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Anthony Williams (centre) helps friends carry Barry’s coffin, Inset Barry Sullivan |
‘I simply can’t imagine life without him’
Songs, tributes and one last trip through Camden Town as ‘Barry Big Heart’ goes out in style
IT was more like a piece of enchanting theatre than a funeral service, with a cast enriched by the real-life characters of Camden Town.
All that was missing from this bittersweet tearjerker was the leading man.
There were moments of comedy, toasts to the good times shared and battles won, and defiant speeches delivered with more power and emotion than any Camden politician could hope to muster.
But how else were they going to honour Barry Sullivan other than with a spectacle like this?
The community warhorse would have loved this musical send-off in a chapel bursting with old friends and awash with colour rather than black ties and suits.
Even his pet dogs, ribbons slipped through their fur, were allowed inside Golders Green crematorium on Tuesday afternoon for a service which ran for more than an hour and a half but could have gone on all night.
Instead of prayers, there were poems.
Instead of hymns, there were the recordings of Eartha Kitt and Adelaide Hall, the jazz singer with whom Mr Sullivan had enjoyed a fond friendship.
“Barry Big Heart”, who died from cancer last month aged 60, became a folk hero for his work as a charity volunteer, leading the Camden Town Neighbourhood Advice Centre.
He helped the vulnerable and the elderly cut their way through the baffling worlds of council bureaucracy and housing tribunals.
The community service, with nearly 1,000 needy clients on its books, was rejected for financial help by the council and then, in 2003, evicted it from its council-owned base in Greenland Road with the use of 40 riot squad police.
Mr Sullivan staged a famous five-hour protest on the roof, summing up the distress of an entire neighbourhood in pain.
Nobody at the ceremony had forgotten the hurt of that day, but the spirit that grew behind the barricades remains a source of celebration.
Typical of a gang who have never taken the simple route, the hearse pulled in 20 minutes late and with a decorated double decker bus in tow.
Mourners seemed the wrong word for the passengers, a jumbled up platoon of all ages determined to give Mr Sullivan one last tour of the borough.
The bus stopped in Camden High Street where community officers removed their hats in respect; and again at the Town Hall to remind those inside that the scars of the “Siege of Greenland Road” remain unhealed.
As Mr Sullivan’s friend Red Jen Matthias explained: “The procession was exactly as Barry would have wanted it, loud and proud, stopping traffic in our wake.
“The kindness of strangers was observed through the eyes of us all. It was Barry’s wish that people knew he was leaving and we covered that on his behalf.”
But it was in the crematorium where this little chapter of Camden Town folklore was spelt out clearest, the speeches and musical performances revealing how much Mr Sullivan was adored.
His tale of growing up in a foster home, rubbing shoulders with the famous as a nightclub host before giving up his waking hours to help others has rarely caught the imagination of the top politicians and officers who run the Town Hall.
But it will remain on the lips and minds of those who live in Mr Sullivan’s old stomping ground for years to come.
Cathy Pound, one of his closest friends, said: “We can only imagine that it must have been a sunny day on the day Barry was born. How else could he have that smile that exuded pure sunshine?
“Our hearts will always be with him.”
Former mayor Gloria Lazenby said: “I simply can’t imagine Camden without Barry there”, while Labour councillor Roger Robinson, one of only a handful of local politicians who tried to stop the eviction, added that Mr Sullivan had been “betrayed by local government”.
He said: “Barry said to himself he would seek to change society and see how people’s problems can be reconciled.
“I’ve known some wonderful people and some less than wonderful people but he will always remain in my heart as one of the most wonderful men I have worked with in my life.
“He started life with nothing, and out of nothing he did more than any member of local or national government without any title or praise.”
Tributes followed from the Crossroads Women’s Centre and campaigning pensioner Ellen Luby. And then there was John Behan, one of the last men hauled out of the neighbourhood centre’s barricades on eviction day.
He was lost for words, unwittingly swearing repeatedly in the pulpit. His uncontrolled emotion didn’t matter in this bohemian farewell.
“The word that sums Barry up to all of us is ‘Love’,” he said of the friend who helped him when he was down and almost out.
“He showed what it is to be there for somewhere when they were in shit street. It was a privilege to have known him.”
The ceremony was topped and tailed by the voice of singer Johnny Amobi, a West End talent who sang majestic versions of I Am What I Am and My Way. There was hardly a dry eye in the house.
The party continued late into the evening at a tenants’ hall in Somers Town.
It was the hardest of farewells, but, as Red Jen said: “Barry went out in style.” |
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Your comments:
I HAVE known Barry Sullivan for most of my adult life, mainly through my parents Pat and John Goldsmith. When my father passed away eaighteen years ago leving my mother widowed at just forty seven, I belive it was Barry who pulled her through this tragic event. Looking back on that time he and my mother spent nearly every weekend (Upon
Barrys insistance)dressing up to the nines and hitting the theatre,and rubbing shoulders with the stars. Barry put the smile, makeup and fun back into my mums life. They remained very close until his death we will miss him greatly. This is just one example of many strong frienships and how Barry touched peoples lives.
S. Mustafa
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