Remembering my brother's friend Higgi 60 yrs on... 2026 4 12
What brought back this memory was another friend of both my brother and me in the person of Brian Bailey, Brian Fredrick Bailey to give him his full title but affectionately known as Joe for much of his adult life who, unlike Jim my brother and I, didn't live much beyond his 60th birthday, dying as he did in 1962, shortly after my heart attack that same year.
Higgi on the other hand would with difficulty be claimed as a true friend, although for my part we did some noteable rock climbs together in the Peak District, which included the "Dove Dale" outcrop, around that time together, and when Joe and my brother Jim turned round during our first ascent of Beinn Nevis, Britain's highest mountain, it was Higgi who continued to partner me on our continuing ascent for a short distance further, until, unfortunately the conditions were becoming total "White Out", and we were aware that on its north side the mountain had precipitous cliffs, when we turned round too.
That same Easter weekend was noteable also for me spending most of the following night in its local lock-up owing to a run-in with some Scottish guys at the local Saturday night dance, in nearby Corpach: arguing about who had the best football teams when, of course, I knew nothing about football, but had the misfortune to utter the phrase "Scottish bastards", to what I blieved to be one of their party, who took a hold of me from behind, when instead it proved to a Police Constable, who took umbridge at my exclamation, too much whiskey coupled with an excess of Saturday night fun and hilarity the culprit, lol.
A not-so-clever incident, working at the time in the city of Fort William for the commissioning of its newly errected Pulp and Paper Mill, also situated at Corpach. The Foreman of the Procurator Fiscal's court next morning jokingly exclaimed it wasn't my lucking day, since the PF was also a Scottish Nationalist, but happily the incident wasn't reported in the local newspaper, and so my misdemeanour didn't reach the ears of my employers in the town to get recored in my CV.
But it was another outing in the English Lake District, when the same foursome camped just to the south of Keswick, when on the day in question it was impossible for Higgi and I to agree on a suitable climb together, when Joe and I decided we would climb Skiddaw, while Hoiggi and brother Jim would climb Sandleback, aka Blencathra, before meeting later in another public house.
My wife and I climbed Skiddaw 40 years later in the early 00's in celebration of our dear friend Joe's life...
But imagine the very next weekend after our foursome camp when I was happily enscounced in my self-contained flat under the eves of Boyne House, in Grove Road, back home in Beaconsfield when who should phone me from the nearby local Railway station but Higgi: come to seek employment on the London Victoria Metro Extention so and why not spend the weekend with his "friend", Jim's younger brother **, when playing the part of his disenchented host I went out of the way to make him a sumptuous meal of Baked Beans on my lovely Bloomer Bread suitably toasted, when he ravenously ate it with delight, but then spoilt his behaviour by opening a second can from his own napsack and proceeded to eat them cold unheated using his fingers as cutlery..?
Thereafter, followed the least enjoyable weekend I ever spent in that Beaconsfield abode, because he had no intention of falling in with any of my usual programmes following a workaday week. His idea for the Saturday was to visit the Tower of London to soak up the atmosphere of all those deaths by execution, of the unfortunates who were beheaded or hung there, etc., John Higgins meanwhile enjoying by immersion in his classical literature period...
But imagine my relief come the Monday evening returning home on foot the few hundred metres from Butler's Court, my place of work, to find he had left for pastures new...
My mother would likewise share my joy for she one noteable Christmas had Higgi for an unwanted and uninvited stay over that particular festive season day, after day for what must have seemed forever, likewisewise my newly devoted wife shortly after we married, living as we did in one of the multi-story apartment blocks in Rochadale City Centre, when on another impromtu uninvited visit he would follow her round the house inspecting what kind of meal she was cooking expectant of another free meal, hahaha!!!
Higgi on the other hand would with difficulty be claimed as a true friend, although for my part we did some noteable rock climbs together in the Peak District, which included the "Dove Dale" outcrop, around that time together, and when Joe and my brother Jim turned round during our first ascent of Beinn Nevis, Britain's highest mountain, it was Higgi who continued to partner me on our continuing ascent for a short distance further, until, unfortunately the conditions were becoming total "White Out", and we were aware that on its north side the mountain had precipitous cliffs, when we turned round too.
That same Easter weekend was noteable also for me spending most of the following night in its local lock-up owing to a run-in with some Scottish guys at the local Saturday night dance, in nearby Corpach: arguing about who had the best football teams when, of course, I knew nothing about football, but had the misfortune to utter the phrase "Scottish bastards", to what I blieved to be one of their party, who took a hold of me from behind, when instead it proved to a Police Constable, who took umbridge at my exclamation, too much whiskey coupled with an excess of Saturday night fun and hilarity the culprit, lol.
A not-so-clever incident, working at the time in the city of Fort William for the commissioning of its newly errected Pulp and Paper Mill, also situated at Corpach. The Foreman of the Procurator Fiscal's court next morning jokingly exclaimed it wasn't my lucking day, since the PF was also a Scottish Nationalist, but happily the incident wasn't reported in the local newspaper, and so my misdemeanour didn't reach the ears of my employers in the town to get recored in my CV.
But it was another outing in the English Lake District, when the same foursome camped just to the south of Keswick, when on the day in question it was impossible for Higgi and I to agree on a suitable climb together, when Joe and I decided we would climb Skiddaw, while Hoiggi and brother Jim would climb Sandleback, aka Blencathra, before meeting later in another public house.
My wife and I climbed Skiddaw 40 years later in the early 00's in celebration of our dear friend Joe's life...
But imagine the very next weekend after our foursome camp when I was happily enscounced in my self-contained flat under the eves of Boyne House, in Grove Road, back home in Beaconsfield when who should phone me from the nearby local Railway station but Higgi: come to seek employment on the London Victoria Metro Extention so and why not spend the weekend with his "friend", Jim's younger brother **, when playing the part of his disenchented host I went out of the way to make him a sumptuous meal of Baked Beans on my lovely Bloomer Bread suitably toasted, when he ravenously ate it with delight, but then spoilt his behaviour by opening a second can from his own napsack and proceeded to eat them cold unheated using his fingers as cutlery..?
Thereafter, followed the least enjoyable weekend I ever spent in that Beaconsfield abode, because he had no intention of falling in with any of my usual programmes following a workaday week. His idea for the Saturday was to visit the Tower of London to soak up the atmosphere of all those deaths by execution, of the unfortunates who were beheaded or hung there, etc., John Higgins meanwhile enjoying by immersion in his classical literature period...
But imagine my relief come the Monday evening returning home on foot the few hundred metres from Butler's Court, my place of work, to find he had left for pastures new...
My mother would likewise share my joy for she one noteable Christmas had Higgi for an unwanted and uninvited stay over that particular festive season day, after day for what must have seemed forever, likewisewise my newly devoted wife shortly after we married, living as we did in one of the multi-story apartment blocks in Rochadale City Centre, when on another impromtu uninvited visit he would follow her round the house inspecting what kind of meal she was cooking expectant of another free meal, hahaha!!!
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