Mrs Guinness

by Lyndsy Spence

  The British press constantly speculated about a secret marriage between Diana and Mosley, and each time they denied it. Since establishing himself as a journalist, Randolph Churchill attempted to exploit his connection to Diana and pestered Tom Mitford for a scoop on the marriage, but it was to no avail. Fleet Street had smelled a rat when Wallis Simpson sent the newlyweds a congratulatory telegram, which the telegram office intercepted and rerouted to Whitehall. However, without access to the wedding certificate there was no proof.

  Mosley felt it was time to officially announce the marriage and used the opportunity to print a notice of his son’s birth. The press were sharpening their poison pens and the inevitable happened. After almost two years of complete secrecy and lies, their marriage became front-page news.

  In a bizarre turn of events, Irene, who still loathed Diana, ventured to Wootton for a meeting with the woman whom she felt had destroyed Cimmie’s happiness and contributed to her untimely death. It was a peaceful meeting, though Irene’s acid wit did not overlook the underwhelming tea of bread, butter and thin slices of Christmas cake. She also noticed how ‘badly decorated’ Wootton was, with its tiny windows ‘so one suffocated’ and the framed photographs of Hitler and Goering on the mantelpiece which she ‘longed to smash into atoms’.

  The women spoke of domestic matters and, perhaps for the first time, Irene really heard Diana’s voice. They had never exchanged a word before and she found the tone and rhythm of the Mitford drawl to be ridiculous. She listened as Diana chatted about the baby, and Irene, who adored children, softened at the sight of Alexander whom she thought ‘big and strong for his age, more like a baby of nine weeks than over just one month old’. They further discussed Diana having to hire a new cook and Vivien’s impending debutante ball, which Irene stressed she would oversee.

  As the New Year of 1939 crept in and the uncertainty of war loomed, Irene went with the Mosley children to Wootton in case tensions should advance and England found itself under attack. Further currents threatened to pull Mosley asunder when the children’s solicitor reminded him that he could no longer avoid his parental responsibilities. The solicitor would not consent to a house that was not the children’s family home being partly maintained by their trust fund money. Mosley appealed on the grounds that the nursery world had transferred to Wootton but the solicitor still rebuffed his plea.

  Ever the opportunist, Mosley asked Irene to subsidise the running of Wootton. Although she had dedicated her life to the Mosley children, Irene could not oblige Mosley’s request and she felt as though she were sinking further into the cesspit of the Mosleys’ life together. Her nerves were on edge because of Diana’s pro-German comments, so casually made as they listened to Anthony Eden’s anti-Nazi broadcasts on the wireless. Irene sensed her days at Wootton were numbered.

  When Britain declared war on Germany the dynamic of Mosley and Diana’s life changed, though they were yet to realise it. During the phoney war, Mosley had campaigned for peace and, having witnessed the atrocities of war first hand, he declared himself a staunch pacifist. The Earls Court Peace Rally in 1939 was the largest yet and Mosley continued to campaign openly with considerable support.

  Although genuine in his delivery, Mosley’s association with the BU’s director of propaganda, William Joyce (dubbed by the press as Lord Haw-Haw), aroused suspicion in his motives. Later appointed as deputy leader of the BU, Joyce was a key player in changing the party’s policy from campaigning for economic revival through corporatism to a focus on anti-Semitism. When he sacked Joyce in 1937, Mosley turned the BU’s focus away from anti-Semitism and towards activism, but it was too late to reform the party’s image. The British government, who viewed Mosley as a friend of Hitler, had little tolerance for his efforts. Diana maintained this was because Winston Churchill was ‘more interested in war than anything else in the world’. Echoing the government’s views, the masses believed Mosley’s peace campaign was an ulterior motive to help Hitler invade England.

  News of the attempted suicide of Unity Mitford (on 3 September 1939) overshadowed any attempts on Mosley’s behalf to prevent a war. She had once romanticised an idea that a strong German army combined with the English Navy would ‘rule the world’ and, excited by this idea, Unity had commented to Diana: ‘Oh if we could have that, and what wouldn’t be worth doing to help the cause of friendship between the two countries even a little.’ Her dream ended in disappointment and Unity declared that she could not witness England and Germany – the two countries she loved – go to war with one another. To her, death was a pleasant alternative.

  Prior to Unity’s suicidal feelings, Hitler had given her a pearl-handled pistol for her protection, and it was with this same gun that she hoped to end her life.* It was a clumsy shot and the bullet lodged itself in her brain. Still, it was not enough to kill her, but it succeeded in rendering her lifeless. Diana felt this was a crueller blow to Unity, whose ‘glittering personality’ her family, including the communist Jessica, loved. Lying unconscious in a Munich hospital, it was several weeks before the family knew of Unity’s whereabouts or the true nature of her suicide attempt. It was four months before Sydney could fetch her daughter home from a clinic in neutral Switzerland, where Hitler had arranged to pay for Unity’s medical treatment. The two never met again. News of the invalid returning to England and evading questioning by Scotland Yard horrified the public. Diana and Mosley’s names were at the forefront of the press reports and once again their association with Hitler was emphasised.

  Diana bore the brunt of Unity’s actions; she was seen as the instigator, the clever sister who introduced the highly impressionable Unity to the dangerous lifestyle she so loved. Nancy and Jessica blamed Diana and political ideologies further destroyed the family. David publicly opposed Hitler in a rousing speech he gave in the House of Lords and Sydney resented his views, for she still felt a fondness towards Hitler. After almost forty years of marriage, their differing politics caused David and Sydney to separate.

  Diana and Mosley’s luck was on a downward spiral. Realising he could no longer afford the upkeep of his Grosvenor Road flat, Mosley gave up the lease. He and Diana found smaller premises in Pimlico, settling on Dolphin Square, London’s most modern and ugly block of flats. They moved into two adjacent flats – separate bathrooms were essential – on the seventh floor of Hood House.

  In between their tumultuous financial situation, Diana had given birth to their second and last child, a son named Max. A short while later, they gave up the lease of their beloved Wootton and moved back to Savehay. It was something Diana was not enthusiastic about, but she had made her life with Mosley and where he went she blindly followed. Cimmie’s preference for chintz décor was not to Diana’s taste and she tore down the flouncy curtains and replaced them with her understated grey silk ones from Wootton. Diana’s elegant world did not blend with Cimmie’s lavish and influential touch. The memory of the deceased lady of the house still weighed heavily on the staff, including Nanny Hyslop, who had cared for the Curzon girls and now for Cimmie’s offspring.

  It was the first time 7-year-old Micky had lived with his father, though hidden in the nursery he hardly saw him. Quite tellingly, on one of Mosley’s visits to Irene’s house, he asked to see Micky, who had just gone up to bed. The nanny encouraged the boy to call out an affectionate greeting to his father but he defied her orders, explaining he was unsure how to address the man, given he had only met him ‘about four times’ in his life.

  Nanny Higgs came to Savehay with Max and Alexander, much to the disapproval of the former nanny. Nanny Hyslop knew Mosley was too cowardly to dismiss her, yet she realised he was cruel enough to allow her to suffer from too much pressure, overwork and constant humiliation, all in the hope of breaking her spirit. The nannies clashed and spent the entire winter at opposite ends of the landing, with each one not uttering one word to the other. Nanny Hyslop also felt no obligation towards Diana and coolly addressed her as ‘Lady Mosley’ whenever circumstances p
revailed for her to speak to the new mistress of the house.

  NOTE

  * The old bullet became infected and Unity died in 1948, aged 33.

  37

  FATE

  On the morning of 23 May 1940, Diana’s day started like any other. Differing from her unremarkable routine, she planned to go up to London to visit Desmond, who was in a nursing home with a gland infection. She mentally went through her list of what needed to be done for the day. Before setting off to London she would have to feed Max and, while they were in town, Mosley suggested they motor over to their flat at Dolphin Square.

  As their chauffeur-driven car pulled up outside the flats at Dolphin Square, Diana and Mosley spied four men lingering at the entrance of Hood House. ‘They must be coppers,’ she muttered as she looked in their direction.

  ‘Sir Oswald Mosley?’ said one of the men.

  ‘Yes?’ Mosley asked, as he and Diana exited the car.

  ‘We have a warrant for your arrest. Can we go upstairs to your flat?’

  Mosley possessed enough arrogance to feel above the law, and he confidently led the four policemen and Diana into the small lift, where they stood uncomfortably close as it climbed seven floors. Once inside the flat, Mosley asked, ‘But what is the charge?’

  ‘There is no charge,’ came their reply.

  Diana was thrown into a state of turmoil, but she had enough control over her emotions to calmly ask where they were taking him. Brixton Prison, she was told. Not to fret, they added, she could visit him the next day. Still believing it to be a mistake and he would be released, Mosley embraced her and from the window she watched the policemen take him away in the car.

  Gathering her composure, Diana asked Perrot, their chauffeur, to drive her to the nursing home. She calmly told Desmond and his governess, Miss Jean Gillies, what had happened and added they were not to worry. She still believed it to be an error. Desmond remained calm, though at almost 8 years old and ill in bed, he probably did not grasp the severity of the situation. Still, something about the visit struck Diana as odd and she felt an undercurrent of nervous tension surging through the room.

  As she drove back to Savehay, Diana was alone with her thoughts. She immediately telephoned Nick’s housemaster at Eton to tell him about the arrest. Her stepson’s feelings were not far from her mind, and when she asked his housemaster if he thought Nick would suffer because of it, she was told: ‘Oh no. You see he’s grown up – he’s 17 – and he’s got his friends and that’s that.’ She listened to this stranger’s voice as he advised her over the telephone to worry about her own son, Jonathan, who was a boarder at Summer Fields.

  Diana was momentarily relieved when she discovered that Jonathan was protected from victimisation because his last name was Guinness; surely his schoolmates would not realise that his mother was the notorious Lady Mosley. It must have crossed her mind if she, too, would have been spared had she kept to her immoral status as a divorcee, thinly disguised behind the title Mrs Guinness. Surely that would have been the lesser of two evils. Diana was unnerved when her 10-year-old son informed his mother that he was not surprised about Mosley’s arrest. With Mosley’s anti-war protests, Jonathan thought it was only a matter of time before the British government saw him as an enemy towards their patriotism.

  Relations with her stepdaughter Vivien had thawed, and since the marriage to Mosley, they had fallen into an easy-going friendship. That evening, Diana and Vivien dined together and their conversation revolved around Mosley’s arrest earlier that day. They spied the wooden gate opening on the side of the lawn and within seconds, policemen pushed through it. Diana instinctively knew they had come to search the house and she raced to her bedroom to hide her photograph of Hitler under the mattress on top of which her baby slept.

  After nine o’clock, Sydney telephoned, the news of Mosley’s arrest had been broadcast over the wireless. ‘What’s the charge?’ her mother asked.

  ‘No charge!’ said Diana, whose anxiety dilated into a cold fury.

  ‘Disgraceful!’ cried Sydney.

  ‘Yes, disgraceful!’ Diana wailed.

  Mosley’s arrest raised several questions. Who would make decisions for his children? And was Diana, as their stepmother, in a position to automatically become their legal guardian? Irene was eager to preserve her rightful place in the children’s lives and she approached Mosley on the subject. After a visit with his client in Brixton Prison, the lawyer warned Irene that Mosley was adamant he would have nothing more to do with his children if their guardianship was revoked from him, and he added that Savehay would be out of bounds to them. Irene’s lawyer stepped in and suggested they share joint guardianship of the children. Irene realised the setbacks of Mosley’s incarceration would lead to Diana’s potential input and she declined. The judge leaned towards Mosley and was willing to dismiss all questions of guardianship, but Mosley refused. He only ‘wanted entire control of the boys – he was not interested in the girl’. The judge revoked his sympathies and Irene was granted guardianship.

  The once jolly and courteous Cousin Winston, always so fond of Diana, had joined the band of friends who publicly denounced her. Churchill told his Cabinet that he opposed Mosley’s anti-war views and explained the reasoning behind his arrest without trial – known as Defence Regulation 18B.* His message was brief – if he bowed to Mosley, sooner or later Mosley would set up a British government ‘which would be Hitler’s puppet’.80 It was a bitter pill for Diana to swallow; she still remembered Churchill’s enthusiasm for inviting her to his flat for tea, pressing her for information on Hitler and speaking of his great rise to power.

  Her old acquaintance, Nancy Astor, who had also been a friend to Mosley and trusted confidante to Cimmie, addressed the House of Commons: ‘Is it wise to lock up the man and leave his wife free when the wife is more notorious than the man?’81 Lady Astor’s question was met with riotous applause, mirroring the overall public opinion on both Diana and Mosley.

  Public opinion or, as Diana put it, ‘the views put forward by politicians, press and BBC’, was that she was as bad as him, if not worse, given the patronising view of women in that era. How could this beautiful, young woman, who was also a mother, entertain an ideology as contemptible as fascism? This question burned in people’s minds and in the House of Commons.

  However, it was not Churchill and her old friends that Diana needed to worry about. Nancy had actively shopped her sister to Gladwyn Jebb at the Foreign Office. ‘I am disturbed about my sister,’ she told Jebb. ‘She’s madly pro-German and I think something should be done to restrain her activities.’82 Jebb did not overlook this piece of information, though it would be a conclusive piece from another source closer to home that would ultimately seal Diana’s fate.

  Diana had been notified that the War Office was going to requisition Savehay and would need it by 1 July. The best thing, Diana decided, would be for everyone to split up. Vivien, Micky and Nanny Hyslop went to Irene’s, while she and her four sons made plans to live with Pamela at Rignell Farm. Diana then promptly paid off the remaining staff who had not already joined the war effort. Preparations were made to store furniture and trunks of clothing, and necessities were placed in the hall for their departure to Rignell. She was husbandless and soon she would be homeless. What more could happen by way of bad luck?

  Casting her mind back to her visit with Desmond at the nursing home, Diana remembered that of the three present in the room, Jean Gillies seemed the most agitated. It was something she had not forgotten, and soon she would know why. Colonel Guinness had been paying Gillies to spy on Diana and to record in her diary the amount of times she had visited Nazi Germany and had spoken of Hitler. Satisfied that he had garnered enough evidence to sink Diana, Colonel Guinness wrote to his friend Lord Swinton, Chairman of the Security Executive – a committee so secret that he was one of the very few who knew of its existence.

  As Colonel Guinness had hoped, Gillies’ diary had a familiar theme: Diana’s frequent trips to
Germany, her casual references to Nazism and, on one occasion, she had apparently taught Jonathan and Desmond how to give the Nazi salute. But the most damning piece of evidence appeared when Gillies recalled that, on 27 September 1938, Mosley had commented that Hitler was perfectly justified in invading Czechoslovakia. When the Athenia was sunk, both Mosley and Diana agreed it was ‘a good beginning’. And Diana had said of Poland: ‘Surely now the goddess of wisdom has forsaken them and they will realise their colossal folly before it is too late.’ The ink was barely dry on the paperwork when plans for Diana’s arrest were put into place.

  On 29 June, Nanny Higgs brought Max, who turned 11 weeks old that day, to Diana for his two o’clock feed. Afterwards, she changed her baby son and placed him in his pram in the garden where she sat next to him to read her book. A maid’s voice interrupted the peaceful scene – if it weren’t for the endless trunks gathered in the hall it would have seemed like any other sunny day. The nervous tone of the maid’s voice alerted Diana that the man and two women callers were not friendly visitors or journalists. She looked up to see them intruding across the lawn, a policeman and policewoman, announcing they had a warrant for her arrest. ‘Now what happens?’ she asked, desperately trying to conceal the panic in her voice, ‘I’ve got a tiny baby and I’m feeding him.’

  ‘You can take him with you,’ stated the policeman, unmoved by her plea.

  As her mind raced, Diana gathered her composure and asked which jail she would be going to.

  ‘Holloway,’ they said.

  Holloway, in London, was far too dangerous for a baby, Diana decided. She knew the bombing of the city was not too far in the future now that France was in Germany’s hands. Diana explained that she would leave Max with his brother, and the policewoman followed her upstairs. ‘How much luggage should I take?’ she asked.

  ‘Oh, only enough for the weekend. You’ll be out on Monday,’ the policewoman told her.