THE CHINA MAIL, SATURDAY, MARCH 12, 1960.
UNRECORDED EPISODES IN THE LIFE OF A VERY SURPRISING YOUNG MAN
His camera brings him trouble ....... he
rows with society
(Continued from Parn }
Meanwhile, Armstrong-Jones has been slowly shrinking his business, becoming more selec.
tive and more careful,
And the other day he took the Anul steps to make sure that those few private mementoes of his past that were in the possession of other people were returned to him. He had lent his precious album for a book te ke waritts abeat hun. Recently he telephoned asking its return.
He didn't say why. He just asked for it back..
Antony Asirong-Jones, the uncommunicative young society photographer, was ready for the royal announcement.
Antony Armstrong-Jones was born in elegant Eaton Terrace, London.
Later his parents divorced and his pretty mother, who is Oliver Messel's sister, married the Earl of Rosse,
JACQUELINE CHAN His favourite model.
saw
凸
ot
As roon as the rowing enthu- slesta
the slight, slim Armstrong-Jones they knew he would make an ideal cox.
But
deal they had trouble at first,
lle was inclined to take his camera in the boat with him. He would spot something on the bank, focus his comers, and During his first week at Eton before the unhappy crew knew One what was happening there would he received two letters. from his father and the other be a monstrous tangle of legs, from his mother, Both con- uzna, and oars. tained the usual parental advice.
By the time Armstrong-Jones went to Eton his father had married again.
They said they hoped he would be happy and work hard, and they both were sure they would be proud of him.
First of all he started doing portraits with his girl friends as models. He had only one room In Albany which he had borrow- ed and it became bedroom, sitting-room, and studio.
The only window was a low one at floor level. He made quite a reputation for the strange por- traits with the lighting coming from below the chip.
He also got his toe in the door of the glossy magazines where his carly efforis are heavily salted with pictures of his rcirtives and close friends.
Business was beginning to look up for Antony Armstrong-Jones. Nevertheless, he was not without his froubles.
He was commissioned by the late Helena Pickard, Sir Cedric Hardwicke's Arst wife, to pro- duce 300 postcard-atze portraits for her friends at Christmas. said sadly. "I didn't even know Afterwards Armstrong-Jones
enough to Be the cards wholesale price."
With only a girl friend to help him he tolled all day and most of the night to get those pictures ready on time.
at
"I think I only charged 3s. 6d. rach," he said later, even more ruchilly,
FURIOUS
There were times when Arm-
Another of his first jobs was strong-Jones was extremely un- popular with his crew before to photograph guests ni a very that day arrived when he coxed glittering charity affair. It was Cambridge to victory in the 1050 in January 1953 and called the Golden Cage Ball. Mayfair was there in force.
Boal-rice.
Even then there was trouble, Unhappily for his parents'
I Armstrong-Jones rammed the wishes a malevolent master was Boon to comment in an end-of- Oxford boat. They touched cars. term report... "Maybe he is and according to those rarefied Interested some subject... tolk who write on such things but it isn't a subject we teach....he "had conversation" here."
with the Oxford Cox.
His days at Elon were not dis tinguished Save for occasional Tows such as the time when he had measles and was dis- covered to be maintaining con- foot with the outside world by means of a bottle and string dangling from his window.
TO CAMBRIDGE
was
Q
was his task to photo- graph the guests with their heads in a golden cage, No one paid less than 5, for the privilege, many a great deal
more,
Armstrong-Jones told his But pot cre of them got a friends afterwards, "All I did finished photograph. was to keep on my line, I told Armstrong-Jones had lost the the other chap to move over, alms. Ile didn't, and we touched. "I don't know what happened swore at each other so to them," he said recently. "They loudly it could be heard both have never lantied up. It was sides of the river."
all so embarrassing. Fortunately everyone took it very well and
We
With all his preoccupations il
They were not always pleasant. At party given for April Brummer, the top debutante” of 1954, he was involved in a playful scufle neur a goldfish pond. Armstrong-Jones, impec- cable in white tie and tails, got knocked in. He emerged dripping with mud,
"Oh dear," wailed Mrs Brun- ner, "I had no idea the pond was so dirty."
"Neither had '1," retorted the bedruggled Mr Armstrong-Jones as be made his watery way to the door.
TROUSERLESS
--
At another party given by copper heless Sarah Chester Beatty, two Old Elonians debagged him. Two more sat un his head. He was left trousericss
and unconscious in the bushes outside the Savoy Hotel.
Later he said, "It may have been funny to some. To me it was unforgivable. It seems that it is rather infra dig to be in society and a photographer a the same time. It seems I should be a stockbroker or someone stinko with money."
But there were many rood days too.
Armstrong-Jones was gel- ling known. He helped the process by begging friends on newspapers for publlelty. Sometimes he got it. But he way invariably described as the
son of the Countess of Rosse.
"Why can't they use my name without my mother #?** he grumbled.
was
With the money that coming in Armstrong - Jones could afford to expand.
He found en fronmonger's shop in Pimlico food,
not far from the gloom and grime of Victoria Station.
And it te here that Princess Margaret has often made her discreet way recently.
THE BASEMENT Armstrong-Jones did moet of
fa small wonder he failed his nobody asked for their money the redecorating himself. exams. Undaunted, ho wrote back,'
He did, however, become
He slept on a bunk on top of interested in photography. and told his mother that he bad Once Armstrong - Jones was a bookcase and had a drawing At that time he was given decided to be a photographer. commissioned by a magazine to room in the barement Alled with a special present. His paternal She replied with a frantle go back to his old school and antiques from his mother's Krofnher
Д famous telegram, "Do not agree sugges- talte pictures of the boys un- house. On the floor, he laid a physician and Visitor in tion changing career. Telephone. loading their luggage, saying fine needlework carpet she had Lunacy, Sir Robert Armstrong- this evening, Fondest laur, goodbye to their parents, and let him have. Jones. When It was decided that young Tony was old enough to appreciate it, he re ceived his grandfather's tree sured microscope,
It was a splendid Instrument gleaming with
but brass, Annstrong-Jones promptly ex- changed it for a camera.
Не ntered some pletures for
Mummy."
But as he told her that night, photography was carcer: he had always wanted, but had not seriously thought about. Failing his exam had made it possible.
TEA BOY
even of his half-brother, Martin Parsons, son of the Earl of Rosse, unpacking in his rooms.
Headmaster Robert Birley, was furious,
He wrote
a slinging letter to Old Etonian Armstrong-Jones,
"I think you should know that I am writing to the parents
He set to work in his new
A wood and studio and built copper spiral elatrcase.
Tired of the bank, he bullk bedroom in the basement, It is a graudy room with violet patterned paper and a startling purple bed.
A
He hung 4s. 11d. wallpaper in bathroom and arranged
his women altiors.
So pleased was he with his
new home that he arranged a
Soon after he came down from of the boys whose photographs the the college photographie Cambridge he became appren- appeared with their names to shelves laden with pots of cream, society's opinion. The criticism tied to Baron, that great friend let them know this was done hairbrushes and face powder for was not futtering. The society of Prince Philip. But Arm- without our knowledge," be reported: "One feels, for ex- strong-Jones was not to make wrote. "I shall not mention your emple, that the picture of the his first sequaintance with none in doing so, and I shall not rebuilding of Upper School royalty then. might well have been made Instead he got all the odd write to the Earl of Rosse," mora erelting if there had been signs of human activity." From Eton, Armstrong-Jones went to Jesus College, Cam- long. bridge, to study architecture.
Jobs to do. He was more ur less the tea boy.
That apprenticeship didn't last
He set up on his own.
Despite thens Hitife set backs Armstrong-Jones was making headway. More and mure he was hired to attend parties and first nights.
dinner party for 22 guests. Each place had a photograph of its intended occupant instead of a nome card.
There were wreaths of syringa. And by candlelight it looked, very romantic.
ROYAL PHOTO-CALL I
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