Jeffrey Archer, 1940-2026

Whatever you think of Jeffrey Archer, who has died suddenly, aged 86, you can’t argue that he had an extraordinary life - athlete, politician, author, jailbird, and charity fundraiser (to name just a few).

It says a lot about the man that even on the eve of his death he was busy promoting what he said was his “final” book. This weekend, following multiple interviews, he was due to attend the Cheltenham Literary Festival and later this month he was going to be interviewed by Lord Hannan, director of the Institute of Economic Affairs, at the IEA in Westminster.

Thirty five years ago I interviewed him for a magazine I was editing. Capital Account was the monthly magazine of the London Society of Chartered Accountants and I introduced a feature called ‘Money Talks’ for which we interviewed well known people and got them to talk about, er, money.

Looking back it was a bit of a rogue’s gallery because other people we interviewed included The Spectator’s Low Life columnist Jeffrey Bernard and Labour MP Dennis Skinner, aka the ‘Beast of Bolsover’. Unfortunately I can’t find the issue that featured Lord Archer otherwise I would post the article here, but I remember interviewing him at his luxury Westminster apartment overlooking the Thames and, although he wasn’t everyone’s cup of tea, I quite liked him.

Our paths crossed again a few years later when he agreed to be the auctioneer at a couple of events I organised with a friend of his. Sally Farmiloe died of cancer in 2014 but for many years she was familiar to readers of the Daily Mail. A former actress who once had a small part in the 1980s TV series Howard's Way, she was a gregarious socialite who organised lots of charity events. It’s a long time ago so I can’t remember how we met, but in 1996 I asked her to help organise a ball at St Ermin's Hotel in London.

Thanks to Sally our special guest was Vicki Michelle, one of the stars of the sitcom 'Allo 'Allo, who was another friend of hers, and the following year we organised a second event, this time at the Cafe Royal in Regent Street. Both events included a charity auction and on each occasion Sally invited Jeffrey Archer to be the auctioneer and I can’t fault him because he turned up and did a great job. The only problem was, he was on a tight schedule, scurrying from one charity auction to another, so he wasn’t with us for long before he had to leave for his next event.

There’s a postscript to this story however because in 1999, the year I joined Forest, a tabloid newspaper revealed that Sally and Lord Archer had been having an affair but all I can say is they were very discreet because I didn’t have a clue! Unfortunately news of the affair stuck to Sally and she was portrayed as a bit of a bimbo (or "scarlet woman", as she put it). Truth is, she was smart and funny and worked extremely hard to earn a living to bring up her daughter from another relationship.

As for Lord Archer, he will be remembered as a Marmite figure for all sorts of reasons, but while he may have been a “fraudster” (as some of his critics are claiming), the number of friends paying tribute to him indicates that most people (including many very successful public figures) are, for better or worse, complicated, and none more so than Jeffrey Howard Archer, Baron Archer of Weston-super-Mare (1940-2026).