H. E. Bates Lydia". His most popular creation was the Larkin family in "The Darling Buds of May". Pop Larkin and his family were inspired by a colourful character seen in a local shop in Kent by Bates and his family when on holiday. The man (probably Wiltshire trader William Dell, also on holiday) turned up to the shop with a huge wad of rubber-banded bank notes and proceeded to spoil his trailer load of children with Easter eggs and ice creams. The television adaptation, produced after his death by his son Richard and based on these stories, was a tremendous success. It
USS William H. Bates (SSN-680) USS William H. Bates (SSN-680) USS "William H. Bates" (SSN-680), a "Sturgeon"-class attack submarine, was planned to be the second U.S. Navy ship to be named USS "Redfish"—for the redfish, a variety of salmon also called blueback, sawqui, red salmon, and nerka—when the contract to build her was awarded to Ingalls Shipbuilding in Pascagoula, Mississippi, on 25 June 1968. However, upon the 22 June 1969 death of William H. Bates (1917–1969), the U.S. Representative from Massachusetts's 6th Congressional District (1950–1969) known for his staunch support of nuclear propulsion in the U.S. Navy, she was renamed "William H. Bates" and was