By Sophie McBain
Eternally romanticised by Evelyn Waugh’s Decline and Fall, permanently enigmatic, these tailcoat wearing drunkards have become the stuff of legend. Now, finally, after almost 150 years of silence, The Oxford Student has got one of its members to talk.
Last December, images of snivelling Bullingdon members were splashed all over the tabloids after all 17 members were arrested for wrecking the cellar of the 15th century pub, the White Hart, in Fyfield.
17 bottles of wine were smashed into the walls of the pub after the civility of a gourmet meal descended into a brawl, leaving a trail of debris that was compared by eye-witnesses to a scene from the blitz. The inebriated members started fi ghting, leaving one with a deep cut to the cheek, and the landlord recalls attempting to pull apart the fighting parties, only to have them set on each other once more, exclaiming, “Sorry old chap, just a bit of high spirits.
Four members, including the ringleader, Alexander Fellowes, Princess Diana’s nephew, spent the night in jail. The legal consequences may have been unusual, but the antics were bordering on lame compared to previous incidents. The club was once banned from entering within a 15 mile radius of Oxford after all 550 windows of Christ Church’s Tom quad were smashed in one night.
‘I like the sound of breaking glass’ is one of the society’s mottos and particularly true of one member who, at L’Ortolan in Berkshire, took it upon himself to eat his wine glass rather than his Michelinstarred meal. At another infamous Bullingdon garden party, the club invited a string band to play and proceeded to destroy all of the instruments, including a Stradivarius.
If their aristocratic roots don’t bar them from hooliganism, they certainly don’t temper a certain penchant for good, old fashioned toilet humour. At the Bullingdon’s annual meeting at a point-to-point, one member, a Hungarian Count, pushed another, Daily Telegraph journalist Harry Mount, down a hill in a portaloo. George Osborne was watching the scene, as was The Oxford Student’s source: Fortunately it was quite early in the day and the unsuspecting victim was shaken but not stirred.
Once their three years is up, if their university career survives to its natural end, Bullingdon members go on to some of the most powerful and influential positions in the country. Harry Mount, George Osborne, Alan Clark, Lord Bath, David Dimbleby, Boris Johnson and "it has recently emerged" the Tories’ man of the people, David Cameron, were trained to the pressures of fame by the champagne quaffing, bellicose Bullingdon.
Cameron was member of the club at a time when it was de rigeur to engage in the ‘man of the people’ pursuits of washing down “a cocktail of drugs with an honest, working class box of chips and a five pound bottle of wine”. Looking at the impressive list of famous members and the impeccably tailored member before me, it seems hard to imagine why any of these last bastions of the British aristocratic classes would participate in activity more suited to British football fan culture.
Any member would no doubt be horrified by such a comparison; the Bullingdon is a ‘dining club’ not a ‘drinking society’, regardless of the fact that our source openly admits that they regularly get kicked out of restaurants for rowdiness before the main course arrives. Most Chelsea Headhunters would hold out till after pudding. More at home with a bottle of champagne in their hands than a can of Carlsberg, they are, above all, discerning yobs.
My source is quick to impress on me that they tend to leave one-off antique pieces untouched, preferring to inflict more replaceable damage. I wonder how replaceable a Stradivarius is. Or 550 windows for that matter. A large part of the members’ motivation is the feudal idea that its quite alright to inflict damage on peasants’ property, provided one is able to pay for it.
That’s why Alexander Fellowes, at the White Hart, tipped the waitress £200, on top of all of the members paying for the damage inflicted. Our source described the White Hart landowner as “unfair” for reporting the matter to the police and as having “no sense of humour”. Most people, he adds, are willing to let such matters slide in exchange for the remuneration on offer.
Although the eyewitnesses at the White Hart described the diners’ degeneration as appearing highly ritualised, our source denies that the Bullingdon’s outbursts are intended. He claims that, hard done by members always “intend to have a civilised meal”, but the historical precedent set by former Bullingdon generations means that somehow, after a couple of bottles of Dom Perignon, their expensive primal instincts are released.
That is not to say though that they wake up after a night of debauchery, in their vomit stained tailcoats, with intense feelings of regret - according to our source, the night at the White Hart was “objectively funny”. The Bullingdon seems to be guided by various strangely distorted moral ideas. Along with rule number one - ‘it’s quite fine to wreak havoc, provided you can pay for it’ - it seems to currently have a slightly peculiar drugs policy.
Super-rich druggies need to go to the Assassins or Piers Gaviston to engage in hallucinogenic pursuits, but our source insists that as far as drugs go, the Bullingdon has decided to become squeaky clean. Allegedly, the Bullingdon has never, even during its most drug-loving days, endorsed the use of marijuana, because it meant members were less likely to get the urge to smash things up. The relatively innocent champagne binging “adds to the Bullingdon’s charm”, our source adds.
Cue Bullingdon code number two: ‘passing out face down in your own vomit is quite charming, provided your illness is only alcohol induced’. The Bullingdon usually has between 15 and 70 members, but this year there are only seven. Are financial barriers holding back new membership? The Bullingdon is one of the most expensive of Oxford’s dining clubs.
The tailormade blue tailcoats cost at least £1,200 and a formal dinner, of which there are usually one or two a term, costs a fl at rate of £100, although once damages are added the cost is far greater than this. Richer members may have to pay an even larger membership fee, sometimes approaching £10,000. Nonetheless, our source claims that there are still plenty of people who are rich enough to join, but claims that it is hard fi nding “the right kind of people”.
Anyone who likes clubbing just doesn’t fi t into the Bullingdon mould. It certainly takes a certain kind of person to be willing to face the initiation ceremonies. All members have their rooms completely trashed as a basic initiation, additional requirements may vary. Our source recalls having to, after a whole day of drinking, down half a bottle of whisky in one. He doesn’t recall fi nishing it.
“The Stoics are all about vomiting, the Bullingdon’s about passing out,” he adds with an all-knowing air. Other reports of initiation ceremonies included having to drink five bottles of champagne. Members were each given a black bin-liner to throw up in, but the newcomers’ bin-liners had had the bottom cut out.
Why then do members to pay thousands of pounds to vomit, pass out, be ritually humiliated and be at permanent risk of being sent down or arrested? It is here that one might see fit to grant our blue tailcoat wearing friends some grudging pity; invitation is by membership only and perhaps new undergraduates are drawn into this society through some desperation to try and fit in. Like any society, the Bullingdon must attract members who want to be liked.
Forget the fact that the Bullingdon’s behaviour may isolate the rest of the university, as our source admits, as soon as you enter the Bullingdon, other members become your closest friends. Perhaps this is why so many of the members go on to become famous, after all a member of the Bullingdon must be willing to go through almost anything in order to gain approval. I suggest this to my source, who responds rather philosophically.
“I suppose there are two theories on this, maybe it is because it attracts people who are resourceful and determined, or maybe,” he adds thoughtfully, but with a hint of glee in his voice, “they are just privileged to start off with.” We may wonder, considering its dwindling membership and Oxford’s changing culture, whether the Bullingdon is coming to the end of its 150 year long existence.
With threats from colleges, run-ins with the police and a general lack of acceptance of its decadence, is there any space for such a society in 21st century Oxford? Our source is adamant that the events at the White Hart did not sound the death toll for the society.
He admits that all of the members have been “feeling rather paranoid” since last December and that they have had to rein in some of their wildest urges and keep their activities rather low-key but, he adds in defi ant tones, “The Bullingdon is in a spirit of recuperation and the controversy will soon rise again.”.
12th Jan 2005
