Stone of Destiny (20 page)

It was the first of many such interviews. Television was then in its infancy. Only London had it, but there were the foreign crews as well. They came from all over the world, and as I was now acting as a sort of private secretary to John MacCormick I attended many of these filmings. They afforded me much quiet amusement. They also made me despair. It was such a foreign way of life to me and it still is. To spectate rather than to do is a sort of death. Who wants to watch other peoples’ lives, when their own is there to be lived? Yet to stand behind the camera, hearing events solemnly discussed, and knowing that I was the author of these events, gave me a feeling of insufferable superiority, which I suffered very easily. It was outrageously smug, but it was also very satisfying. I should have been garrotted with one of the many leads and cables which snaked across John’s drawing room, and probably would have been, had the crews had any suspicion. They never did. Not one of these television personalities ever took me aside to ask precisely what I was doing there. It is the only television role I want to play.

It was probably the best camouflage we could adopt. As happy, talkative, frank supporters of our Lord Rector we were living one life, and our double bluff threw much suspicion from us. As
people not averse to taking risks, we lived another life no less real than the first. We were careful to leave no pathway from one identity to the other. People are a strange creation, and on meeting each other we touch only at the furthest frontiers of our being. One person knows hardly anything about another. We guarded our frontiers and no one knew that there was a totally different person behind the one that was on show. It was a happy time, far happier than when the dreadful spotlight of fame shone on us a few months later. That was miserable beyond belief. But for the moment we could enjoy playing out the ploy in anonymity.

The next part of the ploy was decided in John MacCormick’s flat at midnight of that first night we were back home. Bill, John, Bertie and myself met to decide what to do next. We decided that we had to issue some sort of press statement, although, in my view, the action spoke far louder than any words. The press, with the melancholy exception of the
Glasgow Herald
, had been favourable. The
Glasgow Herald
was then edited by Attila the Hun; the woman’s page by Attila the Hen. The prevailing opinion among us was that something should be said. As yet no one knew whether the Stone had been taken by Anarchists, Communists, or honest souvenir hunters. In addition, His Majesty was distressed. It was our plain duty to reaffirm our loyalty and make it clear that we meant no treason nor disrespect. That was my elders’ view and I went along with it. At the same time we wished to let the King know that we had no respect for his advisers, who were misruling Scotland, and against whom all our actions were directed.

After much discussion we drew up the following petition:

The Petition of certain of His Majesty’s most loyal and obedient subjects to His Majesty King George the Sixth humbly sheweth:

That His Majesty’s Petitioners are the persons who removed the Stone of Destiny from Westminster Abbey:

That in removing the Stone of Destiny they have no desire to injure His Majesty’s property nor to pay disrespect to the Church of which he is temporal head:

That the Stone of Destiny is, however, the most ancient symbol of Scottish nationality and, having been removed from Scotland by force and retained in England in breach of the pledge of His Majesty’s predecessor, King Edward III of England, its proper place of retention is among His Majesty’s Scottish people, who, above all, hold this symbol dear:

That therefore His Majesty’s petitioners will most readily return the Stone to the safe keeping of His Majesty’s officers if His Majesty will but graciously assure them that in all time coming the Stone will remain in Scotland in such of His Majesty’s properties or otherwise as shall be deemed fitting by him:

That such an assurance will in no way preclude the use of the Stone in any coronation of any of his Majesty’s successors whether in England or in Scotland:

That His Majesty’s humble petitioners are prepared to submit to His Majesty’s Minister or representatives proof that they are the people able, willing and eager to restore the Stone of Destiny to the keeping of His Majesty’s officers:

That His Majesty’s petitioners who have served him in peril and in peace, pledge again their loyalty to him, saving always their right and duty to protest against the actions of his Ministers if such actions are contrary to the wishes or the spirit of His Majesty’s Scottish people.

In witness of the good faith of His Majesty’s petitioners the following information concerning a watch left in Westminster Abbey on December 25th 1950 is appended – (1) the main spring of the watch was recently repaired; (2) the bar holding the right-hand wrist strap to the watch had recently been broken and soldered.

This information is given in lieu of signature by His Majesty’s petitioners being in fear of apprehension.

And so we started to play games. The wording of that petition still makes me grue, but I suppose there was nothing else we could do. The King was much loved as a wartime monarch. When he let his concern be known publicly, we had to go warily. His concern was not only for what he regarded as the loss of royal property. Certainly he wanted this part of the Regalia back but there may have been more to it than that. People who live by tradition may ever be fearful that the tradition will die and they take things like coronations very seriously. For 650 years his predecessors had been crowned on the Stone; his predecessors, not his ancestors, for the latter are German. It may have seemed to him an essential part of the mumbo-jumbo of royalty. That this was so we learned privately. He had a superstitious fear that the loss portended the end of his dynasty. All this was so much nonsense, but we had to watch public opinion.

On this matter even the Scots were divided. There was jubilation at the return of the Stone, and vexation that the King was vexed, so I suppose that we had to do something to keep public opinion with us. Also we had to let it be known that it was in safe hands and would one day ‘turn up’ somewhere. You can spend your life looking for the Holy Grail but if you are unlucky enough to find it you’re faced with the problem of what to do with it. Behind the formal, indeed grandiloquent wording of the petition there lay a perfectly reasonable statement of our position. Keep the Stone in Scotland, and we will hand it back. We had to make our position public, and a letter to the King seemed the best way.

Best way or not, it nearly chokes me to quote the petition. From John MacCormick’s point of view it was useful. It kept the Home Rule movement at the top of the agenda. The publicity pot boiled over yet again. The press loved it. The
Glasgow Herald
had
a first leader on it, in which they managed to say that it was the product of a mature legal brain, and the effusion of mealy-mouthed romantics. I’ve never quite forgiven the
Glasgow Herald
for that last remark. It was too near the truth.

And yet and yet, I wonder if I am truly reporting what I then felt for things in general and for the monarchy in particular. That old gentleman, King George VI, had led us, Scotland as well as England, through one of the most dangerous times in our history. There was great respect and affection for him. He personally symbolised us all, not Churchill, who was a political figure, not universally loved. People needed a universal symbol who was above politics, or at least appeared to be. It was the King who was one with the nation. By a curious inversion it is the sovereign who leads the common people, and sometimes speaks for us. I can still recite verbatim the closing quotation of his address to the nation, broadcast live on Christmas Day 1940, when we were alone and the days were indeed dark. Imagine it spoken in that curious hesitant monotone voice he had been forced bravely to adopt to overcome his nervous stammer so that he could speak live to his people. None knows who wrote his speech but this is how it ended:

I said to the man who stood at the gate of the year, Give me a light that I may tread out into the unknown, and the man said to me, Go out into the darkness and put your hand into the hand of God, for it is better than a light, and safer than a known way.

These are memorable words for a grim occasion. It was only ten years since he spoke them. You do not play games with the symbols of your country, whether they be man, stone or trinkets. I did the best I could.

Having prepared the petition, the next problem was how to convey it to the King. A tuppenny stamp and a post box was the obvious solution. After all, it was his Royal Mail. But I was voted down on that one. While petitioning the King, we were also persuading the people, and whatever method we used had to be one which permitted the people to read the correspondence. This was no time for secret diplomacy. From now on everyone was in the game, and whatever we did was open to criticism. Give the public the chance to cheer your actions, and you also give them the right to boo. This communication demanded something more than a licked stamp and a sealed envelope. It had to be made public.

If the press could get access to it, so would the public. The traditional way is to nail the communication to some public door, as we did with a later communication by nailing it to the door of St Giles Cathedral. The obvious door for our petition was the door to the Abbey of Scone, from where the Stone had originally been stolen by Edward of England. Unfortunately, Scone Abbey has no door; indeed there is no longer an Abbey of Scone. We were some hundreds of years too late. It had all been knocked down to provide material for building Scone Palace, the home of the Earl of Mansfield. Things were getting difficult, and since the English press were referring to the Stone as the Stone of Scone,
we decided to use the door to Scone post office as the next best thing. As this could only be done in the hours of darkness, I went off to get some sleep before setting out.

Bill wakened me two hours later. I copied out the petition in false handwriting, being careful to handle the paper only with gloves, since I wished to leave no fingerprints. The false handwriting was not a wise idea. Scotland Yard’s department of holography is probably more skilful than its department of telepathy, and I was taking a needless risk. Still, we had no typewriter immediately available, and the petition was in a hurry. It was coming on for 4 a.m. when we finally went for the car, which had had to be kept in an overnight garage because of the intense cold.

We started it with difficulty and drove off north. As we drove, we argued. I took the view that the petition deserved a better fate than being pinned to the door of a country post office. Post offices are mundane things; village post offices are no exception. It was quite likely that it would be torn down and put in a dead letter box because it didn’t have a stamp. I wanted to deliver it somewhere else.

Scone was still the ideal place, but not the post office. Then I remembered that the Earl of Mansfield had come out strongly in favour of our action. I can take earls or leave them, but their very title makes people think that they are something special, and to have an earl on our side, as well as all the rest of public opinion, was too good to be ignored. I wanted to use the Earl, just as we were using the King. Such a scheme, of course, had its dangers. The nobleman might set a trap for us, and hand us over to the police. Yet I was not afraid of that. I believed that honour was far too real a thing among the aristocracy for him to betray me after he had given me a safe conduct.

In Perth, we stopped outside the post office, looked his name up in the directory and telephoned him. Although I would not give my name he came to the telephone almost immediately. I had the insolence to ask if his telephone was being tapped, although
the insolence had common sense behind it. It gave him a chance to withdraw immediately, and also impressed him with the necessity for prudence. His caution would, I hoped, be a reflection of mine.

He assured me that to the best of his knowledge his telephone was quite innocent, and I asked him if I could come to visit him. He was rather reluctant, for he was engaged with his guests, but when I told him the nature of my business his tone immediately changed.

‘I’m just leaving for the moors with my guests,’ he told me, ‘and I don’t think it would be wise to cancel that. Could you come and see me at six o’clock?’

I assured him that that would suit admirably and rang off.

I drove Bill to Perth station, for he was now leaving me to go back to Glasgow. I was sorry about that as I enjoyed his company, but as President of the Union he had to interview a new pastry cook.

I had 10 hours to put in before I went out to Scone to visit the Earl, but the time would not be wasted. My parents were retired and lived at Ballinluig, less than 30 miles north of Perth, and it had been in my mind that I would visit them. Before I had set out for London I had left Bill a pathetic letter addressed to them. It was a note explaining why I was in the jail. He had been told to post it if things went wrong. We had burned the letter, but now I was to face them in the flesh.