The Impossible Dead‑End — Endless Harassment and the Birth of a Murder Plot
Without his national‑insurance card, the riding‑school could not employ Norman formally. He wrote repeatedly begging Thorpe to send the document. Thorpe kept promising, yet never acted. After months of waiting, Norman lost the job.
For the next two years, Norman sent one plea after another for his card. All were ignored. In summer 1963, while performing at a horse show, he was trampled by a horse; six vertebrae were damaged. Once again he could not work. Lacking insurance‑card documentation, medical treatment was difficult to access. He returned to England to recover.
When Thorpe heard Norman was back, he visited, paid for medical care, and charmed him with soft words. Norman, however, was no longer the naive young man he had been years before.
In December 1964, Norman spotted an advertisement in Horse & Hound. A vet in Switzerland was hiring a stable‑hand with good pay. Thorpe understood Norman wanted to escape England. He sent a strong letter of recommendation, and Norman won the post.
In January 1965, Norman travelled to Switzerland. Upon arrival, he discovered the farm was remote, bitterly cold, and the working conditions harsh. After just one night, he quit. The vet lent him money for a return ticket home.
Shortly afterwards, Thorpe’s door‑bell rang. Norman stood on the doorstep. Thorpe was furious: he had pulled major strings to get Norman the overseas job, and the young man had abandoned it overnight.
During their reunion, Norman told Thorpe he had lost his suitcase on the train. Clothes did not trouble him, he explained — but inside the case were every letter Thorpe had written to him, plus that original explosive postcard from Vater.
Thorpe went into immediate panic. He fired off urgent letters to the British embassy in Switzerland, begging officials to locate the missing luggage. Once the crisis cooled, Thorpe reached a chilling conclusion: Norman was emotionally unstable, disaster seemed to follow wherever he went. He must be pushed permanently out of the country.
Thorpe used his connections once more and secured Norman work at an Irish stable. Within weeks, the stable‑owner wrote an angry complaint to Thorpe: Norman had quit three times, lied constantly, and fought with staff. He could not keep him on.
Thorpe gave up. He stopped replying to Norman’s letters entirely.
Cut off, Norman tried a new tactic. He wrote directly to Thorpe’s mother. In the letter, he made no blackmail threats. He honestly described his history with Thorpe, and acknowledged Thorpe had helped him a great deal. He only asked three reasonable favours: return his national‑insurance card; recover the lost suitcase full of papers; and lend him thirty pounds to survive, which he promised to repay.
Norman imagined Thorpe’s mother would be a sympathetic older lady. He underestimated the hard‑nosed pragmatism of an aristocratic political household. She simply forwarded the letter straight to her son and told him to sort the mess out himself.
Thorpe read the letter and immediately interpreted it as blackmail. He asked lawyers to draft a threatening letter, then hesitated. What if legal pressure drove Norman to go public?
Thorpe settled on a classic politician’s tactic: find a go‑between, a “clean‑up man”, to handle the problem at arm’s length.
His choice fell on Peter Bessell, a Liberal MP who had built a successful business career before entering parliament. Bessell was eager to advance his political fortunes and was happy to do Thorpe favours. He volunteered to travel to Dublin and talk Norman into dropping the whole matter.
Bessell opened negotiations by threatening Norman: his letters could amount to blackmail, and extradition back to Britain was possible. But out of pity, Bessell said, they would choose not to prosecute — if Norman promised silence forever.
Norman’s reply took Bessell aback. “Go ahead and extradite me,” he said. “I have nothing left to lose. In court I will tell the whole story, and maybe then I will finally get my insurance card sorted.”
Bessell quickly softened his tone. Norman restated his simple demands: give me back my national‑insurance card, recover my suitcase, and we will never bother each other again.
Relieved the demands were not monetary blackmail, Bessell handed Norman five pounds for immediate living costs and said he would personally resolve the two outstanding issues.
Back in London, Bessell reported to Thorpe that peace had been achieved. Weeks later, the long‑lost suitcase was recovered. Thorpe took possession of it in his office, removed every compromising letter and the Vater postcard, and burned them all. Believing all damaging evidence destroyed, he mailed the empty suitcase to Norman.
Norman wrote back saying he had a new girlfriend and intended to build a new life. Thorpe believed his nightmare was finally over, and poured all his energy back into Liberal‑Party politics. In 1967, Bessell became the Liberal Party’s treasurer.
That same April, another letter arrived from Norman. He had adopted the new public name Norman Scott. A modelling agency had shown interest in him; he planned to move to the United States and needed help arranging a passport. Thorpe and Bessell rejoiced — nothing would suit them better than for Norman to leave Britain for good.
Three months later, another letter landed. Norman wrote that he had been unable to sustain his new relationship. His boyfriend‑like behaviour had been discovered by his girlfriend, the relationship collapsed, and he had not sailed for America. He was back in Britain, unwell and penniless. He wanted nothing except his national‑insurance card.
Bessell was beside himself. The same small card stood at the centre of a maddening, endless cycle.
Here lay the strangest dead‑lock of the whole affair: Thorpe had ordered a replacement national‑insurance card years earlier — and then he had lost it. Bessell went to the National‑Insurance Office to apply for yet another copy. Officials told him the process was simple, but the registered employer — Jeremy Thorpe — needed to settle roughly £200 in outstanding national‑insurance contributions.
The sum itself was trivial. But paying it would create an official, permanent government record proving Thorpe had once been Norman’s employer. Every trace of that link had been carefully erased over years. That paperwork could never be allowed to exist. And the real reason could never be explained to Norman.
Trapped, Bessell changed strategy. “You want the card for the weekly unemployment benefit of five pounds,” he told Norman. “I will pay you that money directly. Stop pressing for the card.”
Regular hand‑outs kept Norman quiet for a time. Yet misfortune clung to anyone connected to Norman Scott. Bessell’s restaurant investments in the United States collapsed. In 1968, he abandoned his parliamentary re‑election campaign. Even out of office, however, he was trapped. He had diverted Liberal‑Party funds to cover Thorpe’s personal debts; exposure would ruin both men. So Bessell continued to manage Norman’s crises.
Thorpe had married by now, hoping to put his past indiscretions firmly behind him. Bessell met with Norman and gave him a one‑off payment of seventy‑five pounds, urging him to travel to America and restart his modelling career. Norman agreed verbally.
But fate would not let the matter rest. In November 1968, Norman was homeless and broke once more. He wrote begging for money — and again demanded his national‑insurance card.
The impossible dead‑end was plain for everyone to see. For Norman: “I will accept almost anything, just give me my insurance card.” For Thorpe: “I can give you money and support, but under no circumstances can I let you have that card.” There was no compromise available.
Worn past breaking‑point, Thorpe voiced the terrible thought that would alter all their fates: “Where mercy fails, elimination is the only answer. Peter, we have to have him killed.”
Bessell argued fiercely against murder. But Thorpe’s mind was set. He did not require Bessell to carry out the killing. His chosen instrument was David Holmes, a banker, Liberal‑Party treasurer, and Thorpe’s lover. Holmes combined absolute loyalty to Thorpe with limited common‑sense judgement.
In December 1968, the informal assassination circle began holding meetings. They discussed methods to murder Norman Scott over many months.
Then, in April 1969, Bessell received unexpected news: Norman intended to get married. His fiancée loved him despite family opposition, and Norman asked for their good wishes.
The conspirators stared at one another. If Norman settled into married life, the threat might evaporate. Thorpe ordered the assassination plan suspended.
But Norman’s aura of bad‑luck continued radiating outward. Thorpe’s new wife died in a car accident, leaving behind an infant son. Grief‑stricken, Thorpe suffered heavy electoral defeats. Bessell’s American investments imploded, burying him under mountains of debt.
As for Norman: marriage did not rescue him. He spent through his wife’s dowry. The couple wound up so poor they foraged for wild vegetables to eat. Predictably, Norman blamed his misery on not having a national‑insurance card and contacted Bessell again.
Bessell secured emergency welfare payments for him. When those ran dry, he resumed sending five‑pound hand‑outs. Eventually his wife gave up completely, took their child, and left. Norman was adrift once again.
A wealthy widowed woman called Gwenda Parry crossed paths with the destitute Norman. Sympathetic to his story, she supported him financially and planned to invest in a riding school for him. Norman recounted his history with Thorpe to Gwenda many times.
Gwenda took Norman to Westminster to confront the Liberal Party chief whip David Steel in May 1971. Norman’s account rambled and was disjointed. The whip even came away believing Norman had been having an affair with Bessell, not Thorpe. With no tangible proof, he dismissed Norman as a disturbed nuisance and sent him away.
When Thorpe heard about the meeting, a realisation dawned: every original letter and the Vater postcard had long since been burned. Norman held no hard evidence. Without documents, Norman’s accusations were merely hearsay. If newspapers printed the story, Thorpe could sue them for libel.
Re‑invigorated, Thorpe led the Liberals through a series of strong electoral showings. Norman understood that without physical proof he could not destroy Thorpe. He tried tracking down the police officer who had taken his original statement years earlier, hoping to access the archived copies of letters. He failed.
Gwenda Parry descended into alcoholism and died. Norman was homeless again.
The 1974 general election brought Thorpe the high‑water‑mark of his political career. The Liberals achieved their best post‑war result. Since Labour and the Conservatives finished almost dead‑locked, the Liberal Party held the balance of power in parliament. For a brief window, Thorpe seemed certain to enter cabinet. That chance slipped away after drawn‑out coalition negotiations, and Labour formed a government without Liberal support.
Crushed by that disappointment, Thorpe travelled back to his North Devon constituency in November 1974. Driving through town, he glanced toward the pavement — and saw Norman Scott.
After nearly ten years, the two men met by pure accident. Norman waved and mouthed a word meant as “thank‑you”, trying to close the chapter of their shared past. Thorpe saw only the spectre of his worst nightmare, turned up on his home turf. Convinced Norman intended to stir‑up scandal among his voters, Thorpe returned to his office filled with panic. The shelved assassination plan was ordered back into action.
📚 The Thorpe Affair: Britain’s Most Scandalous Political Soap‑Opera
- 1. The Rainy‑Night Moor Shooting and an Ambitious Aristocrat’s Rise
- 2. The National‑Insurance Card Trap — the Aristocrat and the Vulnerable Stable‑Hand
- 3. The Impossible Dead‑End — Endless Harassment and the Birth of a Murder Plot (Current)
- 4. Hired Killers, the Dog Murder, Public Outcry and the Final Verdict
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