The Other Mitford

by Alexander, Diana

  An extraordinary event happened when Hooper was delivering the eggs from Sydney’s chicken farm on 11 November 1927, nine years after the end of the Great War, memories of which were still very vivid in people’s minds. Then, as today, the two minutes’ silence was observed on the actual date of Armistice Day and Hooper, the old soldier, stopped the cart at 11 a.m. and climbed down to hold the horse’s head. The horse, a mare that had seen service with the army in France during the war, swayed in the shafts and fell down dead, probably from a heart attack. Her death, during the two minutes’ silence, made a great impression on the Mitford family and crusty old Hooper wept for her.

  Yet although the Mitford girls loved their animals, and would weep copiously if they were hurt or in pain, their attitude did not extend to their beloved hens. Pam would often reminisce about Sunday lunch at Asthall or Swinbrook when the roast chicken appeared. ‘Is this Blackie or Whitey we’re eating today?’ one of the children would ask, but she did not remember anyone being put off their lunch when the meat was identified.

  Even during her childhood Pam was honing the skills of gardening, animal husbandry and cooking which were partly responsible for her being nicknamed Woman by her siblings. It was also her serenity, her care for others and her capable kindness which made the name stick and which gave her a special place in this extraordinary family.

  Pam had her own brand of humour which, though different from her siblings, was still extremely funny. In much later life, when living in the Cotswold village of Caudle Green, Pam and I were invited to supper with our great friend Mary Sager who also lived in the village. The purpose was to meet a newcomer, one Dr Ezra, who had just rented a nearby cottage. Dr Ezra, an American, was full of lengthy advice on most subjects. The first topic of the evening was education and the newcomer delivered a long and stern lecture on schools, many and various, both in England and across the pond. But even she had to stop eventually to draw breath and Pam, quick as a flash, leaned across the table and announced in her unmistakable ‘Mitford voice’: ‘I never went to school, you know.’ It was the last time education was mentioned that evening. In fact, in spite of Nancy’s descriptions of the Radlett family’s sketchy education in her novels, the Mitford children were soundly taught first by Sydney, and later by a series of governesses, Miss Mirams and Miss Hussey being the most competent.

  Pam lagged behind her siblings in the classroom, but she was nobody’s fool, as is shown particularly by two incidents during her childhood. The first, when she did her best to avert disaster, happened during the Great War when the family was staying with Sydney’s father at his cottage on the Solent. At bedtime Pam declared that she could smell smoke but the nursery maid took no notice, thinking that she was making an excuse to stay up longer. David returned on leave two days later to discover that the building had been burnt to the ground. Luckily, no one was hurt and the family had decamped to the home of their neighbour Mr Marconi, the radio pioneer. The children regarded the fire as a great adventure as they sat on the lawn watching the blaze, the grown-ups hurrying backwards and forwards trying to save what they could. Six-year-old Tom, always known for his politeness, called out, ‘Good morning, Mr Caddick’ to the butler as he hurried past with a load of dining-room silver, and was surprised not to get an answer. Even at such a tender age, Pam had reason to indulge in feelings of self-righteousness.

  On another occasion a big fete was being held in the grounds of Batsford Park in aid of a nearby convalescent home for the war-wounded. Sydney, thinking that the popular white elephant stall was looking somewhat bare, took several ‘knick-knacks’ from the house to fill the empty spaces. Among these was a very rare Buddha collected by her father-in-law, the first Lord Redesdale, during his Far Eastern travels. Sydney thought it was ugly but it was valuable even then. Pam bought it for sixpence and treasured it to the end of her life.

  Pam’s youngest sister Debo, when interviewed quite recently, put forward the idea that when they were growing up they had far more freedom than today’s children and were not constantly supervised by adults. It was when they became young women that they were chaperoned. Pam states that, unlike her father and his siblings, they were allowed to play with the village children and the only time she ever got into trouble for doing so was when she stayed out after dark and a search party had to be organised. Indoors the children had the run of the house, in this case Batsford Park with its five staircases, in which to play hide and seek to their hearts’ content. In these games they were often joined by David and their grandmother Clementine, not to supervise them but to join in the general hilarity. On one occasion, Grandmother Redesdale fell flat on her back and it was thought that it was only the bun on the back of her head that saved her from serious concussion.

  One of the games, inevitably invented by Nancy, was a variation on ‘doctors and nurses’ in which Nancy would play the part of a ‘Czechish’ lady doctor. She spoke with the heavy foreign accent which she imagined an inhabitant of Czechoslovakia would use. Tom was generally the patient, Diana his anxious mother and Pam the nurse. An instant and serious ‘opairation’ was embarked upon, usually involving a painful knuckling of the chest. It was during this game that Czechish, the first of the Mitfords’ private languages, was begun and Nancy used it to the end of her life.

  It was at this time that Pam’s nickname Woman often became Woomling and Nancy would say of her, ‘Oh, she ees wondairful’, sometimes also referring to her simply as Wondairful or Wondair. Nancy, as a result of this game, was often referred to as Naunceling or Naunce, especially by Pam. It is the final irony that when Nancy was dying a particularly painful death from cancer and Pam was the sister she most wanted to look after her due to her quiet, capable attitude, she would write to the other sisters to say, ‘Woomling ees wondair’, or simply, ‘she ees, she ees’. They knew what she meant.

  In common with other upper-class children of their day, the Mitford children saw comparatively little of their parents and much more of their nanny and governess. Lily Kersey, the nanny who blotted her copybook by her treatment of Nancy after Pam was born, an unkindness which affected Pam at least equally, was succeeded by Norah Evans of whom nothing is known. In her wake came the Unkind Nanny who was briefly with the family around the time of Diana’s birth and made the remark, which went down in Redesdale family history: ‘She’s too beautiful. She can’t live long.’ In fact, Diana died aged 93. The Unkind Nanny was sacked, ostensibly for banging Nancy’s head against a wooden bedpost, though Nancy said she did not remember this. True or not, her departure led to the Redesdales engaging a nanny who made a tremendous difference to their children’s lives and who devoted her own life to them.

  Laura Dicks, who became known as Blor, was pale and thin and Sydney wondered if she would be capable of looking after the boisterous Mitford children. But she also exclaimed over Diana’s beauty and was engaged on the spot. The difference between her and the other nannies was that she was scrupulously fair and so was loved by all, even Nancy. Her background was Nonconformist but, far from being dour, she was both charming and funny. Nancy said of herself that, although she was still vile to the others, she would have been much worse but for Blor. Her influence on Nancy must have made Pam’s life a little easier and, like all the others, Pam loved Blor dearly.

  Blor stayed with the family for more than thirty years and during this time she often took the children on holiday to her home at Bexhill-on-Sea in Sussex; there they enjoyed the delights of sea bathing, after which Blor would rub their freezing limbs with dry, striped towels and give them ginger biscuits and hot drinks from her Thermos.

  In his book The House of Mitford, the definitive history of this exceptional family, Jonathan Guinness, Diana’s eldest son, acknowledges the tremendous help that his mother and his aunt Debo gave him with his research. But he remarks that, ‘as with most of us, their memory of the past is selected, packaged, interpreted. Pam does very little of this; her memories, as she recalls them, retain the freshness of direc
t perception.’ One of the best examples of this is Pam’s descriptions of childhood Christmases, which in old age she recounted to me as if they were yesterday.

  Preparations for the great event began in October when Sydney started making Christmas shopping trips to Oxford – never London – to buy presents for the tree from Elliston and Cavell and the children’s favourite shop, Hooton’s bazaar. By the end of November they began to pack the parcels, a mammoth task since there was a present for every adult who worked on the estate and a garment for each of their children. Many of the clothes had been knitted by Sydney earlier in the year. Every child also took home an orange and a bag of sweets from the Christmas tree. It was Pam’s job to wrap up the sweets in home-made bags and she always wished that she could eat them all herself.

  On Christmas Eve a huge tree from the estate was brought in and decorated by the family. Then all the uncles, aunts and cousins arrived, amid great excitement. Next there was tea for a hundred guests from the estate, followed by the arrival of Father Christmas to the sound of ‘sleigh bells’. David would fling open the door to admit the scarlet-clad figure with his sack bulging with presents. It was years before the Mitford children solved the puzzle of why the parson, Mr Foster, was the only guest who came late to the party, after Father Christmas had departed. After the party, the carol singers would arrive from the village and were invited in for a glass of beer or cider, served by David from large barrels.

  The children hung up their Christmas stockings until they were almost grown up and at 5.30 on Christmas morning the excitement became even more intense as they awoke to open them. They always contained an orange in the toe and envelopes containing money from the aunts and uncles. On one red-letter Christmas Pam found £5 in one of her envelopes.

  After breakfast the family walked to Swinbrook church which was decorated with holly and chrysanthemums. Mr Foster always chose the children’s favourite carols and preached a short sermon so that everyone could get home for Christmas lunch; after this a walk was deemed necessary to make way for the Christmas cake and then the event that Pam always dreaded – the dressing up.

  The children vanished to the attic to choose their outfits from the dressing-up box, which was full of fancy-dress costumes and some of Sydney’s old evening dresses. The costumes were supposed to be a secret but there were few surprises as everybody knew what was in the box. Nancy was the most inventive of the family but their father always wore the same dressing gown and a ‘ghastly red wig’. Pam admitted that she was hopeless at dressing up and always went as Lady Rowena from Ivanhoe in a long red dress trimmed with orange beads. Debo still keeps those beads on her dressing table to remind her of Pam. The long dress meant that Pam could keep on her woolly knickers against the cold, but Nancy would never let her get away with it and would pull up her skirt to reveal her knee-length bloomers to the assembled party.

  After supper the house party played a game called Commerce, for which David produced money prizes ranging from 10s to 1d. The Game often went on until 11.30 p.m., by which time the adults were visibly wilting while the children got more and more excited – the very young ones having been taken off to bed much earlier.

  Boxing Day brought the gloomy thought that the guests would be going home the next day and life would return to normal. The children always longed for snow so that nobody could reach the station – a five-mile drive by pony and trap when the weather was too bad for the car. Pam remembered it happening only twice and felt that the adults may not have been as ecstatic as the children at finding their escape to London closed.

  The excitement continued, however, for on New Year’s Eve the mummers arrived and performed their traditional play with St George, the Dragon and the Turkish Knight, the village children reciting their parts in a monotone. It was in this group that a youthful Bob Arnold, who later played the part of Tom Forrest in The Archers, began his acting career.

  All too soon it was Twelfth Night when the tree was dismantled and the decorations put away, as was the sponge and water bucket which David always hid behind the tree as a fire precaution, since Pam might not always be around to smell the smoke!

  This amazing attention to detail and the obvious enjoyment with which it was related many years later is an example of how Pam carried the images in her head. She never lost her joy of Christmas; in fact, it probably increased in later years since she no longer had to endure the ‘dreaded dressing up’.

  Two

  The Other Children

  David and Sydney spent the first years of their married life in London and it was here that the five eldest Mitford children were born. They were brought up very much as other upper-class children who lived in the capital, not seeing very much of their parents and being in the care of a nanny when they were young and a governess as they grew older. They went for walks in the park and were sometimes allowed to visit the zoo or – oh joy! – Harrods pet shop from which they acquired an assortment of animals, including rats, mice and even a grass snake which Unity christened Enid. They played with children of their own kind who lived nearby or with their many cousins.

  As well as her convictions about the power of the Good Body to heal itself, Sydney would not allow the children to eat pig meat, rabbit, hare or shellfish, but David refused point blank to give up these tasty meats which he had eaten all his life. This meant that the children had the added agony of smelling the bacon, sausages, pigs’ brains and trotters which they were not allowed to eat unless one of the kitchen staff secretly took pity on them. When Tom went to boarding school, he wrote home triumphantly: ‘We have sossidges every Sunday’ – a statement which no doubt provoked shrieks of envy among his sisters.

  Both Sydney and David agreed on the subject of their children’s education, the main thrust of which was that girls should be educated at home. David did not want daughters with thick calf muscles from playing hockey and Sydney was happy to teach the children herself and then engage a governess. Although Nancy and Jessica bemoaned the fact that they hadn’t been allowed to go to school, they actually must have received a good education, particularly from their mother, who insisted that they should be able to read the leading article in The Times by the time they were 6. Later they were taught by Miss Mirams and Miss Hussey who came from the Charlotte Mason PNEU training college in Ambleside. They were taught French, as it was deemed to be a language that all well-bred young ladies should speak, and they were always encouraged to use the library which gave them a wealth of knowledge within easy reach. That their education was well up to standard is illustrated by the fact that when Tom went to his prep. school, he was put in a class for new boys who had got top marks in their entrance exam.

  Some of the girls did, in fact, spend brief spells at school. In London Nancy went to the Frances Holland School close to the family home and later to Hatherop Castle School near Cirencester. Unity was sent twice to boarding school and twice asked to leave because of her disruptive behaviour, and Jessica, when the family was living at Asthall Manor, cycled to Burford School and persuaded the headmaster to enrol her as a pupil. Sydney, however, wouldn’t hear of her going because she might want to bring home children whom the family ‘wouldn’t know’. Such was life among the upper classes before the great changes in social mobility which began with the Great War. Diana and Debo felt ill at the thought of going to school and Pam was content just to be at home.

  When the family was living in London, David worked as office manager at The Lady, a job given to him by his father-in-law, who had founded the magazine. It was not one which he relished, preferring to be outside, but he stuck at it in order to bring home an income to keep his ever-increasing family. Sydney also had a small income from her father but the Mitfords were not considered rich. However, because Sydney was such a good manager of money, she was able to afford to rent Old Mill Cottage in High Wycombe so that the children could be away from London during the heat of the summer. It was here that they had their first taste of country life which some grew to lov
e and others to hate.

  The outbreak of the First World War coincided with the birth of Unity, the Mitfords’ fifth child and fourth daughter. This was something of a disappointment to David and Sydney who would have liked another boy, but they still felt there was plenty of time. Unity’s second name was Valkyrie, the war maiden, and she was conceived in Swastika in Canada where David had a rather unproductive gold field. Both names were to prove prophetic. Despite having lost a lung while fighting in the Boer War, David managed to get to France where he became a dispatch rider, came under fire several times and was mentioned in dispatches.

  Then the family received tragic news which was to change their lives for ever. David’s elder brother Clement, much loved by everyone, was killed in May 1915, leaving a pregnant wife and a small daughter. David was so devastated that the thought of succeeding to the Redesdale title was far from his mind, but when Clement’s widow produced another girl it became only a matter of time – since his father was already gravely ill – before he inherited the title and the vast Victorian house with five staircases which was Batsford Park. The expense of being in London with very little money during the war had meant that the young Mitford family was already living in a house on the Batsford estate, but in 1916 they moved into the mansion itself.

  From the start it was obvious that the family could not afford to stay for long in a huge house where the upkeep was immense, but even David, who tended to sell when the market was low and buy again when it was high, realised that the war years were not a good time to put such a house on the market. The children always knew that they would not be there forever but they had a lot of fun playing hide and seek in the vast house, riding in the park with Hooper, hunting with the Heythrop hounds and being hunted themselves by their father’s bloodhound.