Note
Trevor Grundy's book is an account of his experiences as a young member of Mosley's post-war Union Movement. Before the war, both his parents were members of the British Union of Fascists. His father was detained during the war under regulation 18B. When Mosley founded Union Movement in 1948, they became members along with their son Trevor and their daughter Lovene.
That summer, the secretary of Union Movement, Alf Flockhart, came to the house to ask my mother if she would do him a favour. Mosley was a friend of many of the surviving Nazi leaders and some of them wanted their sons and daughters to travel to London to meet people of their own age and study English. Would the Grundys put up some of the young Germans? Naturally, my mother would be paid for doing this. She willingly agreed and gave the impression that she would accommodate a division of the Waffen SS at 40 Blandford Square if the leader requested it.
After a beer with my father, Alf Flockart said that it was time I started doing something for Mosley and Union Movement. He said he'd been told that I'd had a wonderful singing voice before my voice broke. 'If you can sing for the church, surely you can speak for Mosley,' he said.
'Speak about what?' I asked.
'About the aspirations, the hopes and dreams of young people. You're young aren't you?'
I was beginning to wonder, for my life seemed much too sober, unexciting and cold-blooded. But then our first German house guest arrived and it suddenly became very clear that I was as hot-blooded a teenager as my classmates.
Waltraut Skorzeny was the daughter of Otto 'Scarface' Skorzeny, who rescued Benito Mussolini from the partisans towards the end of the war. Skorzeny was a master of guerrilla warfare and one of Hitler's most decorated soldiers.
Skorzeny with his daughter Waltraut in 1950, image - WW2 Gravestones
Waltraut was seventeen, a honey blonde, athletically built and very tanned. She had beautiful blue eyes, strong white teeth and a firm jaw. She had large breasts.
I'd seen dozens of girls just like Waltraut in my father's Second World War books. Captions described them as 'Germany's mothers of the future.' Many of the pictures had been taken by Hitler's favourite photographer, Leni Riefenstahl. She specialised in pictures of Waltraut-type girls throwing their bodies and right arms out in the direction of Hitler as he passed by in a car. I asked Lovene, 'Why don't we have girls like that throwing their arms out at Mosley?' She looked at me in disgust.
Waltraut's English was reasonable but it was the way she said words such as 'please', 'thank you' and 'excuse me' that so excited me. She pursed her lips and pouted like Brigitte Bardot.
She was in London to try to find the right college to prepare her for the Cambridge English exam, so she could qualify for a job as a translater. Waltraut was also studying French, Spanish, Italian and Russian. She said that one day Germany would conquer the Soviet Union and interpreters would be required.
When Waltraut arrived I was so overawed all I could think of to say was, 'You're very brown.' I said the words slowly, mesmerised by her magnificent breasts.
'You don't speak any German?' she said, hardly acknowledging my presence. 'My father owns several large companies. He is a personal friend of President Franco and I live part of the year in Madrid and part of the year in Bavaria. That's why I am brown. I also ski, swim and walk a great deal in the hills and the mountains.'
After I had walked her round Regents Park, shown her the ducks and swans, and received stares from several Jewish ladies who had seen a Waltraut or two during their days in Germany or Eastern Europe, she said to me, 'Please comb your hair. I am embarrassed to be in the middle of London with someone who is trying to look like a Hollywood actor.'
Each night I'd lie awake and think of the German Valkyrie who'd taken over my freshly decorated bedroom.
I'd been relegated to a small, white-washed room next to my father's dark-room, but that was of no concern to a fifteen-year-old boy who found himself deeply in love. Waltraut was the best looking girl in the world and she was sleeping in my bed! I found it easy to follow The Leader's recommendations that we should love our European comrades, especially the Germans.
One evening, when my parents had gone out, Waltraut and I were left alone in my front room. My sister had lent me a long-playing record with Tchaikovsky's Italian Caprice on it. I put it on and Waltraut and I hummed the theme. At the end of the record, I tried to kiss her. She put her hand across her face and said, 'Trevor, please don't be a silly little boy. I have a very large boyfriend in Germany who is twenty two years old and he would not enjoy it if I tell him that an English Halbstarker had tried to kiss me.' I asked her what the German word meant and she said it referred to someone who was half-strong or half-grown-up.
The following week she left for Bavaria or Spain or wherever it was and I was delighted to get my room back and put my hair into a Tony Curtis again. At fifteen, it's amazing how fast you can fall out of love.
Memoir of a Fascist Childhood: A boy in Mosley's Britain, by Trevor Grundy. Published by William Heinemann Ltd; First edition, 20 Jan. 1998.
