John Howard's phantom toast to Menzies

JOHN Howard has deleted from his book that he invited Robert Menzies's daughter, Heather Henderson, and her husband, Peter, for martinis.

John Howard

JOHN Howard has deleted from the paperback edition of his book the story that, on his first weekend in The Lodge as prime minister, the Howards invited Robert Menzies's daughter, Heather Henderson, and her husband, Peter, for celebratory martinis.

This follows a letter from Mrs Henderson to Mr Howard on December 21 last year rejecting his account, branding it as "quite fanciful" and asking him to remove it from future editions of his book.

"I was astonished when I read his account because it didn't happen," Mrs Henderson told The Weekend Australian this week.

She said that during the 11 years Mr Howard was prime minister she and her husband were never invited to The Lodge as a couple to celebrate or to recall the memory of her father, the founder of the Liberal Party.

In her letter to Mr Howard, Mrs Henderson said: "An invitation to The Lodge is not something that is forgotten. Nor, indeed, is no invitation."

In the first edition of his book, on page 34, Mr Howard wrote that on his first weekend in The Lodge, in 1996, he "invited" the Hendersons for a drink.

He said "we mixed and drank martinis in memory and honour of her late father" and this occasion meant that "proper respect had been paid".

Mrs Henderson was offended by this account. In her letter to Mr Howard, she said: "As I mentioned, Peter was only inside The Lodge once in your time and that was to help the National Trust when it was open to the public.

"It is quite fanciful to describe mixing martinis and talking about my father. I would be grateful if you would delete that whole passage in the next edition. And, for the record, I don't like and don't drink martinis."

Mrs Henderson also sharply corrected Mr Howard's letter to her in response to her initial letter of complaint. She wrote of the Howard letter: "You then go on to say, 'I think you (Heather) told us that it was the first occasion that you had been in The Lodge since your father's prime ministership'. In fact, I was in The Lodge at the invitation of the incumbent or his wife in the time of Holt, McMahon, Whitlam, Fraser, Hawke and Keating."

One reason Mrs Henderson pressed the issue is because she and her husband were not invited to The Lodge under the Howards yet Mr Howard asserted the opposite in his book Lazarus Rising.

Mr Howard told The Weekend Australian the difference was really about "the sequence of events".

"My recollection is that she came to The Lodge with a letter and she was invited in," Mr Howard said. "I think the initiative to come was hers. My wife remembers taking her around The Lodge and looking at some of the rooms. My recollection was that we had a drink and a chat and that Peter was with her."

Mr Howard agreed his recollection might have been faulty.

"After the book came out, she wrote suggesting, in effect, that I had conflated her call at The Lodge with a subsequent visit to their home by Janette and me at their invitation," he said. "She asked for the reference to be taken out and in deference to her I did."

The dispute was conducted by letter alone. Mrs Henderson sent a handwritten letter on November 30 last year to Mr Howard, disputing his account. After Mr Howard replied, she wrote a second typed letter in December.

That letter began: "Thank you for replying to my letter. I wonder if you read it all."

In an interview with The Weekend Australian last week, Mrs Henderson recalled what happened. She had gone to The Lodge soon after Mr Howard's victory to deliver a congratulatory letter to the Howards and an invitation for them to come to the Henderson house for drinks.

When the guard at the gate contacted the house, she was invited in. "They offered me a drink or cup of tea but I had to get home," she said. "All I intended to do was to drop off the letter. They came to our house at Easter in response to my invitation and I am positive about that. But the events that are described on page 34 of the book did not happen."

In her second letter, Mrs Henderson wrote: "The only drink we shared with you and Janette was in our house soon after you had moved into The Lodge."

Mr Henderson was head of the Foreign Department under the Fraser government.