Friends reunited
Thursday, April 28, 2022 at 10:00 I visited a friend at the weekend.
Peter and I go back a long way. We met at university in Aberdeen where we co-edited Campus, a student newspaper inspired in part by Private Eye.
After graduating we both ended up in London and it was Peter who introduced me to Madsen Pirie and Eamonn Butler of the Adam Smith Institute who introduced me to Michael Forsyth (now Lord Forsyth of Drumlean) who gave me my first job.
In 1987, at the height of the Eighties’ housing boom, we bought a house together in Camberwell, paying well over the asking price to secure the four-storey property.
Peter had previously owned a flat overlooking the Oval cricket ground in Kennington but this was my first step on the property ladder so I was very much the junior partner.
The market crashed soon after we moved in and I didn’t make a penny on my investment (I must have been the only person who didn’t make money on property in London in the Eighties!) but aside from two break-ins and one stolen car I loved the house and the street if not the general area.
In 1992 I got married and for six months Clare and I shared the house in Camberwell Grove with Peter and his girlfriend (now his wife) Eva before we moved to Edinburgh where we rented a flat in Thistle Street.
Our landlord was Peter’s father Aldric who owned an antiques shop and several other properties in the same street.
I’ve told this story before but there was an original sign above the door of what was our sitting room. Dating from the 18th century it read, ‘No more than 14 people shall live in this room’.
In those days and for much of the Victorian era whole families lived in single rooms so the noise and stench must have been horrendous.
Today, although it’s been gentrified, Thistle Street has an irresistible Dickensian charm and we were very happy there, living above Aldric’s antique shop, popping in to the Thistle Street Bar or having tea and cakes in the wonderful James Thin bookshop on George Street, a few minutes walk from the flat.
But I digress.
While I was visiting him at the weekend Peter produced a file containing multiple copies of Campus including several editions I haven’t seen for over 40 years.
I’ve got copies of most of the issues we produced between 1978 and 1980 but one or two were missing so it was like catching up with old friends.
Campus built its reputation by baiting student politicians of every hue and in hindsight we probably over-stepped the mark more than once (the once being the time we were sued for defamation).
In one edition however (January 1980) there is a bona fide interview with none other than the-then Aberdeen football manager Alex Ferguson.
I didn’t write it. Nor did Peter because he wouldn’t know one football club from another but if I have a moment later today I may post the article in full because it’s actually quite interesting (if you like football) and something I certainly didn’t expect to find in a publication dedicated to sending up student politicians and socialites.
For example:
Ferguson holds no ambition to manage the international side or to move south so he has set his sights on becoming a permanent fixture at Pittodrie.
In 1986 of course Ferguson took the Scotland national team to the World Cup in Mexico and subsequently became the most successful manager in English Premier League history. He was later knighted, becoming Sir Alex.
Peter, I should add, is enjoying a somewhat quieter life after an interesting and challenging career, much of it centred round assorted war zones.
Here is the Telegraph’s take on one of his early adventures:
His footfall cushioned by heavy snow, Peter Young slipped silently out of his hotel on a cold December evening in 1979 and took the Moscow subway to the end of the line. Although he was not a spy, the 21-year-old had undergone extensive training on how to smuggle documents through airport security and evade detection.
Young knew how to check if he was being followed on the street and how to behave during interrogation if arrested by the Soviet secret police, the KGB. He walked a memorised route through the Moscow suburbs to a building he had never visited before, climbed the steps to the fourth floor and knocked softly on the door of Soviet dissident writer Georgi Vladimov.
See: The senior Tories with the secret Soviet past (Telegraph, March 2021).
There are many more stories like that - including a road trip over the mountains into Kabul in Afghanistan - so if he ever gets round to writing his memoirs I will certainly order a copy.
Reader Comments (2)
I too have fond memories of Campus, although unlike you I was not personally involved. It was very well written with great jokes and was brilliant at winding up lefties. I remember there were targets who were hounded relentlessly and mercilessly. Since most of Campus's victims were severely misguided I doubt you received the credit you deserved for helping steer them back on the straight and narrow. I'm not sure what today's Woke Snowflakes would make of it, short of wanting to ban it.
I wonder whatever happened to Fiona Duff? David Steele's naughty niece? Did she sue you?
The comments about Alex Ferguson are fascinating - I hope you post the full interview.
I hope Peter Young's friends all encourage him to persevere with his memoirs - it would be a great read. If he completes it and finds a publisher brave enough to publish it (Woke publishers and spineless publishers intimidated by the Woke dominate the market), I would like to offer to host a raucous book launch party.
Hi Richard,
Fiona Duff is alive and well and living in Edinburgh. I saw her a few years ago and we are on good terms (I think!). Her recollection of Campus is surprisingly positive although she can afford to be magnanimous having enjoyed a stellar PR career - see ‘Fiona Duff: My Big Break’:
http://www.allmediascotland.com/press/50262/my-big-break-fiona-duff-xxxx/
I’ll post the Ferguson interview tomorrow.
Looking forward to the raucous book launch party. If that doesn’t motivate Peter to write it nothing will.
PS. Will there be an after party in Majorca?