Ephraim Hardcastle

THE thomas Markle affair poses a tricky question for the heralds at the College of Arms as they design a royal standard for his daughter Meghan. What to put on her coat of arms? traditionally, a woman marrying in to the royal family has her own – Michael Middleton was given one before his daughter married William. It’s more complex for Mr Markle. As a us citizen, he must first petition the Queen to be granted one. But what symbols to include? Mr Middleton opted for three acorns – one for each of his children. since two of Mr Markle’s children haven’t been invited to the wedding and seem to be at war with the third, perhaps crash helmets might be appropriate. AS if Meghan Markle hasn’t enough embarrassing relatives, Channel 4’s documentary Meet The Markles has unearthed an eighth cousin Jeff Mudgett, the great, great, great grandson of HH Holmes, a serial killer hanged in Philadelphia in 1896. Worse, Mudgett claims that handwriting analysis and details from the Jack the Ripper murders suggest Holmes carried out the Whitechapel killings on a trip to London. BONFIRE of the Vanities author tom Wolfe, who has died aged 88, never disclosed who he modelled drunken UK journalist Peter Fallow on, encouraging speculation that it was Christopher Hitchens. Brilliant and thirsty Hitchens, who died aged 62 in 2011, was sure Fallow was fellow British journalist Anthony Haden Guest, sometimes known as ‘Ironman Nightlife Decathlete’. New York-based Haden-Guest, 81, a brother-in-law of actress Jamie Lee Curtis, is better known as Private Eye’s Anthony uninvited Guest. CLAD in a black leather jacket, short skirt and cowboy boots, TV’s Anne Robinson, lunching with Oldie proprietor James Pembroke at lawyer-infested Middle Temple Hall, approached judge Sir Brian Leveson. Did the presenter and journalist, pictured, discuss his controversial inquiry into the Press? She says: ‘No, I just talked to him about his dad, who was a famous psychiatrist in Liverpool. Lovely man, he tried to help me kick the booze. He didn’t succeed. I needed to be with other extreme cases at AA – people who had wrecked their lives.’ THE Rolling stones open their European tour at Dublin’s Croke Park tonight with hundreds of £165 tickets unsold. ‘It’s only rock and roll, so why pay too much for it?’ said the Irish times, adding: ‘It seems that fewer punters than expected will be spending the night together with the ageing rockers.’ FORMER Civil Service chief Lord Kerslake poses as a non-partisan crossbench peer but everyone at Westminster regards him as a Jeremy Corbyn ally. Now Labour MP John Grogan tells the Commons : ‘There is no civil servant closer to the Labour Party than Bob Kerslake.’ Shouldn’t he shift his backside to the Labour benches? IN February theresa May said she would end the ‘automatic entitlement to a peerage’. Does that include the speaker? John Bercow-hating MPs who wear badges with three Bs on them indicating that they’ve been ‘B ******* d By Bercow’ certainly hope so.