The Viceroy's Daughters

by Anne de Courcy

  Grace Curzon’s autobiography describes much of her early life with Curzon, and his letters recount the long battle to achieve an heir. Details of the balls given by Curzon for his daughters can be found in the British Library, with further descriptions in The Lady and other society magazines. The account of Curzon’s proposal that Oliver Lyttelton should marry one of his daughters is in the memoirs of Lyttelton (later Lord Chandos).

  Contemporary descriptions of balls and parties can be found in publications like The World, The Lady and society papers like The Tatler and The Bystander, Baba’s coming-out ball is described in The Times and in The Lady as well as in the Curzon papers; and she frequently appears, with Grace Curzon, in society magazines. Her presentation at court is described in The Lady of June 15, 1922.

  Postwar society life is admirably described in Loelia Duchess of Westminster’s Grace and Favour and in Cynthia Asquith’s Remember and Be Glad. Grace Curzon describes fully the life at Carlton House Terrace in her memoirs. Scatters Wilson’s military career is listed in contemporary Who’s Whos.

  Fruity Metcalfe’s military career is documented in the Public Record Office and in the Imperial War Museum; there is also material in the autobiography of his niece, the broadcaster Audrey Russell. Lord Mountbatten’s diary gives a very full description of the Prince of Wales’s Indian tour. Nancy Astor’s tactless remark to Grace Curzon is described by Frances Stevenson in her diary, held in the House of Lords Library. The episode when Prince Henry cracked Curzon’s dining room table is described by Baba in an unscreened Channel 4 interview.

  Lord Ravensdale described the initial meeting between his mother Cimmie and Tom Mosley. Elizabeth Winn explained that her aunt Phyllis Brand had found Mosley so attractive that she persuaded him to come and canvass for Nancy Astor in Plymouth—where he remet Cimmie. Tom Mosley’s military career is listed comprehensively in the Public Record Office. The letters between Curzon and his wife give a full account of their movements and feelings, and of Baba’s movements. Grace’s appearance at Saint Moritz in January 1923 is described in several contemporary newspapers.

  The important balls, the Buckingham Palace garden party and the Prince of Wales’s incognito trip to Le Touquet are all described in various issues of The Lady magazine. The prince’s letters to Fruity Metcalfe are in the possession of his son David Metcalfe, who also holds the compact, written on paper headed “Sea Meads, Sandwich Bay, Kent,” to cut down on smoking by the Prince of Wales, Prince George and Fruity. Baba wrote, “I never got the £100 as they kept the pledge,” on the envelope in which it is kept.

  The Story of Melton Mowbray, by Philip Hunt, and Melton Mowbray in Old Photographs, by Trevor Hickman, provide a comprehensive picture of this little hunting town in the twenties. Irene’s hunting journal is full of the incidents and accidents in the major hunts, many of which are also mentioned in the Leicester Mercury and in Michael Clayton’s Foxhunting in Paradise. There is much about Craven Lodge in Melton Mowbray, Queen of the Shires, by Jack Brownlow. The Local History Archive of the Melton Public Library also has much of interest about Craven Lodge, the town, and the Prince of Wales. The late Miss Monica Sheriffe added personal reminiscences of that time.

  Lady Glyn (born Susan Rhys Williams, the daughter of Elinor’s youngest daughter Juliet) recorded that after Elinor died, Cimmie told Juliet that Curzon had asked to see Elinor Glyn when he was dying but that no message had been received. “I asked my mother why the message was never given to Elinor,” wrote Lady Glyn to the author. “She said: ‘Cimmie thought it was his wife who prevented it. She was jealous.’ ” Curzon’s wills and codicils are, of course, freely available.

  The description of Cimmie “in costly furs” is by a German newspaperman, Egon Wertheimer, who attended a meeting of the Labour Party in the Empire Hall in southeast London. Irene describes her love affair with Gordon Leith in her diaries; interviews with Lord Ravensdale fleshed it out further. Lord Holderness described the affection his father, Lord Halifax, had for the encampment of Naldera, near Simla; the Metcalfes’ lunch with the Halifaxes is recorded in Lady Halifax’s diary. Savehay Farm is described in a private publication by its present owner, Mr. Frank Cakebread, and there are other descriptions in the biography of John Strachey by Hugh Thomas.

  Grace Curzon’s attempt to prevent her daughter Marcella from marrying Edward Rice was recounted to me by Marcella’s daughter Lady Plymouth. Tom Mosley’s many infidelities were confirmed by his son and biographer Lord Ravensdale.

  The Leicester Mercury describes the Melton Ball of January 1929. Thelma Furness recounts her love affair with the Prince of Wales in her autobiography. There are descriptions of Fort Belvedere in both the duke and duchess of Windsor’s memoirs. The Honorable David Astor talked to me about his mother and Cliveden and there is much family material in James Fox’s The Langhorne Sisters. Cimmie’s election campaigning is recorded in Irene’s diary and the local Stoke newspapers. Her parliamentary speeches are in Hansard.

  The biography of Oswald Mosley by Robert Skidelsky covers the Mosley Memorandum in full. The diaries of Beatrice Webb and Robert Bernays describe the atmosphere of that time. Irene Ravensdale’s diary as ever provides a full account of the lives of the three sisters.

  There is a full account of the New Party in Hugh Thomas’s John Strachey, Nicholas Mosley’s biography of his father, Robert Skidelsky’s Mosley biography and several others. The Birmingham Town Crier and the Manchester Guardian describe Cimmie’s resignation from the Labour Party. Mosley’s sending of emissaries to Germany is reported in the Daily Herald. Statistics of the Nazi Party vote are in the October 1998 issue of History Today (“Who Voted for the Nazis?” by Dick Geary).

  Diana Mosley writes about her relationship with Tom Mosley in Venice and after in her autobiography A Life of Contrasts and has also described it to the author in interviews. Much information about Arthur Rubinstein was supplied by Lady Weidenfeld, who knew him for many years. The story about Tom Mosley recounting to Robert Boothby his confession to Cimmie of his mistresses is in Nicholas Mosley’s biography of his father and was confirmed to me by Lady Boothby. Vivien Forbes-Adam and Nicholas Mosley confirm that the “sister” referred to was their aunt Irene and not, as most people supposed, Baba.

  Miles Graham’s letters, the diary of his mother, Lady Askwith, and Irene’s diary give a full picture of their engagement and of Cimmie Mosley’s death. Tom Mosley’s love affair with Baba Metcalfe was confirmed to the author by her close family, who were able to throw much light on her feelings about it. Baba Metcalfe confirmed to the author her continuing hatred of Diana Mosley and her belief, shared by those around her, that from the start Diana had been determined to wrest Tom Mosley away from her sister; Diana Mosley in several interviews confirmed that this had never been her intention and that Mosley had told her he would never leave his wife.

  There is a great deal of information about Jock Whitney in press articles such as the Saturday Evening Post (June 1, 1957) and Vogue (February 1, 1965).

  The best descriptions of the events leading up to the abdication are in Philip Ziegler’s official biography of Edward VIII and Lady Donaldson’s Edward VIII: The Road to Abdication. The recent release of some of the Monckton papers has added further detail. Alfred Shaughnessy recounted to me the stories he had heard from his stepfather Captain the Honorable Piers (“Joey”) Legh, equerry to the Prince of Wales, who sailed with him when as duke of Windsor he went into exile, and I am obliged to the Royal Archives for passing on to me copies of several of Fruity Metcalfe’s letters.

  Walter Monckton’s papers are in Balliol College Library. Betty Hanley furnished me with a full description of the Château de Candé in the time of her aunt, Fern Bedaux, together with papers and letters (many from the Bedaux butler, Hale) describing the household the duchess wanted and the cost to M. Bedaux of much of the duke’s behavior, together with letters concerning the visit to Germany. Baba Metcalfe’s diary gives the fullest, most immediate eyewitness account of the W
indsors’ wedding.

  Descriptions of life at La Cröe can be found in several books, notably Dina Wells Hood’s account of her life with the Windsors and Harold Nicolson’s diary. Much other information was given to me by both David Metcalfe and Sir Dudley Forwood; there are additional details in Lady Loughborough’s unpublished memoir. There were many pictures and descriptions of Little Compton and its furniture in a Sotheby’s catalog of September 1999. Accounts of the fuss the Windsors made about leaving Antibes in 1940 are in the Monckton papers and Fruity Metcalfe’s letters.

  Details of the construction of the Dorchester, its early years, guests and menus are contained in the hotel’s own files. The Public Record Office holds details of correspondence leading up to the Mosleys’ imprisonment, internment and eventual release, as well as letters and papers relating to the Windsors’ return to France after the war.

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  Campbell, Nina, and Caroline Seebohm, Elsie de Wolfe: A Decorative Life (Panache Press, 1992)

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  ———, Portraits and Appreciations (Hodder and Stoughton, 1929)

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  ———, Letters and Journals of Sir Alan Lascelles: In Royal Service, 1920–1936 (Hamish Hamilton, 1989)

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  ———, Mountbatten (Collins, 1985)

  Index

  The pagination of this electronic edition does not match the edition from which it was created. To locate a specific entry, please use your e-book reader’s search tools.

  Abdication crisis, 236–44

  Ackroyd, Peter, 139

  Acton, Harold, 133

  Albert, Duke of York (later King George VI), 69, 72, 229, 233, 248, 264, 298, 306; and the Abdication crisis, 240–41

  Alexander, Ulick, 243

  Alexandra, Queen, 12

  Alice, Princess, 215

  Allen, George, 259, 261, 262

  Allen, Paula and Bill, 210

  Altemus, Liz, 225

  Anderson, Sir John, 323, 325

  Arlen, Michael, 157 />
  Ashley, Sylvia, 119, 157

  Askwith, Lady (Ellen), 178, 182, 187, 188

  Asquith, Herbert Henry, 2, 32, 40, 99, 320

  Asquith, Lady Cynthia (formerly Lady Cynthia Charteris), 1, 17, 42

  Asquith, Margot, 5, 28, 143

  Astaire, Fred and Adele, 118

  Astor, Bill, 273, 276

  Astor, David, 273, 277

  Astor, Nancy, Viscountess: and Cliveden house parties, 23–24, 272–73, 277–78, 337; Curzon’s friendship with, 23–24, 28, 31, 40; relations with the Curzon daughters, 24, 31, 41, 49–50, 54, 69–70, 78, 83–84, 113–14; and politics, 49–50, 133; and Cimmie’s marriage to Tom Mosley, 56; and scandal involving Bobby Shaw, 153–55; and Grandi, 197; on Tom Mosley, 204; and Irene, 207; and Baba’s children, 245; character, 272–73; and Lord Lothian, 338–39, 342

  Astor, Waldorf, 2nd Viscount Astor, 23, 24, 50, 154, 155

  Austria, and the Anchluss, 276

  Baldwin, Oliver, 145–46

  Baldwin, Stanley, 66, 67, 76, 95, 99, 107, 125, 220, 229, 234, 260; and the Abdication crisis, 236–37, 238, 240, 241; on Wallis Simpson, 264–65

  Balfour, Arthur (later Lord), 7, 11, 13, 41, 47, 66

  Balsan, Consuelo (formerly Duchess of Marlborough), 83, 96–97

  Balsan, Jacques, 96

  Baring, Maurice, 121

  Barry, Gerald, 204

  Barrymore, Blanche, 119

  Beaton, Cecil, 157, 258, 333

  Beaverbrook, Lord, 344

  Becket, Rupert, 337

  Beckett, John, 271

  Bedaux, Charles, 255, 258, 259, 261–62, 268, 269, 272

  Bedaux, Fern, 255, 257, 258, 259

  Bedford, Gertrude, 310

  Belgian royal family, 33–34

  Benes, Eduard, 284

  Benson, Guy, 40

  Beresford, Lord Charles, 3

  Bernays, Robert, 177, 200–201, 223, 273, 292; and the Abdication crisis, 238–39, 241; and the Munich crisis, 284

  Bevin, Ernest, 159, 359, 385