D-DAY 65th anniversary

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Members of the Royal Family who are unable to make it to the Memorial event in Normandy would be very welcome instead to visit Reigate, Surrey where the D-Day landings were masterminded in utmost secrecy by Montgomery and his team! Perhaps the President of France didn't realise this when he was planning his own celebrations for 6th June this coming weekend.

It's such an exciting international story including the top-secret bunker mined deep into Reigate Hill via the old chalk quarry. I wouldn't be a bit surprised if Churchill had first thought of it on one of his many visits, decades beforehand. I was up there this morning on a beautiful sunny June day and really, the view southwards across Surrey and Sussex towards France is fantastic. There are many links with the Royal Family in the town's history too, and this new research is all ready to be revealed.

So in the absence of any huge publishing deals, exclusive broadcasting rights and general razamatazz, I shall be giving an illustrated talk about "Churchill's Secret Reigate" on Sunday 15th November at 2pm for the Churchill Fellows Association (Surrey and W Sussex region) at the hotel which is right beside the chalk quarry and Monty's Battle HQ - I have copies of the War Office drawings with that very title BATTLE HQ to prove it.

The location is highly accessible - on the A217 just half a mile south of Junction 8 on the M25.

Churchill Fellows are invited to reserve a place for themselves and their named guests.
Tel: 01737 217013
Email: grace[at]relax-well.co.uk.
No Press please.

Do book early to avoid disappointment. There will be several treasured artefacts on display and key people to meet.

I shall be giving this talk free of charge, so it will be an opportunity for you to make a donation towards the research expenses and CHASE children's hospice.

A really big secret

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If you have ever had this magnificent silver cup sitting on your mantelpiece, then either you are in the Board Room of Reigate Grammar School or you were awarded it one year. It's the Mitchiner Cup.

And who was Mitchiner? Well he was a 'notable' Old Reigatian - a star pupil, a top consulting surgeon, a Major-General in the Territorial Army, Honorary Surgeon to George VI and Elizabeth 2 and a lot more besides - until his early death aged 64 in 1952. And the rest of the story is a secret. I am offering to tell people about this 'funny little man' - the methods and medicines that he used with such great success and taught many a student doctor in his time - the lives he saved, secretly, and the confidences he kept, secretly and forever. This was all in the days before methicillin (of MRSA fame) was discovered, just down the road in the village of Betchworth. We are so lucky that there are still a few of his former students still alive who remember him personally, and with such affection and respect.

Great tales!

My presentation is called Bowels & Bullets so if you are interested, do please get in touch. The number is 01737 217013. You would think a huge charitable organisation like the Wellcome Trust would jump at the chance to highlight the lifetime's work of this great chap, but no - they even expected to find it freely available on the internet! No fear. I wasn't born yesterday!

This is what people are saying:

Age Concern: "they loved your talk and were talking about it"

"they would like another talk"

"most impressive slideshow"

Private View: "I am inspired"

"I can hardly wait to tell my daughter all about it this evening"

"It was very nice to have a reminder of the connecting themes"

"Fascinating - definitely makes you think!"