Remembering Hugh Massingberd

A. N. Wilson commemorates the life of the great journalist Hugh Massingberd 

The following is the address given at his funeral at Kensal Green Crematorium on 2 January

We were all so lucky to bask in Hugh’s generous friendship. He included in this friendship his family, his children, Harriet and Luke, Gareth, the father of Hugh’s grandson Jack, whose arrival on this planet caused him such immense joy, Christine and of course Ripples, his wife, friend for life and ministering angel, as well as dozens of happy men and women, boys and girls, all of them cheered up by his mere appearance, or by one of his frequent, semi-legible post-cards written in thick felt-tip pen. In his own phrase — ‘Nothing better!’

There was nothing better than his friendship. Knowing him, we were in the Garden of Eden before the gate had shut. It was an essentially innocent world, Hugh’s, and the lavishness, the absurd generosity, the over-indulgence in which he longed for us all to share, were all a part of this. I remember a breakfast at Gunby, being prepared by Hugh and Luke — with more fried eggs than it seemed possible to have assembled in one pan, together with rashers, sausages, tomatoes, and a vat of baked beans into which he was lowering about a pound of butter. Having done so, he turned, with a broad grin and said, ‘I think I shall add some clotted cream — nothing better!’ The same largesse was always displayed during lunch at the Travellers, at which he ordered wines he could not afford — he had the ambition to try every vintage in the cellar — and discreetly reminded whoever happened to be serving, ‘Could we have triple helpings of bread sauce!’

The lavishness extended not merely to fleshly appetite but to his generous appreciation of other people’s talents, always noted — literally.