by Belinda
'In 1953, while doing my National Service as a Second Lieutenant in the 10th Royal Hussars, I was on a "Survival Course" in Germany with my troop of three Centurion tanks. Survival in this case meant living off the land for two weeks without rations or cash.
'We camped in a forest which turned out to belong to a most gentle and generous German aristocrat. I knew this to be so because one evening he invited me to dine with him in his castle. In order to treat the occasion with proper respect I donned my officer's uniform and arrived at the castle gates at 7 p.m. Imagine my surprise when I found that a Signal Corps Brigadier had also been invited for the same reason. He had bivouacked a whole brigade within the generous confines of the estate.
The three of us sat down to a gargantuan feast in an enormous dining hall. Course after course was washed down with continuous libations. The Brigadier was quite unable to cope with this generosity and soon began to insult both our host and me. He made a number of insulting toasts to the Germans in general and our host in particular, but soon, concentrating on the one least able to defend himself, he turned his attention to me. He patently disliked me intensely. He disliked the Armoured Corps, cavalry regiments, toffee-nosed subalterns and, for what seemed an eternity, I was subjected to a torrent of abuse - all because I was a junior officer to the Brigadier.
'Coming to the end of his tirade he challenged me to find and attack his brigade before daylight. Very quietly our host inquired whether this was an order, and the Brigadier confirmed that it was just that. As he was driven off in a drunken stupor, our host came round the castle in an old Bugatti and offered me a lift. His purpose soon became clear when I realised that he was following the Brigadier back to his camp without lights so that I could discover the whereabouts of his brigade. They were in a small wood nearby. All the vehicles were under camouflage netting and there was no sentry on duty. As the Brigadier tumbled into his tent, my host and I returned to my troop. Twelve rather sleepy men started up the tanks and we retraced our tracks to the Brigadier. We surrounded the camp with a trail of diesel oil and, as we drove away, we were confident that the whole brigade was on fire.
The sweetest part of the revenge was not so much the conflagration, but the hand-written note from the German which awaited me upon my return to camp. It read: "In the event of your court martial, I would be honoured to attend on your behalf to confirm that you were obeying an order to a junior officer." '
- with thanks to Anthony Snow, the well-respected chairman of Hill and Knowlton (UK) Ltd.
A trouper in the Queen's Royal Irish Hussars was on exercise in Germany - his specific duty was to look after the officers' mess tent which was a marvellous affair, equipped for great comfort with furniture and paintings. The officers' latrines were in a tent behind the mess tent, behind which was another tent and the soldiers' latrine was beyond that. Trouper North got into the habit of using the officers' latrines rather than the soldiers'. He also smoked like a chimney and more than once Major Christopher Hanbury warned him that he should not smoke in the latrines, with a merry caution that 'it's neat alcohol down there!' Trouper North still did not desist, however, so between them, a few officers hatched a plot to stop him by pouring petrol down their latrine. Later, they saw North creep in and, a few minutes later, there was an almighty explosion and North was expelled, airborne, followed by a torrent of the latrines' contents. There was, apparently, little hair left on his body. He dutifully made the long journey to the soldiers' latrines in future.
It was common practice among officers in a certain regiment to get their own back on someone by placing a small pebble in the back left hubcap of their car. This would produce a little rattle which, because it was on the far side of the car from the driver, would be almost impossible to trace and would even baffle the garage mechanics to whom the cars were sent.
Animal Antics
'People who fight fire with fire usually end up with ashes.'
'Dear Abby' newspaper column, 7 March 1974
Animal Antics
'Tiny' is the name of the large stuffed shark which hung in the Food Halls of Harrods for some time as part of the continuing feud between Tiny Rowland and Mohammed Al Fayed. Here Mr Al Fayed, chairman of Harrods, explains the true story of events.
'When Mr Leo Kennedy, a London shipping broker, caught a record-breaking Mako shark off Mauritius something inspired him to telephone me from his holiday hotel offering me the beast. I accepted immediately and arranged for the shark to be placed in the care of a skilled taxidermist and shipped to me at Brompton Road. I knew that, whatever had happened to him in his life, the shark's true destiny now lay ahead of him.
Checking only to make sure that there was a good likeness, I ordered Tiny to be taken to the Food Halls and suspended over the smoked salmon counter, his new name proudly painted upon the dorsal fin.
His arrival was widely reported and Tiny soon became a must-see on the list of London attractions. As Mr Tiny Rowland's vendetta ran out of steam and it was clear to everyone that there was no justice to it, so his demands for recompense grew more ambitious. I ignored them. I said, and often repeated, that the only concessions I would ever make were as follows - I would shake Mr Rowland's hand, I would give him a
jolly good lunch and I would take down his fishy namesake from his place of honour. And so it came to pass that on 22 October 1993, Mr Rowland and I signed a one-page peace agreement thus ending his fifteen-year quest for Harrods. We then proceeded in a spirit of good fellowship to the Food Halls where together we winched down Tiny to general applause and the clatter of the Nikon choir.
By this time Tiny had acquired a small shark in his formidable jaws, the small shark bearing the name Bock in honour of Mr Rowland's new partner and then co-chief executive Herr Dieter Bock. As the journalist reviewing the newspapers on the following morning's broadcast of radio's Today programme remarked: 'It is not often that the fish counter at Harrods makes the front page of every broadsheet newspaper.' Later Mr Rowland and I enjoyed several convivial lunches together.
As for Tiny, I took him by Harrods horse-drawn delivery van to Mr Rowland's house in Chester Square. Mr Rowland had planned to hang Tiny over his swimming pool but he magnanimously agreed to my suggestion that the shark perform one final public service. Tiny was auctioned by Sotheby's - who generously waived their fee - for £4,000; the money going to the excellent charity ChildLine. Tiny is now the star attraction at a marine world theme park in Scotland.'
There was to be a dinner party in a rather grand old house in Southern Ireland. The food was all prepared and the guests arrived. The hostess went into the kitchen to sort out the canapés and was horrified to see the family cat nibbling the beautifully-displayed salmon. She gave the cat an enormous belt which launched it half-way across the room and tidied up the fish, covering the bits
that the cat had eaten with cucumber and lemon and generally patting it back into shape.
The evening proceeded well. After the main course, however, the hostess was even more horrified to find the cat in the kitchen again but, this time, lying on the floor stone cold dead. She immediately thought of the salmon and her guests and was overwhelmed with fear for their safety. Quickly she telephoned her doctor who prescribed radical treatment immediately. Each and every one of her guests went to the casualty department to have their stomachs pumped.
Some time afterwards the results of the autopsy on the cat were returned. The cat had its ultimate revenge - it had actually died of a heart attack.
'This happened while I was an apprentice rider. One of the lads had been getting a lot more rides, and was really condescending about the way I rode. He just wasn't very pleasant over quite a period of time. While he was working in another yard he was down to ride a horse which had a good chance of winning in a Conditional Jockeys' Race (a “boys" race). I got one of the lads in my yard to phone the trainer's secretary and say that his horse was not running as it had gone lame. So he didn't show up. But I did. I went on to win. I haven't re
ally looked back since.'
- John Francome, jockey and TV presenter.
The crew of a racing boat became progressively more and more irritated by the rich owner of a large dog. He would let it off his gin palace on to the dock where it would roam around all day, getting in everyone's way and, more often than not, doing its doings in places where it would inevitably end up on a sail or a sailor. Theytried
to get it to stay out of their way by kicking it into the water from time to time, where it would flounder around like Scooby Doo for a while, but always it returned to haunt them.
When they could take no more they devised a simple revenge - the big, hungry dog was more than delighted to eat the sump oil sandwiches which they fed it just before it was due back on the gin palace.
Sump oil has the same effect on the digestion as castor oil and they had a good laugh imagining the state of the smart carpets in the motor yacht.
'I had been out deep-sea fishing for the day and had been lucky enough to land a big barracuda. This, I thought, could provide us with a little amusement that night. We decided to slip it under Ralph Glister's pillow and scare the pants off him when he turned in, particularly as his wife Kathie was in on the joke and had in fact told us that Gillie always slept with his arms stretched out under his head. The fearsome-looking fish was duly placed in his bed and the rest of the family and myself gathered quietly in the anteroom of the Glisters' suite to hear what happened.
'We heard Gillie say good-night to Kathie. He yawned, then slid between the sheets. Don Miles nearly burst a rib trying to keep quiet during the next half-minute of silence which was then broken by a howl from the other side of the door.
' ''Jesus Christ!" came Gillie's voice. "Kathy! What the hell..." By this time he was out of bed and the lights went on in the room. Gillie was last seen rushing out of the other bedroom door yelling. "Chief, chief," he hollered. "Where are you, you..."
'The sight of him dashing down the hotel corridor, where we presently found him, was worth a million
dollars. Gillie, we noticed, wore a red flannel nightshirt down to his ankles and with this thing flapping about and a damned great fish in his arms, he looked like an escapee from a nuthouse. We even got the house detective on the phone, telling him that there was a madman on the penthouse floor rushing about in a red nightshirt with a barracuda in his hand. Poor Glister was nearly locked up - and he didn't think it too hilariously funny at the time, either!'
- from All Arms and Elbows, the autobiography of high-spirited racing driver, the late Innes Ireland.
A man who lived at a smart Chelsea address became thoroughly fed up with a dog-owner who constantly allowed his pet to foul the footway right in front of his house. Over and over again he would set off for work and step right in it.
Eventually he decided enough was enough so he kept vigil from early one morning until the culprits, as usual, stopped right outside his house and the dog did its business. Instead of confronting them he quietly followed them back to their home and noted their address.
Later, when the urge hit him, he collected a large offering of his own and wrapped it in newspaper. He went to the dog-owner's house and put it, newspaper and all, on his front doorstep. Quickly he set fire to the paper, rang the doorbell and ran away to the safety of a pillar on the other side of the street. He was able to watch the horrified dog owner jump all over the burning package, thus spreading its contents all over his shoes and the doormat.
When Edward and Lizzie Hughes invited their friends the Stevens for the weekend they didn't consider the implications when they asked whether they could bring their dog. 'Sure,' they said, but soon regretted their bonhomie.
On arrival the big, floppy Bassett hound jumped up and laddered Lizzie's tights, it went around hoovering the food (including all the snacks and some of their supper) and proceeded to howl endlessly. Enough, thought Edward, none of us will sleep tonight with this racket. He wrapped a Mogadon in a piece of leftover steak and slipped it to the dog. Peace reigned. It wasn't until noon the following day that they found the dog. It was fast asleep and snoring blissfully in the herbaceous border.
Keif was a beagley-mongrel who belonged to Jane Stonborough's family when she was little. He was the most intelligent and dignified dog, and he was responsible for the only case of genuine canine revenge we have encountered.
Jane's cousin Derish came over to their house one day and, after lunch, lit a huge cigar. Derish delighted in tormenting Keif - over and over again he would take a huge puff and blow it right into the face of Keif, who responded with great dignity for a while. Finally Keif could take it no more and walked away... to Derish's bedroom. Jumping on to the table, he took the other cigar in his mouth and returned to the drawing room. He then walked up to where Derish was sitting, broke the cigar into pieces and dropped it at Derish's feet, whereupon he sat down and stared at the man in a manner that can only be interpreted as contempt.
'It was, for me at least, love at first sight,' said Jane Capp about her boyfriend Tom. Tom swept her off her feet with flowers and romantic weekends in the country. 'We really hit it off both in and out of bed,' she added, 'I thought I'd met the man of my dreams.'
She hadn't. Tom was spotted canoodling with a mystery girl by a friend of Jane's. When Jane confronted Tom his attitude was 'what you don't know can't hurt you'. 'But I did know and it did hurt me,' said Jane. 'I wanted to buy him something that would tell him exactly how I felt.'
With this thought in mind she went to a pet shop, bought a dead white rat, attached a tag to its leg saying 'Tom' and then she posted it to him. 'I think he got the message,' said Jane.
A naughty stable owner disguised a winning horse with boot polish and entered it into a novice race. Naturally it won, bringing substantial gains to the owner and trainer.
'Quick!' said the owner to one of the lads, 'get rid of the horse!'
Unfortunately, he took the owner literally. Several days later the owner asked to see the horse and the lad said proudly: 'Don't worry, I shot it and put it down a mine shaft.'
When Ernie Perkins bought an old gravel pit and started commercial tipping, his neighbours began to complain. It all came to a head when Gloucestershire County Council ordered Mr Perkins to cease operations, even though the pit was not full. He announced that he would take his revenge, and did so, by investing in 3,000 pigs. 'I'll teach them what stink really means,' he said, as several score prime, swill-eating, slurry-producing pigs were unloaded on to his land.
'After three happy years he suddenly behaved monstrously, during December. In order to leave it all behind and get on with my life revenge was important.
He is an artistic man, obsessive and prone to panic reactions. He is also an expert plantsman and has a beautiful garden alongside a side street, with a 4'6" fence. Slugs send him into paroxysms of rage. I waited until May when the plants were up, growing and juicy, by which time I had devised a fitting act of vengeance. With the help of a friend we leafleted all the surrounding streets with the following notice:
NON TOXIC SLUG CONTROL RESEARCH PROJECT
DO YOU HATE KILLING SLUGS?
Natural scientific research welcomes your healthy, unwanted slugs.
Please place them in our research garden centre at:
5, GEORGE STREET,
CHICHESTER
Easy access and parking
Research results will be published in the November edition of Green Magazine.
'Mud- and rain-smudged notes were put through his letter box with information about where the slugs had been placed. Ladies with flowing hands wrote from afar, one thus: "I have put 36 slugs in your left-hand border.
Such a pretty garden. Are you sure you are doing the right thing?" He has no idea how many slugs he was given. I felt much better.”
A jilted banker had a poster made up and photocopied with his unfaithful girlfriend's picture, bearing the caption 'Have you seen this Dog?' He nailed it on to trees all over west London.
Te
lephone Trouble
'Sweet is revenge - especially to women.'
Lord Byron, 1788-1824
Telephone Trouble
A woman scorned worked out that the way really to upset her control-freak former lover was through his address book. She carefully changed all the telephone numbers, postcodes and street numbers around. The threes became eights, the ones became fours and Cs became Os.
- with thanks to Royal correspondent Ingrid Seward.
Several years ago, TV personality Sarah Greene returned home from a couple of days' filming to find fifty-six messages on her telephone answering machine. When she played them back they were all from the same person who had obviously heard her husband, presenter Mike Smith, on the answerphone tape and thought it was a terrific wheeze to hear it over and over again.