It was a dark day for the United Kingdom when much-loved comedian Jim 'Nick Nick' Davidson passed away from a heart attack in 2013 after receiving an enormous tax demand from the Inland Revenue. Here we look back on the day Britain said goodbye to the man who gave us three decades of side-splitting laughter.
The nation's great and good gather for Jim Davidson's funeral in Westminster Abbey. Here we see former prime ministers Edward Heath, Winston Churchill, William Gladstone and Stanley Baldwin singing one of Jim's favourite songs - 'Send the Buggers Back' from off of Peter Kay's Car Share.
Crowds of mourners gather outside the Abbey as Jim Davidson's coffin begins its final journey to the Elephant and Castle. Many in the crowd recite some of Jim's world famous jokes such as that one about them all having big dicks and that other one about how they all have bones through their noses.
Jim Davidson's coffin is led past an honour guard of the 4th Royal Thunderers. Five Chelsea Pensioners stand in silence, perhaps remembering that joke of his about how Chalkie couldn't make his appointment at the DSS because he tripped over his big dick and dropped his UB40 down a drain.
Jim Davidson fans line the route, many clutching cherished mementos of the man known to millions as 'Britain's Second Favourite Racist Comedian'. Here, a fan holds a signed photo of Jim calling Brian from off of Big Brother a shirtlifter. Another holds newspapers full of heartwarming stories about Jim's alcoholic rages, propensity for domestic abuse and troubles with the taxman. A third man watches a video of Jim doing a stand-up routine about how they all go about in canoes and eat people for their dinner.
It wasn't just in Jim Davidson's home town of London that the crowds came out to pay their last respects. Bereft mourners packed into city centre squares across the country to watch the funeral on giant screens, such as this one in Leeds. "I wouldn't have missed this for the world," said one of the mourners. "Neither would I," said the other one.
For those who couldn't make it to London or to one of the cities broadcasting the funeral, smaller ceremonies were held to honour the life and work of Jim Davidson such as this one in the South Yorkshire village of Black Lung. "Jim was loved up here," said one mourner,
"especially when he was having a go at the dirty f****** p****."
Jim Davidson was laid to rest in the grounds of the Arse & Elbow public house - the place where history was made when he told his first racist joke about West Indian cricketers in 1971. Today it is a site of pilgrimage, with fans coming from all over the country to pay their respects to the man who revolutionised racist comedy. "I saw him at the Doncaster Dome in 1998," said one grieving fan who had come all the way from Goole. "The best bit was when he had a go at the gays."
Jim Davidson - 1953-2013
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