Why wasn't I informed of this?
From The Times, January 18, 2026:
Sir John Blofeld obituary: Judge who crossed paths with Stones and 007
High Court judge and Norfolk landowner whose family name was the unwitting inspiration for James Bond’s nemesis, dies aged 93
John Blofeld, an Old Etonian whose estate in Norfolk had been acquired by his family in 1537, was not, it seemed, the obvious barrister to act for Marianne Faithfull when she and Mick Jagger were arrested by the Chelsea drug squad in 1969. He was not a noted aficionado of her music and had never partaken of cannabis or its derivative, hashish. So he thought he had better try it.
Blofeld, who was to take silk a few years later and would become a High Court judge and be knighted, was acting as a junior for Faithfull, who was the girlfriend of Jagger. She was already famed for reportedly having been clad only in a fur rug in another raid two years earlier. The Rolling Stones’ frontman was represented by Michael Havers, a future lord chancellor, who was also unfamiliar with this drug.
“During the case Michael and Dad went to the Metropolitan Police commissioner’s office to look at hashish,” said Blofeld’s son, Tom. “It was decided that, in order to know what the effects were like, and thus the social consequences involved, they should all have a smoke — in a borrowed pipe as they couldn’t roll a cigarette. Dad claimed he didn’t like it but Havers thought it rather good. The police gave no viewpoint either way.” The upshot was that Jagger was fined £200 and Faithfull (obituary, January 30, 2025) , whom Blofeld came to like, was acquitted.
Blofeld was considerably more accustomed to such exotic individuals than to aberrant drug-taking. He had attended the same prep school, Sunningdale in Berkshire, as a Scaramanga, whose name appealed to Ian Fleming, another old boy, for a villainous character in his James Bond books. Like Blofeld’s father and both his sons, Fleming became a member of Boodle’s in St James’s. Henry Blofeld, John’s younger brother, is of the view that the author alighted on the family name for another villain when leafing through the membership list. “Ian gave a yelp of delight, had a glass of champagne and never looked back,” he said.
In adult life John Blofeld had no interest in 007 and was not a filmgoer. He tended to converse primarily about subjects that interested him and preferred PG Wodehouse. There are competing stories for the Bond link, but few doubt that Ernst Stavro Blofeld derived from the Blofeld family.
John Christopher Calthorpe Blofeld was the son of Thomas Blofeld and Grizel (née Turner) and was born on the family’s estate, Hoveton House, Norfolk, in 1932. After Sunningdale, where he was captain of the 1st X1 cricket team, he was educated at Eton College and King’s College, Cambridge, where he read ancient history and classics for two years, followed by law for a year. He shared rooms with Tam Dalyell, his fellow Etonian and a future MP, and canvassed with him for the Labour Party....
....MUCH MORE
Which elicited a letter to the editor:
I believe Bond is now a judge but don't have a ref. close to hand.
