Oceanside’s International Politician, Bessell, Dies

Peter Bessell, a former member of the British Parliament who earned a colorful, if somewhat less potent, local reputation battling beach erosion, died Tuesday at his home here after a long illness. He was 64.

Bessell, a dapper, silver-haired man who settled in a beachfront home with his wife here in the mid-1970s, was perhaps best known internationally for his involvement in the Jeremy Thorpe affair, a lurid political scandal that rocked England in the late 1970s. It involved the leader of the Liberal Party at that time and included allegations of blackmail, a secret homosexual liaison and a murder plot. Bessell later wrote a book about the episode, “Coverup: The Jeremy Thorpe Affair,” in which he admitted involvement in the scandal.

Born in Bath, England, Bessell was a member of the small, centrist Liberal Party who was twice elected to the House of Commons, serving between 1964 and 1970. He also was active in United Nations affairs and was a delegate to the U.N. General Assembly in 1968.

An investment broker and consultant by trade, Bessell, with Nelson Rockefeller and others, was a founder of the North Atlantic Free Trade Area Committee, formed in 1966 to consolidate trade among the United States, the United Kingdom and Canada.

In Oceanside, where Bessell retired after the Thorpe scandal, his activities were somewhat more pedestrian. But his impact on the North San Diego County community was significant, friends and political colleagues said Tuesday.

“Peter was the most fascinating man I’ve ever met,” said former Oceanside Councilwoman Melba Bishop, a close friend. “He had been at the very top of the political spiral. He had talked with kings, queens and presidents, and negotiated war and peace issues. And lo and behold, he winds up involved in local politics in Oceanside.”

“Frankly, he brought a lot of class to this town.”

In 1983, he was a leading proponent of a ballot measure calling for a special tax to pay for a project designed to put sand back on the city’s eroding beaches. Voters soundly rejected the proposal, but Bessell persevered, launching a campaign to raise $3 million to restore the shoreline with private money. His illness, however, limited that endeavor.

Throughout his career as a local activist, Bessell displayed a refined and worldly political style admired--though somewhat out of place--in Oceanside, friends said. Bishop noted that Bessell treated the most mundane matters with an attention to detail seemingly suited for more weighty issues.

“People tend to remember the scandal, but despite that I can say I’ve never met a man with more political integrity than Peter Bessell,” Bishop said. “One very important thing he did was bring people who disagreed on issues together and make them sit down and work out their differences. That talent for negotiating is a big part of his legacy here.”

He was also a kind-hearted man, said Bishop, whose son once interviewed Bessell for a school paper on “someone famous.” When a veterinarian suggested the family dog be put to sleep because its hind legs were useless, Bessell designed a cart that enabled the animal to wheel itself around the house.

Bessell is survived by his wife, Diane; a son, Paul, of London; a daughter, Paula Boughton, of Suffolk, England, and three grandchildren. A memorial service has been scheduled for 1 p.m. Tuesday at the First Presbyterian Church of Oceanside. The family requests that donations be sent to UNICEF.