The body parts had been gathered without the knowledge or consent of the parents. The existence of this experiment was at first flatly denied by the British Department of Health. But an American doctor made worldwide headlines by disclosing the existence of just such an experiment called “Project Sunshine”.
The United States Department of Energy later admitted more than 6,000 dead babies had been harvested for use in fallout experiments without parental consent.
The National Radiological Protection Board, which had resolutely insisted that no-one had been affected by the fallout from the Windscale incident, finally issued a report estimating that 32 deaths and at least 260 cases of cancer could be attributed to the fire.
But there were widespread concerns that this figure was much too low. In 1993, official figures confirmed that in nearby Seascale, the incidence of leukaemia and non-Hodgkin lymphoma (both linked with people being exposed to radioactive material) was 14 times the national average.
Ken McGinley could see clear parallels with the Windscale experience and that of his own veterans. It didn’t surprise him that William Penney had been the man chosen by the government to keep a lid on the incident.
He had been writing to the scientist for several years asking him to comment on the plight of the nuclear veterans, but had never received a reply. In 1985, however, an unexpected opportunity arose to bring ex-soldier and scientist together.
THE URINAL DIALOGUES
Lord William Penney, OM, KBE, OBE, PhD, DSc, Father of the British atomic bomb, Fellow of the Royal Society, Fellow of Imperial College and Supernumerary of St Catherine’s College Oxford, must have thought he was in purgatory: every time he went to the lavatory, he was joined at the urinals by Ken McGinley, former private in the Royal Engineers, who greeted him with a cheeky, “We’ll have to stop meeting like this…”
Trapped and helpless, Lord Penney could only smile weakly as he endured a stream of questions from the loquacious Scot who easily brushed aside Penney’s MoD minder, a huge flat-faced individual with beetling brows, whenever he moved to intervene.
The unscheduled ‘meetings’ were held in the improbable setting of the gentlemen’s toilets in a large building annexed to the St James’s hotel in central London. The building was the venue for the Australian Royal Commission which had clattered noisily into town for a spot of Pom-bashing, over the conduct of the British during atomic bomb testing carried out in Australia’s vast deserts in the 1950s.
Penney had been most reluctant to take part in these proceedings, but had been persuaded by his former masters in Whitehall. Ever the patriot he agreed to be questioned by the Commission, chaired by a colourful and abrasive Australian judge named James McClelland, dubbed ‘Diamond Jim’ for his sharp suits and sparkling tiepins that brought to mind a Mississippi riverboat gambler.
Penney was not enjoying the experience.
He had prepared a 12-page statement setting out how the bomb tests had been conducted, and how safety considerations had been the number one priority of the scientific team.
McClelland was having none of it and had already lambasted the British government for withholding relevant documentary evidence covering that period of British scientific history.
He suggested the government was dragging its feet and warned witnesses not to trifle with the truth. He had already caused a minor sensation by producing like a rabbit from a magician’s hat an official document showing that British scientists had seriously considered using Wick, an island off the northern coast of Scotland, as a possible test site for nuclear weapons.
Parliament was in uproar; Scottish politicians were raising hell.
Penney, according to those closest to him, was deeply affected by many of the allegations that were coming out of the enquiry, such as those about using men as human guinea pigs.
But the stories that upset him most were those claiming that many of their children had been born deformed. These had already prompted him to send at least one letter to a newspaper expressing his concern about the “dreadful problems.”
And it was well known he had been devastated over the birth of a malformed baby to the wife of his old Los Alamos colleague Sir Ernest Titterton.
It was March 1985 and McGinley had been in the news almost constantly for two years. His tub-thumping allegations had culminated in part to Penney’s presence before the commission.
Under normal circumstances, Lord Penney would have run a mile before agreeing to see McGinley who only that afternoon had been on TV accusing Penney and his political masters of “crimes against humanity”.
Unfortunately for Penney, the meetings were unavoidable. At aged 76, he had a condition not uncommon in gentlemen of advancing years: a weak bladder. This necessitated him visiting the toilet at frequent intervals and, to his obvious embarrassment, found his visits coincided with McGinley who, it seemed, had a bladder condition in synchronisation with his own.
Scientists like Penney had good reason to be careful about whom they met. Once feted and admired, they were now being treated like pariahs. The horrors of nuclear war had been brought into sharp focus by the veterans, and the public was baying for blood, especially in Britain which had a long tradition of nuclear antipathy.
Penney’s shoulders slumped whenever the slightly-built Scot appeared at his side; it was an ignominious position to be in for a man of his stature.
McGinley, who away from the microphones was a courteous man, was aware of his discomfiture. “I don’t mean to bother you Lord Penney,” he said during one visit. “I’m not doing this deliberately. It’s just that, well… if you’ve got to go, you’ve got to go.”
Lord Penney, a burly square-set individual, big around the beam and a heavy jaw, had been given a rough ride by the commission who seemed to be holding him personally responsible for all the sins of the nuclear bomb tests.
He was forced to answer some uncomfortable questions and admitted that at least one of the bomb tests had been far bigger than expected. Penney obviously loathed the experience.
Throughout all the pre-publicity, he had maintained a lofty silence, not wanting to add fuel to the debate, hoping all the brouhaha would eventually go away. He had never been known to give an interview about the bomb tests, and he usually avoided questions.
But on his ‘comfort breaks’ he could hardly avoid McGinley, and McGinley took full advantage: “I bombarded him with questions at every opportunity,” recalls McGinley.
“I knew I would never get another chance. I told him about the effects on some of the soldiers and how it had affected their lives. I told him about the widows left behind and the children that had been born deformed. I said it could not possibly be all coincidence.
“He listened carefully and looked distinctly uncomfortable. I don’t think anyone had spoken to him like that before. I remember him saying he was “sorry” for what had happened to the men, and that everything had been done to protect them.
“He gave me a copy of the statement he had made to the commission. As far as I was concerned it was full of inaccuracies, but I didn’t want to upset him, and his minder was ready to step in at the first opportunity.
“I believe he was sincere in what he was saying, but I also thought he was hiding something and I told him so. Penney just looked sad. That’s my last memory of him.”
McGinley couldn’t know it, but Penney was battling liver cancer to which he finally succumbed in 1991.
Some experts said it was ‘highly likely’ it was linked to his role in the atomic bomb tests. Some believed it was an apposite end to a life steeped in secrecy and suspicion.