The Sisters_The Saga of the Mitford Family

by Mary S. Lovell

  42 OSU/1697, SR to JM, 8 December 1939.

  Chapter 14: Irreconcilable Differences, 1940–41

  1 DD, interview with the author, Chatsworth, 4 May 2000.

  2 Mosley, Diana, A Life of Contrasts (Hamish Hamilton, 1977), p. 165.

  3 Interview at Chatsworth, June 2000.

  4 Not Unity’s diaries. Janos kept these safely and later sent them to Lady Redesdale.

  5 Guinness, Jonathan and Catherine, The House of Mitford (Hutchinson, 1984), p. 436.

  6 OSU/1697, SR to JM, 28 January 1940: ‘I see that doctors today have given up on pills and potions and taken to great mysterious engines, electrical and otherwise. This clinic is full of them and is more like the inside of a battleship than a hospital. She has had all sorts of electrical tests and X-rays. We are certainly living in a mechanical age.’

  7 NM to Violet Hammersley, 7 January 1940, in Mosley, Charlotte, Love from Nancy (Hodder & Stoughton, 1993), p. 126.

  8 The House of Mitford, p. 438.

  9 A Life of Contrasts, p. 167.

  10 NM to Violet Hammersley, 10 February 1940, in Love from Nancy, p. 130.

  11 The House of Mitford, pp. 439–40.

  12 This quote appeared in English papers as ‘Unity was always a headstrong girl’. See OSU/1673, TM to JM, 18 January 1940.

  13 CHP, JM, to SR, 26 February 1940.

  14 OSU/1697, SR to JM, 1 April 1940.

  15 The Times, 9 March 1940, p. 4.

  16 Unless otherwise stated, the information on Decca and Esmond’s experiences in the USA is taken from Mitford, Jessica, Hons and Rebels (Victor Gollancz, 1960). For the Miami period, see pp. 210–14.

  17 OSU/1628, Kay Graham file, 13 April 1978.

  18 OSU/1032, Nellie Romilly to JM, 8 July 1940.

  19 Hons and Rebels, p. 222.

  20 Durr, Virginia Foster, Outside the Magic Circle (University of Alabama Press, 1990), p. 138.

  21 OSU/1029, JM to ER, June 1940.

  22 CHP, JM to DD, 17 November 1986.

  23 OSU/1697, JM to SR, 22 July 1940.

  24 OSU, Jessica Mitford Papers.

  25 Ibid.

  26 Ibid.

  27 OSU/1020, JM to ER, 8 September 1940.

  28 OSU/1031, ER to JM, 11 September 1940.

  29 OSU/1029, Max Beaverbrook to Nellie Romilly, 19 November 1940.

  30 Mosley, Nicholas, Beyond the Pale (Secker & Warburg, 1983), p. 443.

  31 Winston Churchill thought this likely. See notes taken at a War Cabinet meeting 28 May 1940, in which Churchill discussed his decision against possible negotiations with Hitler: ‘“we should become a slave state, though a British Government which would be Hitler’s puppet would undoubtedly be set up under Mosley or some such person” . . . no one expressed a flicker of dissent’. See Hugh Dalton, The Fateful Years (Frederick Muller, 1957), p. 336.

  32 Dalley, Jan, Diana Mosley (Faber & Faber, 2000), p. 267.

  33 Quoted in TV documentary Churchill vs. Hitler: The Duel, Channel 4, 8 May 2000.

  34 DM to the author, January 2001.

  35 Major Vidkun Quisling, leader of the Norwegian Fascists, proclaimed a puppet government on the day Norway was invaded by the Germans.

  36 DM to the author, January 2001.

  37 BBC2 programme, 2000, The Age of Nazism – Tourists of the Revolution .

  38 Skidelsky, Robert, Mosley (Macmillan, 1981), p. 447.

  39 Ibid.

  40 Hubert Gladwyn Jebb (later 1st Baron Gladwyn) at the Ministry of Economic Warfare, 1940–42.

  41 20 June 1940, in Love from Nancy, p. 132.

  42 The House of Mitford, p. 492.

  43 Ibid., p. 493.

  44 Ibid. Jonathan Guinness points out that the statement regarding the profits of the radio station was incorrect. Half the profits were contracted to the German radio company, which was also involved in the venture.

  45 DM to the author, January 2001.

  46 A Life of Contrasts, p. 213.

  47 Ibid., p. 189.

  48 OSU/1697, SR to JM, October 1940.

  49 Love from Nancy, p. 139.

  50 JM to VH, 1 October 1940, in ibid., p. 140.

  51 26 December 1940, in ibid., p. 144.

  52 Ibid.

  53 OSU/1707, NM to JM, 4 July 1940.

  54 OSU/1697, SR to JM 26 September 1940.

  55 OSU/1700, referred to in JM, to SR, 2 April 1960.

  56 3 March 1941, in Love from Nancy, p. 147.

  57 André Roy was his nomme de guerre. His real name was Roy André Desplats-Pilter.

  58 Mrs Rattenbury was a murderess.

  59 OSU/1559, DD to JM, 6 May 1940.

  60 Ibid., DD to JM, 7 October 1940. Joseph Kennedy departed from London on 23 October 1940 at the height of the Blitz saying that he had the greatest respect for Londoners.

  61 Lees-Milne, James, Prophesying Peace (John Murray, 1997), p. 345.

  62 Collier, Peter and Horowitz, David, The Kennedys (Secker & Warburg), p. 94,

  63 OSU/1679, ‘Nannie’ to JM, 15 September. Philip Toynbee, Esmond’s old friend, was also at Sandhurst at the same time.

  64 OSU/1697, SR to JM, 7 October 1940.

  65 NM to VH 3 March 1941, in Love from Nancy, p. 147

  66 The House of Mitford, p. 581.

  Chapter 15: Gains and Losses, 1941–3

  1 In Hons and Rebels Decca says a nine-bed ward, but in her letters to Esmond she describes it, and draws a diagram of a five-bedded ward.

  2 OSU/1648, JM to Anne Horne, 18 October 1984.

  3 A Spanish grandee who left her home and family to join the Republicans fighting Franco. See In Place of Splendour – the Biography of a Spanish Woman (Michael Joseph, 1940).

  4 OSU/1698, SR to JM, 15 April 1941.

  5 Ibid., 18 April 1941.

  6 Madeau Stewart, interview with the author, Burford, spring 2000.

  7 OSU, DD to JM, 1959 (undated).

  8 DM to the author, January 2001.

  9 Ingram, Kevin, Rebel (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1985), p. 217.

  10 OSU/1030, Virginia Durr to ER, 1 August 1941.

  11 OSU/1029, 3 September 1941.

  12 Ibid., ER, 6 September 1941.

  13 OSU/1030, ER to JM, 11 November 1941.

  14 OSU/1031, JM to ER, 1 December 1941.

  15 Ibid., Chief of Air Staff to JM (extract), 2 December 1941.

  16 Durr, Virginia Foster, Outside the Magic Circle (University of Alabama Press, 1990), p. 141.

  17 OSU/1029, Wing Commander Ronald Clark, O/C, 58 Squadron Linton on Ouse, York, 4 December 1941.

  18 Churchill, Winston S., The Second World War, vol. III, The Grand Alliance (Cassell, 1950), pp. 539–40.

  19 Moran, Lord, Churchill – The Struggle for Survival (Constable, 1966), p. 13.

  20 Robert Treuhaft, interview with the author, San Francisco, October 1999.

  21 OSU/1794, JM notes. Also OSU/1707, Nellie Romilly to SR, 19 March 1942.

  22 Pearson, John, Citadel of the Heart (Macmillan, 1991), p. 306.

  23 OSU, Romilly file, Nellie Romilly to SR, February 1942.

  24 OSU/1032, Virginia Durr to SR, c. February 1942.

  25 Lees-Milne, James, Prophesying Peace (John Murray, 1997), p. 349.

  26 Outside the Magic Circle, p. 141.

  27 OSU/1032, Virginia Durr to SR, c. February 1942. When Lady Redesdale replied to this she diplomatically repeated several phrases used by Mrs Durr, to let her know, without saying so, that her letter had been safely received.

  28 Rosemary, Mrs Richard Bailey, interview with the author, Westwell, March 2000.

  29 CHP, JM to SR, 22 February 1942.

  30 NM to DM, 22 November 1941, in Mosley, Charlotte, Love from Nancy (Hodder & Stoughton, 1993), p. 151.

  31 NM to DM, 24 August 1942, in ibid., p. 155.

  32 The shop still exists in Curzon Street. Today, a ‘blue plaque’ commemorates Nancy’s association with the building.

  33 Lees-Milne, James, Ancestral Voices (John Murray, 1975), p. 27.

&nbs
p; 34 Ibid., p. 26.

  35 Ibid., p. 247. Anthony and Christopher, playmates of the Mitford children, were killed early in the war. Timothy’s conversion to Roman Catholicism in 1943 while in a PoW camp is said to have distressed the Baileys ‘more than the death in action of their two other sons’.

  36 Ibid., p. 201. The ‘autobiography’ became the basis of the novel The Pursuit of Love.

  37 Ibid., p. 343.

  38 Ibid., p. 351.

  39 Ibid., p. 249.

  40 Prophesying Peace, p. 312.

  41 Hastings, Selina, Nancy Mitford (Hamish Hamilton, 1985), p. 144

  42 Mitford, Nancy, The Pursuit of Love (Hamish Hamilton, 1945), p. 189.

  43 Hastings, Nancy Mitford, p. 149.

  44 Love from Nancy, p. 162.

  Chapter 16: Women at War, 1943–4

  1 Churchill, Winston S., The Second World War, vol. III, The Grand Alliance (Cassell, 1950), p. 627

  2 Ibid., p. 750

  3 Mosley, Diana, A Life of Contrasts (Hamish Hamilton, 1977), p. 192.

  4 Ibid.

  5 DM, interview with the author, June 2000.

  6 Ibid.

  7 Mosley, Nicholas, Beyond the Pale (Secker & Warburg, 1983), p. 483.

  8 OSU/1698, JM to SR, 11 April 1943.

  9 Mitford, Jessica, A Fine Old Conflict (Michael Joseph, 1977), p. 37.

  10 OSU 1742, RT to Aranka, 28 December 1942.

  11 Ibid., 8 January 1943.

  12 A Fine Old Conflict, p. 41.

  13 Ibid., p. 46.

  14 Called ‘Mrs Tibbs’ in A Fine Old Conflict.

  15 A Fine Old Conflict, p. 46.

  16 OSU/1698, JM to SR, 16 March 1943.

  17 Ibid., 11 April 1943.

  18 Even as an adult Dinky is unmistakably Mitford. I was easily able to identify her from among a jumbo jet-load of passengers when I first met her, merely because I was familiar with photographs of her Mitford aunts at the same age. However, she told me that when she was about nineteen she was walking in New York one day when she noticed a man walking towards her and staring as though transfixed. He passed by, then turned and came back to her. ‘I say,’ he said in an English voice, ‘are you in any way related to Esmond Romilly?’ She replied that Esmond was her father. ‘Thank God,’ he said. ‘I thought I was seeing a ghost.’

  19 OSU/1698, JM to SR, 11 April 1943.

  20 Ibid., 30 May, 1943.

  21 Ibid., BT to Aranka, 27 June 1943.

  22 Doris Brin Walker, ‘Dobbie’, interview with the author, San Francisco, 23 October 1999.

  23 OSU/1698, JM to SR, 28 June 1943.

  24 Ibid., 21 July 1943.

  25 Ibid., 22 November 1943.

  26 OSU, misc., JM to Winston Churchill, 24 November 1943.

  27 A Fine Old Conflict, p. 58.

  28 When David found this question on forms he always answered, ‘Honourable’.

  29 Soames, Mary (ed.), Speaking for Themselves (Doubleday, 1998), p. 486.

  30 A Life of Contrasts, p. 198.

  31 Speaking for Themselves, p. 488.

  32 Possibly the development of ‘Window’, bundles of thin strips of aluminium foil ejected from high-flying aircraft, designed to confuse enemy radar.

  33 A Life of Contrasts, pp. 199–200.

  34 Guinness, Jonathan and Catherine, The House of Mitford (Hutchinson, 1984), p. 508

  35 OSU/1698, SR to JM, 1 January 1943.

  36 Ibid., JM to SR, 27 March 1944.

  37 Sally Norton.

  38 Kick kept in constant touch with Billy while in Washington. A friend of the author, Quentin Keynes, who worked at the British embassy in Washington, knew her well and used to send their letters through the diplomatic bag.

  39 Collier, Peter and Horowitz, David, The Kennedys (Secker & Warburg, 1984), p. 129.

  Chapter 17: The French Lady Writer, 1944–7

  1 James Lees-Milne recorded in his diary that the Duke of Wellington was furious when he heard that Debo had called her son ‘Morny’, which appeared to be a diminutive of the Wellesley title Lord Mornington. ‘How would you like it,’ he complained to the Duke of Devonshire at a party, ‘if I christened my grandson Harty of Burlington?’ Nancy broke in, ‘But Debo christened him after her favourite jockey. She’s never heard of the Duke of Wellington.’ See Lees-Milne, James, Prophesying Peace (John Murray, 1997), p. 345.

  2 OSU/1698, JM to SR, 15 June 1944.

  3 Ibid., 27 March 1944.

  4 Ibid., DR to JM, 21 May 1944.

  5 Ibid., SR to JM, 16 May 1944.

  6 Lord Hartington was killed on 10 September 1944.

  7 Patsy White. See Collier, Peter, and Horowitz, David, The Kennedys (Secker & Warburg, 1984), p. 144.

  8 Ibid.

  9 Ibid.

  10 Smith, Amanda, A Hostage to Fortune (Viking, 2001), p. 601.

  11 NM to SR, 24 September 1944, in Mosley, Charlotte, Love from Nancy (Hodder & Stoughton, 1993), p. 167.

  12 OSU/1698, SR to JM, 25 July 1944.

  13 OSU/1709, NM to JM, 26 May 1944.

  14 Prophesying Peace, p. 294.

  15 Mitford, Nancy, The Pursuit of Love (Hamish Hamilton, 1945), p. 193.

  16 Prophesying Peace, p. 344.

  17 Ibid., pp. 348–9.

  18 Ibid., p. 355.

  19 Ibid., p. 380.

  20 Ibid., p. 394.

  21 Once part of British India, Burma became a separate state in 1937. Its government continued to function from India after occupation of the country by the Japanese.

  22 The information on Major Freeman-Mitford’s death is taken from (a) the official Statement of the Company Commander, Devonshire Regiment (OSU 1701) and (b) Commonwealth War Graves Commission records. His grave is at Taukyan War Cemetery, plot 17 F20. See also OSU/1698, SR to JM, 19 June 1945.

  23 Prophesying Peace, p. 425.

  24 Lees-Milne, James, Deep Romantic Chasm (John Murray, 2000), p. 101.

  25 OSU/1698, SR to JM, 22 April 1945.

  26 Prophesying Peace, p. 425.

  27 Ibid., p. 426.

  28 Ibid., p. 460.

  29 RT, interview with the author, Oakland, California, October 1999.

  30 OSU/1698, JM to NM.

  31 OSU/1707, 13 April 1945.

  32 OSU/1698, 22 April 1945.

  33 NM to EW, 17 January 1945, in Love from Nancy, p. 175.

  34 Author and publisher, editor of the London Magazine, and godson of Mrs Violet Hammersley.

  35 NM to SR, 17 September 1945, in Love from Nancy, pp. 184–5.

  36 NM to Randolph Churchill, 30 September 1945, in ibid., p. 187.

  37 John Betjeman to NM, 19 December 1945, in Lycett-Green, Candida (ed.), John Betjeman Letters (Methuen, 1990), p. 378.

  38 NM to Gaston Palewski, 20 January 1946, in Love from Nancy, p. 195.

  39 Guinness, Jonathan and Catherine, The House of Mitford (Hutchinson, 1984), p. 444.

  40 11 February 1947.

  41 OSU/1698, SR to JM, 24 March 1945.

  42 Ibid., Hasties (Mitford family solicitors) to JM, 15 June 1945.

  43 Cockburn, Claud, ‘Island Fling’, Punch, 30 March 1960.

  44 Ibid.

  45 OSU/1698, JM to SR, 21 May 1946.

  46 Ibid., SR to JM, 4 February 1946.

  47 956 Clayton Street, San Francisco.

  48 Extract from RT’s address at the memorial for JM held in London.

  49 RT, interview with the author, Oakland, California, October 1999.

  50 Pele de Lappe, interview with the author, Petaluma, California, October 1999.

  51 OSU/1698, JM to SR, c. December 1947.