Lawson Hospital nurse auctions John Lennon memorabilia
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THREE unique items of John Lennon memorabilia, dating back nearly half-a-century and with a Sutherland connection, are going under the hammer next week.
The pieces – an autograph book, a telegram and a single of “Give Peace a Chance” – form one lot in a sale of Beatles and Rock n’ Roll memorabilia which takes place in London on 23rd November.
The lot is expected to make up to £2500.
The items have been in the possession of a former Lawson Memorial Hospital nurse, who has not been named, since 1969.
She helped look after Lennon, Yoko Ono and their respective offspring, Julian Lennon and Kyoko Ono Cox, when they were taken to the Golspie hospital following a car crash in Tongue in July that year.
The nurse persuaded all four family members to sign her autograph book. She also acquired a telegram sent to Lennon by his agent and which he left behind at the hospital.
Julian Cornthwaite, of auction house TracksAuction.com, said the autographs were unique.
“This is the first time we have seen a set of autographs of John, Yoko and their offspring from the sixties in one collection and all are signed on the same occasion,” he said.
Lennon’s love of Sutherland is well documented. He spent many childhood holidays staying with an aunt and cousins at Sangomore, Durness, and is said to have been inspired by the wild landscape.
In late June 1969 he took a trip north with his family. At the time Yoko was pregnant. Julian Lennon was aged six and Kyoko was five.
The family came to grief when Lennon, a notoriously bad driver, crashed his white British Leyland Austin Maxi near Tongue on Tuesday, 1st July. The car left the road and landed in the ditch. All four were taken to Golspie’s Lawson Memorial Hospital.
Julian was treated for shock and was the first to leave the hospital. He was taken to Durness to stay with his great aunt until he was collected by his mother, Cynthia Lennon.
Meanwhile Lennon, Yoko and her daughter all received facial stitches. Kyoko was picked up by her father but Lennon and Yoko and remained in hospital for five days.
The couple were airlifted on Sunday, 6th July, from the hospital grounds by a chartered helicopter and taken back to London.
On his discharge Lennon quipped to reporters: “If you are going to have a car crash, try and arrange for it to happen in the Highlands. The hospital was just great.”
Mr Cornthwaite described the condition of the autograph book, which measures 10.5cm by 8cm, as “very good”.
Julian and Kyoko signed their first names only on one page while Lennon and Yoko signed the adjoining page.
The handwritten, two page telegram included in the lot, is addressed to “Mr and Mrs Lennon, Lawson Memorial Hospital, Golspie” and was sent from the Beatles’ Apple Records London offices by press officer Derek Taylor.
It contains a review, which appeared in English music weekly Record Mirror, of John and Yoko’s first Plastic Ono band single “Give Peace a Chance”. The single was one of several copies sent to the hospital by Lennon after his discharge as a thank you.
Mr Cornthwaite said: “Unfortunately, there is a single crack across one part of the entire surface of the record.”
The sale is being held in Le Meridien Hotel, Piccadilly, but online bids can be made up until that date by visiting www.tracksauction.com
- More on this in today’s NT
