The Mitfords

by Charlotte Mosley

  Well that’s it Hen – keep your pecker up.

  Much love, Yr Hen

  When will your book actually be p – bl – sh – d?

  Darling Debo

  We went over to Fontaines last week & found Wid bearing up – just. Poor Wid, Christopher [Hammersley] had gone the day before. Nancy is being (I’m afraid) unkind to her in small ways. I don’t understand their relationship – N waits to go to Fontaines until Mrs Ham looms up & then loathes her rather. Her book1 came out, she does herself an injustice don’t you think so? One would not die much for the author of that book yet in real life she is die – worthy.

  How long are you going to be in America? I die for you.

  All love darling, Honks

  Darling Honks

  I’ve just got back from New York where I spent 2 queer days & nights. The lingo is difficult but very funny & the kindness of the souls who live there is extreme i.e. I was lent a Bentley & a nanny of a chauffeur for two days while its owner Mrs Mellon1 walked everywhere in the rain.

  I did love Nancy’s idea about the Loved One’s announcement.2 It was a shame it wasn’t what you thought. He’s very fit. I’ve got him saying mincing but sometimes he gets it wrong & says minuetting which is lovely isn’t it.

  Today was the biggest bit of luck – I had lunch with Cecil Beaton and how we longed for you to be there.

  I’m in love again, such a bore, with a marvellous woman called Mrs Fell,3 she is the pick of the bunch, beautiful & funny. The deathly secret is I’m quite fairly longing to come home, & I plan at the moment to stay here this weekend & go to Boston on Monday with the Loved One—IF he goes & IF he’ll take me – to hear Teddy4 do his eve of poll meeting & fly home on Tues. We’ll see. If Boston is off, I may come sooner. Of course it’s been pretty queer here but I wouldn’t have missed it for anything.

  I had a v. nice time in New York but it’s nice to get back here to this house. Mrs Astaire is amazing, she’s 84 & looks 54 & is v. spry both mentally & physically & so nice the way she fusses over one. I stayed in Adele’s flat & she’s in the same building.

  The Loved One was on for the dinner before the opening of the drawings5 otherwise he hasn’t been too much in evidence because of no official entertaining at the White Wendy House.

  Much love, Debo

  Dear Miss

  The Loved One really has surpassed himself & even I am sharked. So rude, letting the beastly thing off in our faces like that, do speak.1

  Poor Honks is in despair I daresay she has told you, the puncture cure on which she had really counted doesn’t seem to have worked. She looks ill & wretched oh what a worry it all is.

  Daisy [Fellowes]’s funeral very beautiful (nothing but white flowers please note for mine) but very empty. She really had quarrelled with half Paris – there was a Stern funeral and a Murat wedding at the same time. Many regulars at rue de Lille were absent, including the Windsors, who lived there. They gave out that it is common to go to funerals & were photographed twisting at 5 that morning instead. (She went to Dior’s however.) It seems she, Daisy, had a terrific row with Honks2 only the day before (don’t know what about) which they were to make up at luncheon instead of which she died. Grace [Dudley] came & sat with us, what a row of giantesses.

  Heavenly here with one million people at winter sports & all the children gone from rue Mr. Oh for the fearful avalanche3 I wouldn’t mind that a bit!

  Much love, Happy X, N

  Dear Miss

  I didn’t know you were ill – you must have thought me v. hard hearted. I’ll see if I can’t get a private line to the White House to be kept up to date about events at Chatsworth (as well as to get off my chest what I feel about Bingo Bango Bongo).1

  I fear these cures often work for a bit at first & then prove disappointing. You see Honks’s headache is back again. The cure for that in my view would be to go quietly in & kill Sir Oz.

  I hear that in a list of pornographic books at the Cairo museum is: ‘How to Make Love in the Cold’ by Miss N. M. That’s the stuff. Colonel keeps saying ‘Why don’t you write a novel?’ ‘Because I haven’t got a subject.’ ‘Why not a fascinating French politician in Paris or a fascinating French ambassador in Rome?’

  Dolly is v. excited for the new collections & so am I.

  That’s all for now, DO be better.

  Love, N

  No news of Wid for a fortnight. Have you?

  Dear Miss

  I had a long vivid dream about Bosomy.1 He came to rest at Chatsworth after two railway accidents on Br Railways. We had to explain that these are quite normal & in no way an attempt on his life. As I happened to be staying with you I made movements to go & you said, ‘Stay man stay’. I said, ‘But what shall I talk to him about?’ You said, ‘Let him talk, & laugh if he makes a joke’. He arrived & we all went to the local museum after which the dream went to pieces. Up to then it was one of those pretty, coloured dreams I’m so fond of & the local museum! I wish you could see it, was a sort of early Italian cloister, too lovely.

  [Incomplete]

  Get on

  Many thanks for the dream re Bosomy, the railway accidents & the local museum. I lived in it & was furious when it went to pieces.

  I’m in such a rage with what choose to call themselves Local Authorities that I’m about to write a letter to The Times. Do you know that you aren’t allowed, by law, to put a lavatory in a bathroom if that bathroom leads out of a bedroom & if it’s the only lavatory in the house? So I found a lot of workmen putting a new lavatory in a shed in the garden of a house which already had a perfectly good bathroom. Can you imagine such madness. Poor people, think of them going outside in weather like this just because the footling Local Authority says they must. Oh the wicked stupidity. What would they have thought of the lav at Swinbrook, or in the Mews for that matter. FOOLS.

  I was so angry I went scarlet & came home.

  Much love, 9

  Dereling

  U aire. The wonderful comfort – the sweetness of Emmy.1 Oh, I am in clover!

  The wedding was perfect. He2 is really so handsome, with the long chin of Muv’s mother, only he looks ill. Not a bit like a bumble, I never saw anybody less like one.

  Woman was in a mink hat looking wondair & hissed out as I came up the aisle, ‘real mink – it’s insured – it belongs to the wife of an insurance agent’. I think she felt I might snatch it there & then. She stayed up for dinner & caught that 10.30 train home.3

  Oh at the wedding, the church which is small (1868) was completely full. Muv said, ‘What a lot of people, I imagined there would only be six of us!’ ‘Why?’ ‘Oh I don’t know’—& then shrieked how she does.

  Don’t the Paris clothes look deadly.

  Much love & thank you, N

  Darling Debo

  The dreadery here is likely to take longer than I thought – I’m only half way through the first trunk of letters!1 Kit has b——d. He is less than no use because he pretends to sort papers & comes up after four hours in tears but having thrown away nothing. I at least have had several bonfires. Oh darling your letters! And Birdie’s! The ones that make me cry most are Nanny Higgs’s, ‘Your two pets are very well & send a kiss, they often speak of you’, etc (aged nothing & one).

  Love darling & SO many thanks, Honks

  Darling Honks

  I don’t believe I thanked you enough for seeing Miss Cole, it was truly good of you when you had 1,000 other things to do, I do appreciate though.

  Phone conversation between me & Ld W Beresford.

  Me ‘So sorry to bother you but could you tell me about a governess called Miss Cole?’

  He (Throat clearing) ‘Well we weren’t at all impressed with her, no not at all.’

  Me ‘Why?’

  He ‘Well of course she found it very dull here, she likes the bright lights.’

  Me ‘What else?’

  He ‘Well she took the children to the cove one day and we heard afterwards she went to sleep in the sun & the chi
ldren simply ran wild.’

  Me ‘Anything else?’

  He ‘Yes we heard after she left that she sometimes SLAPPED them.’

  Me ‘Oh.’

  So I engaged her. I do hope it will be OK. I’ve written to say let us do a six – week trial on both sides.

  DON’T throw letters away, it’s madness. Just dump them at Mochuda.1

  Much love, Debo

  Dereling,

  Throw nothing away. Handy1 tells me letters from Evelyn [Waugh] for instance are worth £1 each now – from American universities – but a correspondance suivie of a whole family, so rare nowadays, would be gold for your heirs.

  Thank you so so much for the loving time I’ve had here. Last night Kit asked me to dinner, how it was nice, we had champagne. But after we had to see an operation for gallstones on the telly. Well it does ruin an evening – everything is cut off & one can only go to bed after it – cold spoon in a soufflé. (Well perhaps gallstones is particularly cold!!)

  I sat next Mr Profumo2 at a luncheon he is very agreeable. I also had a long talk with David Bruce3—all these sort of people are much more sensible than you’d think from the papers.

  The best I ever heard – from a friend: ‘Did you know my sister was burnt to death in her flat?’ Noises from me ‘Oh well it was a nice way for her to go really!’

  Before Kit came, the telephone bell rang & a foreign lady said, ‘Ees thees Bel[gravia] something?’ Thinking it was Debo I said, ‘Oh eet ees, etc’ ‘Can I speak to Sir Oswald?’ Collapse of N[ancy] R[odd]. Must get up & leave London.

  Love, N

  Dear Miss

  Quelle horrible surprise – a photograph of the Q accompanied by a hideous Eskimo. I imagine she is in some dread Soviet land, look again, & find that it is Princess Anne.

  I’ve been asked to the wedding of A. O.1 (can’t say it would have occurred to me to ask him to mine but still) & think I will go, partly rather fun indeed great fun & chiefly to give an arm to Muv. Then I might as I’m half – way go on to Ireland for a very few days? As I really hadn’t intended to I never ascertained your dates but if you can’t have me I’ll concentrate on Ed [Sackville – West].

  N

  Dearest Hen

  You will have had our telegrams and I have had yours, thanks Hen. Muv is very low, she alternates between being utterly miserable really painful to see and then sometimes she is quite cheerful and laughs about things. She can’t get comfortable and is so weak she can’t move herself & when she is like that she has to be changed in her position every few minutes. Her throat has more or less given out & swallowing is fearfully difficult so that she can only have a teaspoon or so at a time of whatever she fancies, milk, apple juice & sometimes a scrap of chicken jelly.

  We have got two nurses now, both saintly and of course such an immense help & comfort. Even though we’ve got a night nurse we take it in turns to be in her room all through the night because when she wakes she is sometimes sad and likes a hand to hold.

  The weather is unspeakable & no one has been able to get over today but we hope for the Dr tomorrow. Both nurses say they have had cases like this who have gone on for weeks because she’s taking just enough nourishment to keep her alive. She is sleeping more now & often does not shake at all. Oh Hen it is so sad to see her like this and she longs to die, she keeps saying so & making us cry & then laugh by saying Somewhere you’ll find my absurd will.

  I will keep in close touch Hen – are you going to N.Y. at all or are you going to be at home?

  Much love, Yr Hen

  She says she wants to be buried at Swinbrook.

  She makes marvellous jokes, like Woman said she was writing to Aunt Iris, ‘Oh, have you told her I’m dying’ Muv said.

  Then she does get very miserable when she’s restless.

  So difficult to die, like so difficult to be born.

  She sends you LOTS of love and says she thinks such a lot about you.

  Early Tues A.M. Just the same. Muv says, half laughing, ‘tell them I’m still here!’ She is wonderful.

  Darling Soo

  There is a little improvement & she’s not so sad. There have been dreadful times when she has felt so ill she didn’t know how to bear it. Then she has twice seemed to be going, said goodbye to everybody, said, ‘Perhaps Tom & Bobo, who knows?’ Messages for you & so on. She said, ‘If there’s anything in my will you don’t like, do alter it’. I said, ‘But we shld go to prison’ & she laughed!! Then she rallied & for two days now has seemed stronger. We long for her to go in her sleep, but the heart is still strong & the dr says what will be final will come from the part of the brain that controls one’s breathing. She has had a little stroke you see. So strange she’s not a bit deaf now, not in the least. Perfectly lucid. We’ve got two adorable young Scotch nurses – we take it in turns at night, two hours at a time & are all rather tired. Before the night nurse came we did half the nights, two of us together, & that was exhausting.

  I know Debo much wants instructions from you about this place, the servants & so on. Do let the O – Fs1 have it, oh do!

  Fond love, N

  Darling Soo

  Here it goes on & poor Muv is getting so fed up. She scolds us now for ‘dragging her back from the grave – what for?’ But all we have done is to give her a little water when she asks which isn’t exactly dragging! Three times now we have been gathered round as she seemed to be going & then she had rallied. The fact is she’s fearfully bored & no wonder. Now Christine is coming & we think a new mug may cheer.

  The wedding was most enjoyable – Muv looked smashing & we are so pleased it happened in time because she really loved it. She was got up in black velvet, lace & diamonds & was the most elegant person there by far. How she loves clothes & nice things. Even in the night she likes my dressing gown. Your nightdresses by the way are perfect for her.

  Nancy, Pamela, Diana and Deborah together on Inch Kenneth during the last weeks of their mother’s life. May 1963.

  My clothes are all dirty so I said to Debo ‘I’m going to make Woman teach me to wash & I’ll stand & look on while she does’. Well it worked like a charm & now she’s going to teach me to iron.

  Desmond’s sweet little boy said ‘Granny Muv must have been a very wealthy young lady to have everything so nice’. We asked the girl what is her favourite toy, ‘I’ve got a fluffy dog – God, it’s fluffy’. They’ve gone which is sad – so beautiful & so funny.1

  Oh dear oh dear Susan it’s really awful – you’re lucky not to be here.

  Love, Soo

  TO JESSICA [Telegram]

  25 May 1963

  MUV DIED THIS MORNING MUCH LOVE ALL SISTERS

  Darling Soo

  Pam, Diana & I are here to the end of Muv on the Island. The coffin arrives tomorrow at 4 then the undertakers have to be given whisky – did you ever hear anything so barbarous (with the MacGillivrays I believe), then we shall hear the hammering like David Copperfield, then we all slide after the coffin over the rocks & the neighbours will join in a procession of cars to Salen where we all spend the night. Then Lochinver, & at Oban a motor hearse to Swinbrook where the funeral is next Thursday. Woman goes home – Diana & I to Debo in London.

  Terrible sadness here you may imagine but anything is better than to see her so wretched. Debo & Woman were with her but she never came to & had been in a trance since Sunday.

  Fond love Soo from Susan

  Dearest Hen,

  That must have been a terrible, terrible fortnight. I did so agonize for you all; and it was extremely good of you to find time to write and send the t.grams as I was so longing for news, could think of naught else.

  I know that you, specially, will miss Muv so dreadfully; I always thought you were easily her favourite child, she relied so much on you and when letters came from you (while we were staying there) she’d absolutely light up.

  I’m so glad that we did go to stay with her last year. We rather thought at the time that it would be to say goodbye.

/>   Various mothers of friends have died in the last year or so but all in beastly hospitals, sometimes in what’s known as the ‘intensive care’ ward (the horror of it) where all they do is concentrate on prolonging life a few weeks or months – while knowing perfectly well the person can’t ever really recover. Thank goodness Muv didn’t have to go through that sort of thing but was at Inch K which she loved so much and with all of you there and the nice nurses instead of the Intensive Carers.

  Hen this is just to send masses of love, and from Bob and Benj. Decca

  Dinky is terribly sad; the only time she really knew Muv was when she was 14 that time, and we stayed at the Mews one autumn. They hit it off amazingly well (considering their difference in background as school teachers here say).

  Dearest Hen,

  You are an angel to keep on writing. If it hadn’t been for your letters (and Nancy’s) I should have felt so v. lonely. Your description of the funeral in the letter that just came – talk about floods. It was absolutely as though I’d been there and tasted the pews etc.1 Also thanks so much for thinking of sending flowers from me. (By the way my new book is all about the ridiculous waste of money on funeral flowers & an attack on the Florist Industry for inducing people to send flowers! But I can see, not in this case.)

  Nancy wrote all about the last journey in Puffin, piper, flag ½ mast. Oh Hen I do wish in a way I had come, but from what you all said it could never have been in time because of the coma of last few days. I shall keep all yr. letters forever, with Muv’s last one to me. It was all about the new foal etc. in extraordinarily firm typing – until one came to the end and she said Madeau [Stewart] was typing it for her. She told about the rough journey and said ‘So I went to bed and stayed there until now – which is lunch time the next day’. When I read that I had a bitter premonition, because it’s so unlike her to stay in bed all day.