Country House Society

by Pamela Horn

  Once the hunt was under way the hounds quickly located their prey and they set off at a tremendous pace:

  After galloping for about three quarters of an hour, twisting and turning through the forest, the hounds broke out into open country … and after a long run over agricultural land and through muddy farm yards, the quarry was pressed back into the woods, the hounds gaining ground … Suddenly their note changed to a deeper baying and [the duke] said they must have cornered the quarry … The ugly monster had his back to a tree; his head was down, and the hounds stood in a circle round him … I kept well behind as the boar was shot through the head.90

  The duke subsequently sent her the boar’s head, duly stuffed and mounted, as a memento of the chase. What the local peasants felt about these sporting exploits is not mentioned.

  For younger and more energetic tourists, Switzerland and Austria, with their winter sports, exerted an appeal, with the season reported to be ‘in full swing’ at St. Moritz by the beginning of January 1920.91 A year later The Tatler reported that Society had ‘migrated in almost greater numbers than ever’ to Switzerland, where there was not only skiing and the bobsleigh but skating, with the rink at Davos remaining open the previous year until well into March, so great were the demands made upon it. Among those taking up winter sports was the Prince of Wales, who went skiing in Kitzbühel in Austria and St. Moritz with his friends.92 For many visitors it was the après-ski socialising in the evenings that was a prime attraction, and The Field reported that in Kitzbühel both sports and social entertainment were ‘well organized’.93 In November 1928, in a special ‘Winter Sports’ issue the health benefits of exercising in ‘the dustless cold of high altitudes’ were extolled in The Bystander.94

  However, if winter sports in Switzerland and the various sporting opportunities available on the Riviera and along the coast of North Africa offered welcome diversions for many jaded socialites, for the most affluent and venturesome tourists, big-game hunting in Africa, and to a lesser extent in parts of Asia, provided a special excitement. Kenya, Tanganyika, Uganda and the Sudan were all venues for those who wished to go on safari. The Sudan, for example, was said to be ‘one of the most easily accessible countries in which Big Game abounds and its large territory affords a most varied choice of shooting grounds’.95 But it was Kenya that became particularly noted for its big-game hunting and for the professional white hunters who led and organised safaris for inexperienced or nervous travellers, and yet who wished to enjoy what they saw as ‘the romance and danger’ of shooting wild animals in unfamiliar territory. Robert Ruark maintained cynically that for the professional hunter who led these expeditions it was not so much the location of game and the supervision of the final kill that presented difficulties but the establishing of a camp routine for members of the safari party. The loading and unloading of equipment for what was in effect a small portable city had to be supervised. That included the selection of the campsite, the pitching of the camp, the sourcing of a water supply and the supervision of the skinners who dealt with the animal when it had been shot. Trackers, gunbearers, porters, cooks and body servants had also to be controlled. The professional hunter thus had to be an expert mechanic, able to repair any motor vehicles in use and to combine

  the duties of a sea captain, a bodyguard, a chauffeur, a tracker, a skinner, a head-waiter, a tourist guide, a photographer, a mechanic, a stevedore, an interpreter, a game expert, a gin rummy partner, drinking companion, social equal, technical superior, boss, employee, and handy man … [He] lives in the pockets of his clients for long weeks, and unless he is a master of tact, nobody is speaking to anyone else when the safari pays off in Nairobi.96

  Many high-status people went on safari, including members of the British Royal Family. In 1924–5 the Duke of York and the duchess visited Kenya, Uganda and the Sudan, and seemingly on their recommendation the Prince of Wales went big-game hunting in East Africa in 1928 and 1930. On the former occasion he was accompanied by his brother, the Duke of Gloucester. In 1930, for some of the time his travelling companion was his then mistress, Lady Furness. 97

  The firm of Safariland, founded in Nairobi in 1903, supplied all that was needed by way of tents, transport and general camping equipment from its shop in Nairobi and its branch in Piccadilly in London.98 A rival enterprise, Shaw and Hunter, likewise offered to provide all that was required for expeditions to Kenya and Tanganyika, its advertisement enthusiastically claiming these to be ‘the sportsman’s paradise for Big Game Hunting’.99

  The specialist white hunters included Pat Ayre, who lived in Kenya and accompanied the Duke and Duchess of York on the Kenya leg of their 1924–5 safari, and Pat Rattray, who ‘captured the heart of the daughter of Lord Furness’ when she went on an expedition with him. They later married. Then there was Danish-born Bror Blixen, who with his wife ran a coffee farm in Kenya, and combined his skills as a safari organiser with a reputation for hard drinking and womanising. Denys Finch Hatton, brother of Lord Winchilsea and a close friend of Karen Blixen, Bror’s wife, was likewise a very competent leader and he and Bror arranged the Prince of Wales’s safari in 1930. They subsequently earned the prince’s high praise for their efficiency and their pleasant personalities.100 In the late 1920s Blixen and Philip Percival, another well-established professional hunter, founded their own safari firm called Tanganyika Guides.101 Others at work during that decade included J. A. Hunter, who advertised in The Field in 1927, offering to outfit and conduct big-game shooting parties to Kenya, Tanganyika, Congo and Uganda. He was also prepared to undertake ‘Museum collections and photography’ and he combined these activities with work as a game ranger.102 Unlike many of the other professional white hunters both he and Blixen praised the contribution of the African trackers upon whose skills they depended for the location of the rarer game animals that their clients were seeking as trophies.103

  As one writer has wryly expressed it, much of the pleasure of this kind of sport ‘was the shooting of alpha-male animals by alpha-male humans … The preservation of … tiger skins, alligators and crocodiles cannot be disassociated from male boastfulness.’104 Nonetheless on many safaris female members of the party took pride in their skill in killing game, too, and that included the Duchess of York.

  This issue of personal pride was borne out by contributors to Country Life when they recounted their safari experiences. In January 1921, Raymond Kent, for example, reported his pleasure in achieving his ambition to kill a large bull elephant – ‘a good tusker’, as he put it. ‘No other sport that I know of produces the exhilarating, self-satisfied and contented feeling which follows a successful day’s hunting for big game,’ he declared. He also described the ‘great sport and exciting experiences’ obtained ‘by sitting up for lions during the night.’105 Later in the same month, another Country Life contributor, W. D. M. Bell, warned that in order to prevent the wholesale slaughter of elephants, restrictions had been imposed and a licence to kill two animals in a year would cost the hunter between £40 and £80, so it was important to be selective when making a kill. The following September, in another Country Life article, Bell claimed to have killed sixteen lions personally, arguing that as a game animal the lion afforded ‘first-class sport’.

  Early in 1921 the Duke and Duchess of Sutherland and Lord and Lady Maidstone embarked on their own joint safari to the Sudan. They left England early in January and travelled to Khartoum where they had arranged to hire a small river steamer to act as their base for the trip. These could be chartered at a fixed rate and included catering facilities, servants, transport, forage for the animals and attendants, bearers, skinners and camp equipment for expeditions on land.106 Among the highlights of the safari mentioned in Country Life was the shooting of bull elephants. Even the Duchess of Sutherland killed one and was duly photographed beside its carcase. In all, they shot six elephants, this being their allocation for the trip. Other trophies collected by the Sutherland expedition included a hippopotamus and a rare white rhinoceros, which
the duke particularly wished to secure. Lord Maidstone made his own contribution to the total, killing among others a male buffalo with a ‘good head’, which he presumably intended to display on a wall when he returned home, and a large crocodile.107

  However impressive the Sutherland safari might have been, it paled into insignificance when compared to the four-month tour undertaken by the Duke and Duchess of York. As an enthusiastic sportsman the duke was much attracted by the idea of shooting big game. The duchess initially had some qualms, confessing to a friend,

  I am feeling slightly mingled in my feelings about going to Africa, as I hate discomfort, and am so afraid that I shall not like the heat, or that mosquitoes will bite my eyelids … or that I shall not be able to have baths often enough … On the other hand I think it is good for one to go away and see a little LIFE.108

  In reality her fears proved groundless, and despite the long marches she undertook and the discomfort of blistered feet, she later described the whole expedition as ‘Wonderful. Best bit of one’s life.’109

  The couple left England on 1 December 1924, with five other members of the party, including the duchess’s friend Lavinia Annaly, who also acted as her lady-in-waiting, and the duke’s equerry. They reached Mombasa shortly before Christmas, and left by train for Nairobi. On Boxing Day they were at last able to drive north to set up their first camp on Siolo plain. Here they were joined by their official safari companions. These included two professional white hunters, one of whom was Pat Ayre, and Captain Caldwell of the Kenya Game Department. They remained at the camp for three weeks, but soon began undertaking short expeditions from it. On 29 December, the duchess excitedly described to her mother how they had

  got up at 4 … to try & get a lion. It was thrilling. They had left a rhino and zebra out, & as it was getting light we crept up behind bushes & found two lions growling over the zebra … We all shot together but it was still too dark to see properly, and they were off like a streak of lightning … I saw about 12 giraffes the other day.110

  The duke subsequently went out for a day’s hunting with Pat Ayre, looking for lion or eland.

  After this the strenuous part of the safari began. They travelled on foot, moving camp almost every day, and walking over some very uncomfortable terrain. They covered at least 12 miles a day, rising at about 4.30 a.m. and then hunting until 10 a.m. or 11 a.m., when they rejoined the camp, ‘which has moved after us like magic’, noted the duchess. They rested until about 3.30 p.m. before resuming their expedition. On one occasion the duchess reported seeing ‘thousands of zebra – I shot two dead with two shots for lion kills. Hated doing it.’ Later, as she honed her shooting skills, she informed the king, who she knew disapproved of women with guns, that she had taken to shooting with a rifle. ‘I do hope you won’t dislike me for … I enjoyed it so much, and became very bloodthirsty.’ Her victims included large birds ‘for the pot’, a buck and ‘a rhinoceros which nearly broke my heart’.

  On 4 February they returned to Nairobi at the end of the Kenyan part of the safari. They then moved on to Uganda, where they met two new professional hunters and a new safari manager. Their first camp was in the Semliki Valley and the duke noted ironically that they must have presented a remarkable spectacle in the dawn light, for the expedition’s procession ‘seemed unending, as we have 600 porters’.112 In Uganda they had their first sight of elephants, and the duke shot a large bull with impressive tusks. By this time he had accumulated a sizeable number of trophies, which in those days was the chief aim of any African safari. However, unlike the Duke of Sutherland, he was unwilling to kill a rare white rhino. ‘It is not at all difficult to shoot,’ he noted, ‘but only three or four are allowed to be shot a year as they are becoming scarce. I did not want to shoot one on hearing this, but they wanted me to get one.’113 In the end he did so.

  Early in March they moved on to the Sudan, where they joined a river steamer, although from time to time they left the boat to travel inland in search of more wildlife. Finally, on 6 April they disembarked from the steamer. The ‘idyllic days in the wild’ had ended and they returned to Khartoum. From there, on 9 April, they travelled to Port Sudan, to begin their journey home on SS Maloja. They finally reached Britain on 19 April.

  The duchess found it difficult at first to adjust to her usual daily routine. ‘It’s awful coming back to the social and unnatural atmosphere again!’ she wrote in her diary, soon after her return. London seemed drab after the months in the wild, while the restrictions of her daily round as a senior member of the Royal Family and at Court were ‘more stifling than ever’.114

  Perhaps inspired by the experiences of the Yorks, the Prince of Wales made two private visits to East Africa in 1928 and 1930. Unlike his younger brother, he was not an enthusiastic shot, although he did go shooting on occasion. However, even in 1921–22, when he was in India, Lord Cromer reported: ‘One of the tragic things about this tour is that HRH is not really keen on big-game shooting or shooting of any kind.’ He preferred polo and that had apparently caused ‘puzzlement and hurt among his Indian hosts’.115 Nevertheless he did go tiger shooting and secured some of the expected trophies. In East Africa in 1928, likewise, his equerry claimed he was ‘definitely bored by shooting and fishing’, even though he counted among his victims an elephant. He called the shooting of this ‘easy and unexciting’. When he returned in 1930 he took with him a cine camera as well as a rifle. As Edward Steinhart has pointed out, on these royal safaris an important change was ‘the downplaying of hunting pure and simple. Although plenty of animals would fall to the Prince’s gun,’ he had not come merely to ‘collect heads. His main concern was to observe, to photograph and to film big game.’116 Nonetheless, as Steinhart added drily, ‘His own considerable total of animals killed, especially on his second safari, belies the idea that big game shooting was not of major significance.’

  The prince’s use of the camera rather than the gun may have encouraged a more general trend towards ‘camera safaris’, which became increasingly popular in the 1930s. However, as early as 1928, a contributor to The Field pointed out that while on his first safari in Kenya he had used a rifle, that was to be the only time. He had subsequently replaced it with a camera:

  I can say that from my experience the camera affords more fun and excitement, more interest and chances of greater knowledge than ever can be attained by the rifle. Those who contemplate going on a shooting safari in the near future will, I hope, in the end see how little is really gained by the slaughter of these … interesting creatures and how much can be gained by the use of the camera.117

  As for the prince himself, the term ‘sport’ needed to be expanded beyond the mere hunting of wild animals, in that in 1928, true to form, he rode in horse races, played golf, and watched the annual cricket match between the officials and settlers in Kenya. He and his brother, the Duke of Gloucester, engaged in a number of flirtations, and it was said that the prince’s ‘high jinks’ meant he did not get to bed before 3 a.m. each day. On this occasion the trip was cut short after nearly three months when the serious illness of the king led to the two princes being recalled to England. This may account for his second visit in 1930 with Bror Blixen and Denys Finch Hatton, when he enjoyed what Edward Steinhart has labelled a truly luxurious ‘champagne safari’.118

  4

  Social Rituals

  That nebulous thing called London Society was larger than it had been before the war, but it was still exclusive and difficult for outsiders to enter … People gave dances for their daughters and the daughters of their old friends, and, if one did not get married, one went on being asked to dances for years.

  Loelia, Duchess of Westminster, Grace and Favour (London, 1961), p. 88.

  Family was essential; and to debs from good families the rest simply didn’t count.

  Quoted in Angela Lambert, 1939: The Last Season of Peace (London, 1989), p. 6.

  Growing Up

  In many respects the 1920s was a decade of change,
with the development of new social attitudes and a growing acceptance of technological innovations, such as the wireless, the refrigerator and the motor car. There was an increasing use of electricity, and families hit by declining incomes and a heavier tax burden moved ‘from mansions to mansion flats’.1 That view of change, however, scarcely applied to the methods adopted for the rearing of the children of society’s elite families. As Angela Lambert has commented: ‘From cradle to Christening, from nursery to schoolroom’ children participated ‘in a series of rigidly prescribed social conventions that had changed little over the last hundred years.’2 Hence, much as had been the case before 1914, babies were speedily handed over to nursery staff soon after they were born, and it was the nanny rather than their parents who provided their day-to-day care. Mothers with a busy social life had little desire to devote time and attention to the nurturing of children and, in any case, most of them lacked the necessary expertise. As one head nurse dismissively commented, ‘the parents didn’t know how to look after children … They couldn’t relax, couldn’t let themselves go.’3

  It was perhaps indicative of this approach that Mary Soames, the youngest daughter of Sir Winston and Lady Churchill, should describe her mother during the 1920s as having

  no real understanding of the childish mind or outlook, and [she] applied her own perfectionist standards not only to manners and morals, but to picnics and garden clothes. Consequently, although all her children loved and revered her, they did not find her a fun-maker or a companion for their more untidy, knock-about activities.4

  Mary spent her childhood in a small house in the grounds of the family estate, Chartwell, where she was brought up by her mother’s first cousin, Maryott Whyte. She was a trained Norland nurse and acted as a nanny-cum-governess to all four Churchill children. Although the children went to school – in Mary’s case to a day school near Chartwell – it was Maryott who brought ‘stability and orderliness’ to their lives. She was to remain with the family for over twenty years.