When we arrived in London the next day, we were assaulted by press like I had never experienced. Somehow it had gotten out that the girl the Beatles kept under wraps was now being exposed, and the police were involved, which meant a juicy story for any reporter with poor tact and no morals. I couldn't leave the flat at all, or else risk being stampeded by photographers and reporters looking for answers where I had none.
The police wouldn't tell us when they would come and investigate the flat, no matter how many times we telephoned; they had the element of surprise on their side, and I suppose they weren't willing to give it up for our convenience. This was a matter of some stress to the boys: they left for their tour in just four days, and though they would rather be in London when the investigation happened, they couldn't cancel or even delay the tour. On top of it all, Ringo was under the weather and largely out of commission. I myself was ill with worry and tension; I couldn't sleep, my overactive brain coming up with the worst possible scenarios. I wouldn't – couldn't – go back to my parents.
My estrangement from my parents dates back to 1953, when I was still just a girl. I was the second of two children, both girls, born to Harold and Anne Dawson of Richmond, Virginia. My sister Barbara was two years older than me, and she was our parent's pride and joy. As a result of having spent the last ten years of my life trying to block out memories of my childhood, I don't remember very much about my sister. I'm sure I loved her, but I don't really remember.
However, one memory of my sister is still vivid in my mind. I can still smell the freshly cut grass and see the sun high in the sky. It was June of 1953, two months after my seventh birthday. Our nanny had taken me and Barbra to play in the park near our upper middle-class neighborhood. We were happily playing, me on the swing set and her sitting daintily at the kid-sized picnic table under the playground, playing with her dolly.
A second later, the playground collapsed in a freak accident. I emerged from the rubble amid hysterical screaming and police sirens, my leg broken and my mind reeling. Barbara had been killed by the collapsing set.
My parents blamed me for Barbara's death. It was so irrational of them but in their grief, they saw me as the culprit, somehow. Barbara had always been their favorite anyway, so it was almost natural to abandon me in the wake of the tragedy. Their attitude towards me led me to believe that I was somehow responsible for Barbara, something I didn't get over until years later. But I tried my best, naïve and trusting child that I was, to please them and to make them love me.
My efforts were to no avail. They signed off legal guardianship of me and sent me to live with my great aunt Rosa in London, unwilling to have the complete abandonment of a child on their conscience but hating even the sight of me. Rosa Partridge was a sweet old lady who was very well-to-do, living in the big mansion that she and her husband had bought back in 1904. After my great uncle Benjamin died, she lived alone; so despite the horrible circumstances that brought me to her, she was delighted to have a child to care for. She truly loved me, and it is that time of my life that I look back on with extreme fondness.
After Rosa died in late November of 1962, my parents were contacted to help sort out the distribution of her will and were made to take legal responsibility for me; because I was only 16, my guardianship defected back to my parents after Rosa's death. I, of course, wanted nothing to do with them and planned to be gone before they set foot on English soil. However, Rosa must have known that I would have the opportunity to meet with my parents, and she wrote in a letter I was given after her death that I should try to reunite myself with them.
So out of love for Rosa, I tried to meet with my mother and father when they came. They rebuffed my efforts to see them until it was made clear by Rosa's lawyer that I would be coming into a great deal of wealth; as soon as they knew, they oozed parental concern for my wellbeing and pretended to love me. I saw through their money-making façade and, disgusted with them, gave up my inheritance just to be rid of them. I left just days after they came, taking just enough money out of Rosa's lockbox to get to Hamburg, Germany.
There was no particular reason that I chose Hamburg as my escape, just that it was the first place I thought of. I lived in the red-light district of St. Pauli for three weeks on my own and worked as a waitress. By some miracle, I avoided most of the danger that would have plagued a lone girl of 16 in a foreign country known for its vices; I still thank heaven that nothing worse happened to me than what small things did. I was working at the Star Club on the Groβe Freiheit, a small, run-down street of strip clubs and bars. The Star, formerly the St. Pauli Star Cinemas, was a movie theatre owned by one Manfred Weissleder that had been converted into a club that hosted rock n' roll groups from England. It was there, amid the hookers and drunkards and slick beatniks, that I met the Beatles.