by Richard Mead
3. Stanislaw Sosabowski, Freely I Served, p.183.
Chapter 22: Aftermath (October–December 1944)
1. Including O’Connor, Horrocks, Ritchie, Adair, Thomas and Gale.
2. Stanislaw Sosabowski, Freely I Served, p.199.
3. Essame was particularly close to Horrocks, who later employed him as one of his two co-authors in his book ‘Corps Commander’.
4. Hubert Essame, The 43rd Wessex Division at War, 1943–1945, pp.131,132.
5. In 1947, somewhat bizarrely given his attitude towards the Poles, Thomas was appointed Administrator, Polish Forces under British Command.
6. It cost £140 and Daphne paid!
7. Papers of Field Marshal Viscount Montgomery in the Imperial War Museum.
8. O’Connor left VIII Corps at the end of November 1944 to take up the appointment of GOC-in-C Eastern Command, India.
9. Henry Pownall, (ed. Brian Bond), Chief of Staff, p.193.
10. Alex Danchev & Daniel Todman (eds), War Diaries 1939–1945: Field Marshal Lord Alanbrooke, p.627.
11. Letter to Daphne 26.10.44.
12. Letter to Daphne 8.12.44.
13. Lewis Brereton, The Brereton Diaries, p.371.
14. It was also reported that Boy and Urquhart were invested with the CB. Urquhart had actually received his from the King nearly two months earlier, but handed it back so that it could be presented again. The date of Boy’s investiture is not recorded, but it was nearly two years since he had been gazetted, so it must have been much earlier. Like Urquhart, he possibly went through the motions again.
Chapter 23: Kandy (December 1944–May 1945)
1. Henry Pownall, (ed. Brian Bond), Chief of Staff, p.198.
2. Letter to Daphne 27.12.44.
3. Letter to Daphne 2.1.45.
4. Ibid.
5. Letter to Brooke 25.12.44.
6. Rowland Ryder, Oliver Leese, p.211.
7. Daphne letter to Maud Waddell 18.2.45.
8. Letter to Daphne 14.2.45.
9. Letter to Daphne 18.3.45.
10. Not so, her interest in clothes was nearly non-existent. If his uniforms diverged from the official issue, it was of his own doing. None of the photos of him during this period show him in anything other than authorized dress.
11. Maureen Baker-Munton (née Lushwitz) thought that his sterness was bluff and that it may have disguised the fact that, in some ways, he was unsure of himself. (Interview 22 June 2009)
12. Papers of Major J. H. Money in the Imperial War Museum. (By kind permission of the Provost and Scholars of King’s College, Cambridge 2010)
13. Letter to Daphne 4.3.45.
14. So called because it had been presented to him by ‘Hap’ Arnold, the USAAF Chief of Staff.
15. Letter from Mountbatten to Boy 11.3.45.
16. Letter to Daphne 28.2.45.
Chapter 24: Victory (May–November 1945)
1. Mountbatten, (ed., Philip Ziegler), Personal Diary, p.205.
2. Danchev & Todman, War Diaries 1939–1945, p.692.
3. The brother of Boy’s friend, ‘Chink’ Dorman-Smith.
4. Aung San led the Burma National Army, which had been collaborating hitherto with the Japanese, but which turned against them in a rising on 28 March.
5. Mountbatten, (ed., Philip Ziegler), Personal Diary, p.218.
6. It is easy to have some sympathy with Leese, whose career came to an effective end, without even the promotion to full general which his record and recent responsibilities would usually have justified. He was, however, naïve in his dealings with Slim, whilst his attitude – almost one of condescension – towards Mountbatten was certain to lead to disaster in the end.
7. Letter to Daphne 10.6.45.
8. Ibid.
9. Letter to Daphne 18.1.46.
10. Daphne letter to Maud Waddell 27.7.45.
11. In accordance with Mountbatten’s instructions that all Japanese officers should surrender their ceremonial swords to their opposite numbers, Boy received Numata’s. In a gesture of reconciliation he returned it to Numata many years later.
12. Letter to Daphne 28.9.45.
13. Letter to Daphne 13.11.45.
Chapter 25: Singapore (November 1945–July 1946)
1. One of Boy’s Wren ‘writers’, Joan Ward, recalled being very self-conscious about having to walk the length of the room in order to take dictation.
2. Letter to Daphne 15.12.45.
3. The Indian Parachute Regiment was to prove short lived, being disbanded in November 1946 as part of the immediate post-war reorganization of the Indian Army. A new Parachute Regiment was formed in India in 1952, which retained the maroon beret, but changed the badges, Pegasus and Bellerephon becoming Shatrujeet, a figure from Hindu mythology, half-man and half horse, although the colours of maroon and blue were retained. The new regiment, however, does not regard the old one as its predecessor. Its battle honours are those of the former infantry regiments from which it was formed, but these do not include ‘Sangshak’.
4. During his stay he found himself under fire for the first time since Nijmegen, when his party became the target of an insurgent sniper.
5. Letter to Daphne 16.2.46.
6. Letter to Mountbatten 6.3.46.
7. Mountbatten letter to Boy 9.3.46.
8. Bernard Hailstone. The painting is in the Imperial War Museum.
9. ‘Q’ Quiller-Couch was a friend of the du Mauriers and something of a mentor to Daphne: his daughter, Foy, was one of her best friends.
10. Letter to Daphne 21.2.46.
11. Letter to Daphne 13.3.46.
12. Later Lord Inverchapel. He had been British Ambassador in Moscow and was due to take up the same position in Washington.
13. Mountbatten letter to Boy 30.5.46.
14. Letter to Mountbatten 1.6.46.
15. Text of talk on 12.6.46.
16. Letter to Daphne 7.6.46.
17. Pirie letter to Mountbatten 15.7.46.
Chapter 26: Return (July 1946–December 1947)
1. She was 23 at the time.
2. At this time brigadier was not a substantive rank in the Army, but was only an acting or temporary appointment. The substantive rank immediately below major general was colonel.
3. There were two other selection boards, one for colonels and brigadiers, the other for more junior staff appointments: their secretaries were one or other of the two Deputy Military Secretaries.
4. Shinwell was an Eastender of Jewish-Polish extraction who had been a trades union leader of pronounced left-wing views before being elected an MP.
5. This had not been the case with Gort, who was brought in by the then Secretary of State, Leslie Hore-Belisha, over the head of the CIGS, with the express intent of clearing the logjam of generals which excessive patronage and a late retirement age had produced in the inter-war years.
6. After working tirelessly for the Girl Guides, latterly as Assistant County Commissioner for North London, Grace had chaired the National Association of Training Corps for Girls. She was awarded the OBE.
7. Boy himself remained devoted to Nancy, but saw her relatively infrequently. Nancy and Grace both moved to Downderry in Cornwall in 1953, living there until the former’s death in 1959.
8. Now called the Chief Executive.
9. Although born a Prince of Greece, Philip had given up his title on becoming a British citizen in 1947. Whilst created both Duke of Edinburgh and a Royal Highness, he did not in fact become a Prince of the United Kingdom until 1957.
10. There appears to be more than a suggestion of Mountbatten’s earlier comments about Boy’s political judgement in this statement.
11. Broadlands Archives E 23.
Chapter 27: Princess (1948–1952)
1. One of whom was Edward Ford, who had been on Boy’s staff at 24 Guards Brigade Group. The other was Michael Adeane, who was to succeed Alan Lascelles as Private Secretary.
2. Norman Gwatkin, formerly commander of 5 Guards Armoured Brigade during
Market Garden.
3. Boy gave the Princess his full dress sash to wear on the occasions on which she ‘went into scarlet’. He gave the Duke his bearskin.
4. Letter to Daphne 15.3.65.
5. The son of King George V’s Private Secretary, who had written to Freddie after Gauche Wood.
6. It is now called Fields in Trust and the Duke is still the President, over sixty years later.
7. Letter to Daphne 3.10.48.
8. Eisenhower had recently retired as Chief of Staff of the US Army and was now President of Columbia University.
9. Colonel C. F. H. Gough. He was much closer to Boy in age than his wartime rank of major might suggest. He commanded the 1 Airborne Reconnaissance Squadron during Market Garden and took over command at the Arnhem road bridge when John Frost was wounded.
10. Now the Royal Academy of Dance.
11. Letter to Boy 30.1.51.
12. The Kipling Journal, December 1950.
13. Letter to Lieutenant General E.A.B. Miller 15.5.51.
14. Ridgway subsequently described himself and Boy as having become ‘staunch friends’: Soldier: The Memoirs of Matthew B Ridgway, p. 68.
Chapter 28: Duke (1952–1956)
1. The Equerry is more formally called the Equerry-in-Waiting, a role held by a relatively junior officer (lieutenant commander, major or squadron leader) of the armed services on attachment, usually for two years. There are also three or four Extra Equerries, who are not permanently employed but are available as required.
2. She also used to do private work for him at weekends.
3. Now the Cutty Sark Trust.
4. The party flew back in a BOAC Comet 1, the first commercial jet airliner, which had entered service only two months before. It was piloted by Group Captain John Cunningham, one of the most famous test pilots of the day.
5. The three men were commonly known in the Palace as ‘The Duke’s Beasts’, equating them with ‘The Queen’s Beasts’ – the Lion of England, the Unicorn of Scotland, the Red Dragon of Wales, the White Horse of Hanover and other heraldic animals.
6. The second son of King George III and C-in-C of the British Army 1795–1809 and 1811–27. He resigned in 1809 following a case against him for accepting bribes for commissions at which Clarke was a prosecution witness. It was subsequently revealed that she had been paid by his chief accuser and he was exonerated and reinstated.
7. Dame Anne Griffiths is now the Duke’s Librarian and Archivist.
8. Boy himself had given time to Wilmot, although he is not included among the list of interviewees.
9. Letter to Horrocks 4 3.52.
10. Chester Wilmot, The Struggle for Europe, p.523.
11. Horrocks letter to Boy 5.3.52.
12. It was the Sherwood Rangers Yeomanry from this brigade which provided Gavin with his armoured support.
13. Letter Prior-Palmer to Boy 24.2.55.
14. Letter to Prior-Palmer 25.1.55.
Chapter 29: Breakdown (1956–1959)
1. Horace Evans had also been Physician to King George VI and was regarded as a friend by the Royal Family. He was also the doctor for many establishment figures, including the former Prime Minister, Anthony Eden. He had only just been made a Baron, on 1 July 1957.
2. In the tale, Kay has his heart frozen by the Snow Queen and a piece of glass from a troll’s mirror is lodged in his eye. It is only the warm tears of his friend Gerda which can melt the ice and cause the glass to fall out. ‘Snow Queen’ became an alternative codeword for ‘Covent Garden’.
3. One of the five children who had been adopted by J. M. Barrie and possibly himself the model for Peter Pan.
4. Oriel Malet, Letters from Menabilly, p.102.
5. Daphne letter to Williams 23.10.57. Evie had been Gertrude Lawrence’s secretary.
6. He had been the Queen’s Colour Officer in Malta when the Duke, as its Captain-General, presented new colours to the Corps in 1952, and the Officer Commanding Royal Marines in HMS Surprise when the Queen carried out the Coronation Review from the ship in 1953.
7. Boy admired Reed, but delighted in telling the story of taking him up in a plane and seeing him turn from pink to yellow to green!
8. In one famous scene in The Big Country, Ives walks out alone shouting ‘Hold your fire’ to his opponents; during the filming of Our Man in Havana, Boy would frequently ask Kits ‘And how’s old “hold your fire?”’
9. This entitled him to have supporters for his coat of arms. He chose a golden eagle on one side and, very appropriately, ‘an English Archer of ancient times’ on the other.
10. Daphne letter to Williams 14.5.59.
Chapter 30: Finale (1959–1965)
1. Letter to Grace Browning 20.10.60.
2. They had known each other for more than thirty-five years, from the pre-war period during which Carew-Pole had served with the Coldstream Guards.
3. Letter to Grace Browning 15.7.63.
4. Oriel Malet, Letters from Menabilly, p.184.
Chapter 31: Postscript (1965–1989)
1. After winning the Sword of Honour at Sandhurst on the day on which Boy had first ridden his horse up the steps into the Old Building, Cassels had come across Boy frequently in 1942, when he had worked closely with the Airborne Division as an army liaison officer at the Air Ministry.
2. The Regimental Depot remained at the Browning Barracks until 1993, when it moved to Colchester. The site continued to house the Airborne Forces Museum until this was closed at the end of 2007, to be reopened as the Airborne Assault Museum at Duxford in 2009.
3. He was attached to an aerial photography interpretation unit, but was certainly not involved with ‘Market Garden’, although he may have met Boy in Normandy. Immediately after the War he served on the staff of 23 Indian Division in the Netherlands East Indies, and an alternative possibility is that he may have come across Boy there.
4. Ray subsequently became a well-known writer on wine, with books such as The Complete Imbiber to his name.
5. Richard Attenborough: ‘A Filmmaker Remembers’ – Featurette from the DVD Special Edition of A Bridge Too Far.
6. Daphne letter to Denys Browning 18.3.79.
Acknowledgements
I must start by expressing my gratitude to His Royal Highness The Duke of Edinburgh, both for honouring me with a Foreword and for giving me some of his valuable time during my research. Boy Browning worked for Princess Elizabeth and the Duke jointly for four years, and then for Prince Philip alone for another seven years, following Her Majesty’s accession to the Throne. Moreover, His Royal Highness has, for some thirty-five years, been Colonel of the regiment in which Boy served from 1915 to 1939. He is thus uniquely qualified to offer a view on my subject.
I could not have written a full biography without the support of Boy’s family. Tessa, Viscountess Montgomery of Alamein, is the expert on family history, and as the oldest of his children, has the longest standing recollection of him. She has been consistently encouraging and helpful far beyond my expectations, allowing me full access to Boy’s letters and other papers and providing me with a number of valuable introductions. Her husband, David, was able to add some colour to Boy’s relationship with his own father, from whose papers I am grateful for permission to quote and her son, Paul de Zulueta, gave me yet another view from the perspective of a grandchild. Flavia, Lady Leng, shared her memories with me, whilst her charming book on her mother includes some valuable insights into her father. Flavia’s son, Rupert Tower, produced some documents which I would not otherwise have seen. Kits Browning gave very generously of his time when I visited him at Ferryside, the old du Maurier house in Cornwall, and he and his wife, Hacker, were most hospitable. The photos in the book were substantially provided by Tessa and Flavia.
My other acknowledgements fall roughly into the chronological order of Boy’s life. For the detail of and background to the Browning coat of arms, I am grateful to William Hunt, Windsor Herald of Arms. Nick Hodson, the Secretary of the Old West Downs
Society, pointed me towards the background to Boy’s early schooldays and Penny Hatfield, the College Archivist at Eton, put the resources of the College Library at my disposal.
My research into Boy’s long career with the Grenadier Guards was assisted enormously by Lieutenant Colonel Conway Seymour, the Regimental Archivist. He arranged for me to use the Library at Wellington Barracks, where I worked under a three-quarter length portrait of Boy, painted in the 1920s by Sir Gerald Kelly and on loan from the family. By a coincidence, Colonel Seymour received at just this time a letter from Jake Whitehouse, whose father had served under Boy in the 2nd Battalion during the Great War, and to whom I am grateful for the latter’s reminiscences. Other former Grenadiers who helped me included Major General Bernard Gordon Lennox, the late Colonel Oliver Lindsay, then editor of the Guards Magazine, and Lieutenant Colonel Henry Hanning, the author of an excellent history of the regiment. I had the privilege of meeting two pre-war Grenadiers, Lord Carrington, who had served under Boy in the 2nd Battalion, and Lord Wigram, who first met the recently engaged Boy and Daphne when out from school to tea with Admiral Sir Montague Browning, Boy’s uncle and a friend of Lord Wigram’s father.
