On Arran: That Sinking Feeling
John Bruce recounts the fateful passage of the SS Politician – and what happened to its precious cargo
I
n the course of writing the first two articles for this esteemed publication I have come to realize that the whisky is only a part, albeit a glorious part, of the equation. With this in mind, despite the restrictions imposed by the cruel editor’s predilection for the brevity of the philistine, this edition shall attempt to cover, in no particular order, history, golf, film appreciation, travel recommendations and indeed whisky. On the morning of 5 February 1941, the SS Politician, bound for Kingston Jamaica, ran aground on sandbanks in the Sound of Eriskay. The entire crew was rescued by local men and word quickly spread that a major part of the cargo was 28,000 bottles of malt whisky. This cargo, as any right minded man of the sea will tell you, was salvage or near enough as made little difference, and thus anyone retrieving it was entitled to keep it. The islanders, some from as far away as Lewis, swiftly “rescued” a significant part of it. At this stage, the villain of the piece entered in the shape of Charles McColl, the local customs officer, whose largely ineffectual efforts to thwart the locals were the inspiration for a Compton Mackenzie novel which in turn led to the great Ealing comedy, Whisky Galore. The actions of McColl in having the hull of the ship dynamited to prevent further salvage led to one islander uttering the memorable line “Dynamiting whisky. You wouldn't think there’d be men in the world so crazy as that!” One has to understand that Hitler was in the ascendant across Europe at the time to fully appreciate how horrified this man was. This director of this film was Alexander Mackendrick, one of the great directors of Ealing comedies. Mackendrick was born to Scottish parents in Boston but his parents’ perspicacity saw him 14
HK GOLFER・AUG/SEP 2009
The Canny Man in Wanchai shall be showing a double bill of Whisky Galore and The Maggie from 3pm on Sunday 6 November. HKGOLFERMAGAZINE.COM
One-Armed Bandit
hk history
Arthur Hacker recounts the story of Francis A. Sutton, one of Hong Kong’s more unusual champion golfers
A
f ew mont hs after t he beginning of World War Two, before the Japanese entered the conflict, an extraordinary paralympics golf match took place at the then Royal Hong Kong Golf Club between two fanatical golf enthusiasts who had both lost their right arms. Major Melville-Smith was the Instructor of Gunnery to the British garrison. His competitor, who had had his arm blown off at Gallipoli, was the notorious “One-Arm” Sutton. Before World War One he had won the Buenos Aires Amateur Golf Championship. Having come under serious mortar fire at Gurkha Bluff, where he had lost his arm, Frank Sutton realised that the Turkish Army mortars were far superior to those of the British. While he was recovering from his wound he started work designing what became known as the Sutton mortar. During the China War Lord era, Frank was in Manchuria manufacturing thousands of these mortars for the Old Marshal, Chang Tso-lin, whose ambition was to capture Peking. He had a problem: the Great Wall of China stood in the way. Sutton planned to use his mortars to blow a breach in the wall. Fortunately the defenders had inadvertently left a door open: so it was a simple job. The mad Old Marshal made him a general for this magnificent feat of arms. The Old Marshal had a tiresome habit of murdering his generals, so Frank took a golfing holiday in Shanghai. Here he won a local lottery called the Champions Sweepstake. China was beginning to get unhealthy for foreign mercenaries like Sutton. Fearing that his luck would run out Sutton went to Canada where he lost £500,000 during the awful days of the Great Depression. In an attempt to rebuild his fortune Frank and his golf clubs returned to the Far East. The golf was fun: but otherwise he failed miserably. During the Sino-Japanese War the Kempeitai attempted to recruit him as an agent. “No bloody fear!” growled Frank. He was arrested by the Japanese who deported him from Korea to Hong Kong where he played what was his last golf match against the one-armed major. Frank won! HKGOLFERMAGAZINE.COM
Arthur Hacker
SINGLE MALTS
return to Scotland to be educated, a path that is sadly less trodden these days, and success swiftly followed. Personally, my favourite Mackendrick film is another that portrays the struggle between the cunning of the locals and the authority of the wider world, The Maggie. The film opens with the eponymous Clyde puffer stuck on the Glasgow subway with the great liner Queen Mary prevented from sailing as a result. Things quickly go downhill from there for the puffer and crew in increasingly hilarious and occasionally poignant fashion. Puffers were small steam powered cargo ships with flat hulls which allowed them to beach on the sands of smaller Scottish destinations and deliver much needed cargo to small communities. Talking of small communities, I confess that I have constructed this meandering tale in order that I can recount a tale of my father’s about whisky drinking in the years immediately after the Second World War and through the 1950s, before the “never had it so good” years of Harold Macmillan. Supplies were scarce, licensing hours were tight and good quality whisky was in short supply. As working men, on the Isle of Arran, my father and fellows would have a few drinks on a Saturday afternoon. The problems they faced included the fact that there was only a limited amount of the good stuff and the bars closed between two-thirty and five in the afternoon. To the Scottish aficionado of fine whisky, no problem is insurmountable and the men in question were good friends with the crew of the ferry to the mainland, which took about one hour each way, with a half hour for disembarkation and reloading and a bar that sold the “good stuff” when at sea. Therein lay the short term solution. Nothing moves too quickly in the islands, as the aforementioned films amply demonstrated, but in 1995 the long term solution was found with the opening of Arran Distillery in Lochranza. Still in its early years in whisky terms, the distillery has produced a number of single cask varieties and a very acceptable 10-year-old malt that is not as peaty as most island malts. Indeed, its initial taste is redolent of sweet fruit leading to a spicy warm finish. The character promises much for the more aged varieties that should soon be with us. As a destination for the whisky appreciating golfer, which after all this is aimed at, Arran owns another fine distinction: it has the most golf courses per head of population anywhere in the world; seven within its 57-mile circumference. They vary in length and difficulty but as a reliable measure, if you can’t hit the green on the 120-yard par-3 1st at Corrie Golf Course, you’d be better to give up for the day and head to the bar.
HK GOLFER・AUG/SEP 2009
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