Major Ardale Vautier Golding RTR

Hi Roy,

To complete the picture:

"The Incredible Earl of Suffolk" published in the Reader's Digest in April 1943, and "Earl Raided Bank Vaults, Foiled Invading Germans," published in the Sunday Dispatch.

I wish you every success with your book, which I look forward to reading when it is published.

Best wishes,

Ian

 

Hi Ian,

I can't thank you enough, so far I have read and saved the diary. There is so much material in the diary alone that I'm not sure how to use it. As I think you know my book is about Evacuations and Landings by Merchant Ships, so I must limit each story. Between your documents and the files at the National Archives there looks to be enough material for a book, what say you?

Roy

 

Hi Ian,

There are two files, one I have somewhere on the computer, I will dig it out and send it; the other I only copied what I thought were the interesting parts - I will send those also. There is another later Reader's Digest Article, by Lord Suffolk's brother and an article from Radley school (the second one looks to have been copied from the 1943 RD article).

Roy

 

Hi Ian,

Still can't find the files. I can't drive at the moment so, after the holiday, I will ask for copies of the two files and send them on.

Roy

 

As the report files are too large to load I attach a typescript.

Roy

 

Dear Mr. Golding,

Thank you for the information you delivered to Roy Martin. In fact, I asked him a few months ago for information about your father. A Belgian banker, Paul Timbal, has escaped in 1940 with a fortune on diamonds from Antwerp which is still the most important diamond center in the world. He met your father on the Broompark during a very dangerous crossing from Bordeaux to Falmouth.
Timbal has written a report of 300 pages on the six weeks between the beginning of the war on May 10 and his arrival in London. I'm editing this report. Your information will enrich this publication!

Always ready to return a favour,

Bruno Comer
Weststraat 35
8340 Damme
BELGIUM

 

What did Drew say, Gotta love this forum? That's an understatement. I did say at one point that we are the footsoldiers of history but I think some people here deserve a promotion - brilliant and many thanks to all involved with this fascinating subject matter.

 

Dear Mr. Golding,

The documents that you delivered are very precious. Thank you very much. I keep you posted!

Regards,

Bruno Comer

 

I wrote the Earl of Suffolk & Berkshire's biography in 2008 as part of my first book, 'Come if ye Dare - the Story of the Civil Defence George Crosses'. Still available from the Civil Defence Assoication. He was an interesting man and one whom history needs more of!

 

Hello,
Are anyone of the original posters still on this forum?

 

I wasn't one of the original posters but I do follow this thread out of interest in the subject. Perhaps I can be of help?...

 

Hunter,

A belated post in response. If you hover over the name of the member in their avatar it will show a new text box and within is the date of their last logged visit. Some members "flag" their interest in a thread, which means they get a system alert. Once you have posted five times - a measure to stop spam - you can send a private message (PM) to members using 'Start a private conversation' accessed via your avatar. Such messages depend on their email given at registration is still valid.

In a moment I will send a PM to the six who have posted here, two 11yrs ago and ask them to respond to you.

 

Thank you all!
I'm just passing the "sophomore" phase of researching Broompark and her travails. I will ask and post more here as I continue, and have found Roy Martin and his book very helpful in graduating onward a few steps further.

 

Can I help? I am Terry Hissey and a biographer of the Earl

 

Hello Terry, I didn't know of you, have you published the biography?

 

Yes, Mr. Hissey, would be a considerable help. Would be very interested in linking up by chat or email.
Very coincidentally I already own your book!

 

Shame I didn't notice this thread earlier.

I can give a bit of the background on A.V. Golding. Before the war he was an officer at the Design Department at Woolwich, in the Mechanization branch, which meant that he was involved in tank design. There he was involved in numerous projects in a junior capacity, and his name regularly appears in reports compiled by the Mechanization Experimental Establishment at Farnborough.

In September 1939 he jointed the AFV Branch (AFV(GHQ)) of the BEF's headquarters as a Deputy Assistant Director of Mechanization (DADM), alongside the other DADM, William Blagden. The AFV Branch was a small advisory branch on matters of tanks, armoured cars, carriers etc., headed by Brigadier Frederick Hotblack (the BAFV) and including a couple of staff officers, who were the GSO I, Lt. Col. Richard Lewis, and the GSO III, Capt. F.G.B. Arkwright, the famous cricketer. The AFV Branch also had a small administrative/secretarial body made up of "other ranks".

The reason why A.V. Golding became the Liaison Officer with the French Ministry of Defence in the first place is that as part of the AFV Branch's activities he was party to the initial enquiries as to whether the British could licence produce the French Hotchkiss H39 tank in the UK. He left the AFV Branch to take over the liaison role with the French in mid-December 1939, and this seems to have been a fairly natural move, while at the same time Frederick Hotblack was superseded by Justice Tilly.

Another thing worth mentioning is that the machine tools that Golding salvaged from France were almost certainly American ones that had been sent to France for the production of Oerlikon 20mm anti-aircraft guns, and these tools were subsequently used to produce the same weapons in the UK.

 

Many thanks Don Juan,
The bulk of the 700 tons of machine tools that Suffolk/Golding brought back from France in the Broompark had recently arrived from the USA
Though they did have drawings and maybe tools for the Oerlikons, as you say.
Roy

 

A little more:

Lord Suffolk had listed the materials that they had on board:

Six hundred tons of machine tools. (most of these went to the GWR works at Swindon)

3-million pounds worth of diamonds.

All the heavy water in France, from the Joliot-Curie laboratories.

The entire secret archives of the (French) Ministry of National Education together with the Under Secretary of State of that Ministry and one other officer.

Two pieces of apparatus of considerable scientific importance.

The secret documents belonging to himself and Golding from Paris

A new secret machine tool for the manufacture of 20mm Hispano-Suiza gun.

Another machine tool of similar nature

Some anti-aircraft guns

Twenty four French scientists and technicians of very high rank together with two pharmacologists and one ballistic expert.

After the DSR made the necessary arrangements, he had unsuccessfully tried to contact Suffolk again, leaving messages with the Chief of Police and the station master at Falmouth. He also wanted to tell the Earl that the Minister wished to see him as soon as possible. The Minister was Herbert Morrison and his deputy Harold Macmillan.
............
The evacuation of Bordeaux continued for several days after the Broompark had sailed.

At 1312 on 20 June the Berkeley was ordered by the Admiralty to get in touch with Feller & Co., 1, Espirit de Lois, Bordeaux, and arrange shipment of vital goods ex. Goth Co., Switzerland. These included Oerlikon guns, spares and probably drawings. One file states that 'valuable stores' had been shipped on Swift (General Steam Navigation Co.) on 17 June; Swift made it safely back to Southampton.


On 22 June the B.N.L.O Bordeaux was informed by the Admiralty that s.s. Formedine (Fort Medine?), with a valuable cargo of copper and machine tools; should be sailed without delay. The French ship Le Trait was included in the series of messages, but she was diverted to North Africa, with the goods ex Goth Co that the British wished to get hold of. The French Admiralty had already moved a large quantity of Belgian gold to a 'safe destination' outside France. Admiral Darlan

 

Quoting myself from a book I am currently writing:

"The Admiralty memorandum that had initiated the Oerlikon requirement had envisaged an initial demand for 10,000, this later rising to 20,000, with the primary application being for merchant vessels on Atlantic crossings. A facility for licence manufacture had already been established at Ruislip in Middlesex, this in fact being a railway shed that had been requisitioned by the Birmingham Small Arms Co. Ltd. (BSA), who were overseeing the production programme under the rubric of Contraves Industrial Products. The Ruislip works was intended to produce 150 Oerlikon guns per month using machine tools that had originally been assigned to France."

Slightly frustrating then that the machine tools on Broompark went to Swindon and not Ruislip, so I can't tie this all together. I wonder if Ruislip was on the GWR?

By the way does anyone have all eight pages of the record of events that Ian Golding posted at post #16? Only three seem to be downloadable now.