41 Interview with Mr Ryan ‘Buster’ Parnell, Copenhagen, June 1986.
42 East African Standard, 27 November and 4 December 1936.
CHAPTER 8
1 English translation of Letters from Africa (published in Sweden 1942 as Brev fran Afrika) by Baron Bror von Blixen-Finecke, trans. Gustaf Kleen, Sweden, 1986.
2 ibid.; and interview with Beryl Markham, Nairobi, April 1986.
3 ibid.
4 ibid.
5 Interviews with Miss Florence Desmond, Surrey, 1986.
6 Florence Desmond, Florence Desmond, Harrap, 1953; and personal interviews with Miss Desmond, Surrey, March and June 1986.
7 ibid.
8 Interview with Mme Viviane Markham, June 1986.
9 Beryl with Sir Charles Markham Bt, Nairobi, March 1986.
10 Interview with Beryl Markham, Nairobi, April 1986. I asked Beryl whether she had met the king and Wallis Simpson. ‘Yes, I saw them both, at dinners and dances and things like that, you know.’
11 Daily Express, 8 July 1937.
12 Daily Telegraph, 4 December 1936.
13 Daily Express, 24 September 1936.
14 Whitaker’s Peerage, Baronetage, Knightage and Companionage 1929.
15 White Mischief, James Fox, Jonathan Cape, 1982.
16 Whitaker’s Peerage, Baronetage, Knightage and Companionage 1929.
17 East African Standard, 17 March 1928.
18 Interview with Beryl Markham, Nairobi, March 1986.
19 Playboy of the Air, Jim Mollison, Michael Joseph, 1937.
20 Flight Magazine, July, August and September 1934.
21 New York Times, 6 September 1936. Jean Batten had flown the South Atlantic in the previous November but this was considered a much easier flight.
22 Daily Mail, 7 September 1936.
23 Flight Magazine, 10 September 1936.
24 Playboy of the Air, Jim Mollison, Michael Joseph, 1937.
25 News of the World, 9 August 1936.
26 Reuter syndicated article, 19 September 1936 (see Daily Express; East African Standard; others).
27 Daily Express, 19 August 1936.
28 East African Standard, 18 September 1936.
29 Interview with Mrs Rose Cartwright, Nairobi, March 1986.
30 East African Standard, 18 September 1936.
31 Daily Express, 2 September 1936.
32 ibid., 5 September 1936.
33 Daily Express; Daily Mirror; other English national dailies, 5 September 1936.
34 Interview with Ryan ‘Buster’ Parnell, Copenhagen, June 1986.
35 Daily Express; Daily Mirror; other English national dailies, 5 September 1936.
36 ibid.
37 Sunday Dispatch, 6 September 1936.
38 Daily Express, 5 September 1936.
39 Interviews with Miss Florence Desmond, Surrey, March and June 1986.
CHAPTER 9
1 Sunday Dispatch, 6 September 1936.
2 New York Times, 6 September 1936.
3 Reuter syndicated to many newspapers, 5 September 1936.
4 New York Times, 6 September 1936.
5 Daily Express, 7 September 1936.
6 Alone in the Sky, Jean Batten, Airlife, 1979.
7 Daily Express; many other daily newspapers, 7 September 1936. East African Standard, 16 October 1936. Note minor variations in each version.
8 Interview with Beryl Markham, Nairobi, April 1986.
9 New York Times, 7 September 1936.
10 Sunday Dispatch, 6 September 1936.
11 Daily Express, 7 September 1936.
12 ibid.
13 Sunday Dispatch, 6 September 1936.
14 ibid.
15 ibid.
16 East African Standard, 11 September 1936.
17 New York Times, 6 September 1936.
18 ibid.
19 East African Standard, 18 September 1936.
20 New York Times, 6 September 1936.
21 Daily Mail, 8 September 1936 and New York Times, 9 September 1936.
22 Daily Telegraph, 8 September 1936.
23 New York Times, 10 September 1936.
24 Daily Mail, 10 September 1936.
25 New York Times, 23 September 1936.
26 ibid., 7 October 1936.
27 ibid., 5 November 1936.
28 The Times; report on accident also in other British national newspapers; Liverpool Echo, 19 September 1936.
29 Interview with Miss Florence Desmond, Surrey, March 1986.
30 Florence Desmond, Florence Desmond, Harrap, 1953; and personal interviews with Miss Desmond, Surrey, March and June 1986.
31 Interview with Beryl Markham, Nairobi, March 1986.
32 New York Times, 23 September 1936.
33 Cape Times, 17 November 1936.
34 Interview with Miss Florence Desmond, Surrey, March 1936.
35 New York Times, 4 October 1936.
36 ibid.
CHAPTER 10
1 ‘Your Heart Will Tell You’, Beryl Markham, Ladies’ Home Journal, 1944.
2 Daily Express, 28 September 1936.
3 Florence Desmond, Florence Desmond, Harrap, 1953; and personal interviews with Miss Desmond, Surrey, March and June 1986.
4 Florence Desmond, Florence Desmond, Harrap, 1953.
5 East African Standard, 9 October 1936.
6 ibid., 16 October 1936.
7 ibid., Tommy Rose, 9 October 1936.
8 Contemporary newspaper reports; The Dangerous Skies, A.E. Clouston, Cassell, 1954; and The Story of the British Light Aeroplane, Terence Boughton, John Murray, 1963.
9 Interviews with Miss Florence Desmond, Surrey, March and June 1986.
10 East African Standard, 16 October 1936; Theatre World, September 1936.
11 Daily Telegraph, 16 October 1936.
12 East African Standard, 16 October 1936.
13 New York Times, 4 October 1936.
14 ibid., 9 October 1936.
15 Transcript of interview with Mr Jack Trench by film crew of television documentary World without Walls, Kenya, 1984.
16 Daily Express, 11 November 1936.
17 Interview with Beryl Markham, Nairobi, April 1986.
18 Interviews with Miss Florence Desmond, Surrey, March and June 1986.
19 ibid.; and Florence Desmond, Florence Desmond, Harrap, 1953.
20 Interviews with Miss Florence Desmond, Surrey, March and June 1986.
21 ibid.
22 Daily Express, 21 February 1937.
23 The Dangerous Skies, A.E. Clouston, Cassell, 1954.
24 I.W. Schlesinger – a wealthy South African with a flair for publicity and money making. In 1936 he bought a property in the centre of Maritzburg for £25,000. When the city council refused permission for development as a department store he turned the building into a rest home for down and outs, saying, ‘I am sure that the City Council will be glad to cooperate in my scheme for social uplift and as the property is to be used for charitable purposes no doubt they will be willing to remit part of the rates.’
25 Los Angeles Times, 6 July 1937.
26 Women of the Air, Judy Lomax, John Murray, 1986.
27 The Sky’s the Limit, Wendy Boase, Osprey, 1979.
28 Women of the Air, Judy Lomax, John Murray, 1986; and Biography of Jackie Cochrane, Katherine Moore, unfinished manuscript (1986).
29 The Stars at Noon, Jacqueline Cochran, Robert Hale, 1955.
30 ibid.
31 Los Angeles Times, 6 July 1937.
32 Kiss Hollywood Goodbye, Anita Loos, W.H. Allen, 1974.
33 ibid.
34 Truth (Australia), 2 January 1938.
35 ibid.
36 Telephone interview with Scott O’Dell, February 1987.
CHAPTER 11
The collection of letters between Houghton Mifflin and their authors, referred to in Chapters 11 and 12 and indicated by the symbol ‘HL’, is lodged at the Houghton Library, Harvard University, by whose generous permission they are included in this book.
&
nbsp; 1 Truth (Australia), 2 January 1938.
2 New York Times, 23 June 1939.
3 East African Standard, 20 May 1938.
4 Letters from Africa, Bror Blixen, trans. Gustaf Kleen.
5 ibid.
6 Letter to the author from Sir Charles Markham, 1986.
7 English newspaper cutting (source unknown), 26 February 1938.
8 East African Standard, March 1939.
9 Interview with Mme Viviane Markham, London, June 1986.
10 Josslyn Hay Erroll (Earl of), whose murder at Nairobi in 1941 caused a sensation.
11 Lady Idina, formerly the Countess of Erroll. A woman of great beauty and charm, whose hobby was collecting husbands.
12 Captain Roger A.F. Hurt (later Lieutenant Colonel Hurt DSO, CO of the 5th KAR), known variously by the nicknames Raf and Roddy.
13 New York Times, 23 June 1939.
14 From photographs among Beryl’s papers apparently taken on different days (according to clothes, weather conditions, locations etc.).
15 There is no record of an American licence issued to Beryl Markham or Beryl Schumacher. The Countess of Enniskillen states that Beryl told her she gave up flying ‘because of her heart’. This could mean that she failed the medical examination, although there is no evidence that Beryl was ever anything other than superbly fit.
16 Programme distributed by studio for the premiere of Safari; and various reviews by film critics.
17 ibid.
18 ibid.
19 Paramount Studios PR material.
20 ibid.; and interview with Beryl Markham, Nairobi, March 1986.
21 Statement by Mr Douglas Fairbanks Jr in a letter to the author.
22 Daily Mirror, 16 January 1940.
23 The Moon’s a Balloon, David Niven, Hamish Hamilton.
24 Signed picture among Beryl’s papers: ‘To Beryl, from your loving…Harry Richman (with my flaps down, Toots).’
25 Antoine de Saint-Exupéry – His Life and Times, Curtis Cate, Heinemann.
26 ibid.
27 ibid.
28 Letter from Mrs Tiny Cloete, South Africa, to the author, September 1986.
29 Wind, Sand and Stars, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, Heinemann (London), p. 260.
30 West with the Night, Beryl Markham, North Point Press (USA); Virago (London), p. 267.
31 Interviews with Beryl Markham, Nairobi, April 1986.
32 ibid., confirmed in interviews with Dr Warren Austin.
33 The Duke of Windsor’s War, Michael Bloch, Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1982.
34 ibid.
35 Appointment with Destiny, Rosita Forbes, Cassell, 1946.
36 Interview with Dr Warren Austin, October 1986.
37 Appointment with Destiny, Rosita Forbes, Cassell, 1946.
38 HL. Paul Brooks to LeBaron Barker, 26 June 1941.
39 HL. LeBaron Barker to Paul Brooks, 2 July 1941.
40 HL. Beryl Markham to LeBaron Barker, 29 June 1941.
41 HL. Beryl Markham to LeBaron Barker, 23 July 1941.
42 The name of this man is not known, but Mr Jørgen Thrane remembers Beryl telling him about the matter and showing him a photograph of the man. Letter from Mr Jørgen Thrane, Kenya, to the author, September 1986.
43 United States emigration department stamp in Beryl’s passport.
CHAPTER 12
1 Telephone interview with Scott O’Dell, February 1987.
2 Letter to the author from E.D. Baring-Gould, September 1986.
3 Although Beryl’s first flying licence bears the correct date, subsequent renewals and two passports give Beryl’s date of birth as 26 October 1904. In several interviews she gave incorrect dates of birth, inconsistently dropping two or four years.
4 In his letter to Vanity Fair in March 1987, Scott O’Dell stated that Beryl and Raoul met in the summer of 1940. But subsequently in two lengthy telephone interviews Mr O’Dell (and his wife) explained that the date was open to question. ‘I am two months short of my eighty-ninth birthday,’ he told me. ‘You get to forget that sort of detail at my age.’
5 Santa Barbara News Press, 21 September 1962.
6 Collier’s Weekly Magazine, 30 June 1945.
7 Telephone interview with Scott O’Dell, February 1987.
8 Letter to the author from Mrs Doreen Bathurst Norman, June 1986.
9 HL. Paul Brooks to Beryl Markham, 19 September 1941.
10 HL. Beryl Markham to Paul Brooks, 23 September 1941.
11 This house no longer exists but in July 1986 I visited the site and spoke to Mr Charles Fox – a former neighbour of Beryl’s – who kindly described the former building and its tenants.
12 HL. R.N. Linscott to Mr Greenslet, 20 October 1941.
13 HL. Paul Brooks to Beryl Markham, 23 October 1941.
14 Osa and Martin Johnson were the husband and wife team who pioneered filming in the ‘jungles’ of Africa for early movies. Beryl was notably scathing about their work and in particular thought their zebra-striped seaplane vulgar.
15 HL. Beryl Markham to Paul Brooks, 25 October 1941.
16 HL. Paul Brooks to Beryl Markham, 27 October 1941.
17 HL. Beryl Markham to Paul Brooks, 31 October 1941.
18 HL. R.N. Linscott to Beryl Markham, 4 November 1941.
19 HL. Beryl Markham to R.N. Linscott, 12 November 1941.
20 HL. Paul Brooks to Beryl Markham, 18 November 1941.
21 HL. Beryl Markham to Paul Brooks, 22 November 1941.
22 HL. Beryl Markham to Paul Brooks, 29 November 1941.
23 HL. Paul Brooks to Beryl Markham, 5 December 1941.
24 HL. Beryl Markham to Paul Brooks, 5 December 1941.
25 HL. Paul Brooks to Beryl Markham, 22 December 1941.
26 HL. Beryl Markham to Paul Brooks, 23 December 1941.
27 Letter in Beryl’s private papers.
28 Telephone interview with Mr Bertrand Rhine, Los Angeles, July 1986.
29 Letter to the author from Doreen Bathurst Norman, July 1986.
30 Letter (HL), 2 June 1942.
31 Letter (HL), 14 July 1942.
32 Scott O’Dell told me that the original version of West with the Night sold 30,000 copies, although Houghton Mifflin were unable to confirm this figure from their existing files. The book sold at three dollars so assuming that Mr O’Dell’s statement is accurate and allowing for agency commission Beryl probably earned about $10,000 in royalties.
33 New York Times, 6 and 10 October 1942.
34 HL. Stuart Cloete to Dale Warren, undated but marked ‘filed on 28 November 1942’.
35 HL. Stuart Cloete to Dale Warren, undated but marked ‘filed on 12 November 1942’.
36 Letter and interviews with Sir Charles Markham, 1986.
37 HL. Stuart Cloete to Dale Warren, January 1943.
38 HL. Stuart Cloete to Dale Warren, 25 February 1943.
39 HL. Stuart Cloete to Dale Warren, undated but marked ‘filed on 16 February 1943’.
40 Letter to the author from Mrs Doreen Bathurst Norman, June 1986.
41 Interview with Doreen Bathurst Norman, June 1986.
42 Interview with Beryl Markham, Nairobi, 1986, and transcript on television documentary World without Walls, filmed in Kenya, 1984, in which Beryl makes the same statement.
43 Telephone interview with Scott O’Dell, February 1987.
44 Crusader by Stuart Cloete, a short story about a temperamental horse tamed by a young girl.
45 HL. Stuart Cloete to Dale Warren, 7 September 1943.
46 See a collection of short stories by Beryl Markham, The Splendid Outcast, compiled by Mary S. Lovell, Hutchinson, 1987.
47 Telephone interview with Mr John F. Potter (France), December 1986.
48 Many people who knew Raoul Schumacher well thought that he wrote under a pen-name. No one, including two very close friends and his stepson, knew what the pen-name might be, but Scott O’Dell thought it was a woman’s name. Most people were surprised to learn that he had ever written under his own name.
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49 Collier’s Magazine, 29 January 1941, p. 54.
50 Vanity Fair, March 1987.
51 Telephone interview with Scott O’Dell, February 1987.
52 Antoine de Saint-Exupéry was killed whilst on active service in France, 31 July 1944.
53 Houghton Mifflin contracts files show that Beryl and Raoul received a $2,500 advance to write ‘An African Novel’. The contract is dated 9 January 1944 and was placed through Raoul’s literary agents, MacIntosh & Otis. This falls far short of Raoul’s claim to Scott O’Dell that Beryl received an advance for $15,000 and Houghton Mifflin confirmed that this would have been considered an enormous sum at that date. It is highly unlikely that an author of Beryl’s (or Raoul’s) stature could have looked for such an advance based on an outline for a novel.
CHAPTER 13
1 Information provided by C.M. Schrader, US Military Personnel Records Center, Missouri.
2 New York Herald Tribune, 18 March 1938.
3 Little Gloria, Happy at Last, Barbara Goldsmith, Macmillan, 1980.
4 The Heart Has its Reasons, Duchess of Windsor, Michael Joseph, 1969.
5 Little Gloria, Happy at Last, Barbara Goldsmith, Macmillan, 1980.
6 ibid.
7 Interviews with Mr Lee Van Atta, Montecito, July and August 1986.
8 Interview with Dr Douglas Hall (current owner of the ranch), August 1986, and his subsequent letters to the author.
9 Index files and extract from ‘Noticias’, archives of Santa Barbara Historical Society.
10 Interviews with Mr Van Atta, Montecito, July and August 1986.
11 Dr Warren R. Austin, telephone interview (Washington–California), July 1986.
12 After-dinner conversation with Dr Austin, Hampshire, October 1986.
13 ibid.
14 Telephone interview with Mr John F. Potter, France, December 1986.
15 Transcript of filmed interview with Mrs Maddie de Mott by film crew of television documentary World without Walls, Kenya, 1984.
16 Santa Barbara News Press, 8 June 1958.
17 Dr Warren R. Austin, telephone interview (Washington–California), July 1986.
18 ibid.
19 Interview with Mme Viviane Markham, London, June 1986.
20 Conversations with Fleur and Valery Markham, Beryl’s granddaughters.
21 After-dinner conversation with Dr Austin, Hampshire, October 1986.
22 Telephone interview with Mr John F. Potter, France, December 1986.
23 Telephone interview with Scott O’Dell, 9 February 1987.
24 ibid., 10 February 1987.
25 Conversation with Warren Austin, Hampshire, 23 October 1986. During research for Beryl’s stories this one eluded me until a chance remark to Juanita Carberry caused her to volunteer the information, ‘I’ve got that story tucked into my copy of West with the Night!’
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