The mitchmen Royale Studio blog: April 2023

In their catalogue description of 'Navy Gash', Royale boldly announced that the stars were members of one of the Royal Navy Teams in the Royal Tournament Gun Race. Similarly Peter George's solo sets were introduced with the statement that he was a Corporal in the RAF and this information was printed in beefcake mags that featured him (see Airmen in Royale images). Many other models were also promoted as servicemen in this way (see foot of post)

There are many accounts of how easy it was to pick up servicemen from pubs near barracks and enjoy their company (and maybe more) for the price of a pint. There were large numbers of conscripts in the services at that time, reluctantly doing their National Service in the aftermath of World War 2, so there will have been plenty of off-duty gay and non-gay servicemen who ignored the prohibitions of their superiors and frequented gay haunts to simply enjoy the company or offer themselves for rent, where their military identity was an invaluable selling point.

Basil Clavering (the man behind Royale) was a willing buyer of course and through these men he could gain access to an even larger pool of less adventurous and non-gay servicemen, who could also be persuaded to perform for him. It's possible, I suppose, that this grapevine effect may have given rise to the myth about homosexuals 'recruiting' straight men and 'turning' them queer.

The Earls Court area of West London where the Royal Tournament was held annually was close to an area which at that time had a seedy reputation rivalling that of Soho in central London. It was home to a number of well-known gay pubs and clubs with intimidating reputations, notably The (leathery) Colhearne, The Boltons and The Catacombs. There were notorious, dangerous, cruising areas, nearby.

With a seedy, leather reputation, May have been a recruiting ground for Royale's Basil Clavering

The Colhearne Pub (ca 1970?)
(click to enlarge)

During the Royal Tournament all the pubs in the immediate vicinity of the Arena will have been crammed with military men from all 3 services taking a break from performing and attending to their equipment, so there would have been unrivalled opportunities for Basil Clavering and his associates to chat up and proposition likely lads, offering them the possibility of becoming celebrated in a slightly different way and earning some pocket money to boot (no pun intended!). To gay servicemen in those oppressive times it must also have seemed an attractive way of having their publicly despised sexuality recognised and valued even.

It was risky for serving personnel to allow themselves to be photographed in compromising, homosexual situations, they risked lengthy imprisonment, not just expulsion from the services. Royale's description for NAGA referencing the 1959 Royal Tournament actually comes from their October 1959 Catalogue, so the men involved were probably still in the Navy at that time and therefore highly vulnerable. Peter George was also implied to be a serving airman and his Royale Career history provides hints that the practice may have backfired on Royale. Likewise the story of Tom Manlick.

Royale Studio - Navy Romeo, Part 1 - Image 7

Sensible models will have use fake names - Harding, Avard, Willigan in the list below for example seem improbable. The need for Royale models to have a degree of anonymity may account for the fact that their faces are often obscured or turned away in Royale Studio pictures which feature two or more men together. You can see this especially in Part 1 of the 'Navy Romeo' storyette. But it's also true that when it comes to censorship, rear views in general are safer ground than frontal bulges.

Fortunately Royale images circulated largely on the fringes of society. A few relatively innocuous pictures and contact ads appeared in the back pages of British beefcake magazines but even those magazines were hard to come by in the UK at that time. There were rigorous censorship laws and uncontrolled Police activity and homophobia led to the seizing of anything (they) deemed to be remotely indecent. In addition Newsagents, the only available public outlet in those days, were mostly in the hands of conservative, private owners whose personal standards determined what could go on their shelves. Even those willing to sell the magazines were likely to hide them 'under the counter' where they were effectively restricted to those 'in the know' and bold enough to ask.

I'd welcome any comments on this era by readers who experienced it.

Servicemen Appearing in Royale's Photo Sets

Royal Navy, Royal Tournament Gun Crew

Alan and Harry

Don Avard (link pending)

Ned Willigan

Ted (see DTS)

Tom Harding

Tony Newnes (link pending)

Royal Navy (other)

Alan Routh

RAF (PT instructors) -