12 NOVEMBER 1983, Page 24

Sir Oswald's attraction

Sir: Nicholas Mosley may be interested in my own reaction to his father on his release from prison in November 1943 when, as cub reporter on the Oxford Mail, I was the only female in a large press party crowded into a very small room near Oxford to inter- view Sir Oswald about his internment.

I had to kneel in front of him right at his feet because of the great crush. He was rather a forlorn and not unsympathetic figure in loose fitting dark suit, talking in- cessantly without answering any question put to him. I had an impression of an in- curably weak man with a strong voice, in fact typical of many MP's of that period but, as a woman, I could see his attraction. As he talked on, foolishly, mainly about the Jews whom he blamed for everything especially the war, the crowd quickly melted away leaving me and several others alone with him.

Imprisonment had made him feel impor- tant but the pathetic part was that he was

forgotten, indeed almost unknown in the Oxford of '43 packed solid with American servicement or the very young, innocent almost schoolboy undergraduates. I was told by my former employers, Reuters, to limit my story to 300 words maximum.

Olga Franklin

Bishams Court, Caterham, Surrey.