IT was a Conservative conference held in a time of austerity – with the chancellor warning that the country had to live within its means.

The Tory party’s gathering in Bournemouth, 60 years ago this week, was the biggest event of its kind the town had ever seen, with 4,000 people in town.

The Conservatives had won their second successive general election victory in May 1955, shortly after Sir Winston Churchill finally bowed to failing health and resigned in favour of Sir Anthony Eden, the uncle of Bournemouth West MP John Eden.

Above the political news on the first day, the Echo carried a scene-setting piece headlined “Curtain rises on Bournemouth’s biggest conference”.

It said: “They were up early this morning at the Bournemouth Pavilion preparing for the opening of the 75th annual conference of the Conservative Party; and in the auditorium where there have been so many first nights there was, even so early, a bustle and excitement to get ready for yet another premiere, the opening of the largest conference that Bournemouth has ever seen.”

It went on: “Dead on nine o’clock, the lights flashed on and the world’s press began to come in, and the first clouds of the tobacco smoke that hangs heavy over all conferences started to hang like a pall over the empty seats. The television cameras with their two red eyes swung backwards and forwards, ready for the long day’s work.”

The star of the conference’s first day was the Chancellor of the Exchequer, RA ‘Rab’ Butler, who said: “I propose to continue with the credit squeeze.

“My theme for the party as well as the country today must be that it will be through service and sacrifice that we shall win salvation.”

The first full session of the conference opened with a service led by the rural dean of Bournemouth, the Rev Canon ALE Williams, and the president of Bournemouth Free Church Council, the Rev GJ Hammond.

The mayor, Cllr DN Willoughby, gave the official welcome, saying: “We are still beset by many problems but it does seem that there is a lessening in world tension and I hope that in the light of that you will be able to proceed in your deliberations in the spirit of confidence.”

The conference cheered when the representatives were read a message that had been dispatched to Winston Churchill, holidaying abroad, thanking him for “incomparable services to the nation and Empire”.

On the second day of the conference, the keynote speaker was the foreign secretary, Harold Macmillan.

He announced that the western powers would be making a new security offer to Russia over the rearmament of Germany.

“Whether we succeed or not depends on the answer given to a very simple question – why does the Soviet Government object to the establishment of a united Germany under a system of free elections?”he said.

Macmillan told the conference that “There ain’t going to be no war” – so long as total war was known to mean total destructions to both sides, the Echo reported.

Local figures played their part in the conference alongside the cabinet.

Nigel Nicolson, MP for Bournemouth East and Christchurch, won backing for a resolution urging a state pension for those who had retired before 1939 on a pension which had never been increased.

But as today, the big event was the party leader’s speech, held on Saturday.

Crowds waited in the pouring rain outside the Carlton Hotel on the East Cliff for the PM and Lady Eden to arrive the evening before.

The couple were driven down from London and, when their car and its police escort reached the hotel, the crowd surged forward, cheering and waving.

The hotel’s manager, NK Wilson, welcomed the couple, who paused on the steps to acknowledge the cheers.

After changing into evening dress, the couple were driven to the Pavilion, where another crowd was waiting. They were welcomed by A Clegg, general manager of the Pavilion, and again acknowledged the cheers of the crowd.

That Saturday, Eden closed the conference with a speech that announced changes to the call-up for national service.

He told the audience that the armed forces would be cut by around 20,000 in the next six months and about 40,000 in each of the next two financial years.

The prime minister also warned that the Middle East situation was serious and could become dangerous. The Echo reported him saying that “there were grave risks in the tension which existed between Israel and Egypt”.

It was that very situation which would bring an early end to Eden’s premiership in the wake of the Suez crisis.

Macmillan would succeed him, while Rab Butler, like the late Denis Healey, was destined to join the list of the “greatest prime ministers we never had”. But the Tories would enjoy a run of 13 years in government before the social changes of the 1960s swept them out of office.