Agent Zigzag; Alice in Sunderland. Money for old rope

Jerry · Post by **Jerry** » Mon Jun 25, 2007 11:16 am

Eddie Chapman - Geordie safe-breaker, jailbird, womaniser, German agent, British agent (hero of the film Triple Cross, Christopher Plummer) - is commemorated in a new book Agent Zigzag by (forgotten) Macintyre.

(Sless) If you don't know of Chapman, you'll be amazed. If you find out exactly where he was born, let me know.

Alice in Sunderland Brilliant comic book etc by Bryan Talbot (creator of Luther Arkwright) Mostly about Durham legends (Lambton Worm, Penshaw Hill, Lewis Carroll) , Sunderland etc. Sid James died at the Empire, but Tommy Steele made his debut there, and Benny Hill was a flop. This book has been called ridiculously cheap at £16.

The Dangerous Book for Boys is also excellent for men. DON'T BUY THE SMALL GREEN VERSION, WHICH IS JUST FLOGGING BITS OF THE ORIGINAL. GET THE BIG RED ONE.

Not all Booker Prize winners are unreadable. Barry Unsworth of Wingate and Pat Barker of Thornaby/Durham are certainly readable and some of Barry's books have been filmed (Pascali's Island with Charles Dance).

You can often work out a winner by calculating if it's the year for a woman/ethnic writer/readable book etc. I made a huge amount of cash on Pat Barker's Ghost Road at 10-1. Bookies have the odds.

DBC (Dirty but Clean) Pierre won the Booker in 2003 with Vernon God Little, which 35% of readers couldn't finish, though it's short. It's full of obscenities, I'm afraid.

Pierre was on TV being pretty good about the Aztecs the other night. He regards himself as Mexican, but was born Peter Finlay in Australia. His life up to now has been a record of dissipation, but blow me if his mother wasn't born in Durham city, Pierre went to school there (quite possibly when Tony Blair did) and has often revisited the coalfield where his ancestors lie. He wrote movingly about the Durham Miners' Gala in the Guardian.

It's a small world.

baldy.smith · Post by **baldy.smith** » Mon Jun 25, 2007 12:52 pm

Re: EDDIE CHAPMAN

Born Edward Arnold Chapman 16th Nov. 1914 at Burnup Field, (now called Burnhope) Near Durham. Birth registered in Lanchester
ref:10a 685.

http://www.bloomsbury.com/media/ZIGZAGdossierfinal.pdf

brian c · Post by **brian c** » Mon Jun 25, 2007 12:56 pm

So he was born exactly 30 years before me.

Now there's a usless fact of information for you.

baldy.smith · Post by **baldy.smith** » Mon Jun 25, 2007 12:59 pm

Hope your not expecting me to send a card

Reference No. for your birth is 10a 1233
Can't make out your mothers maiden name, looks like Coats.

brian c · Post by **brian c** » Mon Jun 25, 2007 1:21 pm

Thats right Baldy.

brian c · Post by **brian c** » Mon Jun 25, 2007 1:29 pm

Baldy, what website are the birth details on?

Please

baldy.smith · Post by **baldy.smith** » Mon Jun 25, 2007 1:30 pm

Ancestry.co.uk

The link is below to the page you want. Don't know if it will work for you though. It works for me. You may have to download something from the site first. Try it.

http://content.ancestry.co.uk/iexec/?ht ... pid=574315

Jerry · Post by **Jerry** » Mon Jun 25, 2007 2:02 pm

Baldy, thanks for the birth date. I had him on my site (Famous People) as 1908?

It's Burnup Field on the declassified documents I find, but I thought that was an official mistake for Burnopfield.

baldy.smith · Post by **baldy.smith** » Mon Jun 25, 2007 3:21 pm

You are almost certain to be correct in your assumptin that it was an error printing Burnup Field as his birthplace. An 1861 map shows it as Burnopfield in the district of Lanchester which was where the birth was registered. So I was wrong in assuming that it was Burnhope.
Burnopfield is also known as Burnhopefield and there are a lot of sites about it with that name. Although the maps all show it as Burnopfield.

Charles Wesley described having visited Burnup Field and the description of where it is located is exact for Burnopfield.

Another interesting link:

http://www.seaham.i12.com/myers/chapman2.htm