The Stick

Desmond

I was in my surgery one morning in 1982, expecting my next patient, and was surprised when a very healthy looking lady of approximately seventy years,, entered and immediately said “I am not ill,
I have come to give you something that I think should be owned by an Irishman, and preferably by you, Dr Mc Donald”. She was American and I had seen her only once previously, for something trivial. She went on to tell me that her Christian name was Maureen and her maiden name was Mc Donald, and asked if she could have fifteen minutes of my time later in the day. I agreed and brought her back just before lunch time, at which time she gave me a present of a stout stick, which she said had been left to her by her father, and added that although she was married she had no children and therefore had no one of direct descent, or of the name Mc Donald to leave it to. I was told that it had been in her family’s possession since the mid 1700s and that there was a long history attached to it, too long to recount at that moment, and for that reason she had written it down. She then gave me the stick wrapped in brown paper and a bulky letter. I thanked her and brought them home with me to open after my dinner.
It proved to be a stick made of particularly hard wood, which I later found to be walnut. It was 32 inches long, the handle end being three inches in diameter, the shaft straight, but the other end finishing as a club, over 9 inches in diameter and studded with almost forty nails driven deep into the wood with the ends flattened and protruding. The handle end had a circle of similar nails to prevent the stick from slipping out of the hand, and had a hole bored through it to take a stout cord, which could be placed around the wrist, again to prevent it being lost. It was altogether a formidable looking weapon and had obviously seen plenty of use, as there were several groups of notches cut into the surface, probably to depict victories or even deaths. I couldn’t wait to read the accompanying letter giving the history of this stick, which had survived since the 1700s. The Mc Donald family described are probably not in any way connected to my family, but it certainly makes interesting reading.



Gerald

It starts with a Gerald Mc Donald, born in Co Kilkenny, Ireland around 1710, at a time when the land of Ireland was being annexed by English and Anglo-Irish families and the original Irish people being reduced to tenant farmers, and having to pay exorbitant rents to landlords who were mostly absentee. By 1740 only 6% of farms were owned by Irish and there was a law stating that a farm could not be left to one sole person, which resulted in outsiders gaining possession, or by the farm being broken up into smaller and smaller holdings. Understandably this caused great resentment and unrest and was responsible for many evictions. At this time Gerald was thirty years of age and was forced to divide up the family farm with three brothers when his father died, rather than be evicted. Like many others he joined a group of young men to try to make an impression on the government, calling themselves The “Whiteboys”. They made almost no impact, so they resorted to damaging property and burning houses to attract attention. Weapons were strictly prohibited by the general public, so people made weapons from almost anything that would be of use, like pieces of metal etc. A few years before Gerald had seen a very rare walnut tree and had spotted a stout straight branch, and immediately decided that it would make a great club. He cut off the smaller branches where it began to divide and hammered several nails into the end. By the next year the wood had grown around and buried the nails, so he repeated the process, and continued this for several years, until a sizable bulbous end was formed, consisting of more than 50% iron. He then cut it from the tree and moulded it into a sturdy club, capable of inflicting severe damage. He embedded several nails in the handle end, so that it wouldn’t slip from the grip and he bored a hole through that end, through which he put a strong rope to help attach it to his wrist.
During 1740/1741 there was a severe famine in Ireland and many evictions when people couldn’t pay their rents. This caused even more resentment and the activities of the Whiteboys became more daring, attracting more and more attention from the British army. Gerald carried his stick with him on these raids and was eventually forced to use it one night when an army unit laid a trap surprising his group. Shots were fired and two men were killed, before a hand- to- hand struggle ensued. Gerald wielded his weapon and found that nobody succeeded in getting near him, while he inflicted wounds to several, and may have killed one. He fled with the rest of the group and had to lie low for a long time because of army and police activity. Having cut a notch in it, he hid his stick in a small loft over the open hearth, which was used as a storage place for all kinds of rubbish. Between 1741 and 1798 the stick was used only around the farm, so it spent most of its life in the loft.



Gerald’s grandson Sean

In 1797/1798 rumours of impending rebellion against the crown were rampant, and Sean, who was almost thirty, joined a group of rebels based at the borders of Kilkenny and Wexford. When the planned insurrection started in’98 liaison between Dublin and other parts of Ireland was very poor, and resulted in independent action in various parts of the country. The Dublin leaders were arrested very quickly, mostly because of information from traitors, leaving Wexford as the main scene of fighting. Sean was involved from the start, distinguishing himself in all battles, culminating in the final scene at Vinegar Hill. He had the stick with him in all, and after his escape to Kilkenny he reckoned he had accounted for at least eight of the enemy. He cut notches in the handle of his stick and then returned it to the loft, where it remained hidden for another fifty years, apart from the occasional use on the farm.


Sean’s grandson Patrick

The years 1800/ 1850 saw stringent Penal laws in Ireland, with land being divided into ever smaller farms, education forbidden, and more evictions than ever. When the great famine started due to failure of the potato crop, people found it almost impossible to pay their rents, family after family were thrown out of their houses, which were then razed to the ground. People died by the thousand, with almost no help being given by the British, apart from the Quaker fraternity who did their best to feed the starving population. Anyone who could afford the fare to America made their way to Cork to join ships heading for that country, others went by the hundred to Dublin to take ships to England, where most of them settled in Liverpool, Manchester and Glascow. The population in Ireland in 1800 was eight and a half million, compared with eight million in England. By 1850 there were only four million left in Ireland, the rest had either died or emigrated. Sean’s family starved and three of them died, so one day his father advised him to try to get to Cork and escape to America. At this time he was six feet in height and just under ten stones in weight, having reduced from twelve stones because of semi starvation, and with food becoming more and more difficult to find he decided that if he left, there would be a little more left for the others. Reluctantly he decided to leave, so after saying a tearful goodbye and taking the stick he made his way south. On the journey he met many others heading for the same place, some of them just walking skeletons barely able to walk, and he passed hundreds of corpses, just lying in the ditches as nobody felt well enough to bury them. As he neared one village he saw an apple tree with two apples and made his way to get them. Just as he was about to pick them two young men spotted him and immediately set about him with intent to take the apples for themselves. One man produced an ugly looking knife and made to attack, but Sean neatly stepped aside and hit him with the stick on the arm, hearing the bone snap. The other man jumped Sean from behind, knocking him to the ground, but fortunately the club stayed attached to his wrist so he swung it and hit that man across the legs, forcing him to release his grip. This ended the struggle so Sean walked away and spent the night in a shed near the local church and was awakened the following morning by the Parish Priest, who begged him to assist in burying four parishioners. Not having much option he agreed leaving himself absolutely exhausted, but was rewarded by receiving the large sum of £3, which was a small fortune in those days. This was to prove invaluable when he arrived at the ship, which was about to leave for America, as nobody was allowed on board unless he could pay £2 and have a little left for food. He was able to board safely feeling sad and a bit guilty at leaving hundreds of men and women milling around the docks begging to be allowed to board. The ship was full of people in a similar plight and it was difficult to find a suitable place to lie down in comfort but eventually Sean found a corner where he could rest with his back to the wall and view that part of the deck. It was a wise decision, as he had to defend himself on several occasions from rogues trying to steal what little money or valuables they could from people less able to defend themselves. However when he produced the wicked looking stick they thought twice. The only time he had to use it was to defend a pretty young girl who was being terrorised by two ugly brutes. They had forced her to the ground and were trying to strip her while looking for any money she had, when Sean intervened wielding the stick across their shoulders and forcing them to desist. He then invited her to sit near him. She introduced herself as Doreen O’Shea, saying that all her family had died from hunger and she had just managed to get enough money together for her fare. They became great friends and remained together during the voyage. The food was bad and as time went on hygiene practically vanished and conditions became almost intolerable. It wasn’t long before Typhoid broke out as rats were everywhere and people fell ill at the rate of eight of ten per day. Several died and were buried at sea and others were ill in all corners of the ship. There was no treatment and no nurses or doctors and it was easy to see how these ships became known as coffin ships. Sean escaped but Doreen fell seriously ill and hovered between life and death for almost three weeks. Sean attended to her as if she was married to him even though half the time she was unconscious and there was no doubt she would have died without his help. Suddenly she improved and after that they were inseparable and they determined to stay together when they reached America. It surprised them to find that they had to stay in Ellis Island for some time to insure that they were healthy enough to enter America. The authorities wanted to take the stick away from Sean but relented when he told that it had been in his family for four generations. On being allowed to enter the country eventually they made their way to a famous Irish owned Public house called The Shamrock where they were advised where they could find lodging, one room which they were glad to share. When opportunity presented they found a priest and got married. Over the next few months Sean had to defend the two of them several times with his stout weapon as the city was completely without law of any kind and robbery was common. In this way several new notches were cut into the handle. Rumours of free land available inland tempted Sean to join a wagon train heading west. He spent his last money buying a covered- wagon and two horses and joined a group of around fifteen others of various nationalities, all with the same ambitions. He had to fight his fellow travellers four or five times to prevent some of them molesting Doreen and again a few notches arrived on the stick. When they reached the central plains, without warning they were attacked by hostile Indians. Fortunately Doreen was safely ensconced in one of the wagons. By now Sean had acquired a gun and he helped repulsing the attack. It came down to hand to hand fighting in the end and Sean was able to wield his stick freely and he estimated that he accounted for at least six of them and later he notched that number of marks on the weapon. Several months later there was a decision to be taken as half of the party wanted to head south while the remainder went west. Sean joined those going south, seven in all, and they hadn’t gone far when Doreen found she was pregnant. There were four separate attacks by Indians during the next few months as they travelled and Sean proved he was a great fighter, accounting for ten of them and afterwards notching his victories on the stick. Doreen’s baby boy was born in the wagon as it moved, arriving without any trouble or complications in 1855. They called him Senan, after Doreen’s father. Travel weary and with numbers decimated they found a pleasant valley in Tennessee, not too far from present day Memphis, and Sean built a house and fenced off a sizeable tract of land for farming. The next seven years passed quickly and found them prospering and with three children. All this ended with the Civil War, which forced Sean to join the Confederate forces, leaving Doreen to survive as best she could. He saw action in many of the major battles and accounted for dozens of the enemy, but managed to survive without serious injury. His stick by now was well notched. With the defeat of the south Sean found himself cheated of most of his land and the family almost penniless, though fortunately they had survived in spite of various tribulations. He decided to leave the area and having heard of the new transcontinental railway he got out his old covered wagon and put his few precious possessions into it and with his small family sought out the rail company. He had no problem getting employment and was able to sleep at night with his family. There were several attacks by Indians and again Sean proved invaluable in beating them off. The railroad was finished in 1869 with the golden stake formally driven in at Promontory, Utah, and Sean was now free to move on. He didn’t like the thought of settling in Utah so he moved to Wyoming, where it was easy to acquire land. On arriving there he found a fertile valley with a fine spring and a fast flowing stream, and quickly started to build a house with Senan’s help. Senan was now almost fifteen and nearly as big as Sean and was quite strong. Money was now available so they stocked up with cattle and within a couple of years profits started flowing in. There was plenty of open land, which they used, and more and more cattle were fattened, and a fine ranch house was built, and several cowboys employed. Senan could ride from an early age and by the age of twenty- two he was a very experienced horseman and had grown into a very strong man, bigger than his father. Sean on the other hand was only a poor horseman, which proved disastrous for him as he had a bad fall while rounding up some cattle. He fell heavily and fractured his spine and although he lingered for a week he died in the arms of his faithful wife. All hands carried guns, a rifle and a hand - gun worn in a belt around the waist and both Senan and Sean had acquired skill in their use, but Sean always carried his well - worn stick attached to his wrist. It was still there when he fell, and following in the family tradition Senan continued carrying it in the same way.


Senan

Senan took control of the ranch in 1879 and built a second house for his younger brother, Patrick, who was six years younger. He married the daughter of a neighbouring rancher who bore him twin boys two years later. There was a great demand for cattle and the profits rolled in for several years, until the sheep farmers arrived. They arrived with huge flocks in large numbers, fencing off large tracts of open land, which the ranchers had been using as their own for years. Inevitably this caused range wars, with the ranchers trying at first to frighten off the sheep-men by running off their stock, destroying their homes and even by using force. Sean acted in all these ways and succeeded for a while, but in the end the sheep-men joined forces and armed themselves, and got the backing of the law by registering claims for their land. Sean’s acreage shrank and his profits dwindled, so he joined with a few of his neighbours and several hired men to make a stand and decide the issue, one way or another. Armed to the teeth and numbering around thirty they raided the area of the sheep- herders, only to find that they were prepared for them. A gun battle started with many deaths on both sides and it culminated in a hand to hand fight in which Senan excelled using his tough stick, killing at least four. He was engaged in a tussle with a farmer when a shot rang out and he was badly wounded in the chest. The range-war was won by the sheep-men, and the days of serious cattle trading in that particular part of the country were over. Patrick found Senan mortally wounded with his stick lying beside him. He took him home, where he survived for ten days and buried him after he died on a hill- side overlooking the house. It was 1895 and he had lived to the ripe old age of forty. His fortune was considerable, so his widow, Ita, was surprised to fine that she was quite a wealthy woman. She was very pleased to have Patrick to give her advice and even more so when he said that he would look after her interests.




Patrick

Patrick was thirty- three years old and the twins were fourteen, while Ita was thirty- six. He had never married, having had always secretly loved his brother’s wife since they had first met. He didn’t lose much time in proposing to her and was rather surprised when she accepted him immediately. He got on very well with the twin boys, Dermot and Niall and when the wedding took place in1897 they accepted him without question. Later that year they had a family conference and the decision to move to California was made. Travel was much easier now that the Indian wars were over, and Indian nations more or less confined to reservations, consequently the family packed their belongings into covered wagons and travelled overland. They had plenty of money and had no trouble in buying a home and it wasn’t long before Patrick realised that there was a great opportunity in building for the hundreds of people that thronged to the city every year. He called his company Mc Donald Homes, with equal shares for all four members of the family. The houses were mostly built of wood, easier to construct and cheaper for the newcomers to buy. San Francisco was a pretty lawless city at that time so Patrick always carried his stick attached to his wrist and was forced to use it on many occasions, until his reputation grew as a person not to be trifled with. He wasn’t long in seeing that he could acquire old tenement houses for very little money and rent them out for rather high rents. These old houses were death traps, mostly made of wood, riddled with rats and spreading Typhoid and Tuberculosis. They should have been demolished years before, but at the same time they housed the thousands of newcomers that arrived per month. Patrick moved to a magnificent home in Nob Hill and joined one of the exclusive clubs, and was soon recognised as one of the most influential people in the city. Life was very good for the family for the next eight years, which saw them buying more and more houses and building less and less.
All went well until 5.12 am on the 18th April 1906,when practically everyone in the city was asleep. Suddenly every building shook and most of them collapsed when an earthquake happened without warning, killing hundreds of people. The quake involved 296 miles of the San Andreas Fault, from Oregon to south of Los Angeles, and inland to Nevada. All the old tenement houses were the first to go, and to make matters worse fire started and spread quickly, finally covering 4.7 square miles of the city. Patrick, and his step - sons, Niall and Dermot, woke to find their house shaking and ornaments crashing, and dressing quickly they went down into the city to try to help. They could see fire spreading everywhere and before long it seemed to involve every bit of the city except Nob Hill. Chinatown was a mass of fires and all the way down to the sea saw fires breaking out everywhere with people screaming and panicking. With a group of others Patrick tried to bring some kind of order into the situation. He got separated from the other two who were trying to help in Chinatown. He directed all he could towards the comparative safety of Nob Hill. Time flew by and suddenly it was evening and as it got dark some of the less respectable people started to loot. He had his stick around his wrist as usual, and without hesitation when he saw a group of thieves he waded in, wielding it with great effect for a few minutes until one of them struck him from behind with a knife in his back. He collapsed, bleeding profusely, pulled himself forward, half staggered to his feet and fell again, this time partly into one of the fires. He died in agony even though some person dragged him from the fire and he lay there until late that evening when Niall and Dermot found him, having searched for two hours. He still had the stick attached to his wrist. Onlookers later told that he had accounted for four of the robbers. The twins were twenty- three at this time They were both saddened, as they had both loved and respected Patrick. With so many dead they had to bury him themselves in the little cemetery behind Nob Hill. They drew lots as to which of them should have the stick and Dermot won and one of his first acts was to cut the notches into the handle.



Dermot and Niall

After the funeral and when the fires were eventually extinguished the family gathered for a conference and quickly realised that they were broke, all their properties had been destroyed in the fires and all they had left was the house in Nob Hill. The bank building, which had kept their money and securities, had disappeared as it had never existed, and the manager and most of the staff had died in the fire. However they were better off than most and Niall was quick to realise that they could borrow with the house as security. The two young men were interested in the building trade and they decided that they would immediately start to reconstruct the city and build modern homes and stores etc. The first step was to demolish the rubble and remains of the old quarters and as they did so the rats and sources of disease disappeared. Labour was cheap and everyone worked to capacity and it wasn’t long until a whole new city started to take shape. This was the beginning of the formation of one of the most beautiful cities in the world and the two young men became two of the wealthiest in the city. Ita lived to see their prosperity and to see them both married, Niall to a beautiful half Chinese girl named Ching, and Dermot to an equally lovely girl of Irish descent named Maura. Both couples produced four children each, all girls, except one, a lovely boy who unfortunately died from Diphtheria at the age of seven. In time all these girls married well and all settled down to live in San Francisco, apart from Maureen, the third daughter of Dermot and Maura, who married an Englishman, whom she met while he was on holiday in the city. They went to live in England and eventually settled in Ashford Middlesex where they had two daughters. Maureen’s husband died in 1979 and a few years later she decided to take a trip to see her relatives in San Francisco where she hadn’t been for years. After many reunions it came time for her to return home and she was surprised to find that her sister had brought the famous family stick, which she remembered well. The whole family had agreed that Maureen should bring it back to England and that she should endeavour to find an Irishman who would treasure it, preferably a Mc Donald. In due course she found a Dr Desmond Mc Donald and presented it to him

Snippets 14

As a fourth year medical student I went into the Coombe maternity hospital to do my midwifery. We had to work in pairs and after some experience in the hospital we were sent out on the district to attend home confinements with the help of a local midwife. On one of my early cases the midwife was not there so I did the delivery myself. When the patient was about to deliver instead of a head a large white mass appeared getting bigger by the second. After a few seconds panic I realised I had to do something about it, so with my scissors I cut around the solid matter I could feel, which proved to be the babies neck. As I was doing this, the midwife arrived and immediately said that the baby was being born under a caul, a very rare thing where there are two separate membranes around the infant instead of one. That around the head is separate unto, and has to be cut away exactly as I did. The baby was born perfectly normally otherwise. The midwife advised that I should wash the piece of membrane, the caul, thoroughly and preserve it and said that it could be sold to any sailor for a large sum of money as it was a common belief that the owner would never drown and that he would be very lucky. I washed and dried it and folded it into a small parcel, around one quarter of an inch square, and I still have it after sixty years and I must say I have been very lucky throughout my life.

Snippets 13

Dr and Mrs Bengry had a villa near Benisa in Spain and needed a car with a Spanish registration number, so that he could leave the car there for his use on holidays, to save him bringing a car down every visit. He eventually bought a second hand Mercedes and decided to take a week’s holidays with his wife and drive to Benisa and fly back. The trip was uneventful until they arrived at the Spanish border, where there was a short queue for customs. The car in front of them was found to have guns hidden under the upholstery, probably Etta separatists, which caused a great delay. When it eventually came to their turn, their car and papers were scrutinised thoroughly, but they were allowed to proceed about four hours later than they had planned. A few hours later, near Teruel in central Spain, they were stopped at a road- block and told to pull over to the verge. The car was now searched from top to bottom. The upholstery was taken up, as was the lining of doors etc. The tyres were taken off, but of course nothing was found. However they were told that no import duty had ever been paid on their car and that they had a week to pay this, and failing this to take the car out of the country. The police took them to town where they found a garage willing to put the car together again. When this was completed they had to stay in a hotel in Teruel overnight. Next day they arrived at their villa and settled in. The following day they went to Alicante, having made an appointment to be seen in the Ayuntamienta to pay the import duty. They were told that it wasn’t handled in their office and that they had to go to Valencia next day before 4pm. Arriving in Valencia at midday they had a good lunch and made their way leisurely to the office, where they were again told that the duty could only be paid in Madrid. Three days had been wasted to no avail, so they decided to fly to Madrid and duly presented themselves at the appropriate office, where they found that their passports were needed before the car could be registered. They hadn’t their passports and assumed they had left them in Valencia, but after a difficult telephone conversation found no luck, similarly in Alicante the passports were not found, and now they had to assume they were lost. On making enquiries they found they could get temporary passports at the embassy next day, so there was no alternative but to stay the night in a hotel. Next morning, the fifth day of their week’s holiday, they got both temporary passports and duty paid and flew back to Alicante, and made their way to their villa. The following day was the last of their short holiday and after a pleasant day at the beach they went out for a meal and discussed the whole trip. It struck both of them at the same time that the passports were probably in the hotel in Teruel where they had spent the first night. On phoning the hotel they found they were correct, so even though it was quite late they drove to Teruel, collected the passports and returned, a round trip of over four hundred miles. They left the car at the villa next day and returned to England.
A month later, needing a holiday badly, they flew to Spain and made their way to the villa to find that the four wheels had been taken off the car and stolen. They then had to have four new wheels flown out from England, which took two weeks, during which time Dr Bengry had a garage built to house the car. All this had cost a lot of money, but they felt that it might still be worth all the trouble. Six months later, thinking that the car was safely housed in the new garage, they went on holiday again to find that the garage door had been forced and two wheels stolen from the car and the chassis supported on blocks. This meant getting more new tyres flown out and getting more substantial locks on the garage doors.
The car gave reasonable satisfaction for the next seven years but then started to give trouble. As it was now getting old and causing a lot of expense the doctor decided to sell it, but found it was practically worthless. As it happened there was a young Englishman working at a nearby house and he had been helpful in many ways to the family so Dr Bengry asked him if he would like a present of the car. The offer was accepted and soon afterwards he and the car left the area and were never seen again.
Six years later Dr Bengry got a very big bill from the licensing authority, saying that he was being fined a larger sum each year for the past six years. His explanation that he was no longer the owner was not accepted and he was told that it was his responsibility to inform the authority or to officially declare the car as scrap. The tax plus fine cost almost £1500! Dr Bengry sat down one day to work out the total cost of the car etc from the beginning and found that it would have cost him very much less to have hired a car for all trips.

Snippets 12

When Desmond was a medical student he was approached one day by a fellow student called Paddy, who suggested that they should go to the faculty ball, adding that he would like to introduce him to his girlfriend’s sister, a really lovely girl that he was bound to like. When Desmond hesitated he added “you would do me a great favour as I am very keen on my girl friend, Anna, and her parents wont let her go unless her sister goes as well, and you will really like Una anyway. Desmond agreed to meet Una that week and found her quite pleasant, so Paddy arranged for the two of them to meet the girls at their parent’s house to formally ask the parents permission to take the girls to the ball. The parents gave permission with a proviso that they would use taxis, have no more than two drinks, and have the girls home by 1am, half an hour after the end of the ball. The two boys spruced up their evening suits, which were worn in those days rather than dinner jackets, and counted their money carefully, finding that between them they had just enough to buy the tickets, have two drinks each, and pay for a taxi there. However there wasn’t enough for the taxi home so they went down earlier that evening and locked their bicycles to the railing behind the hotel intending to give the girls a lift home on the crossbars. The girls of course had no objections as long as they got to the ball somehow. Fortunately it was a lovely evening when they arrived at the family home and the two young ladies looked beautiful in their ball gowns and the parents were very happy seeing them all off in the taxi giving the usual last minute instructions. Everything went according to plan, the food was great and they had a wonderful evening dancing even if they had only barely enough to drink and they were all sad when they had to start for home. The night had clouded over but there was no problem getting the girls on the bicycle bars. They had covered the first mile of the two mile journey home when it started to rain so the young men tried to move faster, but unfortunately Una’s dress caught in the bicycle chain and she and Desmond crashed to the ground right in the middle of a large puddle of water and her dress was torn from the top to the bottom exposing her under garments and a lot of skin. Una started to cry and couldn’t be stopped and tore her dress more in trying to release it from the chain smearing oil over everything. When Anna tried to help she got oil all over her clothes so she cried too. The girls refused to get back onto the bicycles so they walked the last mile home getting soaked to the skin with hair ruined, dresses beyond repair, and the two girls almost in hysterics. On arrival at the house Paddy rang the doorbell and when the father opened the door he almost bundled the two girls into the house and without waiting to give explanations he and Desmond hopped onto their bicycles and rode away to the sound of some choice language from the father. Needless to say they never saw the two girls again and that was the end of Paddy’s romance.

Snippets 11

Dr John O’Rourke and his wife had agreed to join the usual group of friends to attend the annual celebration of St Patrick’s Day at the Grosvenor House Hotel, making a total party of eighteen. During the morning of that day he and his wife had a very big row, one of the worst in their eighteen years together, ending by her storming out of the house saying “I will be at my sister’s home until John you come to apologise, and I will certainly not be coming with you to the ball this evening”. At first John thought that he should phone his friends to cancel, but on reflection he realised that the money was paid anyway, and that he might as well go and try to forget his argument. Consequently he found himself with his friends, all of whom had their wives and all of them enjoying themselves thoroughly, while he was feeling miserable. He wasn’t much of a dancer so he was mostly sitting alone watching the others and he tended to drink considerably more that was his share of the wine, and later of the brandy. All his friends had organised taxies, but he hadn’t given any thought to that problem and had driven his own car and parked it in a side street behind the hotel. As the evening went on he got more and more depressed and drank more and more, and finally found a comfortable chair into which he collapsed. One of the group saw him some time later and alerted his friend Cyril who lived in much the same direction and he agreed to take him home in his taxi and leave the car to be collected next day. However when Cyril went to find him an hour later he found that John wasn’t still in the building and as he certainly wasn’t fit to drive the whole group searched the hotel and all the streets in the neighbourhood but to no avail. At 4 A M Cyril’s phone rang and he heard John’s voice say” you know nothing of me last evening if anyone asks you and you don’t know if I had my car” and John didn’t wait for a reply. It was two days before Cyril heard the full story. John had revived in the hotel and while he was very drunk and completely fed up he decided to go home, not stopping to think that he was too drunk to drive safely. He got behind the wheel and immediately put his foot down and travelled no more than five hundred yards before he hit a bollard. He immediately panicked and got out of the car and ran away about a hundred yards, thinking that as a doctor he would be off driving for at least a year and might possibly be stricken off the medical register. Still very much under the influence of alcohol he then realised that his car would be recognised, so re returned to it and tried to start it but failed to get any response so had no option but to abandon it again. He then opened the petrol tank thinking that he could completely demolish the car if he put a match to it, and without delay threw a match into the tank causing quite an explosion and a gush of flame which quickly engulfed the whole car. John got a dreadful shock and drew back by sheer reflex action, but not before he singed his hair and scorched his clothes. He then took to his heels and ran about half a mile before picking up a taxi. Fortunately there were no people around as it was around three am and very cold. He sobered up quickly with the shock and changed taxis three times before giving the final driver his home address. On arriving home he immediately phoned his friend who was also his family doctor who came around at once and on hearing the whole story who also realised the police would be able to trace the car fairly quickly and that they would be around without much delay. He then said to John that your story must be that you left the hotel and sat in your car and put the key into the ignition and then received a blow on the back of your head which knocked you out, and on regaining consciousness the car was gone. You then wandered around in a semi-conscious state until you reached the place where you found the final taxi to take you home, and then you phoned me. John said that is a very convincing story except that I have no injury on the back of my head. The friend whose name was Dave took up John’s wife’s hand mirror off the dressing table and from behind struck John’s head a sharp blow and said “you have the necessary injury now”, and then he calmly proceeded to put three stitches into the wound and when finished he bound up John’s head leaving very little visible, having firstly cut away all visible signs of scorching. He was barely finished when the police arrived asking to speak to Dr John O’Rourke. Dave told them that he couldn’t possibly allow them to interview him as he was suffering from concussion having sustained a quite serious injury to the back of his head and that absolute quiet was essential for forty-eight hours. He said he would allow them to view John from the door but insisted that they must not try to speak to him and to this they agreed, following which they left saying they would be around again next afternoon. Dave said that they must contact him first to make sure that John’s condition would allow this. Next day with Dave present the interview took place and John gave his rehearsed story, which the police seemed to accept. A week later he was interviewed again and of course his partly shaven head and wound were clearly visible and clearly there were several gaps of memory on John’s part due to the concussion. The police were very sympathetic and wished him a speedy recovery, and also his wife who returned during that week. The only thing on John’s conscience later was that he had to claim on his car insurance for the value of the car. However to salve his conscience he gave the cash to charity, regretfully having to find a large sum to buy a new car. John went to live in Cheltenham a year later having gone through a nasty divorce after finding that his wife had been having an affair for over a year!

Snippets 10

Doctor Tony Rourke had finished his hospital experience and early general practice experience in Ireland and had decided to come over to England to work in the health service in 1960. He succeeded in finding a suitable assistantship with a view to partnership after a year if he proved agreeable to his employer, a man of approximately thirty years of age. He found accommodation near the surgery and soon settled into the routine of general practice and became quite friendly with Dr Davis with whom he worked and who did his best to find suitable friends for him by entertaining him in his home and introducing him to he local golf course. He particularly liked Tom and Maria Sessions, a local solicitor and his wife whom he met first with Dr Davis, and who entertained him in their home and took him out to meals. After a few weeks they were meeting every week and the two men played golf together, and when he was formally offered a partnership they were the first people he told. It was now necessary for him to find a house to live in and it furthered his hopes to marry a lovely girl who had agreed to wait for him until he got established in practice. It was now nearing Christmas and the usual parties were starting and everyone wanted to meet the new doctor who consequently got plenty of invitations, mostly in company with the Sessions. At the New Year’s Eve party everyone drank more than usual and as he didn’t know many ladies Tony danced almost every second dance with Maria Sessions and found he was dancing with her when the midnight chimes rang, so he reached over to give her a token kiss, and to his amazement she kissed him passionately and clung to him. As he didn’t respond she apologised and they rejoined the group. Next day she made a point of seeking him out, and explained that she had consumed far too much drink and hoped he would forget the incident of the previous evening. He told her to forget it and put it completely out of his mind and their relationship continued as before, except that both she and Tom were even more helpful to him. Some weeks later he found a lovely house and set about furnishing it with his friends help, and when it was finally finished he organised a party to celebrate during which he told his friends that he hoped to marry later in the year. Everyone congratulated him and wished him well in his new home, particularly his close friends Maria and Tom, who said they were looking forward to meeting his fiancé. It snowed a few days later, followed by a heavy frost, which made the roads very dangerous, and unfortunately Tony skidded into another car causing considerable damage. The other driver was a large man who got very annoyed and abusive, using very bad language while he meticulously took down name and address and details of insurance. Tony tried to put it completely out of his mind and leave it to his insurance company. A couple of days after that one of his patients got very irate at the fact that he delayed a couple of hours in visiting his wife who was ill, and wouldn’t accept the excuse that Tony was busy delivering a baby, and threatened to report him to the family practitioner health authority. Everything seemed to happen in threes, as during the night a few days later Tony’s car was tarred and feathered, the repair of which cost quite a lot of money. The police were involved and promised to keep an eye on the house, but there was nothing further for a week and then in the middle of the night a large brick was thrown through a downstairs window. This time Tony related the story of the accident and that of the abusive patient, thinking that it had to be one or other of them who was responsible. There was an obvious police watch on the property for the next few weeks, but when they grew less attentive one night the four tyres were slashed on his car, which he had left out, being on night call. Over the next few months there was a repetition of damage of one kind or another to either the house or the car. Shrubs in the garden were damaged, garage doors were broken, windows were smashed, and he was getting tired replacing tyres on his car. The police came up with absolutely nothing, and Tony felt he would be absolutely distraught if it hadn’t been for the support of Maria and Tom. After the three of them talked it over one night they decided to stay up and watch every night in turns, either all three of them or at least two at a time, and they would carry golf clubs in case of violence. They saw and heard nothing even though they repeated this many times over the next few months, and the damage continued. In the end Tony wrote to his fiancé postponing the wedding and shortly afterwards decided to leave the area. His partner understood the situation and realised that there was no real alternative so he reluctantly accepted Tony’s two month’s notice. Tony decided to return to Ireland and put his house on the market and started applying for dispensary practices and was pleased to be called for interview almost immediately, and even more so when he got a very suitable position. He had also succeeded in finding a purchaser for the house, as there were no further attempts to damage it, although his car was still a very definite target, having suffered four different severe scratches during a ten-day period. During his last week in the area he made up his mind to make a last attempt to catch the culprit and stayed up all night two consecutive nights and at around two o’clock in the morning he saw a figure dressed in a rain jacket with a hood approach the car, which he had conveniently left out. He waited until the figure was beside the car and saw that there was a large knife in the upraised hand, but he didn’t let this deter him and sprang suddenly from his hiding place and tackled the person from behind. A sharp struggle ensued during which he sustained a knife wound to his arm but he knocked the offender down and managed to wrestle the knife away and then got a firm arm lock making. At this moment the person shouted in pain and Tony realised that it was a woman, and shortly afterwards he recognised her as Maria, much to his astonishment. She scratched at him and bit his arm and swore softly, saying that he had treated her badly, making her think that he cared for and then discarded her for a woman from Ireland that he hardly knew. Tony dragged her down to her own home which was only a short distance down the road and woke up her husband who was equally astonished. Maria had to alternative but to admit everything, and in trying to justify her actions it emerged that she resented the fact that they had no children and that she blamed her husband for that. Tony proceeded to put three stitches into his arm rather than involve another doctor, and as he was doing this he agreed to take no action on condition that Maria would consult a psychiatrist, simply because he rather liked Tom. They accepted Tony’s offer without question and Tony returned to Ireland and a few months later heard from Tom that his wife was a schizophrenic with the potential of violence if circumstances didn’t go exactly her way

Snippets 9

Doctor Mc Dougall with his wife and three daughters went to Italy towing a caravan in August 1966, driving over the St Goddard pass and down through the Dolomites in the middle of a very severe thunder storm. They stayed in a nice camping site in Lido de Jesolo, close to Venice, intending to spend a lot of time in that wonderful city. During the next few days the thunder- storm continued without cease, with a flash of lightening every two minutes and torrential rain, which quickly resulted in severe floods all along the coast and particularly in the actual camping site. Several caravans and camps were hit by lightning and a few people were killed, and to get to the facilities one had to wade through a foot of water, making everything very unpleasant and dangerous. Dr Mc Dougall decided to yoke up the caravan and crawl slowly through the floods until they reached high ground, which proved to be a wise decision as the storm got even worse It was the storm which damaged Florence and many other cities and towns and was in fact the worst storm in living memory. Having started in the early morning they arrived at the foothills of the Appenines at midday, and being hungry they found a very interesting restaurant for lunch. None of the family could speak Italian and the staff couldn’t speak any English, so without preamble they started to serve delicious food one course after another, each with a half bottle of wine, which they enjoyed thoroughly. Not being in a hurry they lingered and the staff continued serving until eventually they had served twenty- one courses, going through starters, fish, meats, game and deserts, each with it’s particular wine. It was 7 p m when they finished and found that there was no camping site in the area so they consulted their map and found that it was only ninety miles to Pisa, which they thought they could make in roughly two hours, so without hesitation they found themselves underway and saw a sign N 7 to Pisa and followed the route indicated. It got dark almost immediately and around half an hour later they ran into fog, which slowed them down. They soon found they had to negotiate hairpin bends, which seemed to come at ever increasing regularity and there wasn’t the slightest chance of turning around to retrace their steps. To make things worse there were sheer drops at both sides of the road with no protection whatsoever, the drops looked hundreds of feet deep when they could see in the gaps in the fog. There was no traffic in either direction and no area where they could possibly park the caravan even for a short time so they had no option but to proceed until at midnight they arrived in a small town where they parked for the night in the middle of the town square. Next morning they woke up to the sound of many voices outside, so Dr Mc Dougall put on his shorts, and accompanied by his two older daughters went outside to find hundreds of people who cheered them and then lifted them shoulder high and took them off to see the mayor. He gave them a great welcome and explained that they were the first people to take a caravan over the fifty-six mile long Abatone pass. The doctor’s wife was dressed by now, and when collected by her husband they were all taken to a specially prepared feast in their honour, with plenty of wine and champagne. Later they were told not to attempt the descent on the other side, that they would never make it, and rather that they should return the way they came. Next morning however, they chanced the descent to Pisa, a journey that took them all day, as they had to manhandle the caravan at every sharp hair -pin bend. After a couple of days exploring Pisa they made their way to Rome and found a beautiful site in Lido de Ostia where there was a lovely beach with great swimming, and the best thing about it was the fact that it was only half an hours run from Rome. They made their way to that wonderful city every day leaving the beach at around four o’clock in the afternoon, which gave them time to sight see and to dine in some of the city’s lovely restaurants an to get back to camp around midnight. The doctor’s daughters were sixteen, fourteen and four, the latter needing a sleep after lunch every day, while the other two were beginning to attract the young men, particularly the eldest girl who attracted one handsome youth for the duration of their stay. Obviously he thought she was much older as he approached the parents to ask their permission to propose to her, and later visited England to further his prospects, having driven all the way in mid winter. He had to accept that there was no chance of success. Before the return journey they stayed in a site called Solfatara, which is near Pozzuoli, an extinct volcano crater which hadn’t erupted for two thousand years. There was a distinct smell of sulphur all the time and one small area of boiling lava, which they were told had been like that for hundreds of years, but there was a little island to which they could swim and it was the base for exploring Capri. However a week was enough before starting the long journey back to England, so they left and decided to take another week enjoying the return trip. A week after they left the previously extinct volcano erupted, swallowing the small island and completely destroying the site at which they had been staying.