Harold Wilson and the Isles of Scilly

I am going to use this blog to reproduce a few stories I wrote about prim minister Harold Wilson and his love of the Isles of Scilly.   They were originally written for the now defunct Scilly Now and Then and possibly used as scripts for the former Radio Scilly.

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Harold Wilson builds his holiday home

After his first visit to the islands in 1952, Ernest Kay recalls in Pragmatic Premier   that Harold Wilson decided ‘he would build a holiday home of his own on St.Mary’s.  As soon as he went back to London he would ask the Duchy of Cornwall if they could find him a plot of land.  “We’ll have a bungalow – a Cornish prefab”, he said excitedly.  “We’ll call it Hugo’s Home”’, he said, presumably a play on Hugh Town. It took some years for the plan to come to fruition and the bungalow was given a different and arguably more suitable name.    At the suggestion of Harold Wilson’s sister Marjorie, it was called Lowenva, an old Cornish name meaning House of Happiness. In 1958 the Wilsons bought a small plot of land on the edge of Hugh Town for £200 from the Duchy. There they built a three-bedroom bungalow.    In his authorised biography, Philip Ziegler notes, ‘The rooms were poky, the architecture unambitious, but it was exactly what they wanted.’ ...
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Harold Wilson's love for the Isles of Scilly

In Easter 1978 I was staying at my parents’ home near Penzance and took my future wife for her first visit to the Scillies.   We had a reasonably smooth crossing on the Scillonian both ways.  Coming back the boat was not that busy as it was a week or so after the Easter holiday.   I was therefore quite puzzled when there was a delay getting off at Penzance.   When I got to the top of the stairs the reason became apparent.    Harold Wilson was there, accompanied by his golden labrador dog   Paddy.    He was shaking the hand of every passenger as they got off.    This was about two years after he had stopped being prime minister. What I should have noticed was that the Scillonian would have been flying the flag of Trinity House.   Wilson had been made an Honorary Elder Brother in 1967 and always flew the flag outside his bungalow when he was on St.Mary’s. Whether or not they agreed with his politics (and most...
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