Norah Docker

A dance hostess at a club in her youth, she married three times, on each occasion to an executive of a business that sold luxury goods.

Her third marriage, to Sir Bernard Docker, the chairman of Birmingham Small Arms Company (BSA) and its subsidiary, Daimler, was notable for the couple's extravagant lifestyle.

This was often funded by tax writeoffs and company expenditure that could not be legitimately defended, which led to Sir Bernard's removal from BSA's board of directors.

"My close friends in Fleet Street have told me that I have been good entertainment value for money, for their millions of readers over the years, and frankly I have never objected!

[14] Lady Docker won a marbles championship in 1955 at Castleford's "Reight Neet Aht", a charity event for the Cancer Relief Fund, while wearing a sequin dress and diamonds.

[15] The next year, while in Melbourne, Australia, to watch the 1956 Summer Olympics, she challenged the suburb of Collingwood to a marbles match.

[16] In 1969, her memoirs, Norah: The Autobiography of Lady Docker, ghostwritten and edited by Don Short, were published by W.H.

One part reads: "I have planted my feet, delicately but boldly, on red carpets in the palaces and castles of some of the most sacred dynasties across the world.

To protect her maid Charlotte Reed, Norah converted the bidet in her bathroom into a stool in which to store her jewellery.

The car was sold in 1959 for seven thousand, three hundred pounds, to an American motor-cycle distributor, William E. Johnson, Junior, of Pasadena.

Its accessories included solid silver hairbrushes and red fitted luggage made from crocodile skin.

[24] The initial plans were for a two seater sports car, in a deep green with the interior trim scarlet crocodile.

[27] It was a cream and gold, fixed head sports car, with an ivory dashboard, cocktail cabinet, vanity box and built-in picnic basket.

We could comfortably accommodate twelve people in the four double, and four single, cabins.’ The crew would often buy Norah dolls to help with her collection, and fluffy animals.

[29] At the end of May 1956, Sir Bernard Docker was removed from the board of Birmingham Small Arms Company (BSA), where he had been chairman.

[30] The issues leading to the removal of the Dockers stemmed from the extravagant expenses they presented to the company, including the show cars made available for Lady Docker's personal use, a £5,000 gold and mink ensemble that Lady Docker wore at the 1956 Paris Motor Show that she tried to write off as a business expense as she "was only acting as a model" at the show,[31] and Glandyfi Castle, bought with £12,500 of BSA's money and refurbished for £25,000, again with company money.

Affair’ in the Autobiography: ‘Bernard sent out over ten thousand telegrams to share-holders, promising that they would know the full and honest facts behind his dismissal.

I condemned the commercialisation of the wedding and, in one article, I criticised Princess Grace, on a fashion count, for wearing a ridiculously-large brimmed hat on her arrival in Monaco."

She saw the stage was empty and grabbed the microphone and said some unkind things about Prince Rainier and his former girlfriend, Gisele Pascal.

The next day over lunch in the Hotel de Paris, Norah told Bernard she wanted to leave and go to Cannes immediately.

Bernard, who had returned to London for a business meeting, went to rescue Norah but he was detained at Nice Airport on his arrival.