Beaverbrook

We have had the most unusual April, it has been sunny with blue skies and I cannot remember when we last had rain. Usually those pesky April showers sneak up and catch you unaware, but this year it has been unseasonably dry. Even when the forecast is for a cloudy day, it turns out to be a sunny one. Long may that last! Today was forecast to be cold with winter showers, and I know up north they have had some snow but despite being colder today it was another beautiful sunny day.

I was invited to lunch at the garden kitchen restaurant at the newly opened Beaverbrook, once the home of Lord Beaverbrook known as Cherkley Court. It now boasts a £30 million golf course and a luxury hotel is due to open there this summer.

Lord Beaverbrook was one of the most powerful men in 20th Century Britain. A Cabinet Minister during both World Wars, Lord Beaverbrook also held the title of “First Baron of Fleet Street”. His newspapers could make or break almost anyone – a tool he used to considerable effect to promote his friends as well as undermine his opponents. It was said that if Winston Churchill was Britain’s bulldog, then Lord Beaverbrook, via his Daily Express and Sunday Express, was surely its bark. Lord Beaverbrook was both admired and feared, often at the same time: his good friend H.G. Wells is quoted as saying of him: “If ever Max ever gets to Heaven, he won’t last long. He will be chucked out for trying to pull off a merger between Heaven and Hell after having secured a controlling interest in key subsidiary companies in both places, of course.” For his part, Churchill simply said; “Some people take drugs. I take Max”.

This is the view looking towards London from the golf course - not sure what the beautiful trees in blossom in the foreground are, but they looked good against that blue sky.