Peter Cadbury
MrChopper
Peter Egbert Cadbury was born on February 6 1918, the elder son of Air Commodore Sir Egbert Cadbury, DSC, DFC, a First World War ace who shot down two Zepellins over the North Sea from his Sopwith Camel, and went on to become a managing director of Cadbury Bros, the predecessor of Cadbury Schweppes.
Egbert was in turn a grandson of John Cadbury, a Quaker who had started business as a tea, coffee and cocoa merchant in Bull Street, Birmingham in 1824.
Cadbury Bros became one of the world's largest confectioners. Peter recalled as a child being allowed to dip his fingers into vats of molten chocolate.
Cadbury never worked in the family business however but followed his father into flying, with an early career as a test pilot in jet fighters, then qualifying as a barrister, playing a minor role in the Nurenburg War Crimes trials, before deciding his future did not lie in law.
Cadbury was the founder of Westward Television and later on Air Westward but it was his activities in television which were to consume most of his career.
Cadbury was known for his frequent rows with neighbours, the press, and even with his own board of directors. He was more than once involved in fistfights on roads over his driving. He owned a Ferrari, a Bentley, numerous yachts, helicopters, aeroplanes, racehorses, properties in the West Indies, and a succession of grand country mansions, one of which had an airstrip and a hangar for five aircraft.
As a result of his ongoing conflict with the IBA (the then-regulator of ITV) Westward lost the round of franchise renewals in 1980, and were replaced by TSW.
Cadbury was an animal lover who kept a parrot, a great Dane, and a Rwandan gorilla.
He was married three times. The first time was to Benedicta Bruce in 1947 (with legendary Spitfire pilot Douglas Bader as best man), with whom he had a son and a daughter; the marriage ended in divorce in 1968. He married again in 1970 to Mrs. Jennifer Morgan-Jones, who was 27 years younger than he, and with whom he had another son (Joel Cadbury, one time owner of the Groucho Club), before they divorced in 1976. In that same year, he married a third time, to Mrs. Jane Mead, with whom he had two more sons and after whom G-JANY was named.
Last edited by Earl of Rochester; 7th Jun 2013 at 08:48.