Lives remembered: Sir Nicholas Henderson Posted on March 23rd
Malcolm Dougal writes: I served under Sir Nicholas Henderson in the
embassy in Paris for a few months. Your obituary (March
17) referred to his sartorial eccentricities, which were a subject of
some amusement to us, his staff. On one occasion, at a reception for
businessmen at his residence, I introduced him to Sir Eddie Rayne, shoemaker
for Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother. They discovered that they had both
known Ian Fleming. They proceeded to try to out-trump each other by proving
how well they had known him. Finally, Nicko Henderson won, game, set and
match, by saying that when Fleming had died he had left him all his suits
and “this is one of them”, he claimed, fingering the tousled jacket he was
wearing.