A Life By Design

by Siobhan O'Brien

  •

  While she was still married to Percy a twenty-three-year-old named Leonard Lloyd Lewis came into Florence’s dress salon in 1935. What the young Londoner was doing hanging around a fancy women’s dress salon is anybody’s guess, but he described his ‘storybook meeting’ with Florence in an Australian Women’s Weekly’s interview in 1977:

  We met completely by chance…I was a good-looking twenty-three and Florence was a glamorous thirty-six. It was like a young man meeting a film star. I was instantly enamoured. I didn’t leave her side for twenty-six years,’ he says. As Leonard explained, ‘Florence’s marriage to her first husband…was on shaky ground. Soon after we met she and Percy were divorced and we were married in London before the war.

  Leonard was a financier, a diesel engineer or both. And, as his son Robert claimed, he was wealthy. Margaret Alcock, contributor to Vogue Entertaining and Travel, who befriended Leonard in the sixties, described him as, ‘Effusive, lively, good humoured and kind. He always had good things to say about people. He was high spirited and socially gregarious.’ Other people such as Leslie Walford described him less flatteringly as ‘walking in Florence’s shadow’. Leonard himself said, ‘Wherever she went she was always Florence Broadhurst and I was acknowledged as “Mr Broadhurst”. She didn’t belong to any man.’

  Leonard’s marriage to Florence was fiery, extravagant and fuelled with passion. According to Margaret Alcock, Leonard was an extremely generous man. As Leonard explained, ‘In the wonderful years of our marriage it gave me great pleasure to shower her with expensive jewellery. Florence, a dazzling woman herself, loved her equally dazzling jewels.’ They were gifts more often than not accompanied by notes. Some were simple—‘All my love Leonard’—while others were more effusive:

  My lovely, it was lovely to see you last night. It makes me feel better when you come. You looked the best woman in the world to me last night. I believe you had love in your eyes. You mean so much to me. I don’t think I could go on without you. Without you there would be nothing in life left. While I am writing to you now I feel as though you were sitting next to me, speaking to me. It’s an odd feeling really. I feel I could tell you all I want to without writing. I love you with undying affection and my devotion to you will get stronger day by day. God bless you dearest. With all my love—Yours forever, Leonard.

  •

  Back in Mount Perry in Queensland, Florence’s mother had been struggling with a heart condition for some time, and spent a month in hospital before passing away. The closest Florence got to the funeral was a letter she received from her sister May, written on 18 October 1938:

  Dear Florence, Mother passed away last night after a month in hospital. Saturday evening she became unconscious and remained so for forty-eight hours with Dad and I by her bedside the whole time, but she never spoke just gasped away. It was a dreadful trying time. We had an impressive service in the crowded church and the funeral moved from there at three o’clock with the coffin smothered in lovely wreaths. I did all I could and the hospital staff was marvellous also Doctor yet that swelling I told you of was beyond human cures. It was the last stage of heart trouble the outcome of bad circulation and so she just had to lie each day only to get weaker. It was a terrible end I think. Dad is greatly grieved and broken up. Love May.

  Margaret was buried at the Mount Perry cemetery, a haunting spot on a hillside that catches the sun. Bill was buried next to his wife in 1957. And later, when May and Priscilla died, they were buried beside their parents.

  •

  Hitler invaded Poland in 1939 and just the year before, in 1938, Florence’s only son, Robert, was born on 3 May. The aerial bombardment of London at the beginning of World War II was the backdrop to her mothering. Antiaircraft rockets, search beacons and flames rose from neighbourhoods, docks and industrial districts. A German bomb levelled the Vogue office, which had so keenly promoted Pellier products. It was a war that left 30 000 Londoners dead, 50 000 injured, destroyed the historic heart of the city and heralded a downward spiral for the fashion industry that was Florence’s bread and butter.

  Gone were the days of decadent fashion—economic responsibility and social rules heralded a new austerity. Britain buckled down to the rationing of cloth, clothing and footwear, while the British government battled to keep the fashion industry alive. In 1942 leading British designers launched a utility wardrobe that was all about conserving and recycling fabric. Uniform and monochromatic, the wartime garb placed an emphasis on accessories. These were difficult times for even the most robust business. The result was the closure, in the late thirties, of Pellier Ltd, Florence’s famous fashion house that had once catered to the razzle-dazzle of customers from the stage and society. Once again war had destroyed Florence Broadhurst’s dream. Once again she was forced to move on.

  •

  From the early forties until her return to Sydney in 1949, Florence engaged in a mish-mash of endeavours, some charitable, some profitable: repatriation work, voice recordings at the British Broadcasting Corporation, operating a passenger boat from Brighton, managing her second husband’s diesel engineering business in Surrey (strangely named F.M. Lewis Diesel Engineers after Florence) and homemaking. Leonard and Florence were now living at 12 Higher Drive, Banstead, Surrey. They generously opened their home to Australian airmen during the war and their efforts did not go unnoticed. A letter from London’s Australia House in 1945 reads:

  Dear Mrs Lewis, Now that the war has come to an end and the Australian forces have practically all returned to Australia, it has been decided to close the Boomerang Club as of 13th December next. In this farewell message, I should like to say to you how deeply we, the members of the Australian Women’s Voluntary Service, have appreciated the hospitality which you have extended to Australians throughout the War.

  In the late forties the Lloyd Lewis family moved home to 26 Mill Road, Worthing. It was a house in a state of disrepair. With a child and husband to look after and a home to resurrect, Florence had her hands full. Not long after they moved in, Florence arranged for overgrown roses to be uprooted, the chimney to be repaired and a porous room to be removed. She took down faded curtains, removed broken brackets, tossed out panes of glass, installed new furniture and replaced tiles, washers and lights. Just one of the quotes for interior design hardware was addressed to ‘F.M. Lewis Diesel Engineers’, and came to a total of one hundred and eight pounds and four guineas. The list included:

  3-piece suite

  Fit curtain rod, brackets, railways, pelmet boards and hand 9 curtains

  21 net curtains, hand hemmed

  Double devan cover to match

  4 tapestry curtains and lining

  Braid and fringe to match

  55 yds rufflette tape

  When Florence had a moment to spare, she painted dozens of colourful canvases to adorn the walls of her new Worthing home.

  •

  Being just a homemaker and mother would never satisfy someone like Florence Broadhurst. She looked for opportunities wherever she went and she soon turned her attention to operating a charter boat. A letter from the former operator outlines the terms of the contract:

  I Raymond Kenneth Cook Smith of 17 Ham Road, Shoreham-by-Sea, hereby agree to allow Mrs. FM Lewis of 26 Mill Road Worthing, Sussex, the right to operate a “Slow Passenger” Boat from the West Pier at Brighton for the duration of a contract now in existence between myself and the West Pier Co., Ltd Brighton.

  While operating a charter boat wasn’t quite the same as running the performing arts school in Shanghai or the dress salon in Mayfair, the mood in post-war Britain was not about luxury, but necessity.

  Then, in May 1949, when Robert was ten years old, Florence and Leonard made the decision to return to Australia. Their reasoning was that it was a better place to raise a child. The day that the Lloyd Lewises were scheduled to depart, the neon lights in Piccadilly Square were switched back on for the first time since the war. As Robert had never seen them before
, his parents took him to look at them just before they sailed.

  SYDNEY

  1949–1958

  ‘It’s a risk for a woman to go alone into the desert, but I’ve been lucky.’

  FLORENCE BROADHURST, 1954

  On a glary, hot day at Manly Beach, Sydney, it’s hard to see where the sun ends and the sand begins. Diamonds of light dance across the ocean as surfers carve gracefully through thick-lipped waves. From their towers in the sand, bronzed lifesavers keep a keen eye on swimmers and children squeal in delight as they leap from wooden wharves into harbour pools.

  In the shade of Manly’s resplendent promenade of pines, the newly arrived Lloyd Lewises would have peered out onto this quintessential Australian beach scene. Women paraded along the esplanade in fringed bathing suits and men wolf-whistled from behind the wheels of their convertible Chevrolets. Although the sun’s uplifting radiance begged for the exposure of more flesh, the mood on Australian beaches was still restrained. Abbreviated ‘French type’ swimming costumes, known as bikinis, were considered scandalous in 1949. In 1945 the Manly Council, along with other Sydney Councils, tried to ban bikinis from its beaches. And as late as 1954 a woman was ordered off the beach at Manly when she dared to wear one.

  After the war, Australia was nirvana compared to Britain. Manly village was bustling with glittering department stores, hotels decorated in art deco style, cafés and an abundance of shops filled with fresh produce, meat and fancy clothes. By 1947 ambitious schemes were afoot to transform Manly into a glitzy international tourist mecca and rumours were circulating that Mayor Merv Paine was negotiating to build a Disneyland at North Head. The fifties was an era of reinvention and dramatic change in Manly: bulldozers were busy demolishing old mansions, run-down cottages and slums to make way for a new generation of apartment blocks, fancy multi-storey hotels and dramatic high-rises that architect W.E. Beck believed would ‘add to Manly’s prestige’. Engineer Les Graham agreed with Beck’s vision. The Manly he imagined had an oceanfront ‘lined with glittering hotels and shops behind Manly’s famous pine tree plantations’ (Curby, 2001).

  Australia as a whole was also on the precipice of great change. A new newspaper called the Sun-Herald announced that the Chifley government had been defeated and a new Liberal–Country Party, with Robert Menzies at the helm, had been sworn in.

  •

  Florence did not look fifty and neither did she act it. She had boundless energy. Her demeanour was swift, brusque and urgent. As Florence herself said, ‘Man is not intended for the placid existence of a cow at pasture or the static complacency of a turnip in its furrow.’ To cut her ties with her life in Britain she wrote a letter to ‘H.G. Scadgell—complete hotel and house furnishings’ in Montague Street, Worthing, requesting that the auctioneers sell her furniture and send her the proceeds. She also arranged to have some of her jewellery insured at a local Manly jeweller. Some of her dazzling gems included diamond and ruby earrings, a diamond brooch, a pearl necklace, and a diamond and ruby watch. Collectively they were worth two thousand five hundred and eighty nine pounds. (Later, in 1956, she insured a two-carat emerald and diamond cluster ring at Hardy Brothers on Castlereagh Street. It was worth three hundred and seventy pounds and it is probable that this was the same ring that Florence had stolen from her on the day that she was murdered.) On her travels through Europe Florence had also amassed a collection of antique jewellery. Actress and author Kate Fitzpatrick, who, along with her sister Sally, dyed her hair bright henna red in the sixties to look like Florence, remembered:

  She had a gold necklace made of Louis XV coins that, according to Florence, was one of three of its kind in the world. I had never seen anything like it before and Florence always carried it with her in her handbag. I think it was stolen from her when she died. Years later I saw a guy walking along Oxford Street in Paddington with one of the coins on a chain around his neck, and I remember looking at it and thinking that is weird.

  One reporter made this comment on Florence’s jewellery in the sixties:

  Unusual Accessories: They belong to Mrs. L Lewis—who collects antique gold pieces—and are from, top to bottom, a solid gold chain made in Czarist Russia (she calls it “her meal ticket”), another chain hung with antique coins from 19th century France, Austria, Hungary, England, Russia and Sardinia.

  More than insuring her precious jewellery collection, Florence’s return to Australia heralded a time to turn her attention elsewhere. She had a new home, life and career to establish. Florence decided she was going to be an artist. Her new home was a modern apartment on Victoria Parade located on the isthmus between leafy Manly village and the headland. It had the expansive Tasman Sea to the east, and a sheltered North Harbour to the west. The sandy stretch of Manly Beach was a mere stroll away, and so was Cabbage Tree Bay with its curious rock pools, and Manly Cove with its wharves that jut out like fingers over the water was also nearby. In one of the rooms of her new home Florence set up a painting studio. An article Florence kept from this period explained her thinking: ‘Miss Broadhurst, who studied painting in Britain and France, originally meant to devote her time to singing. Soon the desire to submit her visual impressions to canvas took possession of her.’

  Florence’s daily routine was executed with military precision. From seven o’clock in the morning Florence would spend six hours at the easel where she worked at lightning speed. According to one reviewer, ‘hers is a bizarre brush wielded with the speed of a comet…she has her signature on a large canvas inside two hours’.

  To add depth and luminosity to the hundreds of paintings that were soon spilling from her studio, Florence used a technique employed by the early Italian school: tempera paint applied to the base of the canvas and oil paint on the top. Florence’s painting style also had an antipodean thumbprint. One article states: ‘out among the gum trees and Australia’s historical buildings she (had) turned impressionist because she realised that cubism and futurism were insufficient to express what she felt about Australia’ (Australia Magazine, 1954). Art critic James Gleeson described her work in glowing terms: ‘Vim, bustle, enthusiasm, confidence, color and industry are the components of Miss Broadhurst’s style,’ he said.

  Though Lloyd Rees, William Dobell, Russell Drysdale, Roland Wakelin, James Gleeson and Sidney Nolan were doing a more than adequate job of painting Australian landscapes, Florence was confident enough with her talent to remark that Australia had ‘never before been properly shown on canvas. My oil paintings give a new angle on Australia’ (Australia Magazine, 1954). She claimed that her new ‘mission in life’ was to ‘add to the knowledge that people have of Australia’ and she hoped her ‘pictures may encourage more British migrants to come here’.

  Painting gave Florence an outlet for her creative appetite that she once described as her lifeline. As she put it, ‘I was once asked “How do you know you are living?” and I said, “I create so I know I am living”’ (Australian Home Journal, 1968). Florence’s art career also provided her with financial independence from Leonard who was described in the Australian press at this time as a London financier. By 1954 her bold paintings were selling for up to eighty guineas each.

  Florence was determined to avoid becoming like the average Australian female in the fifties who was either supported by her husband or earning seventy-five per cent of the average male wage. As Florence maintained,

  The outstanding feature of Australian life is the huge number of worthy causes subscribed to by women who have no allowance from their husbands or income of their own, yet manage to make sacrifices from their weekly budget to support the many calls that are made upon them. Women are the sculptors of the human race.

  When Florence wasn’t painting in her studio, she spent her days sketching scenes on the beaches around Manly and on the busy streets in the village or she made the trek up to the headland where she studied the rambling greenery and the plunging cliffs. Other days she took a short ferry ride into the heart of Sydney and explored the sights of
the Botanical Gardens and the glittering stretch of Sydney Harbour. But as Florence was becoming more proficient as an artist, she sought different subjects to paint so, in 1950, Florence carted her easel and sunhat to rural towns such as Richmond, Bathurst, Forbes and Orange.

  Florence had the freedom to go where she wanted, when she wanted and for as long as she wanted. After all, there was nothing (and no one) keeping her at home. In July 1950, just a few months after they arrived on the ship from London, Florence and Leonard had sent Robert to board at one of Sydney’s most prestigious boys’ schools, Barker College. He was in sixth grade by then and a good student, who excelled in sport. Even though sport was compulsory at the school, with well over half the students involved in sporting activities such as rugby and cricket, Robert relished his time on the playing field. In 1952 he was a member of the Under 14A XV rugby team, as well as the captain of the Under 14B XI cricket team. And in 1953 he kicked some goals playing for the 15A XV rugby team. Robert remained a boarder at Barker College until December 1954, when he was in fourth form.