FULL MONTY
A famous ieldmarshal visits
Monty praised New Zealanders and the war service of both men and women, including the women at home, and told the Opera House audience he was authorising a school holiday for all Palmerston North children on the following Monday.
Palmerston North’s inner city seethed with excited people, cramming The Square and lining the streets around it. They were waiting to see a living legend: War hero Fieldmarshal Bernard Law Montgomery, 1st Viscount Montgomery of Alamein, KG, GCB, DSO, PC, DL – one of the most-decorated soldiers of World War II.
Despite his impressive title, he was just ‘‘Monty’’ to ordinary people everywhere.
His major feat was leading the British 8th Army to victory over the Germans and Italians at El Alamein in Northern Egypt in November 1942 – a major, decisive battle.
Winston Churchill had declared: ‘‘Before Alamein we never had a victory. After Alamein we never had a defeat.’’
Tough, somewhat eccentric, slightly built and with piercing pale blue eyes, Lord Montgomery always wore the trademark black beret of his men, rather than an officer’s cap.
It was rumoured he got his nickname from his habit of eating a full English breakfast – a ‘‘full monty’’ – every morning on campaign, although other gossip said he didn’t like bacon, eggs, fish or pork.
Monty, now 59, was visiting New Zealand from July 17-31, to confer with the Government on defence matters. Staff-sergeant AE Wemborne, officially a personal clerk, but in fact a ciphers expert, accompanied him.
The Manawatu¯ Times told its readers: ‘‘Wherever Monty makes his headquarters, sheafs of cablegrams arrive during the day. It is the duty of Staffsergeant Wemborne to decipher them.’’ Monty never scheduled any public appearances after 6pm. Instead, he attended to business, sending replies to London.
The young Bernard Law Montgomery had grown up in a strict, religious family. His father Henry was an Anglican bishop, and his strong-willed mother Maud, a bishop’s daughter.
Their son, when old enough, trained at Sandhurst Military Academy and rose up the ranks, distinguishing himself despite injury in World War I.
In 1927, he married Elizabeth (Betty) Carver, a war widow, and they had a son, David. It was a happy marriage, but Betty died unexpectedly in 1937 from an insect bite that turned septic.
Now, in the Palmerston North Square, in the gathering dusk, the crowd shifted restlessly.
Their hero’s car had been expected at 5pm, via Rangitı¯kei St. He was late.
Just before he appeared, young Muriel Stephenson, of Featherston St, who worked for Beggs’ music store, stepped out of an upstairs window on to a verandah, caught her foot in a skylight and came crashing down on the footpath. She was taken to hospital, but ‘‘escaped with only slight injuries and was able to go home’’.
At last, Monty arrived to deafening cheers. He was wearing his greatcoat and famous beret. The Times noted his car circled The Square and he saluted the war memorial, smiling and acknowledging the Arabic ‘‘Saidas’’ and ‘‘Eziak Effendis’’ drifting up to him from returned servicemen, as well as a few ‘‘Buona Seras’’.
During his brief stop in Bulls, the Bulls Town Board chairman, Rupert Mackay, had given Monty a souvenir, saying: ‘‘As this is the only place in the world where one obtains butter from Bulls, we have pleasure in presenting you with this [butter] sample. We are all interested in the town of Cowes in England and our citizens have already forwarded a food parcel there.’’
After circling The Square, it was off to the Opera House for the civic and services reception.
More crowds of people stood outside that building in the cold, listening to the City Silver Band playing the national anthem, the welcome and address by mayor Augustus Mansford, and speeches relayed through a loudspeaker.
Monty praised New Zealanders and the war service of both men and women, including the women at home, and told the Opera House audience he was authorising a school holiday for all Palmerston North children on the following Monday.
He added he’d ‘‘caught the mother and father of a cold’’ in the chilly South Island.
‘‘I don’t know what I would have done if some kind people had not given me some warm underwear – yes, pink underwear’’ he said, amid laughter. He pointed to the New Zealand-issue jersey he was wearing. ‘‘I wore one in the desert, and I was wearing a New Zealand jersey on Luneburg Heath the day I accepted the surrender of 200,000 Germans. That’s not bad, is it?’’
Next day, before the Field-marshal left the hotel where he was staying – the Majestic, in Fitzherbert Ave – he accepted a gift from Mr EJ Busst, of 96 Bryant St: A handmade, beautifully inlaid table featuring 20 different New Zealand woods. He told Busst and his teenage daughter Margaret that it would be carefully packed up and shipped to his country home in England.
Then, as quickly as he’d arrived, Monty was gone.
Seven years later, Meyrick Clifton James, actor, soldier and Montgomery look-alike, published his memoir. It detailed a five-week period in 1944 when he was recruited to impersonate the Fieldmarshal in a plan to confuse the Germans. Later, the story was made into a British movie.
Later still, Montgomery’s nickname ‘‘Monty’’ also became part of the name of the TV comedy series, Monty Python’s Flying Circus.
The ‘‘real’’ Monty died in 1976. His parting words that night in the Palmerston North Opera House still provide food for thought: ‘‘Be prepared... We went into the late war totally unprepared, we have entered other wars the same way, and the tragic thing is that we start and end wars with disasters. Thousands of young men and women lose their lives. When times of peace come, we should be prepared for it, if someone decides to start a roughhouse.’’