Grateful pensioner
Sir: The vitriolic article on Armand Ham- mer and the Leonardo Codex by William Cash (`A. sordid saga of greed and Weiss', 17 September) made good reading. Family feuds, especially when one of the key play- ers is dead, are an easy target. Having worked for Hammer for ten years, and been with him and Frances when he bought the Codex, I know him to have been a social climber, a maverick and an opportunist. He also used the establishment, so that, after his death, many of those organisations and individuals that benefited from his, or his company's, generosity now choose not to have known him. Admittedly he sometimes found it hard to differentiate between per- sonal and company support, a problem for many business leaders. It is a grey areal An example of the article's bias can be found in the reference to the 'fake' Modigliani at his house. It was a copy of a painting owned by the Armand Hammer collection done by Frances Hammer and signed with a big `FH'; hardly the derisory fake of the story. He was proud of it — and her. For all his faults he was a character who lived life to the full. I liked him, and am proud to have known him. (And he was no Maxwell — my pension's safe!) Tim Halford
Flat 3, 22 Leamington Road Villas, London W11
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