The autograph

For those who would otherwise not be interested, this is not about football.

In 1957, the man widely recognised as the world’s best footballer was Welshman, John Charles. 1957 was the year Leeds United sold him to Juventus for a world record transfer fee of £65,000. It was also the year that I did my ink drawing of John Charles. As is the case with all show-offs I took my drawing to school to show to my pals. One of them, whose name was Joe, told me he knew John Charles as he had him on his paper round. This was absolutely believable as, back in those days, the big soccer stars weren’t earning  vast sums of money and it was common knowledge that the great Mr Charles lived in a modest semi -detached, not far from Elland Road ground.

Joe offered, for a modest fee of one shilling (5p),  to show the drawing to John Charles and get him to sign it. I agreed to the deal and handed my drawing over to Joe. The next morning my drawing was returned, duly autographed by John Charles. I handed over my shilling and wasted no time in getting the drawing framed. For the next 35 years the treasured, signed drawing travelled with me to my various abodes then, in 1992, I was engaged by the famous darts commentator, Sid Waddell, to give an after-dinner speech at a sportsman’s dinner in Cleckheaton.

Being the guest speaker, I was at the top table, as was Sid Waddell and various other sporting luminaries. I was a bit taken aback to see the great John Charles, the biggest sporting luminary in the room by a mile, sitting at a table as a mere guest. Not an honoured guest, just one of the lads.  I mentioned this to Sid who told me that John didn’t like having a fuss made over him. I got to my feet to make my speech and was overjoyed to see my hero laughing along with everyone else. So  I, in my own small way, was entertaining the great man as he’d entertained me and  millions of others over the years.

After the dinner I  made my way over to speak to him. He told me how much he’d enjoyed my speech, (which was nothing more erudite than a comic turn). I  thanked him for all the entertainment he’d given me as a Leeds United fan all those years ago. I also took the opportunity to get him to sign a menu for me ― to my certain knowledge only the second autograph I had ever sought in my life― the first one also being that of John Charles on my drawing.

The following morning, curious to see how John Charles’ signature had changed over the years, I compared the one on the menu to the one on my drawing. The signature hadn’t  just changed. It was more than obvious that the two signatures couldn’t possibly have been done by the same hand no matter how many years separated them. My pal Joe had forged the great man’s signature!

I can only surmise what happened when Joe knocked on John Charles’s door, (which I’m sure he did). I can only assume that the great man was out and that Joe, not wishing to disappoint me, had autographed the drawing himself, so as not to disappoint me. (This theory might be more acceptable had Joe declined my payment of a shilling). However , my ignorance of Joe’s crime gave me 35 years of pleasure every time I looked at the signed drawing.

 In other words, not all lies are harmful, but if ever I see Joe again I want my shilling back!

My arrival, the war, Mam and Dad

When I was about a month old the Germans decided to bomb me. This should give you an idea of how ancient I am.  Physically I’m middle-aged, mentally I’m about 14, biblically I’ve outstayed my time here on Earth. I plan on staying here for another thirty years, after which I’ll review my situation.

Apart from the time I was born the  Luftwaffe didn’t bomb Leeds much. They bombed the street next to us but I wasn’t home at the time ― I was still  in Leeds maternity  hospital having been the innocent  cause of a difficult birth. My mother, God bless her, never really held this against me, despite her developing an ailment that caused  her to have all her teeth out. If heard this once I heard it a hundred times:

‘When I had you I had to have all my teeth out.’

It was Mam’s way of scolding me when I was naughty. It was a designed to make me feel guilty but all it did was to give me a distorted notion of how children were born. My best pal, Roy Morley, tried to explain it to me once but his version (also wrong) was less plausible than mine so we agreed that I was correct.

My dad went off to France on D-Day in a ship called The Princess Portia. He’d never been abroad before and his first visit was one to remember.  Allied battle ships were standing offshore, firing their guns over my dad’s head at the German positions. He was transferred on to landing craft and  struggled on to the beach where he  was ordered to dig himself in. My dad, being in the building trade, reckons he dug the deepest trench on Sword Beach.

He was a signaller whose job was to establish an OP (Observation Post) and direct British gunfire on to the German positions.  I discovered later that it was one of the more dangerous jobs with him always having to take up a forward position, but he never claimed to be a hero, just a bloke doing as he was told. He came home with a row of medals and rarely said a word about the war. It was the way men coped back then. Just before he died he and I spent a lot of time together when he unloaded a great crop of war stories that I’d never heard. My favourite stories being the ones about his time with a commando regiment which had all but been wiped out and my dad drew one of the short straws which  determined which men from his regiment (The Polar Bears) should reinforce them. On his last day with the commandos he’d been ordered to run a wire up to an OP on the top of a ridge. Such was the intensity of gunfire that, halfway up to the ridge, my dad took shelter beneath a burnt-out tank and got his head down. He hadn't slept for a couple of days and, despite the noise and mayhem all around him, he nodded off and woke up many hours later to an eerie silence. He crawled out from under the tank to find the commandos had gone, and so had the Germans, leaving my dad on his own. He had a rough idea where his old regiment was so he set off walking and found them several hours later. He walked into camp and no one asked any questions. They had enough to think about without listening to my dad’s story. He just picked up where he’d left off, whatever that was.

I  have a memory of the war. I remember my mam sitting on the arm of a chair, looking out of the window and crying. I asked her why she was crying and she told me to go and get Mrs Morley, which I did.  I went over to Roy Morley’s house and told Mrs Morley that my mam was crying and would she go over. That’s it. That’s my memory.  It was a memory that had stuck with me and one day I asked my mam if she remembered the time she was crying and sent me to get Mrs  Morley. She said she did and told me why.

The Germans had a propagandist ― an Englishman called William Joyce. He  made frequent broadcasts that could be picked up on British radios. Apparently we were advised never to tune in, but many did. The broadcast always began with this man’s strange voice saying, ‘Gairmany calling, Gairmany calling.’ He was known as Lord Haw Haw.

On this day my mam had been listening when Lord Haw Haw announced that the Polar Bear Regiment had been completely wiped out at Arnhem. Although my mam knew that most of what this man said was lies she also knew that some of his stuff was true. This was the nastiness of all such propaganda. The idea was to destroy morale. For days and weeks after that my mam jumped every time there was a knock on the door in case it was a man from the War Office or perhaps a telegraph boy delivering bad news. It was many weeks before she  got a standard communication dated after the propaganda broadcast, telling her that my dad was alive and well.  After the war Lord Haw Haw was hanged for treason and serve him right for giving my mam such a hard time.

During the war my mam had to put up with all  this stuff plus looking after three young children plus being forced to look after two women lodgers doing war work in a nearby factory. She also had a job as a school dinner lady. My dad always reckoned she was the real war hero in the family. It kind of puts things in perspective when you think you’re having a hard time.

Web: http://www.kenmccoy.co.uk/ 

Email: ken@kenmccoy.co.uk

Twitter: @therealkenmccoy