Peace Work

Last updated
Peace Work
Peace Work.jpg
AuthorSpike Milligan
CountryEngland
LanguageEnglish
Genre Autobiography, Comic novel, Satire
Publisher Michael Joseph (hardback), Penguin Books (paperback)
Publication date
1991
Media typePrint (hardback and paperback)
Pages239 (paperback)
ISBN 0-71-813533-4 (hardback), 0-14-014970-8 (paperback)
OCLC 101317496
828.91407
LC Class PR6063.I3777
Preceded by Goodbye Soldier  

The seventh volume of Spike Milligan's war memoirs, Peace Work, was first published in September, 1991, five years after the sixth volume [1] Goodbye Soldier.

Unlike previous volumes, there is no preface, foreword or leading disclaimers.

This book spans the period between Spike's release from Combined Services Entertainment in Italy in October, 1946, and the start of his career as a writer for Derek Roy's BBC Radio show in October, 1949. [2]

Summary

Spike is released from his contract with Combined Services Entertainment (CSE) in Naples, Italy at the end of October, 1946, and departs for the UK on the QSMV Dominion Monarch.

Shortly after returning home, he looks up his Army and CSE mates Bill Hall and Johnny Mulgrew to restart The Bill Hall Trio in civilian life. They play at numerous venues around London, as well as Blackpool, Glasgow and Dublin. They even get a gig on BBC Television's Rooftop Rendezvous produced by Richard Afton. They next proceed to perform at the Zuka Exposition in Zürich, Switzerland. At the end of that engagement, they sign with a Signor Ivaldi to tour Italy, but head back to the UK first.

The Trio returns to Italy, where Spike again meets his first love, Maria Antoinetta Fontana. But the romance is over. The trio perform in Rome, Milan, Trieste and a remote U.S. Army post in Isonzo on the Italian/Yugoslav border. At this remote post they perform four times in front-line dugouts for the small groups of soldiers manning them. They return to Milan, and are next booked in Verona. Their contract with Ivaldi ends, and they detour to visit a friend in Porto Cannero on Lake Maggiore before returning to the United Kingdom. Their next gig is another Army Welfare tour with stops in Berlin, Hanover and Minden.

When they return home to the UK, Spike leaves the Bill Hall Trio and joins the Ann Lenner Trio with Anne Lenner and old friend Reg O'List. Their first engagement is another Army Welfare Show called Swinging Along. They perform in Hamburg, Celle, Hanover, Kronenberg and Klagenfurt.

Spike leaves trio after returning home. He then reconnects with his Army acquaintance Harry Secombe, a fellow Lance Bombardier, and met Peter Sellers and Michael Bentine. They refer to themselves as 'The Goons' but just do informal ad-lib sessions. Spike finally gets a solo booking as part of a variety group for another tour of Germany, this time in the U.S. Occupied Zone. He performs in Berlin, Hanover and Munich.

After returning from this tour, and as the book ends, Spike living and writing scripts with Jimmy Grafton for Derek Roy's BBC Radio show. [3]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Electric Light Orchestra</span> English rock band

The Electric Light Orchestra (ELO) is an English rock band formed in Birmingham in 1970 by songwriters and multi-instrumentalists Jeff Lynne and Roy Wood with drummer Bev Bevan. Their music is characterised by a fusion of pop and classical arrangements with futuristic iconography. After Wood's departure in 1972, Lynne became the band's sole leader, arranging and producing every album while writing nearly all of their original material. From this point until their first break-up in 1986, Lynne, Bevan, and keyboardist Richard Tandy were the group's only consistent members.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Harry Secombe</span> Welsh entertainer

Sir Harry Donald Secombe was a Welsh actor, comedian, singer and television presenter. Secombe was a member of the British radio comedy programme The Goon Show (1951–1960), playing many characters, most notably Neddie Seagoon. An accomplished tenor, he also appeared in musicals and films – notably as Mr Bumble in Oliver! (1968) – and, in his later years, was a presenter of television shows incorporating hymns and other devotional songs.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Spike Milligan</span> Irish comedian (1918–2002)

Terence Alan "Spike" Milligan was an Irish comedian, writer, musician, poet, playwright and actor. The son of an English mother and Irish father, he was born in British Colonial India, where he spent his childhood before relocating in 1931 to England, where he lived and worked for the majority of his life. Disliking his first name, he began to call himself "Spike" after hearing the band Spike Jones and his City Slickers on Radio Luxembourg.

<i>The Goon Show</i> BBC Radio show broadcast from 1951 to 1960

The Goon Show is a British radio comedy programme, originally produced and broadcast by the BBC Home Service from 1951 to 1960, with occasional repeats on the BBC Light Programme. The first series, broadcast from 28 May to 20 September 1951, was titled Crazy People; subsequent series had the title The Goon Show.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">The Police</span> English rock band

The Police were an English rock band formed in London in 1977. Within a few months of their first gig, the line-up settled as Sting, Andy Summers (guitar) and Stewart Copeland, and remained unchanged for the rest of the band's history. The Police became globally popular in the late 1970s and early to mid 1980s. Emerging in the British new wave scene, they played a style of rock influenced by punk, reggae, and jazz.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eric Sykes</span> English comedian, writer and actor (1923–2012)

Eric Sykes was an English radio, stage, television and film writer, comedian, actor and director whose performing career spanned more than 50 years. He frequently wrote for and performed with many other leading comedy performers and writers of the period, including Tony Hancock, Spike Milligan, Tommy Cooper, Peter Sellers, John Antrobus and Johnny Speight. Sykes first came to prominence through his many radio credits as a writer and actor in the 1950s, most notably through his collaboration on The Goon Show scripts. He became a TV star in his own right in the early 1960s when he appeared with Hattie Jacques in several popular BBC comedy television series.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Procol Harum</span> British rock band

Procol Harum were an English rock band formed in Southend-on-Sea, Essex, in 1967. Their best-known recording is the 1967 hit single "A Whiter Shade of Pale", one of the few singles to have sold over 10 million copies. Although noted for their baroque and classical influence, Procol Harum's music is described as psychedelic rock and proto-prog with hints of the blues, R&B, and soul.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bill Kerr</span> British and Australian actor, comedian, and vaudevillian

William Henry Kerr was a British and Australian actor, comedian, and vaudevillian.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eric Faulkner</span> Scottish Guitarist, Singer/Songwriter

Eric Faulkner is a guitarist, songwriter and singer, best known as a member of the Scottish pop band the Bay City Rollers.

Norman Edward Vaughan was an English comedian who led a long and successful career in the television and theatre, appearing occasionally in films.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Max Beesley</span> British actor and musician

Maxton Gig Beesley Jr. is an English actor and musician. His television and film credits include The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling (1997), The Match (1999), Hotel (2001), The Last Minute (2001), Bodies (2004-2006), The Last Enemy (2008), Survivors (2008–2010), Mad Dogs (2011-2013), Suits (2013), Empire (2015-2016), Ordinary Lies (2015), Jamestown (2017-2019), The Outsider (2020), Operation Fortune (2022), The Midwich Cuckoos (2022), and most recently Hijack (2023) for Apple TV.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mick Gallagher</span> English keyboardist

Michael William Gallagher is an English Hammond organ player best known as a member of Ian Dury and the Blockheads and for his contributions to albums by the Clash. He has also written music for films such as Extremes (1971) and After Midnight (1990), and the Broadway play Serious Money (1987).

The Bill Hall Trio was a musical comedy act originally consisting of Bill Hall (violin), Johnny Mulgrew and Spike Milligan (guitar). They met through the Combined Services Entertainment programme during World War II and the trio continued in its original form until 1947/8. They were featured on a Pathé newsreel of 1947. In the same year they appeared on television on the BBC's Variety programme. After Milligan left, the Bill Hall Trio obtained a new guitarist and other new members whenever old members left or died. The group went on until the death of Johnny Mulgrew. Johnny Mulgrew died on 1 August 1985. Peace Work was published in 1992, and in it Milligan stated that when Johnny Mulgrew died six years ago, the trio came to an end.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">The Membranes</span> English band

The Membranes are an English post-punk band formed in Blackpool, Lancashire in 1977, the initial line-up being John Robb, Mark Tilton (guitar), Martyn Critchley (vocals) and Martin Kelly (drums). Critchley soon left, with Robb and Tilton taking on vocals, and Kelly moving to keyboards, with "Coofy Sid" (Coulthart) taking over on drums.

BFBS Live Events is the live entertainment arm of the British Forces Broadcasting Service (BFBS). It is the official provider of live entertainment to the British Armed Forces. BFBS Live Events routinely sends tours of entertainment to Afghanistan, Cyprus, Oman, the Falkland Islands and to Royal Navy ships deployed worldwide.

The "Ying Tong Song" is a novelty song written by Spike Milligan and performed by the Goons, usually led by Harry Secombe. It is a nonsense song, consisting of small verses interspersed by a completely nonsensical chorus. The origin of the title is said to have come from Harry Secombe's mispronunciation of the name of Milligan's war-time friend and fellow jazz musician, Harry Edgington. When Secombe repeatedly called him "Edgerton", Milligan replied, "it's Edgington, Edgington" and emphasized the point by saying "Yington, Yingtang".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Derek Roy (comedian)</span> English comedian (1922–1981)

Derek Roy was an English comedian, whose public profile was at its greatest in the late 1940s and early 1950s.

Anne Lenner was an English vocalist, who sang with the British dance bands of the 1930s and 1940s. She is most closely associated with Carroll Gibbons and the Savoy Orpheans, a band who regularly played at the Savoy Hotel in London, with whom she made many studio recordings. The British bands played a softer version of the swing jazz popular in the USA during the 1930s and 1940s.

<i>Goodbye Soldier</i> 1986 book by Spike Milligan

Goodbye Soldier is Spike Milligan's sixth volume of autobiography. While he began writing it immediately after finishing Where Have All the Bullets Gone? in 1985, he finished it in a manic two week period in early 1986.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Larry Stephens</span>

Lawrence Geoffrey Stephens was a BBC radio scriptwriter, best remembered for co-writing The Goon Show with Spike Milligan. Stephens was a regular writer of the show for the first two years, and then returned to The Goon Show to assist Milligan. From his association with Milligan, Stephens became involved with Associated London Scripts (ALS), and was said to have been "one of the most eye-catching characters, in the earliest days of the company...he played a significant cameo role in the first phase of success for ALS".

References

  1. Spike: An Intimate Memoir, by Norma Farnes. Harper Collins UK, 2011
  2. Peace Work, by Spike Milligan. Michael Joseph Ltd, 1991
  3. Spike Milligan: The Biography, by Pauline Scudamore. Sutton Publishing 2003