After a distinguished military career, Colonel Tony Aylmer devoted much time in his retirement to helping the Conservative Party. His obituary, published in The Times on 28 February, stated that in 1980 he “left the service to work at Conservative Central Office”. In a supplement to the obituary published on 7 March (with one or two small cuts), Alistair Lexden explained that he was no ordinary Central Office worker.
Colonel Aylmer—I would never have dreamt of using his first name—would not have been pleased to have been numbered among those who worked at Conservative Central Office.
He would descend upon us occasionally with his genial colleagues, a general and a brigadier, who comprised the Conservative Board of Finance. Most of their work was done in grand restaurants with a wide variety of businessmen, rustling up useful sums for Tory funds.
“Dear boy”, the Colonel would say, “I think I would have got a bigger donation today if my guest had not been so browned off about the poll tax. Could you draft a nice letter about it for me to send him?” The reward was an invitation to the Board’s lavish champagne parties at Christmas.
I doubt many honours were promised. “I really think we should do something special for our most generous friends” , he said one day. He seemed delighted when I arranged for some copies of a small book on the history of the Conservative Party to be bound in half leather for them. I often wondered how they went down with his generous friends.
