THANK you for the article on the late Wendy Wood (Wendy Wood: A Scottish patriot to her very core, April 21). As a teenager in the late 1950s I joined the Scottish Patriots and attended meetings in the basement of her flat in Howard Place, Edinburgh.
My mate and I – working-class lads from the council estate – stuck out like sore thumbs amongst the literati of Edinburgh society but the commitment to Scottish independence was inspirational.
This led us to various high jinks involving correct relocation of Union flags! That was when I had a head for heights.
READ MORE: Wendy Wood: A Scottish patriot to her very core
We also sold copies of the Scottish Patriot on the top deck of buses when the clippy was downstairs. It was a popular read at the time and had contributions from those statespersons of Scottish literature we would meet at Howard Place.
Wendy was a real personality and you knew it from the moment you met her. When she spoke at the foot of The Mound in Edinburgh (then Scotland’s Hyde Park Corner) large crowds would gather – plus the odd man in trenchcoat and black shiny shoes. Flamboyant was a word invented for her!
Wendy would not have recognised the SNP of today – she was more into direct action – but I am sure she would have approved as we are now in different times which call for different approaches. I am equally sure that she would be proud of Nicola Sturgeon and the intelligent way she leads the SNP and the Scottish Government.
I enclose a drawing by Wendy from when she was in Howard Place in 1965. It is titled Clouds Across The Moon. Hope your readers enjoy it.
Tony Grahame
Edinburgh
EVEN more significant in the tearing down of the Union Jack by Wendy Wood at Stirling Castle after the 1932 Bannockburn Rally was the fact that in her autobiography, Yours Sincerely for Scotland, she describes her father as an “empire man”. This certainly made no impression on Wendy Wood.
One of her early memories was of the horrors of the Boer War and of British concentration camps, which really coloured her perception of that empire at a time when the overwhelming majority of Scots were empire enthusiasts.
Whilst at Grahamstown Boarding School in South Africa as a teenager, she organised a school strike in protest at the unjust shooting of a black man, which showed a deep antagonism to injustice of any kind.
I would like to elaborate on the significance of Wendy Wood’s campaigns amongst the miners of Fife with her Democratic Scottish Self Government Organisation.
At a time when the Labour party struggled to make inroads into Willie Gallacher MP’s communist citadel of West Fife, and the SNP struggled to make any impact in Central Belt Scotland whatsoever, the DSSO organised soup kitchens for the hunger marchers travelling through Edinburgh in the early 1930s and had substantial political credibility in mining villages like Lochore and Lumphinnans. This has not been given the significance it deserves.
By the mid-1940s Wood had found the second great love of her life, an ex-original IRA man, and they moved together to a croft in the Highlands. This led her to an interest in the wider question of Celtic solidarity, a dimension which the SNP totally ignored until Dr Robert MacIntyre became vice-president of the Celtic League in 1961. In 1928 she described her passion for the newly formed National Party of Scotland as “idiotic sacrifice”, but in keeping the flame of Scottish independence alive, not just in the political sense but also in the wider culture sense, her sacrifice was definitely impassioned but far from idiotic.
Cllr Andy Doig (Independent)
Renfrewshire Council
HAMISH MacPherson’s article on Wendy Wood brought back a memory from the late 40s . As a child I was on holiday with my uncle and aunt in Broughty Ferry, and one day they had a lady friend in for afternoon tea. She fascinated me as she was dressed differently from others of their friends who called, wearing to me what looked like a green beret. After she had gone my uncle said, “Remember, today you have met someone famous.” He didn’t say why she was famous, but I never forgot my only meeting with Wendy Wood.
Anne Cormack
Pitlochry
GREG Russell’s article about oil prices is a bit over the top (US oil price crash is ‘not reflective’ of the wider industry, April 22).
The oil companies can shut down a few wells when the oil price falls below the cost of production. The people who lost money are the gamblers on oil futures who pay 10% down, with the 90% payable in 30 days.
READ MORE: US oil price crash is ‘not reflective’ of the wider industry
They gamble in millions of barrels at a time hoping to sell at a profit before the 30 days are up. If the price drops they may sell at a small loss. But if the can’t sell before the 30 days then the 90% due must be paid, probably entailing bankruptcy.
William Purves
Galashiels
IS Alister Jack covered from head to toe in bandages? The reason I ask is because I am sure he is the Invisible Man.
M Ross
Aviemore
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