Curfew ends prom parade

‘The 10:30 p.m curfew is most effective along the front. Last night between 10:30 and 11 o’clock I counted two naval officers, one private, one mother and son, and a white bull terrier. That was all. The night porter at my hotel ruefully told me that last year there were 152 people staying at this hotel. Yesterday there were 12. In peace time, he said, even at Easter, there would have been 400 or 500 couples sleeping on the beach near the Palace Pier.’ This is from an article in the Daily Mail by Charles Graves published on this day in 1941. Graves, a London based reporter, ran a regular column during the war years (inc. during the Blitz) called I See Life, mostly about life in the city, but occasionally he travelled further afield. 

A very interesting and largely forgotten writer, Graves was born in London in 1899, son of the Anglo-Irish poet and songwriter Alfred Perceval Graves. One of his brothers, a literary writer, Robert, would become famous, notably for The White Goddess. Charles was educated at Charterhouse, and then joined the Royal Fusiliers but was still in training at the time of the WWI Armistice. He studied at St John’s College, Oxford University, and joined the staff of the Evening News as a reporter. Soon he was also the paper’s theatre critic, a line of work that enabled him to engage with London’s high society. He moved on, to the Sunday Express, where he worked variously as columnist, news editor and feature writer. In 1927, he switched again, this time to be a columnist with the Daily Mail.

During WW2, he continued to write for the paper but also to socialise - he was out at restaurants and the theatre whenever possible. He was an active participant in the Home Guard, and he wrote and read propaganda scripts for the BBC. In addition, he spent time at RAF bases and with RAF personnel so as to write novels - such as The Thin Blue Line and The Avengers - promoting the armed services.

Among Graves’ many books (more than 50) are four diaries from the war years. They are of particular interest because they include much detail about Graves’ Home Guard activities. Personal writing about the Home Guard was specifically made illegal (for security reasons). In 2011, Viking published a book called The Real ‘Dad’s Army’ - The War Diaries of Lt.Col. Rodney Foster with great fanfare claiming it was the first such Home Guard diary to be published. But the long-since forgotten diaries by Charles Graves should claim that distinction.

Here, though, after a trip to Brighton, is the piece Graves published in his I See Life column on 14 April 1941. (Photo credits: National Portrait Gallery website, and a screenshot of an I See Life piece from Alamy Images.)

Curfew Ends Prom Parade

‘This has been a strange weekend for Brighton. Never since the days of the Regency have there been so few visitors. The ban on Brighton as a pleasure resort, together with the 10:30 p.m. curfew, has had marked results.

It is true that when I entered the town on Thursday nobody asked me for any pass. 

On the other hand, I was twice stopped when in a motor-coach on Friday and Saturday by policemen who asked for my identity cards and response for being in the neighbourhood.

On the second occasion I was returning to Brighton from Lewes and the sergeant informed me that if had not possessed valid reasons (in writing) for my presence I would have been taken off the motor-coach, sent back to Lewes, and returned in disgrace to London - with my suit-case still in Brighton.

The 10:30 p.m curfew is most effective along the front. Last night between 10:30 and 11 o’clock I counted two naval officers, one private, one mother and son, and a white bull terrier. That was all. The night porter at my hotel ruefully told me that last year there were 152 people staying at this hotel. Yesterday there were 12. In peace time, he said, even at Easter, there would have been 400 or 500 couples sleeping on the beach near the Palace Pier.

Another effect of the ban is that the enterprise of the touts for the motor-coach rides is accentuated. They all tell you pleadingly that their particular excursion goes through far the loveliest scenery of Sussex, and that though the price of 3s, it is worth every penny of 4s or even more.’