Patrick Baty @patrickbaty

@StatelyHomeNews It was after a dinner there on 22nd May 2015. I suspect that there are many owners of items bought at the Stowe sales who have not contacted the school. I just happened to understand the importance and knew that we were looking for it.

Chuffed to learn that the bronze sculpture that I had recognised as the Laocoön that had once stood in the North Hall at Stowe has just been sold for a record sum. It fetched £13.6 million, inclusive of fees, at Sotheby’s, in London. A replica was unveiled at Stowe in July 2019.

@MrsTrevithick It's a good piece. Always pleased to read an appreciation of his work.

Delighted to have just come across this. In memoriam Robert Bevan, British landscape painter: 1915-1925 eclecticlight.co/2025/07/08/in-… via @howardnoakley

Delighted for the mention of Papers and Paints. Both have been good customers over many years.

FT Weekend @ftweekend

3 weeks ago

Inside Sheherazade Goldsmith and Matthew Freud’s newly renovated super-mews ft.trib.al/K5jc1vz

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We need only 218 signatures! There are currently 9,782 signatures on the petition to save the Ilford Park Polish Home. The petition is approaching 10,000 signatures - the threshold at which the UK Government is required to respond and address the petition to save the last centre for Polish veterans. Nearly one million Poles live in the UK. If even a small fraction take a moment to sign, it could make a significant difference in preserving this unique centre and its historic legacy. Signing takes only 1 minute and it brings a great sense of satisfaction! Every signature counts, please sign and share the petition: petition.parliament.uk/petitions/7684…

During the Warsaw Uprising in 1944, George Orwell spoke out in defence of the Polish people and criticised the English intelligentsia’s cautious attitude towards Joseph Stalin’s policies. He accused them of cowardice, hypocrisy and tacit approval of Soviet actions against Poland. Orwell remains one of the most widely read writers of the twentieth century. He was born on 25 June 1903.

Too hot to go outside? Read at home about lost London from my new book London’s Forgotten Island formed by the Tyburn , now underground, and the Thames, home to the richest sources of history anywhere.

Trent Park House of Secrets opens its doors on 21 July 2026 - London's new museum of espionage and intrigue in wartime Britain. From glittering 1930s social hub to wartime surveillance centre - this is an untold story of espionage and deception. Advance booking opens in July

We now have 6,087 signatures. We need at least 10,000 for the British government to be officially obliged to respond to the petition to save the last centre for Polish veterans. Nearly one million Poles live in the UK. If each of us takes just a moment to sign, we can realistically help preserve this unique place. The Ilford Park Polish Home was established in 1947 as part of the “Winston Churchill Promise”, Britain’s commitment never to forget its debt to Poland.Signing takes just one minute – the satisfaction will last forever. Sign the petition here: petition.parliament.uk/petitions/7684…

@PhoneyMajor As you may know, originally B Sqn of 21 SAS was almost entirely formed from ex-wartime SBS men. A Sqn - SAS and C Sqn - SOE. A huge collection of skills and experience.

@PhoneyMajor In a Mk1* canoe, Dickie Livingstone & ‘Gruff’ Courtney (both SBS & later 21 SAS) took US General Mark Clark from the submarine HMS Seraph to meet French General Charles Mast on Op Flagpole. Clark presented his signed M1 carbine to Dickie (now in 21 collection).

@AlistairCarns had a distinguished military career. It is damning that Benn, Starmer, Hermer, Reeves and others would not listen to him on lawfare, the Northern Ireland Bill, on defence transformation or on financial resources; and all credit to this RM veteran for stepping into the breach and his resignation on principle. His dynamite resignation, on the back of the Healey exit represents the necessary detonation of a political bomb under UK defence; highlighting how screwed up it all really is, how badly Starmer is lying to the country, and how totally irresponsible is this @UKLabour government. Carns is very right on the big things, the MoD and the “centre” are not facing reality on the changing technologies of war, they are not getting the resources they need and they are not defending veterans from lawfare. On this latter and vital point, this is led and encouraged by the UK’s own Attorney General as chief back-stabber. For this, Hermer should be the next to go. And by the way, don’t expect much from the Starmer-loyalist, ex-Para Jarvis….not every Politician has the guts to do what Carns and Healey have just done…

Al Carns @AlistairCarns

a month ago

We owe those who serve the UK the kit to do the job and the loyalty to stand by them when it's done. We are failing on both. I’ve spent my whole time in government making that case. Number 10 will not listen, so I am resigning as Minister for the Armed Forces. Letter to the PM

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@Fictionwitch Thanks Harriet. Country Life has always been very good to me.

Many thanks to Country Life for including me amongst the 'best you can buy' (?) in their 'English Issue'.

Spoke with a young guy wanting to serve in @RoyalNavy yesterday. He explained that officer recruitment entirely remote now. Takes years and will not meet a single person, let alone an RN officer, before he gets to join BRNC. How is this getting the best where they need to be?

This @historyinmemes post refers to the events of 19 September 2005, in Basra, Southern Iraq 2 SAS men captured by Iranian-backed insurgents whilst conducting covert surveillance of an Iranian-controlled Iraqi Police Force, were about to be spirited away to Iran for ritual humiliation or worse. The British chain of command, who had ordered the SAS surveillance operation in the first place, became overly worried about the negative presentational impact of an SAS rescue operation on their plans to withdraw British Forces and hand over Southern Iraq to local police and security forces that they knew would be controlled by the Iranians. They feared that such a high profile operation would (correctly) prove to the US-led coalition and the Baghdad government that the UK was withdrawing its forces too soon, and certainly before the area was properly stable; that they were simply enabling a safe logistics base for Iranian insurgents to target Iraqi and US forces in central Iraq. Whilst the many Generals, ambitious staff officers, civil servants and diplomats (in London and Iraq) wrestled with this emerging reality and its potential consequences for their withdrawal plan - hoping that there was a less visible way to recover the men, the SAS prepared an operation to rescue their own men, the moment an opportunity presented itself. The moment it appeared, the SAS pushed past the concerns and fears of a confused, conflicted chain of command that had refused to give permission for a rescue declaring to the SAS CO “that there is more at stake than your men’s lives” and executed successfully the recovery operation, returning the men safe from the clutches of a vicious and merciless enemy. If the SAS Command hadn’t ignored the concerns and constraints of the London HQ staff and their advisors, if their rescue force hadn’t been as skilled and decisive, then the outcome would have been dreadful for their two men and for the country; and for no good reason. As Martin Luther King is reported to have said: “The time is always right to do what is right” and so it was in September 2005. 🇬🇧 🇬🇧

Historic Vids @historyinmemes

a month ago

In 2005, after two British Special Air Service operators were captured in Iraq and approval for a rescue was refused, a lieutenant colonel allegedly disobeyed orders and sent about 20 SAS personnel to retrieve them. When the government pushed back, the entire Special Air Service

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@jaglancy She was an inspiration.

I heard a lovely anecdote today about Sir Alex Younger, the former head of MI6, who has died at the age of 62. Around the time the James Bond film “Spectre” was coming out, there was a private viewing at MI6’s HQ in Vauxhall with some of the production team and actors, including Ralph Fiennes. Alex Younger compared the event, which included an opportunity for members of the audience (who were largely real life spies) to quiz the actors and producers. One person asked Ralph Fiennes: Who was your favourite Bond? He gave an answer about how they were all good, but his favourite was Daniel Craig. The rest of the team said similar. Then Alex threw the question back to the person in the audience who had posed it, asking them who their favourite Bond was. But before this person had time to give an answer, someone else in the audience shouted out: “You, sir!” The individual (a former diplomat) who shared this story with me said it was one of so many examples of how admired, liked and respected Alex was by his colleagues. “He was one of the best chiefs”.

Very well done.

FANY (PRVC) @fany_prvc

a month ago

🪂Three FANYs have completed the tough two-week French Paratroopers Course in ETAP (@ecoledestap), Pau, and have earned their ‘brevet’ (wings). fany.org.uk/News/fanys-com…

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