A Question Of Honour: A Harry Royle Thriller
Read A Question Of Honour: A Harry Royle Thriller Online
Authors: PR Hilton
Preface
Harry Royle didn’t simply spring fully formed from my imagination, he is in fact based on a real person.The man behind the fiction is my late father. He was the classic wronged man, who having made a mistake turned to a life of crime and in the process became a notorious jailbreaker. In 1951, he was Britain’s most wanted man, having escaped from Dartmoor prison and his face made the Front-Pages of the national press. In 1954, his story was serialised over a five-week period in The Sunday People newspaper. He was picked up from the gates of Dartmoor prison by the most famous crime reporter of the time, Duncan Webb. Many of his character traits are to be found in Harry Royle, his strict moral code of honour, his tenacity and strength of will are there, so too is his open-handed kindness for those in need of a helping hand. His sense of humour is there as well. The man was no saint, but at heart he was a good man who took a wrong path.
However, one character does not make a book. When it comes to writing a novel, like the Harry Royle books, one thing becomes clear early on, fiction is all well and good, but fiction is nothing unless it is backed up by cold hard facts. Research is the key to writing a believable story which is set in the past. In the beginning, all I had to go on was the fact that the stories would be set during wartime, and that I wanted them to reflect some real-life events, like an echo of reality, but my own version. One thing I knew from the beginning was that I wanted to represent life during the period as it was and not how modern history has offered it to us, all neat and tidy, inhabited by the correct kind of people. During the past twenty years more genuine information has come to light offering us a great many new insights into the real wartime world, beyond the official government sponsored versions previously available. For example the hidden history of all those who served either in the forces or on the Home Front during wartime, but were left out of history because of the colour of their skin.
Different times call for different views. Writing a story set over seventy years ago has its problems for a modern author. For me, the biggest hurdle was putting the truth of the fiction ahead of my own modern viewpoint. I like to think that over the years since those times, we have come a long way in our views and attitudes, as a modern society that is. For example as a modern man, I consider my marriage to be truly equal. My wife, Raine and I both work and both share the household chores. We both do school runs and shopping, ironing and washing and pull together in everything. Our parents generation were a very different breed. I cook most of the meals. My father only went into the kitchen if he felt like it and never to cook a full meal, as he considered that to be woman’s work, like washing and cleaning and shopping. He would fry up his homemade potato fritters, or make African foods because my mother was nervous about what to do with such exotic items. But the staple diet was my mother’s place, as was paying the bills and looking after the children. And my childhood was during the 1960s - 1970s, years after the war. By these times, people like my parents were becoming more progressive in their thinking, but equality was still a long Way off. As an author, my intent is to capture the flavour of the period, with its unfairness and non-political correctness, instead of presenting a modern sanitised version of a past that never was. My purpose is not to rewrite history, but instead to reflect a truer version of it. Beyond this, of course, is the fact that it is a work of fiction. None of the characters are a reflection of my attitudes on a personal level. In the end it is simply a work of fiction and any faults, failings or mistakes are my own.
During my own journey, I have spoken to and corresponded with ex-police officers, the chairman of Hiatt Handcuffs, numerous library staff across the country, the staff at the National Archives and an archivist from New Scotland Yard and retired prison officers and staff. I have visited Manchester’s Police Museum and Dartmoor’s prison museum and have seen the barren moorland beyond. I have sat and listened to firsthand accounts of those who experienced such events as The York Blitz. I have walked the same streets when I could and have attempted to put myself in Harry Royle’s mindset.
I have read over a hundred and fifty books, covering pre-war, wartime, and criminality from both the police/prison system, as well as the criminal/gangster’s own accounts of those times. In addition to the books, I have also studied maps and guidebooks of the period.
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank my wife, Raine Hilton, whose crystal clear literary intelligence and sharp eye for detail, saved the day on too many occasions to mention. A fierce editor, a stalwart companion and the one person who has contributed more than even she realises in the creation of this book.
You believed in me. Thank you. I always remain your greatest fan.
This book could never have been written without the kind help and generous contribution of the following people who were so willing to give their time, effort and memories for the project.
Thank you to Sandra Botterill for many strange phone calls and for coming up with the characters of Vera and Charlie and their York episode. Also for so many insights into The City of York and those times gone by, but still remembered. Harry Botterill for a thrilling afternoon spent listening to a first-hand account of the York Blitz of 1942. Also for memories of the railways during wartime. Cleland Thom for making a writer out of a dreamer. Maggie Bird at the Metropolitan Police archive Scotland Yard. Who searched miles of files for me and even checked The National Archives. Truly above and beyond the call of duty. Susi Rogel the editor of the London Police Pensioner Magazine, for placing an advert in the magazine on my behalf. Trevor James for providing cuttings, maps, photographs and personal insights into Dartmoor prison, the escapes and the surrounding area. Mr G.W.Cross Chairman of Hiatt Birmingham. For information on the handcuffs in use during the period of the book’s setting. Dave Tetlow, Museum Officer, Greater Manchester Police Museum. The staff of Dartmoor Prison Museum, for being helpful and informative, but most of all for first putting me in touch with a certain Trevor James. Staff at Central Library Manchester, York library. Westminster library. The National Newspaper Archive and UK Press Online.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental
A Question Of Honour Copyright © 2015 PR Hilton
All rights reserved.
Cover Design by Angie Alaya
Published by Good Vibes Press
The right of PR Hilton to be identified as author of this Work has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in retrieval system, copied in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise transmitted without written permission from the publisher. You must not circulate this book in any format.
Visit the author online at www.prhilton.co.uk to sign up for his newsletter and to find out more information.
Coming soon in the Harry Royle Series - A Code of Conduct - A Mission Too Far
For Raine.
Chapter 1
Guards Depot, Pirbright, Surrey
October 1938
Harry Royle raised himself up from the wet mud on his elbows and barked a staccato order to his men.
"Keep going lads and try not to fall on your arses."
Like me, he added in his mind. None of the young men around him so much as smiled at the prone sergeant in the mud. Harry stood and brushed himself down. Royle stood six foot two and was of a wiry build. He had finely chiselled features that were just this side of gaunt. His eyes were blue-grey. He had big hands that were as strong as his shoulders were straight. Here was a man, his demeanour honed on the regimental parade grounds of the Coldstream Guards.
It was a wet day, and the mud was proving to be very hard going. The rain had been battering at the ground for days, a relentless barrage. It seemed to the men that nature herself was lending a hand in equipping them for the rigours of active service. Royle felt a pat on his shoulder and caught the grin of his Corporal and friend Ginger Bates. The man rallied the men and set off at a trot, as Harry adjusted his pack, in readiness for catching up to the others, who were now moving ahead at a quick pace.
Harry Royle smiled to himself. The smile linked to a very private joke. A joke he didn't see himself sharing with anyone, certainly not with Ginger. Harry had wanted to get away from home and the drudgery of the grocer's delivery bike. He'd seen the recruiting posters, all offering escape and adventure. He had decided on joining the Coldstream Guards and here came the punch line.
He had only ever heard of one type of Guards and that was the Coastguard. And so he thought larking around on boats would be good for a laugh. So the young Harry Royle had signed on the dotted line on that wet Thursday in 1934, only to find himself in the number one drill regiment in the British army. Fine joke. Still he had soldiered well and now three years on he was a sergeant and enjoying the life. He knew he had the respect of the men and was good at both discipline and initiative. Looking down at his battledress, he cursed at the mud and the day, as he spat to get rid of the taste of muddy water from his mouth. He knew that after falling in the mud, he would have to show his lads something special. Otherwise, things could easily start to slip. It was odd, discipline was like a wisp of smoke, you couldn't pin it down, could never be certain of what direction it would go in. You could be hard and break men, force them to obey and follow, like so many sheep. You could ask and cajole, but still be despised for your trouble. Or, like Harry, you could set an example, treat the men well, but not take any nonsense from them. Royle never asked a man to do anything; he wouldn't do. He played fair. At the same time if a man deserved a slap, he would get one. Royle wasn't soft, and the men serving under him knew where they stood and because of this, were known to be very loyal to him.
The rest of the exercise played out as expected and an hour later, the small group of mostly tired men made their way back to camp. As they neared the compound, a man waved at Harry and shouted across the stretched barbed wire, which encircled the ‘report to the gatepost' wooden sign.
"Harry, The Colonel wants to see you. You're to report straight away."
Harry arched an eyebrow, as he came close to the other man, but received shrugged shoulders in response. Leaving his men, he quickly crossed the parade ground and dragging his fingers through his messy hair in an attempt to straighten it out, headed toward the CO's office. Waved in by the junior officer in the outer office, Harry walked smartly in and snapped a salute at the man seated behind the wooden desk. Looking up the other man returned the salute.
"Royle, good to see you. Don't worry about the mud, nature of our business, mud, blood and guts. Now to business of a different sort. I've been watching you these past six months and have noticed that both the men, as well as your senior officers like and respect you. In short you're popular and for the right reasons. In fact telling you what I am about to tell you is something of a double-edged sword because I really hate to lose you. Don't worry Royle, you can tell your eyebrows it is safe to stand at ease. I'm not sacking you, I'm promoting you."
With this, the older man laughed and clapped a good-natured fleshy hand on Harry's shoulder.
