The death of a friend is always a shock and the news of the passing of Les on 7th February 1992 is an event which has left all who knew him with a strong personal sense of loss. As the main architect for 30 years of all that we enjoy in the MOC today his death marks the end of an extraordinary era in which his vision and policies put the Messerschmitt way out in front as the micro car to restore and own and the MOC as the Club to join.
Les’s long and distinguished editorship of Kabinews was only part of his unique contribution to MOC affairs but when in January 1989 he handed this task over to Colin Hooper most of us sensed that his dedicated service to the Club was moving to a close. Hopes of a ‘Les Tilbury Column’ were sadly not fulfilled and now that the final break has come his loss at the age of 77 leaves schmitters with a special kind of sadness.
An Obituary should paint a finished picture and I should state that after Les had made a good recovery from his stroke in 1985 I gently broached the subject that, assuming I was still around, the responsibility for writing his might one day fall to me. Mike Kensdale subsequently formalised the matter by raising it at the NEG. Because he was a realist Les took all this in his stride and gave me many details about his life knowing they would one day appear in print. None of us knew Les as a younger person when he played the central role in other organisations so to help set that part of his long life into the context of his Club years I headed for Maldon in Essex to see his old friends lt1illiam (Bill) and Joyce (Joy) Ginn. The
relaxed chat with Bill and Joy, in which they recalled happy times with Les and May, and with Joy’s late husband Len Brett, another great friend of Les, helped bring to light how Les’s superb skills as a communicator and organiser were acquired and honed to the brilliance from which we as a Club were later
to benefit so substantially.
I should also like to thank Gill Brown, Les’s daughter, for allowing Alan Marriott and I access to Les’s papers which revealed the prodigious output and staggering range of his activities as a writer going back to 1930. Like all the family, Gill is a schmitter and took over Les’s KR 200 in 1990 and
intends to be out on the road again soon.
Leslie Walter Tilbury was born at Brentwood, Essex, just after the outbreak of the First World War on 26th September 1914, into what he used to describe as ‘an ordinary Essex working class family’. If you look at old issues of Kabinews you will find Us referred to it in these terms on more than one occasion. Although I never argued with him on the subject, when I asked about his early childhood some of his reminiscences rather indicated that it was not quite as ordinary as all that. Les’s father sent him to a private boy’s school where the fees were £6 per term, and had his own business as a tailor some of whose clients would today be described as ‘upmarket’. He made clothes for local business people and the horse riding fraternity, such as jodhpurs. Bill Ginn recalled having some outfit’s made by Mr. Tilbury that were so good they simply never wore out. tiThe quality was such that you eventually became fed up with wearing them all the time and just threw them out” remembered Bill.
In 1920, when Les was almost 6 years old, an event occurred the consequences of which stayed with him throughout his life and must have had at least some bearing on the formation of his character. Those who never met Les and anyone who knew him only through telephone cal1~probab1y from overseas, will most likely be unaware he was partially disabled. Joy Ginn recalled “it was serious, but it never stopped him doing what he wanted”. Without making a drama of it Les made it clear in a long talk I had with him at Frating Green on 14th January 1989 that what had happened to him 70 years earlier could well have saved his life in view of subsequent world events. I shall return to this point below.
Near the Tilbury home at 126, Ongar Road, Brentwood, there stood an enormous weeping willow tree. One unlucky day young Les had a go at climbing and when only four feet up fell heavily on his left elbow. Some other kids brought him home and a doctor was called who diagnosed ‘more than an average fracture’. Joy Ginn told me it was actually a compound greenstick fractLU’e and added that the doctor announced “we shall have to amputate”. To their credit Les’s parents would not give their consent. For weeks and weeks no pulse could be felt and the arm went, in Les’s words, “like a lump of wood”. A primitive form of electrical treatment was applied and gradually some feeling returned. As all movement of the fingers was lost Les’s father was worried and took him to Harley Street in London (then as now a centre for Britain’s top medical brains – treatment there must have cost the family quite a lot) where he was seen by a specialist, Dr. Elmsleigh, necessitating Les staying during 1921-22 with an aunt while treatment was given. Dr. Elmsleigh prescribed a special aluminium adjustable splint. This was intended to pull the left hand back to the normal position but for Les it was torture as his hand always wanted to return to the bent position in which it had become set. After a miserable year of little progress Les was returned to the local doctor at Brentwood who recommended a new heat treatment twice weekly then becoming available at Brentwood cottage Hospital. But it also failed to bring the hand back into position and, discouraged, the family eventually had to give up the therapy. There was some improvement years later however, as movement of the fingers gradually returned when Les stopped growing. He had by then resigned himself to a permanently damaged left hand.
All this disruption can hardly have helped Les’s education and Bill Ginn believes that elder brother Joe, who became an architect, had a larger share of the resources the family could provide. Les never seemed to resent this according to Bill, and with the sole exception of his swimming pool at Frating Green, followed a consistently modest life-style.
Leaving school at age 15 Les found a job at 75pence per week with a firm of wholesale chemists known as Dakin’s where the conditions were, as he described them, ‘Dickensian’. This did not last long however and the year 1930 saw Les drawing the dole for a while before landing a temporary job as a junior clerk on £1 per week with the London office of the shipping line, Reardon Smith’s. He must have made a good impression because he became a member of the permaned staff and the salary gradually climbed to £1.75 by the time he reached age 21. Then one day Les was annoyed to discover that the young lady he dictated letters to was receiving all of £3 per week!
Les was always to seek fulfillment outside work and it was also in 1930 that he took the first steps which eventually led to the remarkable impact he was later to make on the Messerschmitt Owners’ Club. At age 16 he formed the ‘Tilbolian Press Club’. To do this he placed advertisements appealing for people interested in a discussion group to contact him. One of those who did so was Bill Ginn. “Les replied saying he would write again when he was ready to start. He did and that was how we got to know each other. Len Brett and I met at his home and Les would edit material from our discussions and publish the magazine, a complete set of which has survived at Frating Green. At one time we even went to Bristol on a cheap rail excursion to meet people for discussions there. They formed a branch of the Club and there was another one at Chadwell Heath” recalled Bill.
Bill described how Les developed these early writing activities until he eventually began a weekly column for the Braintree & Witham Times and was able to supplement his income as a freelance journalist. The column had the title ‘Beacon Hill Bulletin’ and ran for 20 years. ‘Les wrote on everything to do with Essex. He was a member of Essex Archaeological Society right up until his death. This gave him access to their library which assisted him with material for his weekly articles. Many of them described the different churches allover Essex, were well-researched and are still remembered today” declared Bill. This view was endorsed by Neville Bonner who recalled the 2 articles with obvious pleasure. Other newspapers Les contributed to were
the Maldon & Burnham Standard and the Brentwood Gazette. “Les had the job of reporting all Parish Council meetings in the area and became well known throughout Essex for his accurate work” Bill told me. Les had been living in Brentwood and then in 1936, about the time he left his job in London with the shipping line, he spotted a cottage to let for 32 pence per week at Wickham Bishops and persuaded Len Brett and Bill Ginn to move in with him and share the expenses. “We named the cottage’ Brave New World’after Aldous Huxley’s novel” Bill remembered. Then one rainy day in 1937 Les noticed two nice young ladies sheltering under some trees and invited them in out of the rain. One was May Gerber, a London girl of German extraction.
Less than two years later on 8th July in the fateful Summer of 1939 Les and May were married. Over to Bill Ginn~ “May had an extraordinarjJ]y beneficial influence on Les, almost to the extent where he became a different person. He saved money and got together £100 using all of it to furnish their home of the next 40 years at Eleanor’s Cottage, Little Braxted, where Gillian and Martin were brought up. Les and May were to have a happy marriage and Les never seemed quite the same following her death in the Autumn of 1979 not
long after they moved to Frating Green. But the outbreak of war in September 1939 saw the commencement of the worst period in the world’s history. Lives were turned upside down and no family in Europe remained untouched. In preparation for war with Germany the Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain, took the decision on 27th April 1939 to introduce conscription of men and in 1940 Les was ordered to appear before an Army Medical Board in nearby Chelmsford. When I asked him about this he recalled the exact words used to reject him for military service. “They took one look at my left hand and said, we shan’t be needing you, here’s five shillings expenses”. That was enough for a night out in those days and the same evening Les and May bought fish and chips and went to the pictures.
Les believed our quarrel was never with the German people, only the madmen in control, but he realised in 1940 that south east England would be the scene of heavy fighting if the expected invasion materialised. As an otherwise fit man and regular swimmer, and with the fighting on mainland Europe hotting up, Les was probably correct that the Army’s curt rejection of him had saved his life. With aerial combat already raging overhead it was time to make contingency plans and he therefore cashed in an insurance policy for £12 and
bought a Humber tandem for £10 from Southend-on-Sea. The Tilbury’s plan was simple. They reasoned that there would not be much they could do as unarmed civilians and would seek shelter further north until circumstances permitted a return to Essex. To do this they would shut Eleanor’s Cottage and head for the Great North Road on the tandem taking any food and cash they had with them. Although this was never necessary the tandem proved useful for basic wartime holidays and when Gill was borne they added on a little sidecar and took her along.
After leaving Reardon Smith’s Les joined Crittall’s, the Braintree-based window manufacturer in 1937 and remained with them for almost 40 years. Like all others the firm soon plunged into war work making window frames for airfield buildings and bomb-damage replacements. They also manufactured portable air strips for use in the desert. He worked at costing and later estimating, which would not even have begun to fully utilise his abilities, and for a while May also worked for the same firm before finding work she
enjoyed as a librarian at Witham library together with Joy. Eventually, in the late 1960’s the asset strippers, Slater, Walker Securities took the firm over, which did not please Les, who took early retirement in 1976. Bill Ginn was with Hoffmann’s, the bearings specialists at Chelmsford at the time and
obtained an interview for Les who then put in a further two years working in their sales office until finally ‘retiring’ and moving to Frating Green in 1978.
Because I had lived through the war and knew about the far reaching effects it had on all British people I asked Bill and Joy to provide a little more background to this subject in relation to Les’s life. Bill’s answer was clear and concise. “In addition to his writing there were three organisations at that time in which Les was active and influential. These were the MCA, the WEA and the Beacon Hill Sports Association based on Wickham Bishops Village Hall. The latter was an organising body for all sporting activities
and fixtures, but the other two had wider social and political implications and need explaining”. The MCA was the Maldon Constituency Association, formed to assist Tom Driberg, a far-left but not Labour Party candidate at what became a famous by-election in June 1942. Its historical significance is that it
was the forerunner of an international leftward swing which in Britain culminated in the election of a reforming Labour Government in 1945. Bill Ginn was active with Les in the MCA and reminded me about the wartime electoral truce, which meant that by-election candidates could only stand as Independents which was why MCA was formed as, technically at least, it was non-party. Les was pleased at Driberg’s success not only because he was pledged to alleviate the almost medieval poverty and privilege then endemic in Britain but also because he was a brilliant journalist whom even the right wing Daily Express employed. Les continued to actively support MCA until 1945 when Driberg joined the Labour Party and stood for them officially representing Maldon and later Barking right through until 1974. The highly controversial and widely reported private behaviour of Tom Driberg, which blighted his parliamentary caree~ bothered neither the Essex voters nor the Tilbury family who always welcomed him when he dropped in for tea at Eleanor’s Cottage. I asked Gill about those times. She remembered Tom Driberg with obvious affection and said “I grew up knowing him as Uncle Tom and always called him that”.
Just at that moment as we sifted through Les’s voluminous papers Alan Marriott handed me an old hard-backed book. It contained the wartime minutes of the MCA which Gill intends to donate to Witham Public Library for preservation. In the WEA Les was to playas central a role as he later did in the MOC. The Workers Educational Association is a venerable British institution, still active today, and provides courses for adults who have not benefited very much from state education. It is not really surprising that Les became involved because of his wish to do something practical about the need for social progress and political affiliation. With demobilisation there was an upsurge of interest at the end of the war which had made many ordinary people realise for the first time what they were capable of. At that point the WEA was expanding into Essex and appointed Les Tilbury Secretary/Organiser of its !,oIickham Bishops branch. His enthusiasm and ability made an indelible impression which is still remembered with admiration today. This was indeed
the ‘Brave New World’ when for a brief period economic and social prospects looked good for Britain. Apart from the work of organising classes and speakers Les was about to score one of his greatest achievements, which members can see for themselves today. The ‘Festival of Britain’ held in 1951 was intended to mark the end of austerity and demonstrate that better times were at last on the way. Up and down the land projects were launched to mark the occasion.
The WEA approached Lord Braintree who agreed to sponsor, in book form, ‘A Survey of an Essex Village’ and Wickham Bishops was selected. The research was carried out under the auspices of the University of Cambridge and the WEA and here is an extract from the book’s preface by Donald Brierley BSc.- ‘Leslie Tilbury, in addition to a host of other duties, has translated a mass of notes on two dozen complicated discussions into this book”. Those members wishing to read the book, which is a valuable social document, should ask their
Public Library to contact libraries in Essex where copies are known to have survived, particularly at Witham.
The scope of Les’s work with the Club and Messerschmitts is so vast that in other fields it would have brought him a knighthood. I can give but an outline here.
In the mid 1950’s Les needed a better means of travelling about than a bicycle and public transport and first acquired a BSA Dandy. These were 70cc two-speed lightweight scooters and as Les was no motorcycle or car buff he may have sought advice before buying. Gill thought he did not keep this for long before changing
4. to a BSA Bantam motorcycle. Despite his disability he coped reasonably well with two-wheeled transport and in 1958 moved on again this time to a turquoise blue 150cc ZUndapp Bella. These had larger sized wheels than the average scooter and Les must have been satisfied because he ran the Bella for some time until in 1961 he handed it over to son Martin and changed to a black and white 200cc model. This was quite a stylish choice and would have had a speed well up in the sixties. But he did not remain on two wheels for much longer. One day Les’s editor on the Braintree and Witham Times told him there was a Messerschmitt for sale at a dealer in Rayne Road, Braintree, known as Jake Hubbards, who Gill told me was a former racing motorcyclist. Les saw the point that it would be better and more significantly he liked the look of the schmitt and thought its steering bar and right hand gear change would suit his disability. Both Les and Bill
date this event as “early 1962” but because of her facility with dates I cannot ignore Gill’s opinion that it was actually late in 1961. Whatever the actual date Les bought the schmitt, which had 10,000 miles recorded and was two years old, making it most probably a 1959 KR 200, and named it’Blodwen’. Inside the cabin he found a membership application form for the L & SE Club and wasted no time in joining. Les took an active interest from the beginning and became Editor of Kabinews in November 1963 retaining
office until December 1988 with no issues missed for the entire quartercentury. The effect on the magazine was dramatic. Les was good at drawing (and also photography) and used this skill to good effect. But it was his flare for writing, with its free-flowing and entertaining style that really captured the membership at that stage of the L & SE’s development. With the ending of Messerschmitt production in june 1964 it was inevitable the character of the Club , would change and Les strongly advocated a hands-on style, which enabled a new style of Club dedicated to preserving schmitts to emerge.
The importance of Les and May allowing the use of the Kabinenrollerhaus at Little Braxted can never be over-estimated. Not only did this ensure the survival of hundreds of schmitts that would otherwise have been scrapped, it revitalised the, whole movement by bringing in new blood. One thinks of the ‘wet’ Rally of 1972 and the arrival on the scene of such able young men as Ian Andrews, Mark Smith, Ian Hopkins, Alan Forbes and many more who were all to play their various parts and still do. He was also adept at giving a role to those in other Clubs such as David Garner and Wynford Jones who made many of the early trips to Schweinfurt with pockets full of cash to save parts that otherwise would never have helped keep Messerschmitts on the road. The introduction of the spares service – later Partsmart – just as supplies through the manufacturers was drying up in 1969 was also a masterstroke. The unveiling of the Derek Cole Silencer in 1970 also pointed
the way forward for the Club to manufacture and source replacement parts.
Our cousins in Messerschmitt Club Deutschland have always acknowledged the key role of Les supplying copies of Kabinews in helping them to establish such a successful club. The increase of contacts with other members in overseas nations was always on his mind and perhaps that will be one of the tasks we could launch in his memory. Alan Marriott has already proposed a permanent memorial to Les and the form it should take will be considered soon.
At meetings I shall always remember the clear blue eyes and quicksilver mind of Les which so often produced the intellectual key to solving difficult problems. He had an instinctive comprehension of what was possible in a voluntary body and was unfailingly right, some times uncannily so. This was markedly noticeable in the run-up to the successful 1980 merger, which was also Les’s idea.
Whenever we chance upon a schmitt out on the road we should ask ourselves whether that one would still exist if it were not for Les Tilbury. And how many of those at the Rally would have survived if it were not for his vision?
P.B.
4.3.92.
