King (Cecil Harmsworth) Group of letters

A large group of autograph letters and cards addressed to Philip Dossé, editor of 'Books and Bookmen', mostly concerned with the business of reviewing, but also revealing Cecil's personality and reactionary politics ("I am afraid we live in troubled times with no effective government. It looks as if the Russians will take over Western Europe. No one seems to think the Americans will prove to be any obstacle. Carter is a huge disappointment. He is a good little man hopelessly out of his depth", 5 August 1978; " am afraid the country is by no means out of the wood yet. The North Sea Oil is a great bonanza, but it will be frittered away in inflammatory wage settlements and social welfare. There is no reason to suppose that a Conservative Government will be any more able to cope with the Trade Unions than this one", 25 July 1979; "Of course I will review Diana Mosley's book. We both are much attached to her and I have a strong sense of her husband's ability", 31 December [1980]; "At the I.P.C. I had announced my intention of retiring in two years time and meanwhile was sitting back to see how the team that was to succeed me was getting on. The result was due to impotence - why wait for two years?: pressure from Harold Wilson: and a suspicion that the new team were not doing well & that I ought to be making changes. I thought they would be utterly foolish to vote me out of the chair at that juncture. They were indeed foolish, but they didn't realise that until later. | If you want peace of mind keep within your resources - human and financial. It is likely there will be an inflammatory book in the next few months, but there is very rough water ahead. The Labour situation is played down in the papers, but looks ugly", 29 May n.y.); many covering letters enclosing copy, with King writing in businesslike manner, giving the name of the book whose review he is enclosing, and usually giving his opinion of it ("a shamelessly dishonest piece of Communist propaganda", "quite the dullest work you ever sent me", "It was difficult not to be libellous but I hope I have avoided that pitfall", "an outstandingly bad book, but I hope the review is readable", "a rather superficial work, but I have done my best with it'"); also including 14 letters to Dossé from King's wife Ruth; v.s. ,The Pavilion, Hampton Court, East Molesey, Surrey, or The Pavilion, Greenfield Park, Dublin, 1971-1979.

***King was involved in and may have instigated a 1968 meeting with Louis Mountbatten, among others, in which he proposed that Harold Wilson's government be overthrown and replaced with a temporary administration headed by Mountbatten. He decided to override the editorial independence of the Mirror and wrote and instructed to be published a front-page article calling on Wilson to be removed by some sort of extra-parliamentary action. The board of IPC met and demanded his resignation for this breach of procedure and for damaging the interests of IPC as a public company.

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