REVEALED: Churchill’s secret wartime letters to the Royal Albert Hall
RoyalAlbertHall.comPosted on Saturday 1 April 2023 by Rick Burin
WINSTON Churchill wanted to use Hitler’s lost testicle as a propaganda tool during the Second World War, papers released by the Royal Albert Hall have revealed.
Historians say that the newly-unearthed documents, dating from August 1940, cast new light on the war of information, showing how no stone was left unturned when it came to undermining the Nazis.
As the Battle of Britain raged, the British Prime Minister wrote to Ernest O’Follipar, then chief executive of the round London venue, asking whether it was true that – to paraphrase the famous wartime ditty – Hitler only had ‘one ball’ since ‘the other is in the Albert Hall’.
In a typically brusque missive, Churchill said:
(The famously hedonistic Chelsea Arts Balls were held at the Hall from 1908 to 1958, and attended by numerous luminaries of the period, including Alfred Hitchcock.)
After apparently scouring the venue for a sign of the missing marble, O’Follipar responded the same day by telegram:
This reply seemed to confound Churchill’s subordinates, who had apparently not been briefed by their boss. They still, however, had the courtesy to respond, with an aide to the Prime Minister writing:
On this document, O’Follipar appears to have drawn a little picture of a cat doing a dance, though this is not thought to have any wider significance.
Historians have described the memos – discovered as the Hall’s archive moved to a new custom-built space which will be open from October – as “revelatory”, “a major find” and “fairly interesting if they are genuine, which I doubt”.
Prof Bamwood Flex, author of World War Poo: The Lowbrow Humour of Our Finest Hour, said that in addition to illuminating our understanding of the propaganda machine, the papers showed the often overlooked relatability of Sir Winston Churchill.
Ernest O’Follipar served as the Hall’s chief executive from 1937 until the late ’60s. He notoriously wrote to the Beatles in 1967, demanding that they change the words to ‘A Day in the Life’ – which he said threatened to do catastrophic damage to the Hall’s reputation – and taking the liberty of suggesting some alternative lyrics to help sell tickets.
The Royal Albert Hall, located in a plum spot in South Kensington, is one of the country’s crown jewels. Churchill appeared at the venue 16 times between 1931 and 1959, but never publicly discussed that weird day when he misunderstood a stupid song and wasted our time.