BOMBED OUT OF CYPRUS Trouble was brewing, even in the remote Troodos Mountains. In 1974 I witnessed the first signs of events that would change Cyprus forever. Soon there would be rebellion, invasion, ethnic conflict, deaths and an occupying United Nations peace-keeping force that’s still on patrol 50 years later. By Terry Walker 09042024 9 […]

Every family history is unique and the brutal bar brawl detailed in this seaman’s story came after a month of fierce Atlantic gales that drove Tyne-based cargo boats 100s of miles off-course, flying the signal “Not under command” because “we could just not steer”… They were heading for the Eastern seaboard of the USA, but […]

When Italian business people go for an impromptu night out in a famed gastronomic city, you would feel confident the food would be good and the wine outstanding. However, what happened afterwards provided “la ciliegina sulla torta” for this night out on the tiles with a Sicilian corker. by Terry Walker AS06042024 8 minute read […]

by Terry Walker 04032024 6 minute read There were surprising revelations when a family history researcher discovered her innkeeper ancestors’ secret of the Peterboat inn. What the innkeeping ancestors had been up to for 300 years at the fishing village at the mouth of the River Thames was revealed in a 130 year-old official report […]

A secret agent served Britain and four terror groups in 1950s Cyprus but 30 years later he discovered how his multiple PSYOP roles brought peace to the strife-torn island of spies, Cyprus. Armed with a 9mm Sten sub-machine gun and a pistol he was ever-ready for action, but never fired a shot in anger. by […]

By Julia Jayden Wells 03042024 7 minute read A fairy tale grand hotel that welcomed Royalty became haunted after the mysterious deaths of guests and the three brothers who owned it. The Berengaria Hotel in Cyprus has been padlocked and decaying for 40 years and now ghosts have secured five stars for the totally derelict […]

One language of ancient Syria was Aramaic, as spoken at the time of Jesus of Nazareth and unchanged even today in remote mountains. It was the language of Jesus, his disciples and most of the people who attended their gigs. It has survived changing dynasties and remains the language of Christians and Muslims who live […]

I had requested a camel train to take us across the Syrian Desert to Palmyra, the hometown of the legendary Warrior Queen Zenobia whose ancestry is unclear. She may have been raised as the daughter of her brother who had married the widow of her father who was the brother of them both. Palmyra was […]

By Terry Walker 03032024 8 minute read from My Life, in Words An historic moment, for surely the mighty fortress Tower of London has never been abandoned to its fate? An act of chivalry, becomes a bomb scare and a unique moment in family history with repercussions that stopped short of a hanging… Two American […]

A family’s history can take many different turns down through time. My “turning” was already mapped out when, as a determined 16-year-old I arrived at the crossroads and changed direction without any hesitation. I was on the road to a career I had dreamed about for a long time… I had converted a summer office […]

The kidnap, torture and murder of farm labourer Richard Hawkins in 1748 was the beginning of the end for the most notorious smugglers gang operating along England’s South Coast. Within a year the Hawkhurst Gang had added two more murders and large amounts of back-door goods to their tally. The King’s Men were closing in […]

It was a Friday like no other in the history of a family and in the history of the world. A peaceful village wedding and the biggest military bombardment in history, taking place simultaneously… The first wedding bells and the first shots of World War II ringing out as Hitler invades Poland and spoils a […]

My grandfather was born 24 years after after his Jewish father, Jacob arrived from Russia after being rescued…Great-grandfather Jacob fled Imperial Russia as an army draft dodger with a gang of Cossack chappers (bounty hunters) was hot on his trail… his 12-year-old wife-to-be, Rachel and her daughter Leah, a baby in arms not yet a […]

He could still hear the shouts of the pursuing Cossack troops as he waded out into the cold sea, his long woollen underwear clinging to his strong body. Soon the rocky beach slipped from under his feet and he began to swim out to sea. Away on his right, he could just make out the […]

Did you ever have a bad day? I mean, a really, really bad day? In western Cyprus, one particular September day turned out to be not only bad but could have been fatal…except for a bit of luck and happenstance. Here’s the true story of a lifesaving tomb rescue from a prehistoric necropolis. There are […]

1972: BOOM as millions flash their new plastic. 1974: BUST Inflation and bailed out by IMF. When your work worries government ministers and MPs and generates the highest amount of correspondence The Times business section had ever received, it pays to have some strong backing to justify the meticulous verbalism. Especially when an attack dog […]

One of the objectives of the media and marketing work Grafton PR was doing for the Isle of Man Government in the 1970s was to emphasise the “differences” between that place and the rest of the British Isles. Press releases to travel and general media and TV holiday programmes, like Wish You Were Here, always […]

The Pathos Beach Hotel was in the last stages of construction on land above a sandy beach that curved around the bay to the small harbour of Paphos, guarded by a 13th century Ottoman fort. A string of local bars and restaurants lined the harbourside. It was unspoilt; it was idyllic because Paphos was the […]

The Troodos mountains in Cyprus, the favourite hideaway of EOKA insurgents fighting British troops in the 1950s, have been the established battleground for regular rumbles involving ethnic and local political differences since the island was divided between Greeks and Turks. After the successful opening of the Paphos Beach Hotel in southwest Cyprus, Grafton partner Geoff […]

I guess it was near 7 pm UK time when I heard the flash. President John F Kennedy had been shot at 12:30 pm Texas time. I was 20 miles from the offices in Darlington, where I’d just been entrusted with the editorship of the Northern Echo (circulation: 100,000) It was, and is, a regional morning daily […]

My very own Aphrodite was standing next to me in the glistening sea. We had just a few more minutes to prepare. Me, getting more pan stick onto her white bits with a sponge and then spreading it evenly to match the surrounding suntanned body. She, adjusting her brown wig to replicate Renaissance paintings of […]