Sowerbutt's New Year's Eve

"New Year's Eve 1947 was one to remember, Jimmy always said. He and his lot made a fortune," the retired writer for the East London Pioneer, who still has the notebook from his early 1960s interview with Jimmy Sowerbutt, said. "London, at least, was starting to recover from the war and the society set were determined to celebrate in style. Four thousand of them packed into the Chelsea Arts Ball at the Royal Albert Hall, all in fancy dress. They'd made these huge floats for the witching hour, must have cost a fortune.
"Dipper Mark II and his boys and girls were there, a few outside and one or two inside in the cloakrooms and helping at the bars. They were careful, like. Money, compromising letters, packets of white powder - stuff that wouldn't reach the stoppers' ears. Over the next few weeks, society guys and girls were paying big money to get offending items back.
"From somewhere, Jimmy got a list of who was attending the Ball. Read like a Who's Who, he said. He and the lads borrowed a lorry and went visiting. Filled it up by the end of the night - paintings, furs, jewellery, small artworks, the odd antique, even a couple of gold ingots.
"Two things tickled Jimmy and the lads. The lack of security in the posh houses and the high and mighty were happy to buy their neighbours' and friends' stuff at knockdown prices. Redistribution of wealth, he called it."
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Sowerbutt's Business 3

Sowerbutt had chosen a table near a side wall in the Cafe de Paris to relax for an hour or so before the journey home. He had no wish to encourage small talk with any of the pampered party set and he was always happier with a wall behind him. Waving away the house champagne which he suspected was cheap Spanish white blown with gas, he sipped a pricey glass of Old Bushmills. He was pleased with the deal he had just reached with Martin Poulson, the maitre d’, swapping two cases of 1924 Chateau Latour for a large handful of notes. He smiled at the thought of their previous owner, a notorious socialite, paying an extortionate price at the club when he visited for a glass or three of his own wine. The silly bastard should have burglar-proofed his townhouse in Grosvenor Square long ago. The often-empty residence was asking to be knocked off. During his nocturnal visit, Sowerbutt had taken some notes of the wine cellar in case of further orders from his well-heeled clients.

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Sowerbutt's Police

"Not many people know that Jimmy set up his own police force," the retired writer for the East London Pioneer, who still has the notebook from his early 1960s interview with Jimmy Sowerbutt, said. "Not with uniforms or sergeants or anything. During the Blitz, he set up a security squad, headed by one of his young blokes, Missionary, to take care of any bombed out houses and keep an eye on strangers. Most of the stoppers had been called up, those remaining were the old blokes or reservists who didn't do much.
"He kept it going during the war with so many foreigners in the Smoke and then the Americans arrived.
"After the war, they started recruiting stoppers again. But they reckoned there were 20,000 deserters - or at least blokes who had left early - on the streets as well as all the young delinquents, kids without fathers.
"Stupid break-ins as well as assaults on women were the real problems and Jimmy wouldn't have his people touched.
"One gang tried it on in Jimmy's patch in '46. He had to put a couple of them in The River before they learnt their lesson and disappeared."
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Sowerbutt's Bargain

"Jimmy never took things too seriously. He always moved on if something went wrong," the retired writer for the East London Pioneer, who still has the notebook from his early 1960s interview with Jimmy Sowerbutt, said. "Like the time in January 1947 when he took a hundredweight of whalemeat for £80. Everything was short in that bitter winter, including meat. Thick snow everywhere and temperatures fell to minus 20 in Essex. The whalemeat was selling for 1/10 a pound so Jimmy thought he could double his money.
"A consignment had been landed at Tyneside and Jimmy had his hundredweight brought down to the Smoke by train - a few were still running. The government was worried about people starving in the big freeze and was pushing the whalemeat. Full of goodness and tasty, they said.
"Not what the housewives thought. Some tried it but only once. Too gamey, they said, the kids wouldn't touch it. I had a plateful at the time and it didn't feel right when you were eating it.
"Jimmy tried everything - two pounds for 2/6; tried calling it venison. He managed to sell a few pounds to some posh restaurant in the West End - God knows what they did with it.
"In the end, he gave most of it away to hospitals, old people's homes and some of the free kitchens that the churches were running."
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Sowerbutt's Scrapes

"Jimmy said he was always getting into scrapes doing odd jobs for the government," the retired writer for the East London Pioneer, who still has the notebook from his early 1960s interview with Jimmy Sowerbutt, said. "He said it was funny an East End lad helping out the toffs. It quietened down after the war with Mr Churchill and his mate, Mr Bracken, going into what they called Opposition. But Jimmy was called back to the colours towards the end of 1947.
"He didn't say much about it but an Eyetie high-up, Count Sforza, was visiting the Smoke to see the government blokes. Some place called Trieste was often in the newspapers. The blokes there wanted to go their own way or they didn't; always that sort of business after the war. The upshot was a group of these Trieste people were in the Smoke and were planning to shoot the Count. A merry old chase for Jimmy and the lads. A sniper in the building opposite his hotel, poisoned food and a bomb planted where the Count and the government people were having talks. He even met up with a lady they had worked with during the war. Funny name, Rosetta. Jimmy said you could write a book about it. But he never did, he was never strong with a pen and paper."
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Sowerbutt's Protection 2

"Jimmy and the lads were busy over the Bank Holiday in 1947," the retired writer for the East London Pioneer, who still has the notebook from his early 1960s interview with Jimmy Sowerbutt, said. "Instead of sunning themselves down at Clacton as they had planned, they were patrolling the streets, trying to dampen down any trouble.
"There were riots against the Jews that weekend across the country, some really nasty. A couple of army sergeants had been hanged in Palestine by the Jewish extremists and that did not sit well with a lot of people. Jimmy and some of the lads went over to Whitechapel and guarded Jack Shakes' tailor's shop. Jimmy wouldn't have his friends touched. He'd guarded the shop during the Battle of Cable Street, 11 years earlier. A couple of gangs who were daubing paint everywhere gave Jimmy some lip and got a good thrashing for their pains. Nobody tried it on after that.
"Spaghetti and a couple of lads went to Grosvenor Square where Jack's cousin's girl was running a posh millinery shop, selling Polly's hats. Nobody turned up there.
"One thing Jimmy was serious about - nobody touches his Family. That was the law of the streets in the East End in those days."
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Sowerbutt's Visit

"A visit he and the lads made to the Soviet Embassy school in Hampstead in '46 or '47 was a real caper, Sowerbutt told me," the retired writer for the East London Pioneer, who still has the notebook from his early 1960s interview with Jimmy Sowerbutt, said. "He'd had a few run-ins with the Reds during the war, so I think he enjoyed the job.
"The school was for the kids of the Embassy staff and all the Russki businessmen who flooded over after the war. He took a peterman with him, Captain Morgan, as they'd asked him to check a big safe there. Jimmy and Captain Morgan managed to open the safe without blowing it and they took all the papers. The lads searched the building and found an Aladdin's Cave behind the classrooms at the back. Black market stuff, ready to be shipped home. Spirits, cigarettes, tinned stuff - you name it. Tipper legged it to a nearby builder's yard and brought back a lorry. They loaded up and had disappeared by dawn.
"Jimmy got paid handsomely for the papers, the lorry-load was worth a fortune and the Russkis couldn't report the theft to the stoppers, could they? They all had alibis anyway and Tipper took the lorry back to the builder and squared him. A good bit of business and a punch on the nose for his old enemies."
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Colour-Lemon-Surrender-1940-ebook/dp/B008USR7FA