miss whirley
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It’s not just the 50’s and 60’s. The article goes into the Charles-Diana era, too.
When Charles was Harry’s age he was given the exact same treatment.-
q: What kind of relationship do the photographers -- the pack -- have to one another?
a: The pack -- in the early days -- was seven or eight people, very competitive -- each one looking for a scoop on Prince Charles. It was mystery blond hunting -- unnamed girls with Charles. It was very competitive, but once the chase was over we all got together and would discuss what had happened -- who we thought it was, whether we'd seen her before. Was this a real romance? Would it peter out? Where were we going to find out about the latest girl. And the next day, we would get up, go our separate ways, chase up and down riverbanks or on foreign trips or even hire models to jump into the sea with him in Australia. We did all the bits and pieces. It was great fun. I think Charles enjoyed a bit of it. He once made a very rude and sexist remark. He said he could always tell when it was a set-up. The really beautiful girls were a set-up and the plain ones did it of their own volition, he said.
Another very interesting part was talking about trying to photograph Charles and Diana on vacation, even though they were given much harder time than the foreign press, and how the Queen intervened to have the photos blacklisted. This will have to be separated into two posts because it’s a long, complicated story
q: Can you take us through exactly what happened when you went to the island in the Bahamas.
a: We heard the Princess of Wales was going to Eleuthera and the Prince of Wales had been in Eleuthera before for a holiday and we naturally were going to follow and James Whitaker phoned up Michael Shea and said "Michael, we're off to Eleuthera." And he said "Look old chap, there's not much point in going. You'll get nothing. The Bahamian Police have promised full security and they're going to turn it all on to make sure they have a holiday in peace without you chaps getting there -- but do come along. You're welcome. You'll get a very nice picture of her arriving at the airport and when she leaves, seven days later, you'll get a great picture of her leaving with a suntan." So we booked up and flew out, arrived a couple of days in advance knowing other papers would be there. I think the Mirror chose not to go because of the Palace saying you won't get anything but we knew the Sun had, who were the big rivals, and that we were going and there would be freelancers there. So we went out there to do a recce. I mean you didn't do these things lightly. We found out that they were going to a different little island off Eleuthera -- it's called Windermere Island -- So we bought a map of the island and worked out how we would get there using compass references because there is a scrub jungle there and there is no point of reference and you're crawling through spiny jungle. It takes hours to go through and we had a lot of equipment to carry and a lot of water. We knew that the Sun were up to the same thing and I knew that the Sun photographer, Arthur Edwards, had been before and been successful and photographed Prince Charles water-skiing, so they had an advantage.
So we got up at five in the morning, put on thick sweaters and gloves -- this is to walk through great heat -- but the spines in the jungle just tore you to pieces. We made our way through and about eight in the morning we could hear the Sun crashing through the undergrowth the same way we were doing.
Eventually we got to an area of beach or mangrove swamp at the waterside. We could see a beach across from us which we reckoned was the one that we'd seen the day before. We'd gone out to the island, photographed the house they were going to stay in and had that picture standing by. We heard the Sun arriving, knew there was not much we could do about that and from checking the day before we'd found the Sun had hired a light aircraft to fly back to the main island. So we thought we're really up against it. James and I discussed the tactics. We thought if they get a picture of her, I'll give it to James. He will flee the island on a light aircraft, taxi aircraft, go to the mainland where there's a local agency. They would transmit the picture back to London for us and this is just to keep up with the Sun. It would have been much wiser to hold on another day but competition was so great.
Anyway within ten minutes of us getting there a party arrived on the beach consisting of Lord Romsey, his wife, Diana and someone else and Diana was wearing a beach robe and within seconds she took the beach robe off and was wearing a bikini underneath. I was watching this through a lens, the lens of a drainpipe and my colleague, James Whitaker was watching through his binoculars. And as I was trying to take the first couple of photographs, there was a mile of water between us and the water, the heat was rising off it and the image was shimmering and James said Oh **** because we'd never seen her like this before and we knew this was a controversial picture. So I shot a roll of film of Diana with Romsey and gave that to James who then disappeared, just crashed out the jungle. Then Charles arrived and the two of them got into the water. They were bobbing about, just their heads about the water, kissing and I kept shooting this and I was shooting color and black and white knowing the magazines we could sell to recover all the cost of the trip and so on. And it was great stuff. Within an hour or so the Sun team arrived and said, "Well what do you think of that?" I said, "Terrific." and we chatted for a minute and they said, "where is James?" And I said, "Oh he's probably gone off into the jungle to do some business." Well Arthur just exploded and he said, "has he gone back to transmit pictures?" And I said, "oh I don't know Arthur." I'm was being very cagey and he said, "because we're not. We canceled our plane." I said, well I don't know what they're doing. It might not be successful." Well the two of them disappeared really angry because they were going to come and tell us they were good boys and they were going to keep it for another day. But it didn't work out that way. So I stayed on for another hour and shot a lot more and packed up and carted the stuff back out the jungle.
q: So who got the picture in first and what was the reaction of the Palace and the competition?
a: Well, we got the pictures in all editions. A front page picture of Diana on a beach, The Sun, unfortunately, only got it in the last edition in Fleet Street which maybe a few people had seen but not very many. There was a huge uproar in London, which I wasn't aware of. I'd gone to bed that night, transmitted, and I still had more films to go of the kissing in the water, Diana throwing a towel over Charles head and wrestling him to the floor and real good horseplay pictures of them on the beach. I get up the next morning. I didn't want to call from the hotel because I knew the police would be looking for me by this stage. So I went to a call box at the airport and phoned up, got a reversed charge through and I said to my Picture Editor, you know, I shouted down the phone, "Bob, it's Ken." "Where are you?" So I told him I was on the island and I said, "I've got great, great pictures. They're much better than yesterdays. It's Diana throwing a rug over Charles head, wrestling him down in the sand, him picking her up in the water, heads bobbing, kissing." And Bob says, "Get off the island." And I said, "Sorry Bob, what's happening?" "Get off the island. Do not transmit any photographs." I said, "Why Bob? I know the police, I'll catch a plane off the island. I know the police will be looking for us now because we've upset and we've beaten their security." And he said, "No you must get off. It's been raised in Parliament as the blackest day in British journalism." Well my heart dropped and it was a really mean time.
I then did get a taxi over to the mainland but couldn't book into a hotel because my name was all over the front of the paper and they were looking for me. The poor guy at Reuters had his room raided and they found one of my prints on his transmitter. It said Ken Lennox in the bottom of it. And they arrested the guy and put him in jail. Despite his protestations they thought he was Ken Lennox and they put him in a jail and held him there and the Americans get really upset if one of their people have been held for taking a photograph of, so he was freed and flown to Miami where he was treated like a long lost hero coming home. Meanwhile I was dodging about on the main island with a suitcase, which eventually I buried in the sand and sort of walked about. I'd have been fairly obviously walking about with a suitcase and a bag full of cameras. I went to a local agency and this little Scots lady - I think her name was Kerr said "Oh Mr. Lennox. I have been told by the police to, the minute you come into the office to phone them and tell them you're here. I'll give you five minutes start" she said. So I disappeared again and eventually caught a flight directly back to the States. But back in London Lloyd Turner, the late Lloyd Turner who died just recently was fired at eleven o'clock in the morning by the proprietor but he was reinstated early in the afternoon. Oh there was a huge fuss in London.
When Charles was Harry’s age he was given the exact same treatment.-
q: What kind of relationship do the photographers -- the pack -- have to one another?
a: The pack -- in the early days -- was seven or eight people, very competitive -- each one looking for a scoop on Prince Charles. It was mystery blond hunting -- unnamed girls with Charles. It was very competitive, but once the chase was over we all got together and would discuss what had happened -- who we thought it was, whether we'd seen her before. Was this a real romance? Would it peter out? Where were we going to find out about the latest girl. And the next day, we would get up, go our separate ways, chase up and down riverbanks or on foreign trips or even hire models to jump into the sea with him in Australia. We did all the bits and pieces. It was great fun. I think Charles enjoyed a bit of it. He once made a very rude and sexist remark. He said he could always tell when it was a set-up. The really beautiful girls were a set-up and the plain ones did it of their own volition, he said.
Another very interesting part was talking about trying to photograph Charles and Diana on vacation, even though they were given much harder time than the foreign press, and how the Queen intervened to have the photos blacklisted. This will have to be separated into two posts because it’s a long, complicated story
q: Can you take us through exactly what happened when you went to the island in the Bahamas.
a: We heard the Princess of Wales was going to Eleuthera and the Prince of Wales had been in Eleuthera before for a holiday and we naturally were going to follow and James Whitaker phoned up Michael Shea and said "Michael, we're off to Eleuthera." And he said "Look old chap, there's not much point in going. You'll get nothing. The Bahamian Police have promised full security and they're going to turn it all on to make sure they have a holiday in peace without you chaps getting there -- but do come along. You're welcome. You'll get a very nice picture of her arriving at the airport and when she leaves, seven days later, you'll get a great picture of her leaving with a suntan." So we booked up and flew out, arrived a couple of days in advance knowing other papers would be there. I think the Mirror chose not to go because of the Palace saying you won't get anything but we knew the Sun had, who were the big rivals, and that we were going and there would be freelancers there. So we went out there to do a recce. I mean you didn't do these things lightly. We found out that they were going to a different little island off Eleuthera -- it's called Windermere Island -- So we bought a map of the island and worked out how we would get there using compass references because there is a scrub jungle there and there is no point of reference and you're crawling through spiny jungle. It takes hours to go through and we had a lot of equipment to carry and a lot of water. We knew that the Sun were up to the same thing and I knew that the Sun photographer, Arthur Edwards, had been before and been successful and photographed Prince Charles water-skiing, so they had an advantage.
So we got up at five in the morning, put on thick sweaters and gloves -- this is to walk through great heat -- but the spines in the jungle just tore you to pieces. We made our way through and about eight in the morning we could hear the Sun crashing through the undergrowth the same way we were doing.
Eventually we got to an area of beach or mangrove swamp at the waterside. We could see a beach across from us which we reckoned was the one that we'd seen the day before. We'd gone out to the island, photographed the house they were going to stay in and had that picture standing by. We heard the Sun arriving, knew there was not much we could do about that and from checking the day before we'd found the Sun had hired a light aircraft to fly back to the main island. So we thought we're really up against it. James and I discussed the tactics. We thought if they get a picture of her, I'll give it to James. He will flee the island on a light aircraft, taxi aircraft, go to the mainland where there's a local agency. They would transmit the picture back to London for us and this is just to keep up with the Sun. It would have been much wiser to hold on another day but competition was so great.
Anyway within ten minutes of us getting there a party arrived on the beach consisting of Lord Romsey, his wife, Diana and someone else and Diana was wearing a beach robe and within seconds she took the beach robe off and was wearing a bikini underneath. I was watching this through a lens, the lens of a drainpipe and my colleague, James Whitaker was watching through his binoculars. And as I was trying to take the first couple of photographs, there was a mile of water between us and the water, the heat was rising off it and the image was shimmering and James said Oh **** because we'd never seen her like this before and we knew this was a controversial picture. So I shot a roll of film of Diana with Romsey and gave that to James who then disappeared, just crashed out the jungle. Then Charles arrived and the two of them got into the water. They were bobbing about, just their heads about the water, kissing and I kept shooting this and I was shooting color and black and white knowing the magazines we could sell to recover all the cost of the trip and so on. And it was great stuff. Within an hour or so the Sun team arrived and said, "Well what do you think of that?" I said, "Terrific." and we chatted for a minute and they said, "where is James?" And I said, "Oh he's probably gone off into the jungle to do some business." Well Arthur just exploded and he said, "has he gone back to transmit pictures?" And I said, "oh I don't know Arthur." I'm was being very cagey and he said, "because we're not. We canceled our plane." I said, well I don't know what they're doing. It might not be successful." Well the two of them disappeared really angry because they were going to come and tell us they were good boys and they were going to keep it for another day. But it didn't work out that way. So I stayed on for another hour and shot a lot more and packed up and carted the stuff back out the jungle.
q: So who got the picture in first and what was the reaction of the Palace and the competition?
a: Well, we got the pictures in all editions. A front page picture of Diana on a beach, The Sun, unfortunately, only got it in the last edition in Fleet Street which maybe a few people had seen but not very many. There was a huge uproar in London, which I wasn't aware of. I'd gone to bed that night, transmitted, and I still had more films to go of the kissing in the water, Diana throwing a towel over Charles head and wrestling him to the floor and real good horseplay pictures of them on the beach. I get up the next morning. I didn't want to call from the hotel because I knew the police would be looking for me by this stage. So I went to a call box at the airport and phoned up, got a reversed charge through and I said to my Picture Editor, you know, I shouted down the phone, "Bob, it's Ken." "Where are you?" So I told him I was on the island and I said, "I've got great, great pictures. They're much better than yesterdays. It's Diana throwing a rug over Charles head, wrestling him down in the sand, him picking her up in the water, heads bobbing, kissing." And Bob says, "Get off the island." And I said, "Sorry Bob, what's happening?" "Get off the island. Do not transmit any photographs." I said, "Why Bob? I know the police, I'll catch a plane off the island. I know the police will be looking for us now because we've upset and we've beaten their security." And he said, "No you must get off. It's been raised in Parliament as the blackest day in British journalism." Well my heart dropped and it was a really mean time.
I then did get a taxi over to the mainland but couldn't book into a hotel because my name was all over the front of the paper and they were looking for me. The poor guy at Reuters had his room raided and they found one of my prints on his transmitter. It said Ken Lennox in the bottom of it. And they arrested the guy and put him in jail. Despite his protestations they thought he was Ken Lennox and they put him in a jail and held him there and the Americans get really upset if one of their people have been held for taking a photograph of, so he was freed and flown to Miami where he was treated like a long lost hero coming home. Meanwhile I was dodging about on the main island with a suitcase, which eventually I buried in the sand and sort of walked about. I'd have been fairly obviously walking about with a suitcase and a bag full of cameras. I went to a local agency and this little Scots lady - I think her name was Kerr said "Oh Mr. Lennox. I have been told by the police to, the minute you come into the office to phone them and tell them you're here. I'll give you five minutes start" she said. So I disappeared again and eventually caught a flight directly back to the States. But back in London Lloyd Turner, the late Lloyd Turner who died just recently was fired at eleven o'clock in the morning by the proprietor but he was reinstated early in the afternoon. Oh there was a huge fuss in London.
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