Kick

by Paula Byrne

  They had been spending time in the Café de Paris and the 400 Club, often in the company of Debo Mitford and Billy’s younger brother Andrew. Billy and Andrew had a rather strained relationship. Andrew was still jealous that Kick had chosen Billy above him, but things got easier when Andrew began courting Debo, who shared Kick’s gift of liveliness and spirit. Like Kick, Debo was one of a large brood, where teasing and jokes were very much the fabric of family life. Debo’s eldest sister, the writer Nancy Mitford, teased her mercilessly: one of her nicknames for Debo was ‘Nine’ (supposedly Debo’s mental age). This was the sort of joke that Kick loved.

  Kick was intrigued by the Mitford sisters. Debo had had a difficult time in recent years. Her closest sister, Decca, a fully paid-up member of the Communist Party, had run away from home with her cousin Esmond Romilly (Winston Churchill’s nephew and some said his illegitimate son). They had married and eloped to Spain, but then returned to Rotherhithe in south-east London. Two other sisters, Diana and Unity, were self-proclaimed Fascists. Diana, the exceptionally beautiful one, had left her wealthy and devoted husband Bryan Guinness to become the mistress of Oswald Mosley, the leader of the British Union of Fascists. They had married in Joseph Goebbels’s drawing room, in the presence of Hitler, in 1936. Unity was obsessed with Hitler and stalked him in Berlin for months on end, before becoming a close friend. She was living in Germany, and had courted huge controversy because of her relationship with Hitler.

  Unity and Diana fascinated Kick. Kick was conscious of how much Lady Redesdale, the girls’ mother, monitored Debo’s movements, insisting that she be chaperoned. Kick observed wryly: ‘What about Unity I ask myself.’13

  The Cavendish brothers and their lively, outspoken girlfriends became a close foursome. Kick experimented with alcohol, without the knowledge of her abstemious parents. The Cavendish boys had discovered a ruse to get free drinks at the expense of their father. The Duke would ask the waiters to label his drinks bottle with the name of a fish beginning with H (for Hartington, his own courtesy title until the previous May), so his sons would ask the waiters if there was a bottle belonging to ‘Mr Hake or Herring or Halibut’.14

  In early March, Kick was summoned to Rome to attend the coronation of the new Pope. Rose was still travelling in Egypt when she heard the news that Pope Pius XI had died. As the white smoke snaked out of the chimney of the Sistine Chapel heralding that a new Pope had been chosen, Rose heard that it was to be her friend Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli. A message arrived that Joe was to represent the United States at the inauguration. Rose, in a state of great excitement, headed for Italy, where the rest of the family were gathering. The children came in a private railway car, with the exception of Joe Jr, who was witnessing the last days of the civil war in Spain.

  On 12 March it was a beautiful sunny morning in Rome. At 6 a.m. four cars arrived to take the family to St Peter’s. The girls were dressed modestly, with veils covering their heads. The family headed into the basilica and were seated opposite the new Pope’s throne, where mass would be said. The Ambassador noticed Mussolini’s son-in-law (and Foreign Minister) Count Ciano marching through the church ‘giving [the] Fascist salute and bowing and smiling’ and ‘was convinced he was a swell-headed Muggo’ (the latter presumably being a slang term for a follower of Mussolini).15 Ciano was angry that his seat was occupied by a Kennedy child. After mass, they went outside and saw the Pope crowned in front of the enormous crowd.

  The following day the family had a private audience with the new pontiff. They were photographed outside the Vatican. Rose wore a long black dress and veil. Kick was in a beautiful knee-length black dress with a long black veil. She wore her trademark single strand of pearls. The boys were in suits.

  The children were carrying medals to be blessed by the Pope for their numerous friends. They came in and each genuflected and kissed the Pope’s ring. The Pope chatted to the family and reminded Teddy of when he had met him in Bronxville and Teddy had played with his cross. He gave the little boy some rosary beads, then walked over to a table and reached for a white box containing another string of beads, which he gave to Rose. He gave rosary beads in white casings to all of the children and they all knelt before him while he blessed them and said, ‘Pray for me.’ They were so overawed that they forgot to ask the Pope to bless their medals, so they sent someone back to have them blessed.

  Afterwards, they went to the Sistine Chapel and saw the works of Michelangelo and Raphael. They were shown the special room where all the Cardinals were locked up for the election of the Pope. Joe noted in his diary, ‘we then had our pictures taken and went home to lunch after the most thrilling day of our lives’.16

  Later in the afternoon, the family went for tea at Castel Gandolfo, the Pope’s private summer residence 20 miles outside Rome, perched above Lake Albano. Visitors were rarely allowed in its hallowed walls, so it was yet another honour for the Kennedys. They walked around the formal gardens and parterres. Inside the house, the Ambassador was amused to find a tray with Gordon’s gin and Canadian Club whisky. Jack Kennedy got up to kiss a Cardinal’s ring, while a photographer snapped away. He joked that his Protestant girlfriend’s father would be mad if he ever saw the picture.17 If Kick were thinking at this moment about her own Protestant boyfriend, Lord Hartington, she would have been very aware of the gulf that separated them.

  Kick wrote a long article for the League of Catholic Women, an American organization that would give great support to the work of the Red Cross during the war. Entitled ‘Impressions of the Coronation of Pope Pius XII’, this was Kick’s first piece of published journalism. She revealed herself to be an extremely able writer: ‘All here is movement and color . . . As the procession advances down the aisle the singing of the Sistine Chapel is drowned in the crescendo of cheering. There is but one thought and that is for the pale and wan figure, who, with slow, gentle movement, lifts his hand in the sign of the Cross.’18 Kick was beginning to establish herself as a key figure in American Catholic circles. She was the daughter of His Excellency the American Ambassador to the Court of St James’s. She had a lot to live up to. And now she was taking her first steps as a journalist.

  While they were in Rome, German troops crossed the Czech border and marched into Prague. The shock reverberated around Europe. Hitler had flagrantly broken the Munich agreement, and Chamberlain’s trust had proved misplaced. War now seemed inevitable.

  23

  The Gathering Storm

  These Catholic girls are a menace!

  Lord Richard Cavendish

  Kick was embarrassed by her father’s increasingly erratic behaviour. She threw a supper party at Prince’s Gate for her circle. Billy and David Ormsby Gore were guests of honour, and Jack had returned from travelling in Europe. When supper was over, Joe invited the party to his screening room, where he had a surprise film set up for the young people. To Kick’s mortification, Joe showed a film of the Great War, of young men being blown up in trench warfare. The Ambassador jumped up in front of the screen with the horrific images behind him and yelled: ‘That’s what you’ll look like if you go to war with Germany.’1

  Kick whispered to Billy, ‘You mustn’t pay any attention to him. He just doesn’t understand the English as I do.’ She knew that Billy had already volunteered for the Coldstream Guards. They were the oldest regiment in continuous active service in the British Army, dating back to the time of Oliver Cromwell. For Billy, it was a matter of honour and duty to volunteer, even though the government was shortly to introduce conscription. Most of Billy’s friends had followed suit.

  The young men were incensed by the Ambassador’s outburst. And the women were also infuriated. Kick’s friend Katharine Ormsby Gore had spent time in Vienna after the Nazis’ takeover and had personal experience of their atrocities. A kindly Jewish doctor in the same apartment block had set her broken foot, and one morning she awoke to find he had ‘disappeared’ in the middle of the night, the door blowing in the wind. She insisted on repeating her s
tory to anyone who would listen: ‘I was a terrible bore on the subject.’2 During Joe Kennedy’s outburst, Jack refused to comment or take sides. He was biding his time, taking everything in.

  In May 1939, the Ambassador wrote a letter to the editor of the Saturday Evening Post in which he declared that ‘the best interests of the United States are served by peace in Europe and not by war . . . I have nine children and I have young friends, and I regard them all as my hostages for my devotion to the interests of the United States, first, last and always.’3 The Ambassador’s problem was that he just couldn’t see beyond his family. He was a fiercely protective father, and all he could think of was his own sons being led like lambs to the slaughter. Many years later, Jack’s wife, Jackie, cut to the quick of her father-in-law’s psychology. ‘Why Papa, you’re all black and white’, she told him.4 Joe knew that the war would destroy much that he had built for his family with his own determination and energy, and he was right. But he was wrong about England being finished, and there was no one more vocal about England’s true grit than Kick.

  Billy’s action in volunteering for the war was focusing Kick’s mind on their future together. In their numerous long talks into the night, he told her about his new rooms in Chatsworth and the undergraduate thesis he was writing on the Whig oligarchy in the eighteenth century and the part his own ancestors had played in the history of his nation. He had been reading the letters of Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire.5

  At a time when everything was changing so rapidly, Billy felt that the new world had much to teach the old world and a Cavendish–Kennedy alliance would be symbolic of Anglo-American amity. Their children would, he imagined, one day be part of a new and better international future. He was deadly serious about marrying Kick, but for now the subject of religious differences was carefully avoided. David Ormsby Gore’s romance with the Catholic Sissy Lloyd Thomas was the talk of London, leading Lord Richard Cavendish, a great-uncle of Billy’s, to proclaim that ‘These Catholic girls are a menace!’6

  The King and Queen were to undertake a PR visit to America and, before they left in early May, Rose and Joe threw a dinner party for them at Prince’s Gate. This was Rose’s finest hour, and she was determined that it would be perfect. Eschewing the conventional French cuisine so beloved by the English upper class, she ordered shad roe from Baltimore, ham from Virginia and pickled peaches from Georgia, all flown in especially. As a final American touch she put American strawberry shortcake on the menu. Orchids and strawberries were imported from Paris.

  Much to everyone’s amusement, all of the Kennedy children attended the supper, the six younger ones on a small table in the dining room. It was a huge success. The Kennedys had triumphed again, and it was mainly due to Rose and the children. Rose wore a turquoise satin dress, while the Queen was in an exquisite pink satin gown.7 After dinner, they watched the movie about a much loved schoolmaster, Goodbye, Mr Chips. Rose noticed that the Queen had a little weep.8

  Later that week, Rose and Joe went to Lady Astor’s dinner at her London townhouse, where they met the Duke of Devonshire, Billy’s father, who told her that he was going to make a tour of Africa. After dinner, Kick and her friends arrived for the dancing. Rose left at 1.30, leaving Kick still dancing with Billy.

  Kick made the most of her freedom when her mother returned to America in May. In Rose’s absence, Kick took over as sister Eunice’s chaperone while she prepared for her Season. The sisters introduced an innovation at an Embassy tea party by having the tea and cakes at intimate tables, rather than at the customary single long one.

  On 9 June, Kick gave her first public speech. It was at the American Women’s Club, and she proved herself to be an able substitute for her parents. Her words were witty and self-deprecating: ‘I rather wish that my Father were here to “deputize” for me. He always has things to talk about – at least nine familiar – subjects’. Urging people to open their purses, she joked: ‘You’re going to have fun – and pay for it!’

  Rose and Joe were back in time for Eunice’s debut party. Described as a ‘small dance’, it was a far cry from Kick’s debut the previous year, but still a great success. Billy was Kick’s guest and he spent the whole dinner telling Rose how wonderful her daughter was. They danced the ‘Big Apple’, the Duchess of Northumberland singling out Jack Kennedy. Rose was a little shocked by the ‘Big Apple’, which had its origins in an African-American ring dance. But Eunice was thrilled with the event: ‘I had achieved the aim of every young girl – that of being presented at the Court of St James’s – the world’s greatest empire – The Empire upon which the sun never sets.’9

  This was Kick’s sentiment, too, but it certainly wasn’t the Ambassador’s, who believed that England was all washed up, and that it would certainly lose if it went to war with Germany. Nancy Astor was preparing Cliveden as a military hospital. The world was inching closer and closer to war, and yet the parties went on.

  The Kennedys had given a Fourth of July garden party at Prince’s Gate, and that evening the family attended a ball, where Joe was alarmed to discover the gossip that Kick had been seen at the 400 Club. He took her aside, and reprimanded her. Rose also had her say, noting in her diary her spirited daughter’s defence, in which Kick changed the subject from moral standards to money: ‘When I told her about the high standard we had in the United States she immediately rejoined with the sentence “but that in having this high standard of living for a few people, we have trodden a lot of others under foot in this country and in other countries”.’10 Kick Kennedy was never one for toeing the party line.

  24

  The Last Hurrah

  In this brilliant scene at Blenheim, I sensed the end of an era.

  Duchess of Marlborough1

  The middle-aged man sat at a table in the corner of the spectacular ballroom. One of the guests, a young man, threw a contemptuous glance at the ‘warmonger’ Winston Churchill deep in conversation with Anthony Eden: ‘Oh look at that poor old has-been. My father says he’s still a potential trouble-maker, but he won’t get any public life now.’2 Young Jack Kennedy thought otherwise. He revered Churchill, was an avid reader of his books and often went to Westminster to hear his speeches. Jack was thrilled to see Churchill in person and in intimate surroundings.

  It was the last, great party before the war, and it took place on 7 July 1939 in one of England’s most magnificent stately homes, Blenheim Palace in Oxfordshire. Jack and Kick were invited to celebrate the eighteenth birthday of the Duke of Marlborough’s daughter, Sarah, but the thrill for the family was that seventeen-year-old Eunice had also been invited for the weekend celebrations.3 She left a long, detailed account of Blenheim: ‘There is something very English about the way it retires from the rest of the world behind a grey stone wall and a gateway which alone gives indication of its character. It is no ordinary country house; it is a national monument.’4 Jack told Lem it was nearly as big as Versailles.

  A thousand guests danced in the golden palace lit by hundreds of lamps; outside, the terrace and lake were floodlit in colours of blue and green, and Japanese lanterns hung in the trees. Don Carlos and his Strolling Players, incongruously dressed in Tyrolean costumes, walked the grounds singing. For many, it was the end of an era. Henry ‘Chips’ Channon MP wrote in his diary, ‘I have seen much, travelled far and am accustomed to splendour, but there has never been anything like tonight.’5

  Inside, the library had been transformed into a magnificent ‘ballroom of flowers’, with lilies, pink and white hydrangeas, gloxinias and malmaisons. ‘Huge sparkling chandeliers sent sparkling light into every corner of the room.’6 The ladies wore ‘bouffant’ gowns, tiaras and jewels. There were footmen in knee breeches and powdered wigs, carrying trays of champagne. The debs draped their fur stoles around the marble statues that lined the palace. In the morning they discovered that thieves had apparently sneaked into the palace and stolen them.

  The servants watched as royalty and aristocracy arrived, filing into the banque
ting room according to rank. Later in the evening, a ten-course dinner was served. Eunice recalled appetizers, soup, fish, game, greens, dessert, sweets, savoury and side dishes: ‘How does the English youth remain so slim?’ she joked. Chips Channon wrote of ‘the ‘rivers of champagne’.

  Kick’s favourite, Ambrose and his Band, played the latest songs: ‘Dancing Cheek to Cheek’, ‘Night and Day’, ‘It Had to be You’, ‘Begin the Beguine’, ‘Moonlight Serenade’. The guests danced all night, both in the ballroom and on an open-air dance floor built on the terrace overlooking the illuminated lake. At dawn, hotdogs and coffee were served.

  The next day there was an experimental ‘blackout’, and then the guests played hide and seek. Chips Channon wondered whether they would ever see the like again. Jack Kennedy, too, sensed that it was the end of an era. He had befriended Tony Loughborough, the heir to the 5th Earl of Rosslyn. Tony’s father had committed suicide when his son was just twelve, and Joe Kennedy had taken him under his wing. Tony fell desperately in love with Kick, although she clearly had eyes for no one but Billy. While their friends were forming serious relationships with the threat of war looming, Jack and Tony formed an alliance they called ‘Ross Kennedy’, which involved seducing as many women as they could find. Jack wrote to Lem: ‘it’s really too bad you’re not here as it’s all darn good fun – never had a better time’.7

  The partying in the summer of 1939 had an even greater intensity than the Season of 1938, no doubt because everyone knew that war was inevitable. Kick’s friends constantly discussed the situation in Europe.8 That summer, one of her old flames, Jack’s Harvard chum the athletic Torbert Macdonald, came to stay. He was still in love with Kick and was keen to impress. He, Jack and Kick attended the athletics meeting at White City in west London where he was sure he would triumph: ‘I tried very hard because I was showing off to Kick and everybody . . . but finished a close third.’9 He was devastated, and felt that she had lost interest in him. It was difficult for an all-American boy to compete with Lord Hartington.