, although they lived very fully in Peter's imagination, while the 'visitors' could be seen as solid, could be felt and heard, and Peter would feel the cold wind against his skin as he was swept out of the bedroom window and taken to that other place for a strange meeting.

By the Christmas 1953 Peter had got through Dan's first, unnamed adventure, and he had also worked his way through the 'Red Moon Mystery' and 'Marooned on Mercury'.

1953 had opened with 'Operation Saturn' which would turn out to be a long story, and one that would have some considerable significance for Peter, as we shall see later.

Space was not the only thing that interested Peter, and by this stage in his life, Peter was becoming quite interested in music.

There was, however, very little music on television, and it was on the radio that Peter heard most music.

'In a Golden Coach' was a rather sentimental song about the Coronation, but regardless of its rather syrupy melody it managed to get into the 'top ten' records.

More significantly, 1953 was the year that Walt Disney's cartoon version of 'Peter Pan' was released.

Now Peter didn't see the film until just before Christmas.

Musically, however, 'Peter Pan' was significant because of two songs, 'You can Fly', and 'The Second Star to the Right'. Peter didn't like the song 'You can Fly' very much – despite the fact that he could !

But 'The Second Star to the Right' he 'fell in love with', and he would often drift off to sleep humming the gentle melody, which always reminded him of the star-spangled night sky that he knew so well.

One particularly annoying song was, 'How much is that Doggy in the Window', and Peter, who didn't like the song at all, was forced to sing it, along with many of the other local children, at a special Coronation Concert given at the Old School Hall.

At the same concert Peter, and the other children, also sung 'Me and my Teddy Bear', by Jack Winters.

For this song each child had to cuddle their own teddy bear, so Peter's bear, called Teddy, was provided with a beautiful matching jacket and trousers, carefully made by Jane. An the colour ?

Well, as Jane had made the little 'teddy-suit' it was, of course, green tartan.

That year was also the year when one of Peter's favourite songs, 'You belong to Me', was published.

Now Peter, of course, didn't really 'belong' to anybody, so perhaps that was why, perversely, he was so fond of the song. But there was another reason, however.

The song began with the words See the pyramid along the Nile, Watch the sunrise on a tropic isle, Just remember darling all the while You belong to me.

See the marketplace in old Algiers, Send me photographs and souvenirs, But remember when a dream appears You belong to me -

for this song go to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=btdgoAaGZy0

The melody, for Peter, had an aching wistfulness, and always it made him think of the mysterious East – with the Nile and 'old Algiers'.

For Peter, of course, the 'mysterious East' was ever present, as the house where he lived was littered with mementoes of the Middle East, and particularly Egypt.

There was the 'Syrian Crucifix', the New Testament from Jerusalem, Arab daggers, handbags and wallets of camel leather, and endless photos and pictures.

And of course, eventually Peter would 'see the pyramids along the Nile', although, despite that, he would never really belong to anybody – and perhaps in a way, like that other Peter who never grew up, our Peter never really did want to 'belong' to anybody. After all, to 'always be a boy and have fun', you must be free ! Alone, maybe, but free.

Nineteen fifty-four would be a significant year for Peter.

This was the year when popular culture began to change, although it would be some time before Peter felt those effects directly.

In that year an American film was released in England called 'Blackboard Jungle'. The film itself was not particularly outstanding, although it did deal with a relatively new topic - that of the generation gap and juvenile delinquency.

More significant was the fact that the film included a song called 'Rock Around the Clock', which was performed by Bill Haley and the Comets.

Now by later standards, Bill Haley was not a particularly revolutionary figure, being a little chubby, and considerably older than his adoring fans. Even his music, although unusual at the time by the traditional standards of 'Tin Pan Alley', was not particularly revolutionary - but it was, in England, the beginning of 'Rock and Roll', and the teenage sub-culture.

Not surprisingly, many older people of a conservative persuasion saw 'Rock and Roll' as a disruptive force that was expected to subvert traditional values.

It is therefore somewhat surprising to note that the East German Communist Government considered 'Rock and Roll' to be part of a Western plot to undermine Communism ! - or perhaps in some strange way Communism is as traditional as the Right.

Rather more significant to most people, and particularly the older generation, was the final abolition of rationing. Finally, nine years after the end of the war, people could go to the shops and buy whatever they could afford without the government restricting or controlling the quantity or quality of their purchases.

It is perhaps difficult, in retrospect to understand the sense of liberation and freedom that this change brought to the average person, and it was undoubtedly a factor in maintaining the Conservative Party in power, despite the fact that their management of the economy would have long term effects that would bring many problems to the country.

The last form of rationing to disappear was the Sweet Ration, which was welcomed by children everywhere, including our Peter, who had a penchant for Kit-Kats, Penguin Biscuits and Fry's Cream Bars.

For Peter, however, things went on very much as before.

He continued to 'plod along' at school, an amenable, but rather dull pupil as far as his teachers were concerned.

DAN DARE Dan Dare, the space hero of the 'Eagle' comic, continued to preoccupy and fascinate Peter, and for the Christmas of 1954 he had managed to nag Jane and John into buying him a 'Space Station Communications Centre', which was one of the most elaborate and expensive of the Dan Dare spin-offs that were then flooding the toy shops.

In many ways, although the Dan Dare serial was set in the then distant future, - the year 2000 - Dan Dare was very much a child of its times.

The central character, of course, who had been invented by Frank Hampson, the comic's artistic director, was Colonel Dan McGregor Dare.

Originally Colonel Dare was to have been a 'space padre', in deference to the Rev Morris. It soon became clear, even before the first publication, that this was not only an impractical character to be the mainstay of the comic, but it was also highly unlikely that boys, to whom the comic was aimed, would be able to identify with such an improbable character.

Colonel Dare, now minus the 'dog-collar', was supposedly born in Manchester in 1967, and he attended Rossal School, eventually becoming School Captain, (as our Peter did), and later went to Trinity College Cambridge. His hobbies were listed as cricket, fencing, riding, painting and model making. In the 1950s, of course, any boy or man worth his salt was expected to have a number of worthwhile and improving hobbies.

His side-kick was a very different individual.

Albert Fitzwilliam Digby was short and fat, unlike the tall, athletic Dan. Digby was Dan's 'bat-man'. He was born in Wigan in 1960, and had been brought up by his aunt Anastasia. Unlike the other characters, Digby was married with four children, Frances, Albert, Mary and Anna. He was only described as having two hobbies; football and sleeping, but then Digby was a stereotypical working-class northerner.

Dan's boss was Sir Hubert Guest, (modelled, in appearance, on Frank Hampson's father, 'Pop'), and was the 'upper class' commander of the Space Fleet, who was supposedly born in 1943.

Grey haired and distinguished, with a neatly clipped RAF style moustache, Sir Hubert was undoubtedly Dan's father figure.

There was only one female in the Dan Dare series, and that was Professor Jocelyn Peabody, (who was based on Greta Tomlinson - one of Hampson's artists). Miss Peabody was young, slim and very attractive, as well as being very intellectual - well she was a professor and a qualified space pilot ! Strangely, none of the men, Dan, Hank an American, Pierre - a Frenchman, or Lex O'Mally - an Irish naval commander, took the slightest romantic interest in her, and always treated her a just 'one of the boys'.

And speaking of boys, there was one boy in the team - Christopher Philip Spry.

Christopher Spry was born in Middlesex, but no date was ever given. In the stories he appears to be about thirteen or fourteen.

Christopher; always known as 'Flamer', first appeared in the 'Eagle' on 28th May, 1954, when our Peter was about eight years old.

Of course, Hampson was quite clever in introducing a character into the stories who was relatively close to the readers' own age, & with whom the reader could easily identify.

'Flamer' himself was based on Hampson's son, Peter - another coincidence of names which take us back to Barrie's eponymous hero.

Just as Hampson thought of himself as Dare, and thought of his father 'Pops' as Sir Hubert, so Peter Hampson became the inspiration and literally the model in the sense of artist's model - for 'Flamer' Spry.

Now there were some strange similarities between Flamer Spry, our Peter and the other Peter - that is Peter Pan, - but we will need to supply some background information for those readers who are not familiar with the Dan Dare stories, in order to make these similarities clearer.

'Flamer' first appears in the Eagle in a story called 'Lost in Space', when he accidentally launches a spaceship containing himself, another, slightly older boy called Steve Valiant, (both are cadets at the Astral College), and an old mechanic called 'Groupie'. The trio are captured by the Mekon, (Dan's archenemy), but eventually all turns out well, as it inevitably must.

What is strange is that, although Sir Hubert Guest is distraught at the thought of the two cadets being 'lost in space', no mention is made of any actions to contact the boys' parents or relatives.

As already stated, everything turns out fine in the end, and in subsequent stories Steve Valiant disappears from the scene.

In 'The Man from Nowhere', Flamer appears in the opening scenes, where he is attending a gala reception at the Venusian Embassy in London, along with Steve Valiant, Dan, Digby and Sir Hubert.

He then disappears, during the initial flap, when an alien spaceship suddenly appears in earth orbit.

After the spaceship crashes into the Pacific, Flamer, on the insistence of Commander Lex O'Mally, accompanies Dan and Digby on an underwater rescue mission in the Tuscarora Deep.

He then disappears from the story again while the alien survivors, the Crypts led by Lero, who have come to Earth seeking help in their fight against the Phants, are rescued.

The story then continues as the 'Terra Nova' trilogy, which is the point where Frank Hampson, and Flamer leave the Dan Dare saga.

Now granting that Flamer Spry is just an imaginary character in a boys' comic, there are still aspects about this young man that impinge on Peter's story.

Firstly, like Peter, Flamer's origins are completely unknown. He is given no date of birth, unlike all the other characters, and all we know is that Flamer was born in Middlesex, which strangely enough is where Peter lived.

Equally, we do not know if Flamer had any brothers or sisters, or even who his parents were.

Was he an orphan, like Peter ? - certainly there were no parents worried and grieving when Flamer is captured by the evil Mekon, or any parents to raise any objections when Sir Hubert decided to allow the boy off on long and dangerous missions out into the unknown, or parents to consult when Dan decided to take the boy on a holiday to Venus.

Names are strange things, and are often involved in inexplicable co-incidences. Flamer's first name was Christopher, and as we shall see there was, later on, a very important person called Christopher in Peter's life. But also Flamer was based on Peter Hampson, Frank Hampson's young son, and so he shared a name with our Peter, and, looking further back, with Peter Pan. And like Peter Pan, Flamer never grew up.

When Flamer first appeared in the Eagle, in 'Prisoners of Space', he was about thirteen or fourteen, and that was in 1954. In 1960, at the end of 'Terra Nova', when he should have been twenty, he was still thirteen or fourteen !

And of course, Flamer is still a teenager now - and always will be - still fourteen, and following his hero, Dan, through the endless reaches of outer space to the glittering stars, - so Pan lives on in yet another boy - and another story !

So 1954 was the year that Christopher (Flamer) Spry came into Peter's life.

MORE MUSIC It was also the year that Peter watched one of the first 'soaps', as they were later to be called, that appeared on British television.

This was 'The Teckman Biography'; now of course almost completely forgotten.

The plot involved an author who was commissioned to write the biography of a dead airman, but subsequently found that the dead man was very much alive while, as a result, the author's own life was in danger.

Now Peter didn't really understand anything of the plot, but he was captivated by the sophistication of the characters, and the elegant life-style that they led.

More particularly he was enchanted by the theme music, which was called "The Shadow Waltz", and was written by Clive Richardson, under the pseudonym of Paul Dubious.

This swirling, mysterious waltz endlessly whirled round in Peter's thoughts in those years, summing up for him the mystery and romance of a sophisticated, adult world that part of him longed to enjoy.

Despite the fact that television had become an important part of many people's lives, radio was still extremely popular. Jane regularly listened to 'the Archers', although Peter didn't have a clue as to what it was about.

All the dialogue in that particular radio 'soap' however, seemed to him very much like the endless and pointless conversations that he was forced to endure when he was taken out by Jane and she met, and started chatting, to a neighbour or friend.

More to Peter's liking was 'the Goon Show', although much of the humour went 'straight over his head'.

Peter also enjoyed 'Family Favourites'.

The programme started during the war as 'Forces Favourites', and was presented by Jean Metcalfe, along with Marjorie Anderson, Joan Griffiths and Barbara McFadyean. After the war, the BBC reintroduced the programme as 'Family Favourites'.

A special edition, Two-Way Family Favourites, linked service personnel abroad with their families at home, and from 1947 Jean Metcalfe, who later married Cliff Michelmore, was the announcer at the London end. Much of the music played on this programme was what is now described as 'middle of the road' popular music, very similar in form and content to wartime 'hits'.

Usually the programme ended with a popular classical piece, and so the programme moulded Peter's musical taste early on. Family Favourites always had a special place in Peter's thoughts - for him it was always associated with weekends, and the huge roast lunch that Jane would always prepare for Saturday and Sunday.

BRITANNIA 1954 was the year of the Royal Commonwealth Tour. After all the excitement had died down after the Coronation, the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh were required to show themselves to the Commonwealth. The Commonwealth was rather more important in the nineteen-fifties that it was in later decades, as memories of Empire had not yet faded. Strangely, at this time 'Empire Day' was still celebrated in Britain, and at school it was the one day when pupils were allowed to wear 'paramilitary' uniform, such as the uniforms of the Scouts, Boy's brigade, Army cadets, St John's Ambulance etc. At Peter's school the Commonwealth Tour was the subject of many lessons and projects, and Peter's class set to work to build what seemed to be a huge cardboard replica of the Royal Yacht Britannia, which sailed majestically along the broad window sill of the airy, well-lit classroom.

THE VISITORS - AGAIN By now the 'visitors' had been gone for some time. Peter just seemed to accept this fact, and life seemed to go on as usual.

There might, however, have been a reason for their sudden and unexpected appearance in Peter's life at that particular time.

Although Peter had never been able to remember what the friendly young man had talked to him about, those meetings presumably had some purpose, significance and meaning.

Now Jacques Vallee, John Keel and Whitely Streiber have all maintained that the 'visitors' know practically everything about us, and our species.

They seem to be able to read our minds, and they know about our past. In addition, they seem to know something of our future – and just in case you start thinking that the future is un-knowable, you should possibly consider Stephen Hawking's latest thoughts on that matter.

So perhaps the 'visitors' had some knowledge or premonition of something that was going to happen to our Peter in the near future, and in some way wanted to prepare him for it, or at least make it more bearable – for something did happen in 1954, that would have many profound repercussions for Peter for the rest of his life.

THE SPRING OF '54 Despite the mystery of the 'visitors', School went on as usual.

By this time Peter was not spending so much time with the girls - Linda, Sylvia, Janet and Susan. He still saw them regularly at school, but as he was now getting older he was tending to spend most of his time with other boys in his class, and in particular with David and John. Much of their time was spent playing in Inwood park which, strangely, was the place where the owls had originally come from - the owls that had sat on Peter's bedroom window sill, and had metamorphosed into the 'visitors'.

The main game that the boys played in the park was cowboys and Indians.

These games were mainly fuelled by a popular film called 'The Battle of Powder River', featuring fighting between the Cheyenne and the US Cavalry. So school and play continued until the Easter holidays, and then things happened.

Because Jane and John had made a number of visits to the family in Newcastle, some of the family had decided to come to London for an Easter break.

As has already been explained, Jane had a brother, Richard Walker, who had married Gladys. They had two boys; Richard, always called Ritchie, and Norman, who had originally been called 'Norma' because Gladys had very much wanted her second child to be a girl.

This, of course, was not good news for Norman, and as a result of being brought up as a girl in his early years, he developed as an extremely effeminate boy.

In 1954 Norman was seventeen, and by then he had a boyfriend.

Now it is not unusual for boys to have a best friend at such an age, but Norman's boyfriend, Jackie, really was a boyfriend, in the sense of 'boyfriend and girlfriend'.

At the beginning of Spring, Richard & Gladys came on a visit to Pears Road, bringing Norman with them. By this time Ritchie, the eldest son, was abroad, serving in the Royal Navy. After a long weekend of 'sight-seeing' in London, the Richard and Gladys then returned to Newcastle, after having arranged that Norman and his friend Jackie would travel down in a few days for a further visit.

Now possibly Jane didn't realize what Norman was like, as she was quite innocent in many respects, regardless of her 'escapade' during the war, but John had made it quite clear to Peter a couple of years previously, when visiting the Walkers in Newcastle, that he thought that Norman was a 'pansy'.

So, it was rather strange that the two young men were allowed to come to Hounslow for their Easter break. Of course they didn't stay at the local hotel, but instead they stayed at Pears Road, and were allowed sleep together on the sofa that could be converted into a double bed, that was situated in the drawing-room.

Now Norman was pale and skinny and, of course, effeminate, although by the time he was seventeen he had learned to hide it quite well.

Jackie, on the other hand was suntanned, with jet-black hair, (like Peter), and was slim rather than skinny, with a well proportioned physique. He was remarkably good-looking, unlike Norman, and had a winning, boyish smile. The problem was, as we shall see later, that Peter liked Jackie, whereas he didn't really like his 'cousin' Norman.

Norman, however, did his best to befriend Peter, and Peter, who was a polite boy who didn't want to make any trouble, did he best to be friendly to Norman.

When they returned to the house, after the trip to Inwood park, Norman and Jackie would usually take Peter into the drawing-room which, for the duration of the holiday, was their room, and there they would let Pete play - sometimes with his soldiers, and sometimes with other toys, and because it was so hot Peter usually didn't bother getting changed after being in the pool.

Usually Norman and Jackie would join in Peter's games, helping him arrange the soldiers, or setting up his Triang train set. Occasionally they would also have games as cowboys and Indians ( political correctness now requires they be called 'Native Americans').

This was an interest that Peter had developed after reading the new series in the Eagle called 'Riders of the Range'.

'Riders of the Range', written by Charles Chilton, was drawn by Frank Humphris. Humphris was nearly as good an artist as Frank Hampson, and his drawings for 'Riders of the Range' were exceptionally well researched and detailed.

His depictions of 'Plains Indians' were particularly accurate, and despite the fact that the comic strip was aimed at young boys, Humphris, for reasons probably best known to himself, always depicted the muscular Indian braves in states of almost complete nudity, wearing only the tiniest loincloths, which were, in effect Gstrings or 'thongs'.

Now Peter, not realizing like most children, that the majority of adults were not really interested in things that fascinate children, was keen to show his comics to Norman and Jackie.

Norman and Jackie, however, were interested in 'Riders of the Range', and encouraged Peter to play the part of the Indians, while they would be the Cavalry, after all, Peter was already dressed like an Indian as he was usually wearing just his brief little swimming trunks and plimsolls - the equivalent of an Indian's loincloth and moccasins. Peter, of course had pistols for the cavalry, and a plastic cutlass, (which had been bought in Selfridges, remember ?), and he had a rubber knife and a rifle for himself, as an Indian.

To begin with Peter was allowed to enact repeated 'Little Big Horn' massacres on the 'cavalry', but in the second week of the holiday Norman and Jackie started to want to be allowed to beat the Indians - the Indians being Peter and his imaginary 'War Party'.

Now for those of you who haven't seen where this episode is going we will continue, - but it does not make comfortable reading.

The defeated Indians - being Peter - had to be tied up, and for Peter this was no problem, as this often happened when he played with his friends in the Park.

In the last 'game' however, right at the end of the holiday Peter was tied up by his hands and feet, and left lying on his back on the drawing-room floor. Then, while Jackie grinned and watched, Norman slowly pulled of Peter's brief little red swimming trunks. Now Peter had only been naked in front of Jane, when she bathed him, so this was a bit of a shock for him as he didn't understand why he should be completely undressed if he wasn't being bathed.

Norman then began flicking Peter's penis, presumably in the hope that Peter would get an erection.

Peter was confused by what Norman was doing, however; didn't get and erection, and started asking Norman why he was playing with his 'willy'.

Norman said that this was part of Peter's punishment for fighting badly, and that real Indians actually got their 'willy' and their other 'bits', (presumably their testicles), cut off if they lost a fight.

Jackie then pushed Peter's legs over his head, while Norman shoved the rubber knife into Pater's anus.

At this point Peter was really frightened, and started crying for Jane (Mummy).

Norman, possibly panicking a little, told Peter to behave like a brave Indian and not to cry, and if Peter was able to take this punishment then he and Jackie wouldn't have to tell Peter's parents that Peter had lost his fight and had cried when he was punished.

Now Peter was only eight, and Jackie and Norman were 'grown-ups' as far as he was concerned - and also 'real men', and he didn't want them telling Jane and John that he was a baby and had cried, and couldn't fight properly - so he stopped crying, and tried to be brave.

And that, of course, is how such things happen, - how children are abused and are tricked into not telling anyone about what has happened to them.

Norman, who was carefully probing Peter's 'back-passage' with the toy knife then told Peter that if he had been a real Indian, then it would have been a real knife up his bottom, which was much worse that a rubber one. Then, after Norman had played about with the rubber knife, he calmly pulled down his trousers, lay on top of Peter, who was now lying on his stomach, with his legs untied and spread, and wearing only his plimsolls, and proceeded to bugger the little boy.

At this point Peter's memories are understandably vague. How much it hurt he couldn't remember, but he did remember finding it very difficult to breathe with the weight of a seventeen year old on top of him.

It didn't take Norman long to finish, and as soon as he got up his place was taken by Jackie.

Jackie, for some reason, was more careful, and took most of the weight off Peter's body, so that at least he could breath properly. Jackie was definitely more gentle with Peter, and Peter was aware of the strong smell of Jackie's after-shave as Jackie, who had stripped off completely, thrust into him with a slow, deliberate rhythm.

Jackie took longer than Norman, and when he was finished, he ruffled Peter's hair, sat him up and untied his hands.

While Jackie was doing this young Peter was fascinated by the sight of Jackie's dark pubic hair, and his slowly shrinking penis.

Jackie and Norman then spent some time in the bathroom together, while Peter put on his red swimming trunks. Then Jackie went and made some tea, while Norman carried on chatting as if nothing had happened.

Later, Peter went up to his room and got dressed, and when he came back down stairs Norman warned him again not to tell his parents, or he really would have his 'bits' cut off. Although this terrified Peter, the warning was really unnecessary, however, as Peter would have been too embarrassed to tell Jane and John about what had happened, and had anyway already internalized the idea that the 'punishment', which he just experienced as pain in his 'backside', was deserved, as he had not been strong or skilful enough in his fighting, and had started crying.

As a result, Norman and Jackie had had their bit of 'fun', and yet were safe, so that when Jane returned from work nothing was said, and nothing needed to be said as there was no sign that anything untoward had happened.

The venerable Dr Sigmund Freud had an early stage in his career considered such abuse as being widespread, and had come to this conclusion based on the recollections of his neurotic patients.

Later, and in particular considering that most of these instances had occurred within respectable, middle-class families, Freud had concluded that he was mistaken, and proposed that such recollections were well-meaning fantasies concocted by his patients.

This view continued to hold for some considerable time after Freud's death.

Subsequent research,however, has shown that such sexual abuse is in fact widespread, and is particularly prone to occur within families.

It is now considered that an abused child, almost by definition, will know and probably be related to his abuser.

There are, however, many problems related to childhood sexual abuse.

While it is wrong to suggest that an abuser can in any way justify their behaviour, the is often a series of events that make the occurrence of abuse more likely, and we can give example from Peter's case to show this.

Firstly, Norman and Jackie were entrusted with Peter's care, and were not supervised in any way whilst giving this care.

The two boys, in fact, had unhindered, uninterrupted and private access to Peter for about four hours on a daily basis.

Often those who are abused feel guilty, in that they were either responsible in some way for the abuse, or enjoyed the abuse to some extent.

In Peter's case he was an attractive, cute young boy, who was in the habit of roaming about with very little clothing on, in fact he often spent hot summer day wearing only swimming trunks and plimsolls, as we have seen. This was the custom with other boys that lived in the same area, but to Norman and Jackie, who came from a more 'straight-laced' and working class environment, in the North of England, such behaviour could be taken as provocative.

In addition Peter was complicit in proposing games involving Cowboys and Indians, and in showing Jackie and Norman pictures in his comics which could have been considered to be quite sexually arousing for young men of Jackie and Norman's orientation.

Equally, by not disclosing to Jane and John, or any other responsible adult, what had happened, Peter seemed in some way to be complicit events, although his silence appears to have been the result of fear of exposure or physical violence.

The other problem that many abused individuals also face is that Peter like and was attracted to one of his abusers, that person being Jackie. Even after the abuse Peter continued to look up to Jackie and see him as an idealized masculine role model, despite Jackie's sexual inclinations.

Sexual abuse obviously has serious repercussions for children.

To begin with it disrupts the faith that children have in adults. Children need adults to sustain them, care for them and protect them. When a child is abused, the child realises that he can no longer make this simple assumption, and comes to believe that in some vitally important areas he is essentially alone, and has to fend for himself with the meagre resources that he has available to him as an immature child.

At its deepest level this involves a basic undermining of the child's sense of what psychiatrists call 'ontological security' - the ultimate sense of safety that a person has - the sense that all is basically well.

This sense of ontological security is essential for a child's normal development, and in Peter's case this basic sense of security had almost certainly been radically undermined by his experiences before his adoption.

As we have seen, Peter had managed to hide the effects of his early traumas, although it had cost him a great deal of effort. The events of Easter of 1954, however, put an even greater strain on him, and the results seemed to be evident in some quite profound changes in his personality.

The sexual abuse of children has other unfortunate effects on the child in question, and one of the most serious of these is the fact that the child's psyche is opened up to sexual experiences and emotions that are not appropriate to the child's age and level of psychological development.

In Peter's case is is also important to take into account the times in which he lived.

In the 1950s there was practically no sexually explicit material available to adults, let alone children.

There was not internet, no sexually explicit DVD, no references to sexuality on television of the radio, and even sexually explicit magazines were very difficult to obtain even for adults. Equally the relatively middle-class surrounding in which Peter was brought up meant that there was particularly no discussion of, or reference to sexual matter by adults or even children.

As a result of living in such a milieu, Peter had very little awareness of sexual matters.

Of course all of this changed as a result of his experiences that Summer in 1954.

From then on, as we shall see, many things that had previously had a neutral effect on Peter now became sexually charged in a way that was completely inappropriate for a child of his age, and this would place Peter in a position which would further alienate him from most of those people with whom he was involved.

In which we see how Peter discovers his own sexuality, which has been prematurely awoken by his previous experience of sexual abuse.

Peter also meets a new branch of his family, and his horizons broaden with regular visits to London and the newly developed Heathrow Airport – and Peter has his first real encounter with Death.

PLEASE NOTE

This chapter contains text which features explicit descritions of adult themes.

The Easter Holidays may have been overshadowed by the actions of Norman and Jackie, but fortunately there were other events to distract Peter.

Jane and John were inveterate 'film-goers', which was probably a habit that they had picked up in the 1930s.

In the nineteen fifties, despite owning what was then still considered to be quite a luxury, a television, Jane and John still went to the 'pictures', - meaning the cinema, - quite often.

Peter always accompanied them, but of course in the nineteen fifties it was difficult to find films that were not suitable for children. At that time only 'X' rated films were for adults only.

The 'pictures', of course, always had a huge impact on Peter, firstly because he was entranced by the luxury of the cinema - cinemas in those days were still 'picture palaces'. Then there was the quality of the sound, the colour, and - by this time Peter had seen his first Cinema-scope film, - so there was the sheer size of the picture to impress him.

The first Cinema-scope picture that Peter ever saw was 'King of the Khyber Rifles'. The film was in colour, and was filmed with the new Cinema-scope lenses, which produced a picture of exceptional width, which was supposed to produce a 3d, or stereoscopic effect. It did not, of course, but it was a good selling point.

The film in question was set in the late nineteenth century, and centred on the conflict between the British Raj and the Pathan tribes of the North West Frontier. Although the Raj had ended the year after Peter was born, he did not realise that, and for him it was his first taste of the mysterious East - that is East of Suez, and the wonders of India.

There were three other films which caught Peter's attention.

There was 'Genevieve', in retrospect a rather boring colour film about the London to Brighton classic cars race. Peter liked it partly because of its catchy theme tune, by Larry Adler, the famous harmonica player, and also because it starred one of his favourite film actors, Kenneth Moore. Now Kenneth Moore attracted Peter's attention because he bore a passing resemblance to John Crawford, and was a reliable, unflappable, caring and thoughtful character that Peter could relate to.

Rather more romantic was the film 'Roman Holiday'.

This film was directed by William Wyler, who later directed one of Peter's favourite films, 'Ben Hur'.

'Roman Holiday' starred Gregory Peck and Audrey Hepburn. It was set in sunny Italy, with the main characters dashing around Rome on, what were then, very stylish Vespers. Not only did it give Peter a hankering for the sunny south, full of olives groves and vineyards, but it also set in his mind the absolute ideal of feminine beauty in Miss Audrey Hepburn.

One very famous scene is where Gregory Peck shows Audrey Hepburn an ancient carved head of a god. There is a legend that anyone who is a habitual liar, and places their hand in the mouth of the image, will have their hand bitten off. Peck does this, and pretends that his hand has been amputated, much to Hepburn's distress.

For some reason Peter was very disturbed by this, admittedly, comic scene.

Perhaps Peter realized that he was not being open about certain things that had happened, or perhaps he knew that the personality that he projected was, in some sense, a lie.

Regardless this scene remained in his mind and developed a significance that was not really justified by such an essentially light-hearted, frivolous film.

Very different in content and style was 'The Dambusters'.

Also filmed in black and white, but with no romantic interest, unlike 'Genevieve' and 'Roman Holiday', 'The Dambusters' was a straightforward account of the bombing raids on the Ruhr Dams.

Starring Richard Todd as Wing Commander Guy Gibson, and Michael Redgrave as Barnes Wallace, this film described the invention and development of the revolutionary 'highball bouncing bomb' that was used to attack the Mรถhne, Eder and Sorpe dams.

The raid was undertaken by a specially formed squadron of Lancaster bombers, which had all been adapted to carry the new type of bomb.

Eight Lancasters and fifty-six British airmen were lost on the raid, and the Germans were quickly able to recover, despite the damage caused to the dams.

Despite this, the raid had a marked effect on British morale at a difficult time in the war, and was remembered for the remarkable ingenuity of Wallace's bomb, and the bravery and skill of the Airforce crews.

When Peter was taken to see this film, the Dominion Cinema, near Hounslow Bus Station, was decked out in Union Jacks and Royal Airforce ensigns, and the steps leading up to the circle were lined with uniformed air cadets, standing at attention - and all this obviously this made a considerable impression on young Peter.

In addition, Peter was captivated by the music used in the film, that had been specially composed by Sir Eric Coates. At that time, however, there was no record player in the house, so Peter simply had to wait for the music to be played on the wireless, (radio), on 'Family Favourites'.

The 'Dambusters' really summed up the attitude of people in Britain at the time of its release. That attitude was one of nostalgia for what had been in reality a pretty 'gritty' recent past, a pride in Britain's achievements, and a hope for continuing, future greatness These films helped to shape Peter's perception of the world, but there were still more personal experiences that would have a considerable effect on Peter's development So, - let us return to that Spring of 1954.

Jane returned from work on that hot afternoon, and Norman and Jackie were polite, helpful and friendly, as only teenage boys can be who are looking to be looked after by a grown woman who is not their mother.

And Peter said nothing, although perhaps he was a little quieter than usual.

And then John came home, and after a bit of banter with the 'boys', he settled down to read his newspaper, and then watch television. And everything was as it should be, except for Peter, and he simply pretended that nothing had happened, and disappeared into that space where he could think of the glittering stars and owls looking in at the bedroom window.

A day or so later Norman and Jackie went back to Newcastle, leaving Peter a very different little boy.

It is doubtful if they realized the significance of what they had done, and when Peter met Norman in future years, Norman gave no sign of even remembering that rough, sweaty afternoon in the warm Spring of 1954.

Peter never saw Jackie again, as shortly after the boys returned to the North of England, Norman and Jackie separated; Jackie going into the Army for his National Service, while Norman, who was excused on medical grounds, became an apprentice to a tailor.

Although Peter never saw Jackie again, the memory of the handsome young seventeen year old remained in Peter's memory, and the image of Jackie, naked and sweaty, stayed burned into Peter's mind forever.

And so the Easter holidays ended, and Peter went back to school, to a new class and a new year, but with the same school friends.

And even to his closest friends; David and John, Peter said nothing. How could he ? He was sure that they would not understand, and anyway he would be too ashamed to go into all the intimate detail.

Unfortunately, however, Peter had been exposed to some of the sexual facts of life, and those facts would not simply go away, no matter how hard he tried to hide his experiences from Jane and John, or his friends.

It is well known that Sigmund Freud was a pivotal force in the development of the concept of childhood sexuality.

His ingenious creation of the theories of the Oedipus and Electra complexes in children, which were mainly designed to explain adult neurotic states, were a breakthrough in the evolution of modern psychiatry.

Despite this, however, it is singularly difficult for individuals to be prepared to admit to having a desire, as children, to have sexual contact with the parent of the opposite sex, and few will even admit to having any sexual feelings, or physical sexual responses before the age of puberty.

Whether our Peter had any physical sexual responses or sexual feelings as a very young child is impossible to say, and his apparent lack of parental figures in his very early years probably means that he did not develop an Oedipus complex, if such a process actually occurs in young children.

Sex, however, must always raise its head at some point in a child's life, and in Peter's case, as we have seen, that occurred very violently and brutally when he was 'abused' by Norman and Jackie.

Whether Peter had any response to that event we do not know. Much of what happened seems to have been repressed.

For some time afterwards things seemed to have carried on as normal, but there were obviously feelings that had been aroused that were just waiting for the appropriate stimulus to trigger a response.

That response was Peter's first remembered erection.

Now whether he had experienced an erection when he was abused Peter could not remember, but the event of that particular day did seem to Peter, at the time, to be a unique event – his first time.

Strangely enough we know the exact date of this 'awakening' because of the nature of the stimulus that set it off.

As we have explained before, the 'Eagle' comic was delivered to Pears Road regularly every week, and Peter would always read it as soon as he returned from school, in the afternoon. As the comic had the date included at the top of the page, we can be sure of the exact date that this event occurred, and it was the twenty-first of May, nineteen fifty-four.

Peter had been following the serial 'Operation Saturn', in which Dan Dare was combating the evil scientist Blasco, and the ruler of Saturn, Vora. The series was reaching the end of the story, and this edition of the Eagle saw the defeat of Blasco, when he was knocked to the floor of the spaceship, and his space helmet fell off.

As there was no oxygen in the cabin, Blasco was left, writhing on the floor as he slowly suffocated to death – an unusually violent episode for a Dan Dare story.

Peter always read the Eagle while lying on his stomach, in front of the fire. On this occasion he felt his penis go hard and grow – a event he found very pleasurable. It is possible, of course that the combination of viewing the picture of the writhing Blasco, while Peter was lying in the same position he had been in when he was 'abused', and the fact that Blasco couldn't breath, which was probably similar to the feeling that Peter had when first Norman and then Jackie lay on top of him, elicited his sexual response.

Regardless, Peter definitely enjoyed the experience of having an erection, and from then on, whenever he fantasized about the combination of an individual being helpless, and having violence perpetrated on him, (and notice that it was him rather than her), this would elicit in Peter an almost instantaneous sexual response, although at that time this would not progress to an orgasm.

THE VISITORS AGAIN Regardless of any speculations about Peter's sexual feeling at this stage, there were other important aspects of this unusual boy's life to consider.

By now the 'visitors' had been gone for some time. Peter just seemed to accept this fact, and life seemed to go on as usual.

There might, however, have been a reason for their sudden and unexpected appearance in Peter's life at that particular time.

Although Peter had never been able to remember what the friendly young man had talked to him about, those meetings presumably had some purpose, significance and meaning.

Now Jacques Vallee, John Keel and Whitely Streiber have all maintained that the 'visitors' know practically everything about us, and our species. They seem to be able to read our minds, and they know about our past. In addition, they seem to know something of our future – and just in case you start thinking that the future is un-knowable, you should possibly consider Stephen Hawking's latest thoughts on that matter.

So perhaps the 'visitors' had some knowledge or premonition of something that was going to happen to our Peter in the near future, and in some way wanted to prepare him for it, or at least make it more bearable – for as we have seen, something did happen in 1954 that would have many profound repercussions for Peter for the rest of his life.

THE SUMMER OF '54 Spring

turned to Summer, and instead of Jane and John taking Peter to the family in Newcastle, the family came to London.

That Summer Mary, Jane's sister, and John Faulkner, her husband, and their children, Jean and 'little' John came for a week's holiday.

While Mary was somewhat disapproving of Peter, there was no real problem with 'big' John, 'little' John or Jean. Jean and 'little' John, however, were a few years older than Peter, but they played together quite happily, and spent a lot of time in Inwood Park on the swings and roundabouts and on the boating pool.

Peter, of course, was completely safe with Jean and John. To begin with they were much younger than Norman and Jackie, and they had been brought up very strictly by their fanatically religious mother, so with these two relatives there was not the slightest hint of sexual play or abuse.

For Peter this was almost certainly a welcome relief, but the experience that he had endured with Jackie and Norman was continuing to effect his subconscious mind, and the result of this would emerge quite forcefully later in the year.

Peter's first 'sexual awakening' had occurred after the end of the Easter holidays, and immediately after that event nothing else very significant occurred.

The Summer, and with it the holidays, came and went, and there were plenty of distractions for Peter; games in the park, the visit by the Faulkner's, trips to the cinema, and the new diversion of television.

At the end of the Summer, as Autumn came and the leaves fell, Peter returned to school.

Now the colder days arrived and the nights began to draw in. In the sky Orion, the hunter, with his hazy nebula, began to rise in the sky, and Peter watched the shining stars of Orion's belt, and the glittering Pleiades, until the nights became too cold for him to open his window, and point his telescope to the skies.

The Autumn nights became cold and foggy. Trips to the Library, in Treaty Road, were now made in the dark, with torches to light the way through the smoggy streets.

'The library ?', you may ask yourself, but Jane insisted on weekly trips to the library even though, and maybe because Peter was still having problems with his reading.

As Autumn turned to Winter, thoughts of Christmas and Christmas presents began to dominate Peter's thoughts. First on the list for that Christmas was a Britain's model of a one hundred and fifty millimetre gun, which would be the pride and joy of Peter's vast army of model soldiers.

Christmas duly arrived, with all the magic of dressing the Christmas tree that stood in the drawing room, and trips to the town to look for presents.

The fine piece of model artillery duly arrived, along with a new platoon of soldiers and the inevitable 'Eagle Annual'.

There were many other presents, however, and some had been sent from Newcastle because, despite the family's dislike of Peter, they still felt obliged to send presents, as Jean always sent presents to the younger members of their families.

One of the presents that Peter received that Christmas was a book of cowboy stories - probably by Mary and John Faulkner - although it is doubtful if they looked at the book very carefully when they bought it.

The book was of little use to Peter, as he was still having problems with his reading, and probably Jane didn't think it was particularly suitable reading material, and so didn't read it to him.

The book did have some full page, colour illustrations, however, and two of them particularly caught Peter's attention. These were pictures illustrating a story about some settlers who were attacked by 'red Indians', (what would now be described as Native Americans).

Subsequently Peter realized that these Indians were Mohicans, at least that is what was indicated by their hairstyles.

In one picture the Mohican's were attacking two women, who were being defended by a lone cowboy.

The settlers were on a rock, and two Indians were attacking from below. While one Indian got the cowboy's boot to his face, the other Indian was shot in the belly with the cowboy's hand-gun.

The other picture was of the Indians riding off, after being defeated, and leaving their two dead comrades behind. One dead Indian was sprawled on his back over a rock, with his arms and legs dangling, and the other lay face down on the sand, with his legs spread, and his arms flung wide.

What drew Peter to these two pictures was the fact that in both the pictures the muscular young Indians were effectively naked, wearing only the tiniest red loincloths, which left their buttocks exposed, and showed very prominent crotch bulges.

Once again it was a combination of helplessness and violence, but this time combined with almost complete nudity, and in the second picture the obvious voyeurism of the victorious settlers.

Peter now began to fantasize that he was one of those red Indians, and such fantasies would cause him to become instantly and very strongly aroused.

Now Peter played 'Cowboys and Indians' in the park, and so he had a rubber knife, which Norman had used to such effect the previous Easter, and a rubber tomahawk and a toy bow and arrow. These were common boys toys at the time, as most boys of Peter's age spent much of their time playing 'Cowboys and Indians'.

All Peter then needed to complete the fantasy in his bedroom was a loincloth.

Among Jane's large collection of unused doilies and side-board runners was a red runner with fringes at both ends, just like the red loincloths that the Indians were wearing in the illustration in Peter's book, and also in the illustrations in the 'Riders of the Range' stories from the Eagle comic.

It was then just a question of Peter passing this length of cloth between his legs, and holding it in place with one of his elastic belts, and he had a perfect red Indian loincloth.

With all the items that he needed to act out his 'Indian' fantasy, Peter just had to wait until it was time to go to bed.

After he had gone to bed, and Jane and John thought he was asleep, Peter would then take off his pyjamas and dress – or rather undress 'Indian style'.

He would then stuff the tomahawk and knife in his belt, pile up his pillows to be the back of the horse on which he would ride, and take up his bow and arrows.

Peter would then ride off, fully 'aroused', and in his imagination, get 'shot' numerous times, and then slump down 'dead' across the pillow, or roll over onto the bed, as if he had 'bitten the dust'.

This went on for quite some time until one night he was 'riding' on the pillows, very vigorously, and of course with a strong erection.

When he was 'shot', he slumped forward onto the pillows, writhing frantically in his 'death throws', but this time he felt something happen between his legs that had never happened before. His 'death throws' had turned into orgasmic convulsions and he found himself forcefully ejaculating into his tiny loincloth.

The result of this secret activity was a bit sticky, and it meant washing the 'loincloth' while Jane was out shopping, but the feeling that Peter had got was so good that he quickly became addicted to his 'Indian fantasy'.

NEW RELATIVES FOR PETER Peter was now nine years old, and Winter was turning to Spring.

Over the Easter holidays two new people from the family appeared in Peter's life.

One weekend, close to Easter a huge, two-tone, Ford Zephyr Zodiac pulled up outside fifty-five Pears Road.

Out of the car climbed a short, bespectacled man, in his late forties, puffing on a cigarette.

This was Richard Crawford - uncle Dick - John Crawford's brother.

Uncle Dick had come south with his brother John in the 1930s looking for work. Dick had managed to get involved in the 'motor trade', and eventually was given a partnership in a garage in Marylebone.

In the middle 50s, the garage had started to diversify into car hire for American tourists.

At this time the first buildings in the new central area of Heathrow airport were being completed, although many flights, particularly international flights, were still using the older facilities in the North area of the airport.

The huge Boeing 377 Stratocruisers would fly lazily over Pears Road, and land on the North side and disgorge their cargoes of wealthy American tourists.

These tourists needed transport during their stay in England, and Uncle Dick's garage would provide the nearest thing to an American car that Britain could provide, which at that time was the Ford Zephyr Zodiac, with column change and whitewall tyres.

Occasionally, if the client was particularly wealthy and valued, Dick would deliver or collect the car himself. Of course, Pears Road was on the route between Marylebone and Heathrow, so Dick started calling to see his brother, particularly if his trip coincided with the weekend.

Unlike the other members of the family, Uncle Dick, up until that time, had not met Peter. Dick, however, was well aware of why Jane and John had adopted a child, as he had been closely involved in the situation that had preceded that event.

Peter was instantly attracted the Uncle Dick, and Richard seemed to be one of the few adults who unhesitatingly accepted Peter.

Richard Crawford was about four years older than John Crawford, and was a very different person from John, although in appearance it was obvious that they were brothers.

Unlike John, Richard drunk and smoked heavily.

He was a 'dapper' man who cared very much about his appearance, and was always dressed in a stylish, double-breasted suit.

Just before John had married in 1937, Richard had married Gladys.

Gladys and Dick were like 'chalk and cheese'. While Dick was straightforward and down to earth, Gladys had come from a wealthy family from Lowestoft, was very well educated, and had a cut-glass accent. She was completely captivated by the romantic stars of her youth, and to Peter she seemed to permanently inhabit the world of Fred Astair and Ginger Rogers.

Unfortunately Gladys also drank rather more than she should, and in later years became an apparently incurable alcoholic.

Because Gladys and Dick were so dissimilar in outlook and temperament, for Peter to be in their company for any length of time was like watching a first rate, comedy 'double-act', and this made them very endearing.

Gladys' best friend was Peter's 'Auntie' Joe, the nurse who had engineered Jane's abortion - although Peter knew nothing of this at the time. And it was on a visit to Joe's flat in Marylebone, one December afternoon, that Peter first saw the statue of Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens, which was described in the first page of the introduction.

Joe, at the time that Peter first met her, was still having an 'affair', (people now of course do not have 'affairs'), with Tommy Kane; the rather dubious, 'hard-drinking' ex-captain from the Grenadier Guards but more of Joe and Tommy later.

Because Richard obviously liked Peter, he would sometimes take Peter to Heathrow.

At Heathrow he would hand one car over to some ridiculously rich American tourist, and then pick up a car that had been left by another client on their departure.

So Peter got to see something of the new Heathrow airport - a place which only his friend John, whose father worked for BOAC, had seen.

At that time work was going on apace on the new central area of Heathrow airport, where the Queen's building and the first terminal had been completed.

The trips that Peter undertook with Uncle Dick to the airport opened up to Peter a whole new world – a world very much like that inhabited

by Colonel Dare – it was the world of the future.

In addition Peter also got to see and ride in all the most modern and expensive cars that were available at the time. As a spin off from this, Uncle Dick then started to take Peter to the annual Motor Show, held at that time at Olympia, where Peter could wander around, 'starry eyed', looking at all the shiny new models, and collecting huge bundles of brochures and pamphlets detailing the new cars.

So contact had been made once again with John's brother and sister-in -law, and Joe. Jane then started visiting Joe fairly regularly - maybe once a month.

These visits took place during the week, while John was out at work. Whether John knew about these trips was not clear to Peter.

As such they were 'girls' days out, where Jane and Joe would go to Oxford Street, browse round Selfridges, and then return to Joe's flat for tea, sandwiches and cakes. Peter was a little bored when looking round the shops, although he obviously enjoyed a visit to Selfridges' toy department or to Hamley's toy shop in Regent's Street.

At the end of each visit, in the early afternoon, Jane and Peter would return to the monumental mass of Baker Street underground station. There, in the station, was Studios 1 and 2.

This was a very early of a 'multiplex cinema'. Studio 2 was a 'News Theatre'.

Now as far as we are aware, 'News Theatres' no longer exist.

The 'News Theatre' was a creature of the pre-television era. In the early 50s, while it was not truly a pre-television period, as televisions were becoming increasingly popular, it was still a time when many people without a television were unable to 'see' the news.

While most people could see a newsreel at the regular cinema, the 'News Theatre' allowed them to watch an extended newsreel, along with a travelogue and a few cartoons probably 'Merry Melodies' and 'Loony Tunes', - and do this cheaply.

Travelogues were an interesting phenomena of the period. At a time when only the seriously rich went abroad for their holidays, there was an appetite to see romantic and exotic places in far flung corners of the world, and this appetite was fed by the travelogue.

Sometimes Jane would take Peter to Studio 2 to see the mixed program, which was so much better than the television because of the size of the screen and , of course, the colour.

On special occasions, however, Peter would be taken to Studio 1, which showed such full length films a Walt Disney's 'Fantasia', which featured the music of Bach, Beethoven, Dukas and many other classical composers, and Disney's 'The Painted Desert', which featured the music of Ferde Greoff. And it was in Studio 1 that Peter's love of classical music was born.

DEATH IN AFTERNOON While Peter knew about death, - after all the King had died just the previous year, - death had never come close to him, except for one occasion, which he then preferred not to remember.

Death, of course, was a factor in his sexual fantasies. The naked Indians that he fantasized about died in an orgasmic frenzy, but it was not a real death.

The occasion that he tried not to remember was of course his brush with death, as he lay almost suffocating under Norman's brutal assault, and it was that 'brush with death' that had led directly to his later, sexual fantasies.

Of natural death – death from old age – however, Peter knew almost nothing.

In Inwood Road - the road that ran beside Peter's favourite park – the park from where the owls had come – was the home of Ivy and Harry Turner.

Peter got to know this couple when he was taken on visits by Jane.

On these visits Peter was allowed to play with a huge range of beautiful toys – which was odd as there were no children in the house – and there was a very tragic story behind this strange fact.

Ivy and Harry, who were older that Jane and John, had had two sons. Both boys were old enough to join the navy at the outbreak of the Second World War. Each had been assigned to a frigate, and both frigates had been torpedoed by German U-boats. As a result both boys had been lost at sea.

All that remained was two framed painting hanging either side of the fireplace; one of each of the frigates, and a cupboard and a garage full of toys. Of the boys themselves it seemed that there were no pictures on display, only the ships in which they had served.

Peter had been told the story by Jane, but he had been quite unable to appreciate the enormity of the tragedy.

Ivy, of course, loved to have Peter come and visit, and play with her sons' toys, and Peter loved to play in the garden, while Ivy and Jane talk over old times.

How the two couples became friends Peter never knew, but later he discovered photographs of Jane and John, and Harry and Ivy on John's boat on the Thames, just shortly after the war, in 1948.

So it was in that Summer of 1954 that 'Auntie' Ivy became ill.

Peter was told this because Jane would often go to visit Ivy, but Peter was not take along to play with the toy's in Ivy's beautiful garden.

Gradually, as the Summer turned to Autumn the visits became more frequent, and finally Jane had to tell Peter that there would be no more visits to play with the toys, as 'Auntie' Ivy had died.

It was cancer, although Peter didn't know at the time, - probably brought on by the gnawing grief that would not leave Ivy as she quietly, almost secretly grieved for her two boys.

For Peter it was a shock. If 'Auntie' Ivy could die, then so could Jane or John, and then what would happen to Peter ? Would he be sent back to those big white empty rooms, and his beloved rocking horse, or worse, would he be dumped on one of the relatives in Newcastle. The best possibility, for Peter, would be to find himself in Baker Street, with John's brother Richard.

Notice that Peter was not concerned about Jane and John dying, but only about the impact that their disappearance would have on his own life. It was not, however, that Peter was heartless or cruel, but rather that other people, even the people that he called 'mummy' and 'daddy' were not, to him, really real.

One would have though that with 'Aunty' Ivy's death Peter would have also become concerned about the possibility of his own death – but of course that was not the case, because Peter would never grow up, become old or die – after all he would always be a boy, and have fun.

Peter, of course, didn't go to the funeral. Jane, as always, tried to shield Peter from any of the more unpleasant facts of life, be they the facts of sex, death, money or simply life's little annoyances, and so things continued, but without the visits to Inwood Road.

Later, two odd things happened.

The first was that Peter met 'Uncle' Harry on his way to Inwood Park, where he was to play with his friends. Harry had engaged in the somewhat inane conversation that grown ups spout when they meet children. In this conversation Harry had promised that he would give Peter ten shillings, (a considerable sum of money for a child at that time), if he came top of the class. Probably Harry felt safe making this promise, as Jane had not hidden the fact that Peter had problems reading, and was not considered to be very bright. Peter, of course, remembered the promise.

The second odd event was that Harry married a young woman, - young enough to be his daughter – in the New Year.

Jane and John were disapproving, and the friendship with Harry slowly ended. Peter was equally shocked. For 'Auntie' Ivy to be so quickly forgotten seemed to him to be unforgivable, and this event was one of the first of many that convinced him that 'grown-ups' could not – ever - be trusted.

And so another year ended – and this time in a 'minor key', as 'Death' intruded into Peter's cosy little world.

Christmas came, but it was not quite so merry. The snow came, but it blew harsh and numbing, and lacked the fairytale sparkle of previous years.

School carried on, but Peter was still looked upon as one of the 'less able children', set aside with a group who were given 'easier work', - that is, effectively neglected.

But Peter also was changing.

That cold winter a dog had jumped on his back in Inwood Park, throwing him to the ground, and lying on him, bringing back memories of when Norman had lain on him, - and so Peter became terrified of dogs – any dog.

In addition he became frightened of being upstairs in a bus. It was not going up the stairs that bothered him, but the coming down. He was terrified that he would fall down the stairs – although the stairs in the house didn't bother him at all.

Undoubtedly the effects of the abuse that he had suffered were, by then, beginning to show, and the sweet little boy who had come to Pears Road a few years before was slowly dissolving and disappearing in a welter of phobias, as he slowly withdrew from the world – but who was to take his place ?

1955 was a good year for films.

By this time, Peter was so interested in films that Jane and John had started buying Peter a film annual each Christmas, and Peter received his first film annual, along with his Dan Dare annual, for the Christmas of 1954.

Cashing in on the popular appeal of the Coronation, 'John & July' was the story of two young children who ran away from home in order to see the Queen crowned. While it was a very lightweight film, it was made both poignant and popular by the inclusion of theme music by Eddie Calvert, the famous trumpet player. So popular was the music, that for many weeks the theme music stayed in the 'top Ten'.

'Storm Over the Nile' was quite a different matter. This film truly deserved the description 'epic'.

The film was an adaptation of the novel 'The Four Feathers', and was directed by Zoltan Korda. It featured Anthony Steel, Laurence Harvey, James Robertson Justice, Mary Ure, Ian Carmichael, Michael Horden and Christopher Lee, and was filmed extensively on location in the Sudan. The music for the film was composed by Miklos Rosza, who later became on of Peter's favourite film music composers.

The film was a magnificent evocation of the British campaign in the Sudan against the Mahdi, or 'expected one', who had raised the Sudanese tribes against the combined rule of Britain and Egypt.

Peter, of course, knew quite a lot about Egypt, as John had served there in the war, and he found the scenes in Cairo and of the Nile fascinating, little realising that one day he would see those places 'for real'.

Another film of that year that featured the music of Miklos Rosza was 'Men of the Fighting Lady'. This was a film, directed by Andrew Marton, and starring Walter Pidgeon, Keenan Wynn, Dewey Martin and Frank Lovejoy, which was set during the Korean war, on board an American aircraft carrier.

Undoubtedly, the most significant film of that year for Peter was 'Kismet'.

Filmed in Cinemascope and Eastman Colour, and released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, it was the fourth movie version of Kismet.

This, however, was no 'run of the mill' Hollywood musical.

What raised it above others of its genre was the fact that it incorporated the music of the 19th Century Russian composer Borodin in its score, and in this way Peter encountered another truly 'classical composer'.

The film starred Howard Keel as the beggar and poet, Haj, and the story was set in old Baghdad. With its lavish sets and costumes, and its romantic story and glorious melodies, this film led Peter into a completely new world of exotic, eastern enchantment.

STRANGER IN A STRANGE LAND Early in the summer strange visitors arrived at Pears Road.

One morning a middle-aged lady and her young son suddenly appeared.

Peter had not been forewarned of their arrival, and had no idea who they were.

The lady's name Peter could never recall, but the boy was called Glen, and in England, at the time, boys were not called Glen. Glen and his mother were American, and came from Ohio.

Now the question was – what was an American lady and here son doing arriving at Pears Road, apparently 'out of the blue' ?

The woman, it appeared, was in England on some sort of business, and she had to go off somewhere.

The result was that she was to leave her son at Pears Road.

An so it was that Glen became one of the family for that summer.

He was a good looking, fair haired boy; the same age as Peter, and he slept in Peter's bedroom on a camp-bed.

Peter and Glen quickly became friends, and Peter took him to Inwood Park and introduced Glen to the local children.

Strange as it may seem, everyone accepted Glen, despite the fact that he 'spoke funny'.

There was no holiday away from home that year, but Jane and John took Peter and Glen on numerous 'days out' to London and to other tourist attractions such as Windsor Castle and Hampton Court. For the two boys, perhaps the most enjoyable trip was to Chessington Zoo, which had recently opened.

There was also a trip to Heathrow Airport, for at that time the airport was not a place of danger, with armed police – ever watchful for insane terrorists – but was rather a tourist attraction and a 'day out'. At the Queen's Building there were playgrounds, and a paddling-pool for the children, along with restaurants and viewing galleries, where visitors could gawp at the 'well-heeled' as they boarded the waiting airliners. There was even a tiny Dragon Rapide, which, for a modest fee would whisk you high above the airport, and then give you a half an hour spin around London – and of course Glen loved all this.

The big question is, of course, who was this boy, and perhaps more significantly, who was his mother ?

Now Peter never asked Glen who he was, or more importantly, who was Glen's mother. This may seem strange but, as J M Barrie reminds us, 'Children have the strangest adventures without being troubled by them, for what troubles a grown-up will never trouble a child'.

So we are left with a mystery, - but it seems almost impossible not to think of that American officer during the war who had an affair with Jane. Was the woman the officer's wife, or perhaps divorcee or widow – and that would make the boy Glen, in a strange way Peter's adoptive half-brother ? And what was the business that occupied her while Glen stayed at Pears Road ?

The connection with the American officer seems a likely speculation, for it would explain why Jane and John made no attempt to offer Peter any explanations for the strange affair – after all it would then bring into question the whole matter of Peter's adoption.

Peter, of course, knew nothing of this, and enjoyed having a 'brother' for the summer.

To begin with Glen had been difficult, after all he came from a very different world. America had not been affected by the war in the same way that Britain had. The Americans had suffered no bombing on their cities, and had not suffered the same privations as the British, and as a result their economy and standard of living had recovered very quickly aster the cessation of hostilities.

As a result Glen was very put out by the lack of air-conditioning, which was something unheard of in Britain at the time, and he was also very critical of the lack of a shower, and the small size of British cars. Very quickly, however, Glen adapted to the post-war British way of life.

Then there was a problem.

Glen loved playing in Inwood Park, and particularly liked the swings and round-abouts. One afternoon Glen was 'showing-off' on a roundabout, and fell, catching his foot between the concrete and the rotating roundabout.

The result was that he badly injured his foot and couldn't walk, so Peter ran home to tell Jane and John.

When he arrived home, he was immediately told off for leaving Glen in the Park on his own. Now to Peter this did not make sense, as he needed John to carry Glen home as Glen couldn't walk. This was yet another example, to Peter, of adults being untrustworthy, unreliable and unfair.

Glen was taken to Hounslow hospital, and his ankle was x-rayed and found to be badly fractured. The end result was that Glen's ankle was set in plaster.

Glen was then reduced to sitting around the house, or sitting in the garden, so for Peter his new 'brother' became rather a burden. Fortunately Glen's mother returned. Whether or not she had finished her business, or whether she returned because Glen had fractured his ankle Peter did not know, but within a day of her return the pair of them were packed, and making their way to Southampton, for the return journey to America on the 'Queen Mary'.

Strangely enough Peter never heard from Glen and his mother again, although parcels of magazines, every three months or so would arrive from America for Peter. These magazines were mainly about cars and aeroplanes, two of Peter's many obsessions, and after a few months Peter knew more about Cadillacs and Pontiacs than he did about Austins and Rovers.

THE MIDDLE 50s It was now 1955. Peter had been living in Pears Road for five years.

Life, however, in day to day and material terms had changed very little.

People were undoubtedly richer. The post-war recovery was well under way under the management of the Conservative Party.

Peter's contact with Glen, and Peter's interest in American films, however, had alerted him to the restrictions in life that were still noticeable in life in mid 1950s Britain.

Now for those who were not alive in the 1950s it might be pertinent to point out what life was like in that era.

We can begin by starting on the morning of an average day.

In the Winter, getting up in the morning was really difficult. Often the condensation on the window would have frozen, so there would actually be ice inside the bedroom.

In Peter's case he would go downstairs to have wash and have his breakfast, and of course there was no bathroom upstairs. In the winter it would be too early to have a coal fire lit, so the only heating would be from a 'bowl' eclectic fire.

Of course there would be no television in the morning, so the radio would be playing. Cornflakes. Porridge or Wheatabix would be the main food at breakfast time, and there was always the chance that a new packet would be opened, and a new free toy would be found Outside there would be the clip-clop of the horse which was drawing the cart from which the milk was delivered to the door.

Also the post would be delivered early, along with the papers.

And of course, in the Winter, it would often be foggy outside, and sometimes there would be smog, reducing visibility to less than a meter, which was a combination of fog and the polluting smoke from millions of coal fires.

Peter, like most children at the time, went to school on his own, walking, as there was no 'school run', mainly because very few people had cars. The first school that Peter went to had no central heating, and the classrooms were heated by coal burning stoves. The new Junior school, however, was centrally heated, which at the time was the very height of modernity.

School ended at half past three, and when Peter returned from school his mother would be waiting for him. After 1953 there would be 'Children's Television', but Peter would often go to Inwood park to play after school.

The evening meal would have to wait until John came home from work.

Of course there was no refrigerator, so food had to be bought each day, particularly in the Summer.

Food would be bought either from Mr Kilm's local shop, or from Platt's Stores, in the High Street, or later from Waitrose Supermarket.

Equally there was no microwave, so food could not be prepared quickly, and when the meal was over there was no dish washer.

After the meal, there was television until ten thirty or eleven o'clock, and there was only one channel: BBC.

TRANS-ATLANTIC DREAMS Life was seeming very simple, and had changed little from pre-war days – or so it seemed.

But America had played a large and significant part in the war, and thousands of American troops had been posted to the British isles before being transported to Europe on D-day, and large numbers of American airmen took off every night in their Boeing Fortresses and Super Fortresses to fly daylight bombing raids over the crumbling Reich.

Peter's family had been affected in a very person way by this influx of US servicemen, although peter was not aware of the fact, - and it is probable that Peter would not have even been in England had it not been for a certain America officer.

In addition, there was the strange visit of Glen, and his mother, suddenly 'dropping in' unexpectedly form Ohio – to be followed by a regular supply of American magazines.

But Peter was not the only one to be affected by trans-Atlantic influences.

While the Rev. Marcus Morris had wanted to stem the tide of inappropriate comics, imported from America, with his 'upstanding', morally pure and British comic, 'the Eagle', it was significant that one of the most popular cartoon strips in the comic was entitled 'Riders of the Range', which was set in the American 'Wild West'.

And not only Peter, who for reasons already explained was rather more interested in the Indians than the Cowboys, was a fan of this particular comic strip – almost all his friends, (the boys, of course), followed these stories assiduously.

Comics, however, were not the only influence on children at this time. Two other media were beginning to hold children's attention – films and the television.

Two characters in particular were very popular – 'The Lone Ranger – and his trusty side-kick, Tonto, the Indian, and Roy Rogers – and his trusty side-kick, Trigger, the horse, and surprisingly for the times, his girlfriend Dale Evans. Roy Rogers, known as the 'singing cowboy', started in films and 'Saturday Morning Children's Cinema' was a peculiar moved phenomena of the 1950s. into As many families at the time did not have a television, television in 1951.

'Saturday morning Cinema' was an important, and eagerly awaited event each week for many children.

The Lone Ranger, in similar fashion, Noisy and ill-disciplined, the show, consisting of cartoons, began as a film series, often shown serials and possibly a 'B' film were available to children only, on children's Saturday morning on a Saturday morning, and a very minimal cost. cinema, and was subsequently a feature of television throughout the fifties.

These were not the only American imports, however.

In 1955 Walt Disney released the film, Davy Crockett, and Crockett mania' swept the country – so that even Peter had a 'Davy Crockett' fur cap.

Another American import was 'Rin Tin Tin, the story of an American boy and his German Shepherd dog. Originally a film series first to see the light of day in the 1920s, and often shown on children's Saturday morning film shows, the story was transferred to the smallscreen, and was first shown by ABC television is a weekly series in 1954.

As for feature films these included' High Noon', starring Gary Cooper, 'Broken Arrow', starring James Stewart, Apache Country, starring Gene Autry, numerous Roy Rogers films, 'The Charge at Feather River' in 3D (yes, 3D is not a new phenomena – people were sitting in cinemas, wearing funny spectacles even in the fifties, as 3D was considered to be a possible answer to the increasing popularity of television).

Other American films also included 'Gunsmoke' starring Audie Murphy, 'The Man from Laramie', featuring the famous song and also starring James Stewart, and 'The Battle of Powder River' to name just a few.

HOLLIDAYS While all this was going on, the regular annual events continued to mark the years of the middle fifties.

Christmas, Easter and Summer holidays came and went.

Previously holidays, such as they were, were taken in Newcastle, with the family.

By 1955, however, Peter was old enough to be taken to a less protected environment, & probably by that time Jane and John were in the mood for change.

So they decided to go to a caravan park at Reculver, in Kent.

Reculver was an old Roman Fort, made famous as the sight for the test bombing runs of Barnes Wallace's 'bouncing bomb', which were depicted in the then popular film post war film, 'The Dam Busters'.

The first problem with Reculver was the wind, as it seems to be a place that was windy all the time.

The second problem was the desolation. Reculver is stuck in the middle of nowhere, with boring flat countryside, at least compared to Northumberland, all around.

In many ways Peter did not enjoy his holiday at Reculver, apart, that is, from flying a small tethered model aeroplane in the phenomenal wind, and excavating a 'cave in the sandy cliff-side.

Such excavations, however, had a 'down side'.

Two boys, about Peter's age, had also dug a cave, although somewhat deeper than Peter's.

Then, one day, just before the end of the holiday, there was an accident. The boy's cave collapsed, burying both of the boy's. John, along with some of the other parents frantically struggled to dig the two boys out of the collapsed cave with their bare hands, while Peter, and some of the other children looked on.

Did the boys suffocate under the avalanche of sand, or were they dug out alive ?

Peter can't, or won't remember. But it brought home to him the fragility of human life. It seemed that it was not just 'old ladies' like 'auntie' Ivy could disappear into the darkness of 'non-being'. Even little boys, like Peter, could suddenly be snatched away.

So in the end Peter was glad to leave the menacing twin towers and endless winds of Reculver, and return to the tranquillity and safety of Pears Road.

NEW TRENDS But to return to everyday life in 1950s Hounslow, - the Transatlantic influence was not only evident in the cinema and television.

Children's toys were effected by this onslaught from 'across the pond', and new crazes followed the films and television series, with cowboy costumes, Red Indian bows, arrows and tomahawks, and sixshooters and repeating rifles.

Hula-hoops, Yo-yos, Davy Crockett hats and miniature clockwork 'Nautilus' submarines (from '20000 leagues under the Sea'), all came and went Music was also changing as the fifties progressed.

The early forties had see a rise in the popularity of jazz, and the dance music of Glen Miller.

With the end of the war there was an increase in the popularity of somewhat more romantic songs, along with a number of very irritating 'novelty songs'.

But then things started to change – and the change was called 'Rock and Roll'.

Originally, 'rock and roll' had been Negro slang for sexual intercourse – not that many people in England realised that.

A fusion of Negro and white 'Country and Western' music, Rock and Roll was first brought to England by the unlikely figure of Bill Haley.

Although Haley, - somewhat portly, conservatively dressed, and by no means a 'teenager', might not seem to us to be a threatening harbinger of a 'counter-culture', to 'Tin Pan Alley', and the older generation Haley was seen as an anarchistic destroyer of both morality and culture – and was even said by some to be part of a Communist plot to destroy Western civilisation.

But he was nothing compared to the next singing idol who was to entrance teenagers both in the United Stated and England – and that singing idol was Elvis!

But of course Peter, and very few of his friends, had 'record players', ans so music was something that was heard on the radio or at the cinema, or for some, on the television.

Peter's first contact with Elvis, therefore, was not a record but the film featuring the song 'Love me Tender', - and that was a song that could hardly be described as 'rock and roll'. But Peter loved the poignant, sentimental song.

Films, television, toys and music were not the only areas affected by the transatlantic influence. Shopping and clothing were also affected.

Peter, of course, had to have a fury Davey Crockett hat after seeing the film.

There were other changes in children's fashion, however. And that was a new idea – the idea of children's fashion.

In the forties children had simply dressed like little adults, except that boys, before they were teenagers, wore short trousers. In the fifties, however, the new fashions came from America.

Checked shirts – cowboy style - for casual wear became all the rage. And with checked shirts came jeans – long denim casual trousers, which again were a 'cowboy' fashion.

So, while Peter wore grey, woollen shorts and a navy blue blazer for school, and a formal suit of shorts and a matching jacket for 'best wear', for his 'leisure' time, playing with his friends, he wore checked shirts and jeans, like a little American boy – in fact like Glen. And when the weather was cold he wore a zip fronted 'lumber jacket', which was another American import, being a jacket modelled on those worn by American 'lumber jacks'.

And then there were baseball boots.

Jane wanted Peter to wear plimsolls – mainly because they were cheap, and needed to be cheap as Peter regularly 'trashed' them and grew out of them – but Peter had to have the new fashion, and that fashion was baseball boots which, again, were a new American fashion, - baseball being the American sport, par exellence.

And then there was shopping, and the American fashion in shopping was the Supermarket, and the first supermarket in Hounslow was Waitrose, half way down the high-street.

TO BE CONTINUED

created with Open Office & Adobe Photoshop

Š copyright Peter Crawford 20010 all rights reserved

the author would like to hear your comments & views , & may be contacted at

petercrawford1946@googlemail.com