CHRONICLE reader Alan Bullion informs me that a Communist candidate stood for Sevenoaks in the memorable general election of 1945 and polled 676 votes, which was 1.63 per cent of the electorate.

Although he didn't exactly rock the boat, he contributed to a gigantic shake-up of the old order.

This was the election in which the BBC producer, poet, novelist and journalist John Sleigh Pudney (Labour) gave the 1914-18 war hero and sitting MP Col Charles Ponsonby the fright of his political life.

In the end the Conservative majority was more than 3,000, but for a few frenetic weeks after VE Day the Sevenoaks Labour Party felt they had the edge.

The Communist candidate was Ken Thompson. I don't know if he held any political meetings in Sevenoaks (perhaps our local newspapers refused to cover them), but his party had told its 1945 congress that unless the labour movement "compels the Government to change completely its present foreign policy, which is simply the continuation of the imperialist line of the Tory party and the reactionary monopoly capitalists, there can be no fundamental social progress in Britain and the whole future of this country is in grave peril".

Throughout the country there were 21 Communist candidates in that election and they won 102,780 votes, and two seats – William Gallacher for West Fife and Phil Piratin for Mile End.

In Rhondda East, Harry Pollitt was defeated by less than 1,000 votes.

Col Ponsonby must have known he had a fight on his hands.

But although he was a man renowned for his military know-how, he and his team failed to show the kind of strategic know-how or energy which characterised his earlier victories on the field of battle.

In the other camp, however, Pudney campaigned vigorously, addressing 52 political and trade union meetings in the Sevenoaks Division.

At his adoption meeting on June 14, 1945, he said: "I believe we shall take Sevenoaks.

"People are concerned for their future after 20 years of Tory rule and they are dissatisfied with having to represent them a man with a voting record such as Col Charles Ponsonby."

He reduced the Conservative majority from a healthy 11,000 plus (in 1935) to that of a marginal seat.

John Pudney lived in Chipstead with his wife Crystal and three children.

Crystal (named after the Palace) was the daughter of AP Herbert.

Mr Pudney was born in 1909 and educated at Gresham's Hall, Holt, where he became friends with WH Auden and Benjamin Britten.

He left school at 16 to work for an estate agency and to pursue his interest in writing.

His first volume of poetry, Spring Encounter (1933) launched his professional writing career in earnest.

He became a writer-producer for the BBC (1934-1937) and later a journalist for the News Chronicle.

In 1938 he published the first of many novels Jacobson's Ladder.

In 1940 he was commissioned into the Royal Air Force as an intelligence officer and as a member of the Air Ministry's Creative Writer's Unit, alongside HE Bates.

He published many articles and among his poems was the famous ode to British airmen, For Johnny.

This poem achieved national significance and was broadcast and performed by several famous actors including Sir Laurence Olivier.

After the war Mr Pudney continued to write in various media and genres as well as work as literary advisor, editor, and director for several magazines, agencies and publishing companies.

In 1952 he published The Net, his most successful novel and, in 1955, married his second wife Monica Forbes Curtis and renewed his career with poetry readings, accompanied by jazz musicians.

He then focused on the subject of recovery – from divorce and alcoholism – producing several articles and the autobiographical Thank Goodness for Cake.

Mr Pudney died from cancer in 1977 aged 68.

As we know the 1945 general election resulted in a landslide victory for Labour.

Winston Churchill, revered as a wartime leader, was rejected and he handed the premiership to Clement Attlee, a man of fewer words.

The Sevenoaks result was as follows: Col Charles Ponsonby (Conservative) 18,893, Squadron Leader John Pudney (Labour) 14,947, Nelia Muspratt (Liberal) 6,906 and Ken Thompson (Communist) 676. Conservative majority 3,946.

Mr Bullion, who gave me these figures, also reminds me that Sevenoaks once had a Communist rural councillor. Jean Feldmar represented the Shoreham seat where she was the communist chairman of the parish council for four years from 1958 to 1962.