The Mitford Trial

by Jessica Fellowes

  CHAPTER SIXTY-TWO

  In the weeks after their return to London, Guy and Louisa had, separately, busied themselves in the complicated aftermath of the events on the Princess Alice. Guy was deeply involved in the case and its preparations for trial, while Louisa wrestled with her longing to talk to her husband openly about her involvement and all she knew, against the very real risk of endangering them both to forces she now knew to be black indeed.

  She returned to her stenography training and the daily routine of before as if nothing had changed, desperately seeking comfort from the repetition. All the time, the fear that she could never return to the normal of their past clung to her like cobwebs.

  They saw each other every day, lay together every night, yet in their cordiality they managed never quite to look each other in the eye. Louisa would sit opposite Guy at the table for supper and miss him, even when she could see and touch him. She knew it was for her to build the bridge again and determined that even if she had to do so brick by solitary brick, she would.

  In the night, Louisa ducked her head down, out of the cold air and into the groove between Guy’s shoulder blades. She stretched her legs along his and slid her hand around his chest until it lay flat where she could feel his heart beat. He was warm, and he moved slightly, letting her come in a little closer.

  Brick by brick.

  CHAPTER SIXTY-THREE

  24 May 1935

  In the Red Lion pub, shabby but always busy, thanks to a constant trade from court reporters and prisoners’ families, several Mitfords gathered during the lunch-hour break from the trial. Much had happened since Louisa had last seen them all together: Pamela had become engaged, and Nancy married, to Peter Rodd, a man she had met and become affianced to within months after Hamish broke off their five-year-long engagement.

  ‘What would one call a group of Mitfords?’ asked Nancy, her tiny waist beautifully shown off in its tailored jacket of black and white dogtooth check. She sat by a round table, a glass of sherry at her hand. ‘A haven? A giggle?’

  ‘A swarm,’ said Tom, taking a long draught of ale. He wasn’t staying for long as there were preparations still to be done for the afternoon’s cross-examinations. ‘Stings and honey. But don’t ask me who the queen bee is.’

  ‘I’m definitely one of the worker bees.’ Pamela was about to bite into a large cheese sandwich, with extra pickle at her request.

  The three of them enjoyed amusing themselves with their insider jokes, and Louisa had known them long enough not to be made uncomfortable by it, but she could feel Guy shifting with impatience at her side. Today was the day Diana was to be called as a witness and her sisters were there in support, supposedly. Not Jessica, as she was not ‘on speakers’ with Diana, nor Deborah, as she had been banned from attending by their parents. Only Unity was to be relied upon to agree with Diana’s testimony. Pamela and Nancy no longer kept their loathing of Sir Oswald Mosley quiet, though Pamela was more diplomatic about it. Despite what they had told their parents, Nancy and Pamela were there purely for Tom, who had been both challenged and overwhelmed by the demands of being at the centre of such a notorious trial. Though his role was relatively junior, no statement could go unchecked, no evidence unexamined and no witness unprepared. While Mr Manners, defending Ella, would be the one who had to put on the display of incisive and brilliant cross-examinations and speeches, he relied on his juniors to hand him notes and information that were impeccable.

  All of the sisters adored Tom. With them in court, he would feel unassailable. That, at least, was Louisa’s reading of the situation. Even so, it was also true that he had seemed, as a child, to relish his freedom away from them when at school, writing letters home that taunted his sisters with his unbridled existence: long walks with school friends to sneak a cigarette, sausages for breakfast and pillow fights in the dorms. Whether he wanted his sisters beside him now, or whether they left him with no choice, was unknown.

  What was certain was that Nancy and Pamela were sitting at one table at the pub and Diana and Unity at another, in the back. Louisa and Guy had originally been invited to join DCI Stiles, but he was then called away to the station in Knightsbridge. Sitting with Nancy and Pamela, Louisa knew she ought to go say hello to Diana and Unity, but she hadn’t seen much of either of them in the last two years and felt reluctant to do so now.

  Before Tom arrived, Nancy had filled Louisa in on the recent Mitford dramas. ‘Diana hasn’t spoken to me since Wigs on the Green was published, and Unity, the loyal sheep, is cross with me, too. They’ve no sense of proportion. Or humour. Really, they’ve become too provincial for words, with Diana pretending to speak fluent German – and you know Unity met Hitler a few months ago?’

  Louisa had raised her eyebrows. What was the proper response to this? Was there one?

  ‘She stalked him. Sat in some sad little café that was his regular haunt, hour upon hour, day after day, until eventually he noticed her and invited her to have luncheon with him. Can you think of anything more revolting?’ Nancy hardly bothered to keep her voice quiet. ‘She wrote to Farve afterwards and told him she was so happy she wouldn’t mind dying.’

  Pamela, who was now engaged to a scientist, Derek Jackson – ‘Debo fainted when she heard the news, she’s so in love with him,’ Nancy reported – signalled to her sister to pipe down.

  ‘I jolly well won’t,’ her elder replied, and continued gossiping. ‘Those two wretcheds have tried to claim that Tom is on their side, but he thought Hitler terrifically ordinary. He’ll only have said things to please Diana because she has good-looking girlfriends he’s trying to take to bed.’

  Louisa wouldn’t be asking him which side he was really on; she suspected he aimed to keep all his sisters happy, to ensure peace and quiet.

  ‘Has marriage made you so shocking?’ asked Pamela. ‘I hope it doesn’t do that to me.’

  ‘I hope it does,’ Nancy bit back.

  It was then that Tom had arrived, coinciding with Guy bringing the drinks to the table.

  ‘Can I get you a beer?’ asked Guy.

  It pleased Louisa, somehow, to see her husband at ease with one of the Mitfords. The case had put Guy and Tom on something of an equal footing.

  ‘Thank you,’ said Tom, pulling up a stool. ‘Where are Diana and Unity?’

  ‘In one of the booths back there,’ Nancy replied. ‘Pretending to prepare for her cross-examination later.’

  ‘Pretending?’ He raised an amused eyebrow.

  ‘It’s a relief not to have to talk to them,’ said Nancy. ‘It’s been sticky since Christmas.’

  ‘You’ve only yourself to blame.’ Pamela waved to the waitress carrying over her sandwich.

  ‘No, actually. They are to blame for getting involved with those heavy-handed monsters.’ Nancy turned to Louisa. ‘Peter and I went to the BUF rally in Olympia last summer…’ She deliberately drifted off. Louisa knew there had been outrage over the violence in all the newspapers, and even the Daily Mail had subsequently dropped its support of Sir Oswald. ‘After that, I lost my sympathy for her. I cannot understand how she can remain so blind.’

  ‘He was always awful,’ said Pamela, nodding agreeably. She was in her usual country attire, with a tweed skirt and jacket, even though she had recently moved from Bryan Guinness’s dairy farm at Biddesden, where she had been working.

  Guy returned to the table for the second time, bearing Tom’s drink, and sat down, raising his glass to each of them. Nancy didn’t respond in kind and Louisa knew she thought it was common. Instead, perhaps to lighten the mood, Nancy had posed her question about the collective noun for Mitfords.

  ‘How do you think it’s going, then?’ Guy asked Tom, when the joke had died down.

  ‘Hard to say. Both pleaded guilty at the time, now both have pleaded not guilty. We always knew it was going to be difficult and the prosecution’s tactics have been hard to predict.’

  ‘Given the evidence they’ve got, you mean.’ Guy took another gulp of bee
r, feeling it wash into his stomach like water into an empty bath. ‘Everybody confessed, then everybody denied. We know at least one of them is lying, if not both.’

  ‘Or someone else altogether knows the truth.’

  Louisa looked up at this. Could they have guessed? Surely not.

  ‘In the end, it comes down to the jury. Public sympathy is for Jim, but we can’t know whether the jury is influenced by that,’ said Tom.

  ‘They’re not allowed to read the newspapers or discuss the case, are they?’ asked Pamela.

  ‘No, but they’re only human. People are talking about it everywhere. You only have to get the bus to hear people gossiping,’ said Guy.

  ‘I ought to try that sometime,’ said Nancy. ‘Get the bus, I mean.’ She registered the response around the table. ‘It was a joke. I take buses all the time. But it’s rather nice being able to afford one’s own taxi sometimes, now the books are doing well.’

  ‘Bravo you,’ said Tom. ‘I’d better go and say hello to the others, then push off back.’

  ‘Is Jim Evans taking the stand at all?’ asked Guy hurriedly.

  ‘No,’ said Tom. ‘If you ask me, he can’t stand the heat of the scrutiny. He’s an odd one, from what I can see. His statements changed several times in the last two years – I know I don’t need to tell you that – and we were told this morning that his counsel has landed on the extraordinary defence that he ate cocaine before the attack and it made him go mad. They’re hoping for a guilty but insane verdict.’ He picked up his glass and said thoughtfully, almost to himself: ‘I wonder sometimes if he didn’t do it at all but is protecting Mrs Fowler.’

  ‘Or Mrs Fowler’s boys,’ said Nancy. ‘Those poor innocents. One father in Canada, another dead and their mother likely to be executed.’

  ‘Justice is justice. If she did it, and I know she did, then she has to be punished for it.’ Guy coloured slightly with the emotion he had revealed.

  ‘I’m sure you’re right,’ said Tom. ‘And I’m only a junior in this. But it’s rum to me. Perhaps someone else did it.’

  ‘We did a thorough job,’ said Guy defensively. ‘That evidence is there to convict them, and it will.’

  Tom nodded, said goodbye and moved off to the back of the pub, to see his other sisters.

  Louisa could say nothing at all. Two people were going to be sentenced to death for a crime neither of them had committed, and she was powerless to stop it.

  CHAPTER SIXTY-FOUR

  24 May 1935

  Old Bailey, Court Number One

  It was impossible for the courtroom to be any more crowded on this, the fourth day of the trial, than it had been since the start of the week, but Guy thought he sensed extra anticipation in the atmosphere, as Mrs Diana Guinness was to be called to the witness box.

  Even with his lack of interest in the sartorial, Guy could not fault Diana’s ability to dress for the occasion. She wore a long black skirt and a white silk top that draped softly just below her collarbone, with a wide dark belt. Her hair was honey-blonde, parted on the side and curled underneath, a little below her ears. Diana held herself straight, her face serious, her red mouth slightly parted as she waited for the man to bring her the Bible to swear on.

  Mr Burton-Lands stood at his bench. ‘Mrs Guinness.’ He smiled at his star witness. ‘Could you please confirm your whereabouts on the eighteenth of June in 1933.’

  ‘I was on board the Princess Alice.’ Diana’s voice was firm and confident. She wasn’t playing to the gallery, only ensuring no juror would strain to hear.

  ‘Would you describe yourself as a friend of the accused, Mrs Fowler?’

  ‘An acquaintance, perhaps,’ said Diana. ‘On a ship one might say that friendships are escalated in a way that they might not be on dry land.’

  There was an obsequious chuckle from Mr Burton-Lands.

  ‘I had not met her before that particular trip,’ she continued. ‘I believe we were introduced by Captain Schmitt at the drinks he gave on the first night.’

  ‘What were your impressions?’

  ‘She was a good-looking woman with a colourful past. I had some sympathy for her. Both of us have been subjected to sneers because we have chosen to follow our hearts.’

  Guy was surprised. It was unusual for Diana to expose her vulnerability in this way.

  ‘Did you believe her to be a truthful person?’

  ‘Objection!’ Mr Manners had stood. ‘Witness is being asked to speculate.’

  ‘Upheld.’ The judge waved a pen at Burton-Lands. ‘Move on.’

  ‘What was the first you knew of the attack on Mr Fowler?’ asked the prosecution counsel smoothly, as if there had been no challenge to him at all.

  ‘I was telephoned by Mrs Fowler at one o’clock in the morning, or thereabouts. She sounded hysterical, as if she’d been crying, and asked me to come to her cabin immediately.’

  ‘Did she tell you why?’

  ‘No, but I could hear the distress. I was in bed, but I went down there within a few minutes, in my dressing gown and slippers.’

  ‘Her cabin was close to yours?’

  ‘Along the same passage,’ said Diana. ‘I hadn’t been to it before, but she told me the number.’

  ‘What did you see when you got there?’

  Diana adjusted her position so the jury could view her better. ‘It was … grisly,’ she said, as if it had happened only moments before. ‘Mrs Fowler was rushing around the room, a drink in her hand, shouting and excited. There was a maid scrubbing at the carpet. I saw Mr Fowler sitting in an armchair, but he was partially blocked by the doctor attending to him. When the doctor stood, I saw…’

  ‘Take your time, Mrs Guinness,’ soothed Mr Burton-Lands.

  ‘There was a lot of blood. Mr Fowler’s eyes were closed. I thought he might be dead, and I left immediately.’

  ‘What did you do then?’

  ‘I returned to my cabin and I telephoned through to my lady’s maid, Louisa Sullivan. I knew that her husband had arrived on the ship, unexpectedly, and that he was a policeman. I asked them both to come see me.’

  ‘Why did you do that?’

  Diana put a gloved hand on the front of the box, as if steadying herself. ‘I had been very shocked and distressed by what I’d seen. I needed my maid. And I suspected that DS Sullivan would be required on the scene. No one else on board realised he was there, but I thought he could do some good.’

  ‘Which was correct,’ said the barrister, pulling on the collar of his robe. He glanced at a sheet of paper. ‘I’d like to ask you about an event before that night. It was only the day before, in fact, when the Princess Alice docked at Livorno. You had made an arrangement with Mrs Fowler?’

  ‘Mrs Fowler and I, with my mother, Lady Redesdale, and my sister, Miss Unity Mitford, were going to have luncheon together at a local café.’

  ‘Why didn’t it happen?’

  ‘When we walked in, we saw her husband was in the café, with Sir Clive Montague, and she said she had to go, that she remembered she needed to buy some toys for her children.’

  ‘Was that what she did?’

  ‘She may have bought some toys,’ said Diana archly, ‘but the next time we saw her she was with Jim Evans. He was carrying several shopping bags and wearing what looked like a new suit.’

  ‘Did you talk to her?’

  ‘Briefly. She explained she’d been buying things for Mr Fowler and that Mr Evans had been helping her because he was a similar size.’

  Mr Burton-Lands picked up a piece of paper. ‘I believe Mr Fowler was six feet and one inch tall.’ The courtroom turned to look at Jim Evans in the dock. He was sitting down. ‘Mr Evans is five foot ten inches.’

  ‘I drew my own conclusions,’ said Diana.

  ‘Which you had better keep to yourself in a courtroom,’ interjected the judge. ‘I remind the witness that we deal only with facts and evidence.’

  If only, thought Guy.

  ‘Later, back on board, what happene
d?’

  ‘The first-class diners, or a great number of them, were gathered in the Blue Bar for the usual cocktail before going into dinner,’ said Diana. ‘A fight broke out between Mr Fowler and Mr Evans. It ended quickly, with the intervention of DS Sullivan.’

  ‘Was any explanation given as to how the fight began?’ asked counsel.

  ‘Mr Fowler grabbed his wife’s arm from mine a few minutes earlier. I think he believed she was about to go in to dinner without him. Mr Evans objected.’

  ‘As everyone departed, you overheard Mr Evans say something?’ Burton-Lands threw a look to the jury, to check they were listening to every vital word.

  ‘He said something very quietly, to himself, but as I passed him I was certain I had heard correctly. I didn’t take it seriously at the time,’ said Diana. ‘I feel guilty about that now. Perhaps I should have.’

  ‘Can you tell the court what you heard Mr Evans say?’

  Diana took a breath before she spoke. ‘He said: “I’ll finish him off next time.” ’

  ‘Thank you, Mrs Guinness. You’ve been most helpful. No further questions, my lord.’

  THE LONDON GAZETTE

  SATURDAY, 8 JUNE 1935

  ‘MY DEATH SENTENCE’ – MRS FOWLER

  Mrs Ella Fowler penned a note before she died in which she revealed that she was taking her life because she realised she could not help her lover, Jim Evans. That is my death sentence, she wrote.

  The coroner (Mr R. A. Silversea) read the letters – in which she told of her anguish since the trial – at the inquest yesterday, when a verdict of suicide while of unsound mind was recorded.

  It was at 3.37 p.m. on Friday 31 May that Mrs Fowler heard the verdicts at the Old Bailey, which delivered her from the shadow of death and sent the man she loved to the condemned cell at Pentonville Prison.

  And at 3.37 p.m. yesterday the suicide verdict was written, which finally ended the stormy story of her life and death.