The Mountbattens
Page 34
He had married one of the most beautiful and richest women in the world, yet it was not the great love match for which he had perhaps hoped – that was reserved for his eldest daughter. Part of the reason for the failure of his marriage may have been the dark secret about his own sexuality, unknown until now, but his sense of inadequacy in his private life found an outlet in his determination for public office.
The story of Dickie and Edwina Mountbatten is almost the story of the 20th century. Both were born at the turn of the century and their lives touched many of the greatest events of the period or intertwined with the dominating figures of the time. Their biographies have a neat narrative symmetry divided by the war. Until then, Edwina was a rich little girl lost, who sought release and escape with lovers and travel. Dickie was a hard-working naval officer, who may eventually have made flag rank. The war changed their lives irretrievably, catapulting them into positions of fame and influence.
Edwina’s reputation is secure, universally admired and loved. An aimless youth was transformed into a middle age of lasting accomplishments as a humanitarian. Difficult, complex, determined to emerge from the shadow of her husband, she proved herself more than his equal in intellect and achievement, and her influence on him in public life has been underrated.
‘She was quicker and more intelligent than her husband,’ the politician Woodrow Wyatt remembered, ‘and understood politics better.’919 She had continually advanced Dickie’s career, whether sweet-talking King George VI to give her husband a D.S.O. or a viscountcy, persuading Nehru to accept the Partition plan, or the Admiralty Board to promote him.
Her husband’s reputation is less clear.
Mountbatten loved to portray himself as a player on the world stage who had changed nations. He wanted to take credit for events, inventions, operations to which he was not fully entitled and even when they did not always reflect well on him, such as Dieppe. Always desperate for attention, even if it was not always admiring, he skilfully used PR agents to promote himself at the expense of others and together with colleagues and family carefully curated how he would be remembered. Living longer than most of his wartime colleagues made it easier to shape the narrative as he wished.
The reality, especially as Supreme Commander and Viceroy, was that he was subject to wider underlying historical currents. Given America called the shots in South East Asia, there was little Mountbatten could do except abide by their wishes. Given the positions adopted by Congress and Jinnah, partition was inevitable even before Mountbatten arrived in India.
He was good at dressing up his role and spinning his apparent influence, but he was really just a front of house manager to make sure everyone remained happy. The irony is that the strings were being pulled elsewhere.
Dickie with his favourite teddy bear, Sonnenbeim, on the balcony of his parents’ London home, 70 Cadogan Square.
© Hulton Archive/Stringer/Getty
Edwina pictured in The Bystander in 1909.
© Illustrated London News Ltd/Mary Evans
Mountbatten’s parents. Prince Louis of Battenberg and Princess Victoria of Hesse and by Rhine.
© Southampton University Archive
Edwina’s grandfather Sir Ernest Cassel at his estate, Moulton Paddocks, Newmarket.
© PA/PA Archive/PA Images
Dickie, the Prince of Wales and two officers of HMS Renown on the 1921 Royal Tour.
© Popperfoto/Contributor/Getty
Dickie and his older brother George on their Douglas motorbikes, 1917.
© Southampton University Archive
Audrey James, the illegitimate granddaughter of Edward VII and the illegitimate daughter of Sir Edward Grey, 1st Viscount Grey of Fallodon, with whom Mountbatten fell desperately in love.
© Southampton University Archive
Peggy Peyton, the daughter of a retired colonel in the Indian Army, whom Dickie also thought he would marry.
© Southampton University Archive
Mountbatten and Dick Curzon on the Vanderbilt’s yacht Venetia, August 1921, when Dickie fell in love with Edwina.
© Southampton University Archive
The crowd in Parliament Square for Dickie and Edwina’s wedding, 18 July 1922.
© Southampton University Archive
King George V and Queen Mary leaving St Margaret’s, 18 July 1922.
© Southampton University Archive
The newly married couple walking under the traditional arch of swords, 18 July 1922.
© Southampton University Archive
The Mountbattens meeting Babe Ruth on honeymoon, October 1922.
© Southampton University Archive
Dickie and Charlie Chaplin making the film Nice and Friendly.
© Southampton University Archive
Edwina with Charlie Chaplin, to whom she supposedly made a pass.
© Southampton University Archive
The Mountbattens’ interwar country house, Adsdean, on the Sussex Downs.
© Southampton University Archive
Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks Jr. with the Mountbattens at Adsdean.
© Southampton University Archive
Edwina with her close friend Jean Norton, the mistress of Beaverbrook, working on the Daily Express switchboard during the May 1926 General Strike.
© Southampton University Archive
The Mountbattens as a young married couple.
© Southampton University Archive
The Mountbattens on RMS Olympic in 1925, the year a downcast Dickie first learnt of Edwina’s infidelities.
Apic/Contributor/Getty
The birth of the Mountbattens’ eldest daughter Patricia, February 1924.
© Southampton University Archive
Dickie, Edwina, Patricia and Pamela in 1939.
© Yevonde Portrait Archive/ILN/Mary Evans Picture Library
Edwina between her husband and her lover, the polo player ‘Laddie’ Sandford.
© Southampton University Archive
Edwina’s first lover, Hugh Molyneux, 7th Earl of Sefton, described as ‘the best-looking man in society’.
© National Portrait Gallery, London
Edwina with her lover, the Hollywood actor Larry Gray, in 1930.
© Southampton University Archive
Michael Wardell, one of Edwina’s early lovers, an ex-cavalry officer who lost an eye in a riding accident.
© Michael Wardell, with permission from his family.
The actor Paul Robeson, whose affair with Edwina was the subject of a court case in June 1932.
© Granamour Weems Collection/Alamy Stock Photo
The singer Leslie Hutchinson, with whom Edwina had an affair for 20 years.
© Pictorial Press Ltd/Alamy
The Hungarian Count Anthony Szapary, one of Edwina’s lovers during the 1930s.
© Southampton University Archive
‘Bunny’ Phillips, Edwina’s main lover during the 1930s.
© Southampton University Archive
Dickie between Edwina and his long-term mistress, Yola Letellier, supposedly the inspiration for Gigi.
© Southampton University Archive
Edwina with Bunny on her Africa trip, spring 1937.
© Southampton University Archive
Edwina with the lion cub, Sabi, at Adsdean, 1937.
© Southampton University Archive
Edwina, the first woman to travel the 700-mile road between Burma and South West China, in 1939.
© Southampton University Archive
Helen Fitzgerald, Hugh Sefton, Wallis Simpson, Dickie and the Prince of Wales at Cannes, August 1935.
© Southampton University Archive
The hallway of the Mountbattens’ new penthouse, a 30-roomed flat above Brook House, designed by Edwin Lutyens in 1936.
© Country Life Picture Library
Broadlands, the Hampshire country house which Edwina inherited from her father in 1939.
© Southampton University Archive
> HMS Kelly after it was torpedoed in May 1940 with the loss of 27 crew.
© Southampton University Archive
The Royal Family watching the filming of Noël Coward’s In Which We Serve, based on Mountbatten and the HMS Kelly, Denham Studios, April 1942.
© AP Archive
Mountbatten and Montgomery planning Operation Overlord.
© Granger/Shutterstock
Mountbatten, as Chief of Combined Operations, with Churchill and Roosevelt at the Casablanca Conference, 14 January 1943.
© Photo 12/Contributor/Getty
Edwina receiving her CBE with Dickie at Buckingham Palace, 1943.
© AF Archive/Alamy Stock Photo
Mountbatten’s lover at South East Asia Command, Janey Lindsay.
© Southampton University Archive
Bill Paley, the founder of CBS, and one of Edwina’s wartime lovers.
© Keystone/Stringer/Getty
Edwina on relief operations, 1946.
© ANL/Collect/Shutterstock
The Mountbattens after a civic reception, 1946.
© Southampton University Archive
Dickie, as Supreme Allied Commander South East Asia, accepting the surrender of Japanese forces, 12 September 1945, with Edwina on the balcony behind.
© Historical/Contributor/Getty
The Mountbatttens are sworn in as Viceroy and Vicereine of India, 24 March 1947.
© Hulton Deutsch/Contributor/Getty
The Mountbattens confronting 100,000 angry Parthans, April 1947.
© Southampton University Archive
Gandhi’s symbolic gesture showing he could do business with the Mountbattens, 31 March 1947.
© Southampton University Archive
The Muslim leader Muhammad Ali Jinnah and Dickie, a difficult personal relationship which had fatal political consequences, meeting on 5 April 1947.
© Southampton University Archive
Nehru, Edwina, Dickie and Pamela having tea, Simla, 11 October 1947.
© Southampton University Archive
Edwina with her lover, the conductor Malcolm Sargent, and Walter Monckton’s wife Biddy, Government House, 1948.
© Richard Britten-Long Collection
Edwina with Peter Murphy, a cross between court jester and éminence grise, Malta 1949.
© Richard Britten-Long Collection
Nehru and Edwina on holiday in Simla.
© Historic Collection/Alamy Stock Photo
Dickie at Prince Philip’s stag night, November 1947.
© Trinity Mirror/Mirrorpix/Alamy Stock Photo
Dickie and Edwina with Prince Charles and Princess Anne, Malta, April 1954.
© Keystone-France/Contributer/Getty
Dickie, Queen Elizabeth ll, Prince Philip and Edwina on the steps of Broadlands, 6 April 1957.
© Paul Popper/Popperfoto/Contributor/Getty
One of the last pictures of Edwina, February 1960.
© Universal History Archive/Contributor/Getty
Edwina’s funeral, HMS Wakefield, 25 February 1960.
© Alpha Library
Sibilla O’Donnell with Dickie in the Bahamas.
© Sibilla O’Donnell
Yola Letellier at Broadlands.
© Southampton University Archive
Sacha, Duchess of Abercorn, Bunny Phillips’ daughter and Dickie’s goddaughter who was his closest companion in later years.
© ANL/Shutterstock
Mountbatten with Clark Gable and Jayne Mansfield.
© Southampton University Archive
Mountbatten with Princess Grace of Monaco.
Pictorial Press Ltd/Alamy Stock Photo
The actress Shirley MacLaine, who often acted as Dickie’s hostess, with Rex Harrison and his wife Rachel Roberts at Mountbatten’s retirement garden party, Broadlands, July 1965.
© Southampton University Archive
Dickie and family having tea at Classiebawn, 1963.
© Robert Estall photo agency/Alamy Stock Photo
Dickie playing with Patricia and his grandchildren in front of Classiebawn.
© Ralph Crane/Contributor/Getty
Mountbatten with his grandchildren, Philip, Amanda and Joanna at Classiebawn, 1963.
© Ralph Crane/Contributor/Getty
Mountbatten’s bodyguard, Graham Yuill, who was relieved of his duties shortly before Dickie was killed.
© Graham Yuill
Thomas McMahon, who served 19 years for Mountbatten’s murder before being released under the Good Friday Agreement.
© Maxwell Photography
Francis McGirl, who was acquitted of Mountbatten’s murder but died later in a mysterious tractor accident.
© Irish Times
Mountbatten’s funeral, which he had been planning for years, 5 September 1979.
© Popperfoto/Contributor/Getty
Part of Mountbatten’s FBI file with its claims of his paedophile tendencies.
© FBI, received after a Freedom of Information request by the author
Acknowledgements
I am grateful to Her Majesty the Queen for permission to quote from material in the Royal Archives.
Lady Pamela Hicks kindly gave me an interview, as did her daughter India and son Ashley. Sibilla O’Donnell, a close family friend, shared her correspondence with Lord Mountbatten and generously had me to stay in the Bahamas. Philip Ziegler, Dickie’s authorised biographer, saw me, and Janet Morgan, Lady Balfour of Burleigh, Edwina’s official biographer, answered various questions.
Others who knew the Mountbattens personally and spoke to me included:
His gamekeeper Bernard Aldrich, who started working at Broadlands in 1956; John Attwood, who spent time on HMS Kelly in 1939; Mountbatten’s personal pilot John Barnes; Pamela Baxter, a matron at a convalescent home for service children in Malta between 1952–54; Tim Benn, who was part of the funeral escort in 1979; David Bicknell, who advised Mountbatten on his security; John Blanten, who worked as a steward at Broadlands in the 1950s; Brenda Bury, who painted Mountbatten’s portrait in 1965; Myra, Lady Butter, the sister of Gina Phillips; Alan Campbell-Johnson’s daughter Virginia, who met the Mountbattens in India; Peter Carter, a steward at Broadlands during the 1970s; Terry Cattermole, the officer of the watch at Edwina’s burial; Graham Chillingworth, a Life Guard during the 1960s; Rick Compton, son of Janey Lindsay; Jackie Crier.
The late Lady Ursula d’Abo; Robin Dalton; Edward Dawnay; Mary Lou Emery and Philippa De Pass, regular riding companions of Lord Mountbatten; Davinia Eastwood; James Ellery, a former ADC to Lord Mountbatten; Bill Evans, Mountbatten’s valet 1959–69; Mike Goodyear of the Lifeguards; Peter Hames, who met Mountbatten in 1947 in Delhi; Mountbatten’s godson Peter Heywood-Lonsdale; Peter Hinton, who served with Mountbatten during the 1950s; Michael Hodges; James and Priscilla Howes; Michael Hutton, who served with Mountbatten during the 1950s; Momin Latif; Freya Lomax; Julian Loring, who served on Mountbatten’s staff in Malta; Barbara Cartland’s son Ian McCorquodale; Mountbatten’s military assistant during the 1960s, Major General Pat MacLellan; Derrick Meakins, who was on Mountbatten’s staff in 1947–48; Janet, Marchioness Milford Haven; the Viscountess Monckton of Brenchley, who knew the Mountbattens in Malta in 1948.
Derek Oakley, Mountbatten’s Royal Marines ADC; Columbus O’Donnell; Ron Perks, Mountbatten’s driver in Malta in 1948; Kerry Pocock; David Roberts, who edited Mountbatten’s 80 Years; Sammy Rowe, who served on HMS Glasgow with Mountbatten; Martin Sands, who worked with Mountbatten during the 1950s; Brian Smith, who served in Mountbatten’s private office, 1952–53; Mountbatten’s goddaughter Emma Temple; Allan Warren, who knew Mountbatten well during the 1970s; Pam Williams, who served on Mountbatten’s staff in 1964; and Graham Yuill, who served as Mountbatten’s bodyguard in 1979 and spoke to me at length about the lapses in security.
My thanks also go to:
Richard Aldous for help with Malcolm Sargent; Rupert Allason; Viscount Allendale; Ron Atkin for advice on Dieppe; Mary Aylmer
for providing photocopies of Private Eye references; Jo Baddenham and her fellow trustees for access to the Derek Hill archive; Mandy Banton for help on the Borneo archives; Simon Baynes; Robert Beaumont for showing me his father Christopher Beaumont’s papers; Sally Bedell Smith for material on Bill Paley; Nicholas Best for various introductions in Ireland; Michael Bloch for introducing me to Allan Warren; Colin Bonner; Richard Britten-Long, who spoke to me about Paula Long and shared his private photo collection; Alan Brodie and Freya Smith, who made some of the Noël Coward correspondence available; Christian Browning; Stefan Buczacki; Cathy and Charlotte Burnaby-Atkins for showing me parts of their father’s diary; Dorothy Byrne for her introductions.