Ringo Starr moved into the apartment in 1965 with new wife Maureen. The area has always been quite hip and Ringo had Mick Jagger and his then girlfriend Chrissie Shrimpton as virtual next door neighbours - they lived just around the corner in Bryanston Mews East.
Maureen was heavily pregnent when they moved in and gave birth to her first son, Zak, at Queen Charlotte's hospital, Hammersmith, on September 13th 1965. Alf Bickenell, The Beatles chauffeur, remembers getting a call from Ringo at 2am that morning to come to collect Maureen and take her to the hospital.
The flat was decorated by Brian Epstein's interior designer, Ken Partridge, in early 60s camp pop star style with purple watered-silk wallpaper, silk curtains and lead-streaked mirrors.
Ringo moved out of Montagu Square after only a fews months into a large house in Weybridge but kept hold of the apartment as a London base and also so friends could use it.
In 1966 Paul McCartney used the basement of the apartment to build a small recording studio. In his book 'Paul McCartney - Many Years From Now', Barry Miles recalled that Paul was getting friendly with members of the avant garde and underground art movements. Paul wanted to start a facility for poets and avant garde musicians to record their work. That way a lively exchange of tapes would happen between these people. Paul often let his friends such as author William Burroughs, art gallery owner Robert Fraser, and film maker Anthony Balch use the studio to make their weird experimental recordings. Paul also used the studio to work on his own songs such as 'Eleanor Rigby'. The tape operator of the studio was Ian Sommerville, a good friend of Barry Miles. Ian moved into the flat with his boyfriend Alan. In the end the idea for the studio fell through as Ian got the idea the studio was only for Paul McCartney. The equipment was removed and Ian moved out of the flat.
On 6th December 1966 Ringo let the apartment to Chas Chandler, the former bass player of the Animals. Chas had just discovered a guitarist in a small club in Greenwich Village, New York, and decided to become his manager and bring him to England. His name was Jimi Hendrix. When Chas moved into Montagu Square with his girlfriend, Lotta, Jimi and his girlfriend, Kathy Etchingham, moved in too.
Kathy described the flat in her book Through Gypsy Eyes. "It consisted of the ground and lower-ground floors of a converted town house in a smart square near Marble Arch. Chas and Lotta had a white-carpeted bedroom on the ground floor, opposite the sitting room, while Jimi and I were downstairs in a room opposite the kitchen. Upstairs had an en suite bathroom with a pink sunken bath, which seemed very exotic to us. and Jimi and I had a bathroom with doors off the kitchen, and a dressing room. Our bedroom had a horrible old fireplace at one end and a lot of panelling on the walls but it was still the best place I had ever lived in and seemed a fitting home for a rising pop star. We had to share the kitchen with Chas and Lotta but we were hardly ever in there at the same time. "
She later says "Chas celebrated his birthday in the flat with a big party that got a bit out of hand and the Christmas tree he bought fell on top of Bill Wyman and his girlfriend who were sitting on the floor beneath it."
"Living together as two couples had its problems because Jimi and I tended to have very loud rows whereas Lotta never raised her voice or argued with Chas at all. They complained they were able to hear us going at one another from their room upstairs.
"Some of the rows between Jimi and me were quite dramatic. mainly because both of us operated with very short fuses and neither of us was ever willing to climb down, so we could only end them by one or other of us strorming off - usually me. Once he was moaning about my cooking again and I felt I had put a lot of effort into whatever it was - mashed potatoes, probably. I didn't take kindly to being told they were disgusting, so I picked up the plate and smashed it to the floor.
'Hell - what are you doing?' he screamed at me, so I picked up a few more plates and threw them around the room as well, yelling back at him. Evenually I turned on my heel and stalked out, crossing the street to find a cab. he followed, trying to persuade me to come back, but I refused to listen. I found a taxi and jumped in, and without letting Jimi hear told the driver to take me to Angie and Eric's place in Jermyn Street. When I returned the next day, having cooled down, I asked him what he had been done while I was away.
'I wrote a song,' he said and handed me a piece of paper with 'The Wind Cries Mary' written on it. Mary was my middle name, and one he would use when he wanted to annoy me. I took a look at the song and read it through. It was about the row we just had, but I didn't feel the least bit appeased."
"Once when I stormed out Jimi chased me into the street and grabbed my skirt to pull me back. it was a pink wraparound skirt which came off in his hand, leaving me standing in stockings and suspenders.
'Coming back now?' he enquired, truimphantly, and I didn't have much choice, partly because I was laughing too much to see where I was going.
After Jimi and Chas moved out the apartment was used for a while by Lillian Powell, Cynthia Lennon's mother. However that arrangement changed when Cynthia caught John with Yoko Ono at their house in Weybridge, called 'Kenwood'.. Cynthia briefly moved in with her mother. Cynthia went on holiday to Italy but was shadowed by a private detective, hired by John. Within five minutes of her arrival back at Montagu Square there was a knock on the door and a solicitor handed her a writ for divorce, citing HER adultery. Cynthia immediately counter-sued.
Finally, John moved out of Kenwood and into the Montagu Square apartment and Cynthia moved briefly back to Kenwood, which was eventually sold as part of the divorce settlement.
Soon after arriving in Montagu Square John and Yoko asked Apple assistant Tony Bramwell to come to the flat with a camera and go away before any pictures were taken. They then photographed themselves naked and put the pictures on the cover of their LP 'Unfinished Music Volume One - Two Virgins'.
"We were both embarrassed when we peeled off for the picture" said John, so I took it myself with a delayed-action shutter. The picture was to prove that we were not a couple of demented freaks, that we were not deformed in any way and that our minds are healthy. If we can make society accept these kind of things without offence, without sniggering, then we shall be achieving out purpose".
"What we did purposely is not have a pretty photograph; not have it lighted so we looked sexy or good. There were a couple of other takes from that session where we loked rather nice, hid the little bits that aren't that beautiful; we looked good. We used the straightest, most unflattering picture just to show we were human".
Quoted in the Beatles Anthology Book, George Harrison said of the picture: What I thought of the sleeve then was the same I think now: it's just two not very nice looking bodies, two flabby bodies naked. It's harmless, really - different strokes for different folks.
Ringo said: The cover was a mind blower - I remember to this day the moment when they came in and showed me. I don't really remember the music, I'd have to play it now. But he showed me the cover and I pointed to the Times. "Oh you've got the Times it in" as if he didn't have his dick out."
I said 'Ah come on John. You're doing all this stuff and it may be cool for you, but you know we all have to answer. it doesn't matter; whichever one of us does something we all have to answer for it'. He said 'Oh Ringo, you only have to answer the phone'.
Nudity on LP covers was certainly not common and when the Chairman of EMI, Sir Joseph Lockwood, was shown the photos he was horrified. John and Yoko were summoned to explain themselves. When John was asked about his motives he said it was artistic - shocking people was an art form. At this Sir Joe got really angry, he said to John, 'If you were doing this for art you could at least put some better looking bodies on the cover - why not get Paul to do it - or use statues from a park!'
A few weeks later the apartment was raided by the police and John and Yoko were arrested for possession of cannabis. Apparently John received a telephone call from a journalist friend to tell him the police were on the way so cleaned out all the drugs he had.
On October 18th 1968 John's friend Pete Shotton made a social call to Montagu Square and found John in the throes of vacuum cleaning. "Thank Christ you've come,' he said. "We've had a tip off that the Drugs Squad are about to raid us. They'll be with their sniffer dogs and they're bound to find something. For Christ's sake Jimi Hendrix used to live here!"
I helped John clear up as much as possible, shoving things in bags, when Yoko appeared. 'I don't want him here', she screamed. John said they needed all the help they could get, but Yoko said no, they could handle it themselves.
"So I left. I took some stuff with me to the dump, but to my regret, I must have missed a vital bit. That was the day John got busted for possessing cannibis.
However the police still found some. John later said the drugs could have been planted by the police - in fact the leader of the police team Sgt Norman Pilcher was later arrested himself for perverting the course of justice. It was also very suspitious that a press photographer was present to take a picture of John being led out of his flat by Sgt Pilcher.
John was quoted about the bust in the Beatles Anthology Book:
"We were lying in bed, feeling very clean and drugless, because we'd heard three weeks before that they were coming to get us - we'd have been silly to have drugs in the house. All of a sudden a woman comes to the front door, and rings the bell and says, 'I've got a message for you'. We said 'who is it? You're not the postman'. And she said 'No, it's very personal,' and suddenly this woman starts pushing the door. Yoko thinks its the press or some fans, and we ran back in and hid. Neither of us were dressed, really we just had vests on and had our lower parts showing."
We shut the door and I was saying 'What is it? What is it'. I thought it was the Mafia or something. Then there was a big banging at the bedroom window, and a big super-policeman was there, growling and saying, 'let me in, let me in!'. And I said 'you're not allowed in like this are you?' I was so frightened. I said 'Come around to the front door. Just let me get dressed.' And he said 'No, open the window, I'm going to fall off'. There were some police at the front and some at the back. Yoko held the window while I got dressed - half leaning out of the bathroom so they could see we weren't hiding anything. Then they started charging the door. I had a big dialogue with the policeman, saying 'It's bad publicity if you come through the window', and he was saying 'Just open the window, you'll only make it worse for yourself.' I was saying 'I want to see the warrant. Another guy comes on the roof and showed me the paper and I pretended to read - just to try to think what to do. Then I said 'Call the lawyer, call the lawyer' but Yoko called our office instead.' And I was saying 'Not the office - the lawyer.'
"Then there was a heave on the door, so I ran and opened it, and said 'OK, OK, I'm clean anyway' thinking I was clean. And he says 'Ah ha, got you for obsctruction!' and I said, 'Oh Yeah' because I felt confident that I had no drugs.
"They call came in, lots of them and a woman. I said 'Well, what happens now? Can I call the office? I've got and interview in two hours, can I tell them I can't come?' And he said, 'No, your're not allowed to make a call...Can I use your phone?' Then our lawyer came.
The police bought some drugs. They couldn't find the dogs at first - and they kept on ringing up saying "hello Charlie, where are the dogs? We've been here half an hour' and the dogs came.
I'd had all my stuff moved into the flat from my house, and I'd never looked at it. It had just been there for years. I'd ordered cameras and clothes - but my driver bought binoculars (which I didn't need in my little flat). And in the binoculars was some hash from last year. Somewhere else in an envelope was another piece of hash. So that was it.
At the time Yoko was heavily pregnent with John's child. However in November 1968 Yoko was rushed from the apartment to hospital where she suffered a painful miscarriage.
Despite all this, John decided to plead guilty to the drugs charge to keep Yoko off the charge as she could have been deported if found guilty of drugs possession. Also the police said they would drop the obstruction charges. John was only fined about £100 and thought it was the end of the matter but, when John and Yoko moved to America in 1971 the conviction came back to haunt him. He wanted to stay in the States but the Immigration Service tried to deport him because of the conviction. Later it emerged that the Nixon administration were illegally involved in the campaign to get John out as John was campaigning against the Vietnam war. John's fight to stay in America lasted for four years until he was finally given his Green Card in 1976.
Regretably, after John's conviction Ringo was forced to sell the apartment by the landlords, so ending The Beatles' brief but extremely eventful time here.