The Restaurant On Old Street
(an excerpt from Harry Laughton’s book)

(Harry is my mother’s youngest sibling and Audrie & Frank are his children. David is Audrie’s husband.)

It was Sunday afternoon and the family was invited to the opening of the new sandwich bar. David and Audrie had been working for hours getting everything ready. Russell arrived about an hour before the family was expected to help out.

When he arrived he found David in the basement tidying up. Russell also smelled smoke and asked David about it. David’s response was that he had been burning some rubbish outside in the quadrangle behind the shop.

Outside the shop in the back was a very small quadrangle open to the elements but only accessible from my shop or the shop adjacent.

Russell & David surmised that the smoke in the basement came from the burning of the rubbish and carried on tidying up.

30 minutes later Russell went back down to the basement and noticed that there was more smoke and not less. He and David went out to the quadrangle to investigate the source. The rubbish bin was not smoking so where was the smoke coming from?

The factory adjacent to my shop had access to the quadrangle by way of a door with a glass window. Coming from under the door was smoke.  They peered through the window and could see what looked like smoldering ashes. The factory next door was a wood factory!

Russell went out into Old Street and found a couple of Police Constables walking along and told them of the problem. Russell pointed out that there was access to the factory through my shop. The factory’s floors overlapped my shop’s floors rather like when you put your hands together with your fingers interlaced.

The Constables went with Russell up to the second floor of my shop where there was a door with access to the wood factory. Together the two Constables broke down the door. There was a whoosh sound caused by the sudden rush of air causing the smoldering ashes to turn into a full blown 4 alarm fire.

Everyone in the sandwich bar ran outside.

Russell, using great presence of mind, found Frank’s camera and began taking the pictures you see in this book. Russell’s idea was to take the pictures to the Daily Mail and get me some free advertising. With camera in hand he drove to Fleet St. ran up to the second floor and shouted out “I’ve got pictures of a big fire; I’ve got pictures of a big fire”.  According to Russell the staff asked if the film was colour or black and white. Russell replied that the film was black & white because it was Frank’s camera and colour film was very expensive in those days. Apparently, 20 minutes later the staff told Russell that they couldn’t use the film because it was indeed colour and would take over 24 hours to process. Quickly thinking Russell told them that he will go and buy black & white film and that they should phone the fire department and ask them to keep the fire on a low light ‘til he gets back.

Later That Evening

continued by Russell

My friend Geoffrey Hearn was with me at the sandwich bar opening along with my fiancée Jackie. The plan was to drive to Geoff’s girlfriend’s home for afternoon tea and then out for dinner.

Geoff’s girlfriend lived on the other side of London in Richmond near the River Thames. Needless to say, we were late. Even though Geoff had alerted the girlfriend as to what had happened with the fire and everything, she wasn’t at all pleased when we all turned up late smelling of smoke and full of ash. Her father had a hard time believing our story. I would have too. But there we were, soot and all.

We cleaned ourselves up as best we could and had a nice cup of tea.

After spending as little time as possible with the parents we excused ourselves and headed out for dinner. Lots of nice little bistros in the area and we had a nice meal. I remember the meal because part way through it I choked on a piece of something and spontaneously coughed bits of mashed potato all over the condiments on the table. Embarrassed? Moi?

After dinner we went for a drive along the River Thames and parked overlooking the river. We sat and chatted and then Geoff suddenly got out and started to walk along the river bank leaving the three of us wondering why. So for a lark I started the car and drove off leaving Geoff to fend for himself.

I drove around a corner, did a U-turn and slowly crept back to see what he was up to. We could see him crouching down appearing to tie up his shoe laces. I drove by him and he stood up and beckoned us. We just sat in the car and waited for him to come alongside. As he reached the trunk of the car I sped up and drove a few yards and waited for him. Geoff was yelling something and waving for me to stop. As he approached I sped up again. Finally I waited for him to approach a third time. With the window open and all of us laughing inside the car Geoff reached my window and started yelling. “Stop, stop I fell into the river”. I got out of the car expecting to see wet feet; instead he was completely soaked from head to toe. There was even seaweed in his hair. He was a mess. Geoff was an immaculate dresser with expensive shoes and pants. Every piece of clothing was now wet and weedy. It appears that he was walking close to the river’s edge when he trod on what he thought was a plank of wood, but it gave way and he lost his footing and in he went, face first.

So we put this wet and bedraggled specimen in the car and took him back to his girlfriend’s house where he had to have a bath. He had to be quiet about it so as not to awaken her dad who would have had a fit.

She couldn’t give Geoff any clothes to wear but she did allow him to take her dressing gown. What a day this has been; what a rare mood we’re in.

We drove Geoff back to his car which was parked near my uncle’s sandwich bar in Old St. Geoff then drove his car a few miles to his home. He lived in a block of flats and the garages for the flats were about 100 yards away from his home. He had to walk through the street at 2am in the morning wearing a woman’s pink dressing gown, pink furry slippers and carrying his soggy clothing. I wish I’d had a camera for that event.

I couldn’t wait to get to work and tell everyone about my weekend. I did get to work and I did tell the story and no one believed me.

Bummer!