* * *
With the birth of their fourth daughter it must have become obvious to both David and Sydney that they would eventually be faced with the expensive task of finding suitably wealthy and socially acceptable husbands for their daughters. It was the process of ‘marketing’ the girls at which Sydney would prove so adept. But first they had to make the then unavoidable investment in their participation in the social season as debutantes; the highlight of which would be their presentation at Court. This process served to announce their social position and marital eligibility. It also involved a huge amount of entertaining, dressmaking, hairdressing and travel; a process that all the girls pretended to hate. Meanwhile, they also invested in their son’s education at prep school prior to the inevitable Eton and Oxford. All of which would have been quite impossible without considerable financial assistance. Traditionally, such funding would have been the responsibility of their grandparents.
It helped, of course, that all the girls were attractive; in the case of Diana outstandingly so. But from an early age, due to their father’s difficulty with accepting visitors and their mother’s refusal to allow them to mix with anyone or go anywhere that she considered of insufficient social status, they were obliged to develop an ability to amuse themselves at home or by visiting, or being visited by, relatives. Unfortunately this social self-sufficiency had a rather unpleasant side to it, usually hidden beneath a veneer of somewhat sadistic humour.
Jonathan Guinness talked of the family having been ‘decent and sensitive’ and ‘sparklingly funny; but with the jokes came an intensity of passion in love and politics. Some find this disturbing.’ This was not always as appealing as it sounds and needs a degree of translation, for the jokes were only funny if you were not the butt of what passed for sparkling fun and often took the form of quite cruel teasing:
Much of the sisters’ childhood was spent in fear of Nancy … her barbed teasing became second nature to Nancy and the ethos of the Mitford nursery … the only defence against it was laughter. Nothing was sacred, any outward display of feelings was to be mocked, everything became the subject of a joke or a tease (‘We shrieked!’).
The ‘passion in love and politics’ presumably referred to their often questionable sexual and political morality and, with the exception of Jessica, their subsequent commitment to fascism. While the more theatrical members of society found all this quite irresistible, many potential suitors found the mixture more than somewhat challenging.
* * *
In 1914, The Times reported Britain’s declaration of war against Germany. It sent cheering crowds surging through London to gather outside Buckingham Palace singing the national anthem. From there many headed to the recruitment centres, and from there, to war. This misplaced patriotism usually, though not always, vanished within moments of appreciating the full hideousness of it all, despite theatricals like Ernest Thesiger’s attempting to make light of the situation by commenting with epicene languor, ‘Oh, my dear, the noise! … and the PEOPLE …!’
The First World War had much to do with Germany’s jealousy of the British Empire and Britain’s jealousy of Germany’s growing industrial power. It didn’t help that Kaiser Wilhelm, who had never really grown up and still enjoyed nothing so much as playing soldiers, was quite round the bend. The outcome of this spectacularly dreadful and totally pointless game was the death and maiming of 37 million people, of whom a particularly high percentage came from the British and German privileged classes. This was largely due to the policy of sending young men into battle ahead of their troops armed only with a revolver, which was particularly ineffective against machine guns and mortars, or even the marginally more effective policy of giving rifles to the terrified troops who were forced to follow them.
It should be said that not all Englishmen were in too much of a hurry to get involved in such suicidal lunacy in the first place. In Hurrah for the Blackshirts! Martin Pugh reported that, ‘The country still seemed a prey to fears … that its young men were too corrupted by materialism and leisure to respond willingly to the call to arms’, which resulted in the need for military conscription:
By the summer of 1915 the press was denouncing ‘shirkers’ for holding back, and young women had started distributing white feathers to men seen in public wearing civilian clothes. These were said to be the first symptoms of the post-war obsession with declining masculinity, the spread of effeminacy and the influence of homosexuality in Britain.
But regardless of whether their young men were ‘AC or DC’ and were pushed or jumped (i.e. whether they were conscripted or volunteered), the grand families of England and Germany were decimated.
Soon after the outbreak of hostilities, David Mitford rejoined the Northumberland Fusiliers, despite the fact that he was not obliged to do so. Largely as a result of the appalling casualties amongst the young officers, he was also finally given a commission, albeit as a lowly second lieutenant, logistics officer. While he would no doubt have preferred to have undertaken a more active combatant role, his position behind the lines probably saved his life. But once again David displayed considerable determination and courage and was even ‘mentioned in dispatches’ for his ‘sterling work’ in getting supplies through to his battalion during the Second Battle of Ypres. This activity also took a considerable toll on his health and he was subsequently rewarded with a move to Oxford as assistant provost marshal; involved in the somewhat less demanding task, for him, of recruitment.
All five of the Mitford brothers answered the call to arms but, ironically, in May 1915 it would be the failure of Clement, Bertie’s chosen ‘golden boy’, to return that would eventually transport David Mitford from his lowly role as an office manager into his new role as Lord Redesdale, peer, member of the landed gentry, fascist and father of the Mitford girls.
The following year his father Bertie died. Apparently he had gone fishing, sat on wet grass, caught a feverish chill and died on 17 August. After which, his widow ‘Clementine went to live at Redesdale Cottage in Northumberland, where her health improved’. And, presumably not suffering from any surfeit of grief, she ‘lived until 1932, and her descendants loved her in her mellow old age’.7
And so David, more by luck than judgement, inherited the title of Lord Redesdale and even a stately pile in the form of the vast, mock-Elizabethan Batsford House. It was a social elevation to which the family were said to have taken like ducks to water. People were soon encouraged to refer to them by their titled name, an imposition that was not appreciated by all, particularly the wife of novelist Richard Hughes, who remarked that, ‘The Redesdales were terribly grand. Quite unapproachable!’
The estate was said to have been valued at some £33,000 in cash and shares. After tax and other bequests David was left with just under £17,000, which would represent a present-day monetary value of more than £600,000, while the land and properties in Gloucestershire, Oxfordshire and Northumberland would be worth seven or eight times that amount.
Despite their inherited wealth, the family liked to give the impression that their life was in no way exceptional and that they lived in a sort of genteel poverty. They even claimed that Sydney was obliged to raise cash by keeping bees. ‘She managed the beehives herself with the help of the “redoubtable” Miss Mirams’8, the children’s governess, selling the resulting honey in London, presumably charging a Mitford premium. Many years later Debo would develop a similar strategy to assist in funding the Duke of Devonshire’s crumbling estate.
At this time it was fashionable for the privileged classes to claim poverty, or what they liked to think may have been a kind of genteel relative of such a thing, while in fact, they continued to live in very considerable comfort and enjoy many privileges.
Unfortunately, due to excessive debts and death duties, Batsford House, the arboretum and much of the land would need to be sold off, but the decision was made to delay the sale until after the end of the war. The Redesdales also decided to share the house with the children of R
onald Norman, brother of the governor of the Bank of England, and his wife, Lady Florence, who wanted to get their four children out of London for the duration of the war. There was certainly enough space for half-a-dozen families, though it is quite likely that the arrangement was adopted to lessen the likelihood of the house being requisitioned by the army. The move from their undistinguished London home to a dramatically ostentatious country mansion also ensured that at least the first five Mitford children were assured of developing an appropriate degree of eminence, thus setting them on the right social path, particularly in the case of Unity.
According to David Pryce-Jones:
A Hon … then, Unity was from the age of two, but a rebel she was to become only by way of disobedience, for the deeper outlook of superiority and indifference to others which is at the base of every racial theory, anti-Semitism included, was natural to her elders, as it was to be to her.
There is also some anecdotal evidence to suggest that the Mitfords enjoyed a fairly relaxed lifestyle while they were in residence. ‘When David was at home, the family played hide-and-seek all over the house, bringing all five staircases into use.’9 Diana remembered ‘the sound of footsteps thumping down the corridor, a distant scuffle and scream and Farve’s triumphant roar when he caught someone.’ One of the Norman children’s few anecdotes concerned Diana’s reaction to seeing their father reading a book. ‘I’ve never heard of a man reading.’ Apparently, ‘she judged all men by reference to her own father.’10 It was also another indication of the limitation of Lord Redesdale’s academic abilities.
* * *
While they obviously enjoyed their time at Batsford, ‘the classic years of the Mitford childhood’11 only really started when they arrived at Asthall Manor, in the quintessential Oxfordshire village of Swinbrook, in 1919.
Even today it remains a quite remarkably original, picture-book English village where deer appear from lush green hedgerows, hedgehogs scamper along the verges and ducks and ducklings paddle across the duck pond. In the words of Dame Edith Evans, the actress of that era, the village is ‘a veritable haven of sylvan joy’.
In early summer, Swinbrook resembles a Rousseau-like green jungle through which the most beautiful Windrush trout stream runs; the heavy flow of the deep stream swirling the green river grass, like Ophelia’s hair. The picturesque Swan Inn and cottage stands next to the stream. Inside are large, sepia pictures of the Mitfords indulging in various rural activities in the company of assuredly ‘devoted’ servants. A small sign reminds one that the inn is now the property of The Duchess of Devonshire, née Debo Mitford; or at least her trust.
But like so many things concerning the Mitford girls, everything is not quite what it seems; even in death. Some of the local residents seem unprepared to accept the reality of their inheritance: ‘You can see their gravestones in the village churchyard. All except Unity of course. They wouldn’t allow her to be buried there because of that business with Hitler.’ But they did and she is. There, ‘in pride of place’ amidst her sisters’ suitably weathered but simple Mitford family gravestones.
3
FASCISM AND FANTASY
* * *
1918–34
* * *
Spoil the child
Spare the rod
Open up the caviar
And say Thank God
Noel Coward
After the First World War it had soon became obvious that the extravagantly theatrical Batsford House and its surrounding Gloucestershire farmland was of little use to any owner lacking agricultural ambition or the desire to open his home to the public. With little of either, Lord Redesdale was faced with not only the aforementioned debts and inheritance tax but also the ever-increasing cost of maintaining the house. So, encouraged by a post-war boom in land prices, his financial advisers managed to convince him of the wisdom of selling both the house and its land. Thus, he could refill the family coffers while retaining his holdings in Oxfordshire. However, he would also have to move into a somewhat more practical house, though of course somewhere still befitting his recently ‘ennobled’ status.
Fortunately, just such a house had recently become vacant. More importantly, if the remaining profits from the sale were safely invested by the aforementioned financial advisers, the Mitfords could continue to live in considerable comfort with little risk of any of them ever having to seek gainful employment or involve themselves in any form of trade apart, perhaps, from their father’s various financial investments; investments from which he would have been isolated by bank managers, stockbrokers and other ‘financial servants’. He was also eventually persuaded to sell his Canadian mining interests, which was a great relief to his family who considered any form of manual labour to be quite unacceptable, for a man in his position.
Thus, Lord Redesdale remained free to indulge his two great passions in life: shooting and fishing, for which the Oxfordshire countryside was ideally suited and which, naturally, his fellow peers expected of him. But Lord Redesdale lived in an age when such indulgence was becoming increasingly threatened and even as a young child Jessica appreciated the anachronistic qualities of her father, saying, ‘Farve, d’you realise that as well as being a sub-human you’re a feudal remnant?’ The latter observation was remarkably accurate if somewhat precocious, coming as it did from a 14-year-old girl, but considering the family’s association with the Third Reich, the former part of the statement was cause for considerably greater concern; sub-human being the term used by the Nazis for those they considered unfit to be considered part of the human race.
Lord Redesdale was assisted in the enjoyment of his various sporting pastimes by his ‘devoted’ chauffeur, James Turner, who loved shooting as much as his master and enjoyed driving him to grand shoots; like most personal servants he was almost certainly an even greater snob than his master. Turner took an active role in ensuring that his master’s prowess remained something of which to be proud. He caused some confusion by dressing in almost identical moleskin jacket and polished leather gaiters, which, so it was said at David’s club, probably resulted in Lord Redesdale occasionally achieving questionable bird counts.
Asthall Manor, the beautiful, ‘rambling and commodious’1 Jacobean house, was – and still is – situated not in the village of Swinbrook at all, but 2 miles down river at Asthall, a fact that the Mitfords tended to gloss over, perhaps because they did not own the village as completely as those of Swinbrook and Widford. Those were the days when one could ‘own’ villages and their inhabitants as a result of tenancies or cottages ‘tied’ to jobs on the estate, but because David’s tenants were obliged to paint their doors, gates and fences Redesdale blue, it was easy to distinguish exactly which properties formed part of his estate.
The manor actually adjoined one of his Lordship’s farms, a situation that Redesdale never found easy to accept. He even endeavoured to advance its status with the addition of a ballroom, though there is little evidence of their having given a lot of balls. But David also enjoyed a lifelong enthusiasm for building, or at least the instructing of craftsmen to do so on his behalf, and the ballroom was a perfect excuse for such endeavour. Unfortunately, following Prince Albert’s example and to the extreme detriment of some of England’s finest architectural heritage, it was something in which many members of the aristocracy had dabbled for several years.
The manor was also situated next door to the village church, but due to the fact that David held no sway over the vicar’s stipend and was thus unable to control the length or subject of his sermons, the family frequented the Swinbrook church. However, there is no evidence of any religious commitment beyond that which the family considered their social duty, apart that is from Unity’s somewhat extreme spiritual development.
Diana insisted their father never intended to stay there long, always planning to build his own ‘unattached’ house on the hill above Swinbrook. But by the time his new house was finally built the children had come to realise how perfectly Asthall had fulfille
d its role as the Mitford girls’ family home.
If devotees of the girls had been invited to imagine such a thing, there can be little doubt they would all have described Asthall Manor.
* * *
While the Mitford family could be said to have profited both socially and financially from the First World War, the death of so many eligible young men also reduced the chances of the girls finding suitable husbands. As the next generation of British and German ruling classes were being slaughtered in the trenches, the Mitford girls were kept busy in the nursery and fields, developing what their mother hoped would be the advantageous appeal of their unique social character. The resulting, charmingly childlike qualities would stay with them for life. It was an English tradition amongst the privileged classes. Because they saw so little of their parents, who considered formal education for girls to be quite unnecessary, they relied on Nanny to adopt the role of surrogate mother; with whom the girls would share their lives until marriage. It was thus hardly surprising that they developed such things as their own nursery language and humour.
David and Sydney were not alone in believing that it was unnecessary to educate girls beyond reading, writing and basic arithmetic; the latter skill only deemed necessary in order for them to be even vaguely capable of keeping or checking household accounts. They were also expected to have a reasonable grasp of the French language and enough geography and history to prevent them appearing ignorant in polite society. Music, needlework and deportment were also included in their curriculum. The imparting of this knowledge was the responsibility of a governess, and/or private lessons in Oxford.
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