1957-03-02 — Page 6

† Page 6

THE CHINA MAIL,

SATURDAY, MARCH 2, 1957.

IT BEGINS TODAY: AN INTIMATE ACCOUNT OF THE YEARS THAT SAW THE RISE AND FALL OF PRINCE PHILIP'S MAN FRIDAY

TRAVEL TROUBLE NO 2

AIR

OFF SEASON?

The most alluring holiday resorts sometimes present as dismal a picture as this.

Consult Jardine's before making arrangements for your next leave. They'll tell you not just where to go but when

see

K

JARDINES AIRWAYS DEPT.

in good time.

Alexandra House, Des Voeux Road, Hong Kong"

The Michael Parker story

NHE first time I met John Michael Avison Parker

T

I would not have put my money on his chances as a successful courtier." A Buckingham Palace servant is a man whose dignity is as highly polished as a royal car. His sense of the seemly is as delicate as winter sunshine.

When I first saw Michael Parker he was wrestling on the floor, trying to take the trousers off a resisting young naval officer.

The occasion was the Duke of Edinburgh's stug party, Just before

married Princess

Elizabeth. The Duke of Edin- burgh was loughing helplessly. Parker, red in the face and tousled smadred, sat on the floor and chevrent.

Two pointers

pouiters.

THAT moment had two significant

the

One was the happiness Duke frund in Michiel Parker's company

The

other was the shock that the Upper Servants at the Palace wort about to have.

What kind of man is Michaol Parker? What lies beneath the surface of this courtier from the suburbs who has risen from anonymity to the headlines? Where does he go from here?

For the first time, hore are the answers to the questions people are asking about a remarkable young man whose parting with the royal circle has soized the attention of the world.

by ROBERT GLENTON

was one of the first people he side were a couple of extroverts tokt.

with snse of Parker-s year older than his better #ted to royal friend hardly took time dinner

to close his office drawer when Paluce. he was asked, almost

the [21

than

responsibility club Rugby

Buckinghyun

inter communication they had introduced.

system swim. They both had wet hair when the birth was solently announced.

Turned up first

TH

HEN the Duke wanted u card index

That is not correct. There which would record notes about same breath, LO become the certainly nothing Introspective everyone he met, So now, when Duke's right-hand man,

about Prines Philip. But he knows he will speak to them The young Austration's Michael Parker, whether ring- again, all manner of Incidental nt and personal information can be nrrival at the Palace was hardly leader or enger follower in #usplelous,

those affairs, is quile a com- turned up first.

Townsend too

war

WAN

plicated man.

Sensitive

AE is sensitive about

health

and

That was Parker's planning, Ad It was Parker who got the R.A.F. to build him

probably the most elaborate diary in the world. It is about 68, by 4ft. and hangs on the office wall. On this he kept a complete cord of the Duke's movementa for the months ahead.

Then the Duke was carried

And it was Mike Parker who remembered the champagne

his favourite drink. Then there was the King's death, fe was a horrifled Mike Parker who heard the news from when the a Nalrobl reporter

Princess Were in Duke and Africa.

It was Parker, no longer bluff but white-faced and soft-voiced, who knocked at the door of the room where the royal

couple were resting and woke ine Duke. He whispered and then said, Her Majesty?"

the news "Will you tell.

He was almost certainly the first man 40 use that regni oddress.

When the Duke went to the

LREADY there before him the soft-voiced, quiet-eyed Peter Townsend another collects pill bottles as a philate middle-class

hero

ist gathers stamps, whose brisk efficiency was dia- He must be liked. He goes out away by the fascination of the Abbey for the Coronation Parker was behind him. He was, like turbing generations of comfort of his way to charm people so radio telephone. He had sets everyone present, owed by the able back-stairs routine.

that their good opinion will be atted to the cars that he ceremony, but not so much that THE PRESENCE OF THE preserved. But Michael Parker could

to Buckingham he did not make joke of it CHEERFUL MIKE PARKER Is no fool. He Is shrewd Palace and Windsor Castle As the following Christmas. It was just nine years later, HIS FUNNY STORIES enough to know when a social he drove.

It was in January 24, 1948, that the amourarement Camo that Princess Elizabeth and the Duko had appointed Lleutenant Michael Parker, R.N. (retd.), to be their equerry,

speak

That

year, the Duke chose for And to make sure that Parker his Household Christmas card a and would

hear his master's voice, photograph showing bim walk- the Duke made him drive a ing down the aisle with Mike And he is well aware of the royal R/T-equipped Ford Parker and other members of

Zephyr,

the royal staff behind him. Parker, When the Duke wished

Parker sent the Christmas

HIS INTIMATE climber wishes to use him as that 36-year-old Parker was LAUGHTER WITH THE DUKE UR In the ladder return to England, his smile WAS A LOT FOR THE TRADI- qulek to act. faded, his royal job gone. A TIONALISTS TO BEAR. portlier Parker with receding hair, with a cloud of rumours for company.

But it is the years between that count. Before he went to the Palace Michael Parker was unknown. Now he will be hard to forget.

Man Friday...

18 progress from

Hanonymity to the

headlines has been remarkable.

Even now little is known of the man who for long was the Duke of Edinburgh's Man Friday.

the

He is an Australian fest Australian ever to have held such a post at the Palace.

he first met the Duke, They

warships on the East Coast.

When his

to

drive

Oddly enough, Townsend and power of the Patuce. Parker, faced by a common sister, actress Mary front, never really united. The arrived in England there was escape from his own efforts at card to all his personal staff perturbation at Court automation he would Duke never made a close con great

dant of Peter

Townsend, about the amount of publicity Parker's private car. Nelther did Parker.

she got by being linked through get him with the Royal Family.

worried This never half as much, car-

They

Instead they set out to into schoolboy trouble,

First they found some shattering thunderflashes. used to let these off with cheer- ful Irresponsiblilty until King George VI sent for them and said it had to stop, as

upsetting the staff.

It Wita

It was loaded

B

UT Michael Parker still had one thunderflash left,

A tidy mind

Parker

BOVE all... Parker

is amelent. Hip has tidiness of malicat in com- Merce wilt probably rapidly carn for him twice the £1,500 a year that the Duke paid him out of his own allowance.

From

One failure

UT Milke Parker's

Buick Calche tor

organisation luy in the way ho

with the courtiers arrowed. At the end of the атто stroko The wrote, "Prince Plulip's beasis."

has So Miko Parker

ocen present at the great moments of This reign. He has also brought cheer into the mundane occasions.

and

When he was following the coped with royal tours, His royal party through a big shop planning was all-encompassing on the tour of Australla to the point of being inleky, Nothing was ever lost. Nothing went astray.

u

It was the Queen who laughed the most.

He has great talent for collection of relieving the dull situation with

It vas the keen-eyed Parker who watched for the awkward moment.

It was the urbane Parker, who

everyone was feeling.. a little jaded, he suddenly lenped over a haberdashery counter, bowed Only once did he fall That to the Queen, rubbed his hando was on this lost tour of together, and said obsequlously: Antarctica.

"Can I interest you in anything, The royal party arrived at a Modom?"

a necktio without survey but moment Parker the One night he had a guest to arrived at the Palace he intro between them. And this was dinner at the Palace. Aflor duced a revolution of orderli- important, as the explorers kept

with on the wall "I will walks ness and system to deal He comes from a very simple wards he said,

visitors'

snipped-off tie-ends as 11 quick wit which hardly his master's affairs. suburban family living in Met- with you to the bus stop."

Bouvenirs.

matches his usual alippery- When bourne His father was a cap-

they reached the end

And the task was difficult.

The Duke made Mike Parker banana-skin sense of fun. queue, Parker tain in the Royal Australian of the

said The offlees in that great grey pay for his

Не oversight.

BUT OF ALL HIS VIRTUES Navy.

hastily

"Well, I have to dash building are high and spacious demanded that Parker's tartan IT IS THE LOYALTY, COM- off now."

They are well-carpeted and look shirt tall should be cut off as a PANIONSHIP, AND SENSE OF Mike Parker became a special

The guest was baffled until out on to the gardens

substitute, And there it hangs, PROTECTION FOR THE entry officer in the Royal Navy. the

inst thunderflash went off It was probably just coinci- now symbolic of (probably) the DUKE WHICH HAVE MARKED in the

queue and he was left to dence or overcrowding that gave last joke that the two men will HIS YEARS AS A ROYAL It was during the war that Tace a lot of indignation.

Michael Purker a poky little ever share.

SERVANT. Then there was the model room, with a view of a gloomy That laughter has

been were first-lieutenants in sister cannon. It worked electrically courtyard, and # threadbare important over the past nine and stood on the window sill of screen through which the hand years. It is a cliche to say that Parker's tiny office. It was basin in the corner could clearly princes are lonely men. But it plugged in, but Parker did not be seen. That room had a rapid is true. Prince Albert, the last was know it was loaded until, transformation. It soon looked

joking with a friend, he pressed more like a schoolboy's study companionship.

udy consort, railed often at lack of the button

Everywhere there were pic- The Duke might well have A great piece of plaster was tures of ships, ships, and more done the sam

same if Parker had blown out of the opposite wall ships. Only on the desk was not been at his side.

and in rushed the uniformed there a framed picture of The FOR

NOE an official, dis MICHAEL PARKER

cussing a suggested staff..

wife ho married during the war

HAS SHARED

MORE THAN fist of folk to be presented to and his family.

ANYONE SAVE THE QUEEN the Duke at a scientific occasion that became very attached to And if the decor did not fit THE HIGHLIGHTS OF THE in the provinces, apologised for,

in with the usual idea of a DUKE'S LIFE.

the lack of nobility. They decided to play a trick courtier's apartment, neither did From being one of the first to another member of the royal the fittings which followed. know of the Duke's engagement, suite who had an office opposite. THE DUKE AND HIS he has participated in every bo more Interested in They stuffed the cannon with FORMER SECRETARY HAVE tom paper, opened tho dloor, VERY ADVANCED IDEAS

At another time, on a visit to and pressed the button,

ABOUT MECHANISATION —

4ho Midlands, an official pushed In a fury, the courtier, look- FROM TOY TRAINS TO for a job with a rope firm and ing rather like a snowman, ELECTRIC BRAINS.

an autograph book in front of Philip. I'm not a flim star a life of trade and the Duke's atormed into Parker's room The first thing that happened

UST before Prines growled the Prince, and turned steps were already, leading to find Princess Elizabeth, the to startle the royal servants was

Charita was bom the away. When the dignitary com- Duke, and Parker full of heard bellowing 'one morning. Duke was alone, except for Mike plained. i was Mike Parker laughter,

"Go and boll your head, Mike Parker, They were at the Palace. who soothed him. “It he started And when finally Prince From these incidents it would Parker... go and boil your First, in impatience, they play signing books, he wouldn't have Philip got engaged Mike Parker seem that the Duke and his head." He was testing the now ed squash and then they had a (Contd. Page 7, Col. 1)

A bolsterous

friendship started al once. There nothing intellectual about it.

The bond

a guest.

1st fumiture The Duke and Michael Parker

throwing and a what-kind-of- mischief-can-we-gel-into

rola- gun. tionship that owed more to the fifth form than anything else.

Then Parker

invalided. was

with ulcers. But the bond • remained. was headed

out of the Navy

ол

•

although Parker

the Palace.

MANDRAKE THE MAGICIAN

to

THE LITTLE FOO WHERE SORT YOU SAW THE GIRL AND/OF-BUT}

COW VANISH WAS

REPORT TO MY OFFICE AND BRING YOUR B

BUT, CHIEF-

IT LIKE THAT?

MOTORCYCLE ITS THE LAST TIME. *YOU'LL RIPE IT!

THICKER

YOU DON'T THINK I'M BALMY?

NOT YOU AND THE OFFICER, IT MAY HAVE BEEN AN ILLUSION A

HYPNOTIC

EFFECT

great situation.

Favourite drink

By Lee Falic and Phil Davis

-OR SOMETHING ELSA I'M IN NO RUSH, WE'LL JUST SIT |--AND WAIT.

WHAT IS THE LITTLE FOS"?

smoothed the ruffled feathers.

"Not a film star"

Said Parker: "The Duke will blus-

prints than in blue blood.”

There's More than Magic in

FRY'S

They

FAVOURITES

are Delicious