by Pamela Horn
To take part in this ceremonial a large cash outlay was needed, something which many of the families could ill afford, at a time when incomes from landed estates were shrinking and much of British industry was in the doldrums. Some mothers economised by holding joint dances to launch their daughters, thereby halving the cost. Others chose the cheaper alternative of holding a ball in a hotel.60 But others again, according to the gossip columnist Patrick Balfour, were prepared to spend up to £1,000 on a single large ball for their debutante daughter, to which fellow debutantes and eligible young men were invited. Balfour calculated that since few families still owned large houses in London, merely renting a property – perhaps a large flat – for the Season, they would have to hire somebody else’s house for a night. That might cost £150. Then a band had to be ordered from a band agency, there would be ‘a cartload of flowers from a florist, servants and champagne from a catering company’, and the expense of sending out some hundreds of invitations. Balfour argued that wiser or thriftier mothers had discovered that it paid better ‘to enter the marriage market in a more informal and personal spirit’, and to lay out the thousand pounds in various smaller entertainments, including theatre parties, supper dances in restaurants, and Saturday to Monday gatherings in a country house.61 He was not alone in his reservations. Lady Mary Dunn, too, considered it was all ‘somewhat overdone … The amount spent in one night would have kept a whole family for a year.’62
Yet, despite such criticisms most parents felt they must follow the traditional course. Daphne Vivian’s father had very limited means and she realised that he could only afford to finance her in London for two Seasons. Even then she felt guilty in case it resulted in the family having to sell her beloved Cornish home. In the event she was to have a third Season, but this time it was paid for by an aunt.
In May 1922, the Vivians moved into a house they had rented for 15 guineas a week. They took with them six servants, including Mabel Creek, Daphne’s lady’s maid. She was to remain with Daphne long after she married. As with other debutantes, she acquired an extensive trousseau, helped by the contribution of a rich uncle of her stepmother, who agreed to double the amount originally set aside for expenditure on her wardrobe. This enabled her to go to some top London dressmakers, including Lucille, the prestigious establishment owned by Lady Duff Gordon.63
As the Vivians’ circle of friends in London was limited, Daphne at first received few invitations to parties and balls organised for her fellow debs. Her stepmother responded by leaving visiting cards on all prospective hostesses of dances. In addition, an aunt agreed to give a small dance for Daphne at the end of the Season. ‘People soon heard about this, and so began to ask me to their dances. I realised that Society was conducted on a strictly cutlet-for-cutlet basis.’
It was Daphne’s father rather than her stepmother who chaperoned her at the various parties she attended. Most of the other debutantes were accompanied by their mothers or other female relatives, who sat on gold chairs placed round the ballroom, gossiping to their friends and keeping a close eye on the dancers. In those circumstances her father’s arrival was welcomed since he ‘ran a shuttle service’, taking one lady after another to supper ‘and giving them a turn round the room’.64 He enjoyed it, too, being always a keen partygoer.
Daphne’s particular friends were two half-sisters, Diana Duncombe and Beatrice Beckett. They were unusually emancipated in that they were allowed to go to dances on their own. ‘Until I knew them,’ wrote Daphne, ‘I was not allowed out by myself even in the daytime, but had to be accompanied by a maid.’ However, when she went out with Beatrice and Diana she was allowed to go without any other escort, on the strict understanding that they stayed together.
During the Season Daphne was constantly warned against getting a reputation for ‘wildness’, although as she subsequently recalled, the young men she met that first summer were far from wild. ‘The entry in my diary after my first dance reads: “Disappointed in the London young men – rather a spotty, weedy crew.”’ She was presented at Court, ‘wearing a silver dress with a train and white feathers in my hair’. She also went to Ascot, where she much enjoyed being permitted to lunch alone with young men. Nevertheless, she returned to her Cornish home at the end of the Season feeling rather deflated because she had not received one serious marriage proposal.65 In later years that changed and she became involved in several flirtations before she became secretly engaged and then married to Henry Weymouth, heir to the Marquess of Bath. The two had first met when he was at school at Harrow, and their friendship was resumed when they attended parties in Oxford, where he was an undergraduate. The secrecy was needed because of parental opposition on the grounds that they were too young to make such a long-term commitment. In 1926, however, shortly before Henry was due to depart for the United States of America, where he was to spend some months, they decided to marry anyway. While he was away Daphne wore her wedding ring on a chain round her neck. On his return the following year both families agreed the match could go ahead, quite unaware that the two were married already. The official ceremony took place on 27 October 1927, at St Martin-in-the-Fields in London amid much pomp and ceremony. Daphne’s dress was designed by the young Norman Hartnell, and the pages who attended her wore Hartnell-designed medieval doublets of red velvet and gold.66
Meanwhile, the four Courts which were held in 1922, when Daphne came out, were the first since 1914 that had something of their pre-war splendour. During the war all presentations had been suspended, so that by 1919 a large backlog of aspiring debutantes had built up. In that year the Lord Chancellor decided that to meet the exigencies of the situation, instead of holding Courts, three special Buckingham Palace garden parties would be held during the summer, to which 15,500 people were invited, including several thousand debutantes who had missed out during the war.67 The Bystander declared this decision was a grave disappointment ‘to many young matrons and maidens … Presentation in a walking dress, with just a little “bob” to Majesty’ hardly matched the evening splendour and glamour of a formal presentation.68 The policy was attributed partly to the need for economy after the disruptions of war, but doubtless it enabled the backlog of debutantes to be dealt with more speedily. For those who feared they might not meet the king and queen, reassurance was given that the mere receipt of an invitation to a garden party would be regarded as equivalent to a presentation. This latter point was important for the debutantes in that permission to enter the prestigious royal enclosure at Ascot was only given to those who had been presented at Court.69 As The Bystander commented slyly in 1929, one of the chief attractions of this privilege was being able ‘to pass those green velvet-coated guardians at the white gate that leads from the paddock’, thereby ‘exciting envy in the hearts of those of one’s friends who cannot do so … The woman with an enclosure badge who can wave to her dearest friend on the other side of the railings can be said really to have lived.’70
That comment drew attention to the underlying spirit of rivalry and petty jealousy that also characterised much of the London social scene. This competitiveness provided valuable material for the growing number of aristocratic gossip columnists who appeared on the scene from the mid-1920s. The first signed social column, detailing the doings of ‘High Society’, appeared in the Sunday Express in 1926 when Lord Beaverbrook recruited Lord Castlerosse to write his ‘Londoner’s Log’. The following year Lady Eleanor Smith carried out a similar role in the Weekly Despatch, and others followed quickly in their wake, including Patrick Balfour himself.71 In the late 1920s he became ‘Mr. Gossip’ in the Daily Sketch, and in 1939 succeeded to the title of the 3rd Baron Kinross. As Balfour admitted, in this way ‘Society people are making money … by recording each other’s doings in the Press.’ Hence if the well-to-do wanted to maintain their reputation they must be careful not to ‘behave like a fishwife in somebody’s drawing-room. There may be a social columnist present, who will record your antics.’ At the end of the decade The Times gave space
to those who were protesting at the unscrupulous tactics adopted by the gossip writers, who attended events merely in order to pass on any revealing details and tittle-tattle they had picked up to their eager readers.72 The protests were to no avail for the social columns were too popular.
In the interim the traditional Courts began to be held once more from 1920, although initially they were ‘shorn in some small measure’ of their previous magnificence by the decision not to permit the wearing of feathers and a full Court train.73 Not until 1922 did the ostrich-feather headdress and the train again make an appearance, and even then they were somewhat modified in that the length of the train was reduced, and to meet the changing fashion for shorter skirts, the floor-length gowns of pre-war days were no longer the norm.
It was, however, part of the strict Court protocol that divorcées were excluded. Hence a divorced mother could not present her daughter, but must find a friend who would perform the service for her. Loelia Ponsonby, whose own presentation at Court was delayed until 1925, even though she had ‘come out’ six years before, remembered her mother also sponsoring another debutante whose mother had been divorced. As a token of gratitude, the mother provided Loelia with a dress from the famous French designer, Patou. Unfortunately, despite its high cost, it proved a disappointment. Since she was unable to return to Paris to have a fitting, it was ‘a shocking fit’. Later, when worn as an ordinary dance frock, she thought it looked hideous.74
The second wife of the 9th Duke of Marlborough was affected by this ‘no divorce’ rule even though she had not been married before. But the duke had. The fact that she had been his mistress before they married perhaps further blighted her prospects. Consequently, when he asked his cousin, the Duchess of Devonshire, who was Queen Mary’s Mistress of the Robes, to make the presentation, she promptly refused: ‘Oh, no …. I really couldn’t go that far.’ Eventually, almost two years after the marriage, he prevailed on Lady Birkenhead to make the presentation. But the duchess remained very much on the fringes of society both in Oxfordshire and in London. As she noted in her diary, she had not been invited to a garden party at Buckingham Palace because ‘H.M. … [was] terrified of articles published re divorced men’s wives going to court!!!’75 Yet the prohibition does not seem to have been universally applied since Lady Astor, who had been divorced many years before in the United States, was able to sponsor not only her own daughter, Wissie, on 8 May 1928, but two other ladies as well. All were instructed to wear ‘Court Dress with feathers and trains’.76
Soon after receiving the invitation for herself and Wissie to attend the Court, Lady Astor and her daughter went to Paris to order a new wardrobe. Unlike Loelia Ponsonby, when some of the clothes proved unsatisfactory, Lady Astor soon complained. Thus a dress ordered from the famous couturier Molyneux for Wissie was condemned as ‘colourless’ and ill fitting. ‘Lady Astor wonders if you would be willing to take this back’, wrote her private secretary to the fashion house. That Molyneux agreed to do. In addition he was to provide ‘an interlining’ for a navy blue coat Lady Astor had ordered for herself. Their Court dresses were ordered from Madame Louiseboulanger, another couturier, and cost around 3,000 francs each.77
In addition to acquiring a new wardrobe, there was Wissie’s coming out ball to arrange, with hundreds of guests to invite and the celebrated Ambrose and his orchestra to provide the music. It proved ‘a great success’, but for Lady Astor, the numerous social occasions on which she must chaperone her daughter, combined with her parliamentary duties, put her under a good deal of pressure. As she confessed ruefully to one friend: ‘Life is a changed thing for me since my daughter is out.’78
Clementine Churchill, too, found chaperoning her debutante daughters tedious. That was not merely because of what her youngest daughter has called her ‘un-social nature and early-to-bed habits’, but through her contacts with fellow mothers. ‘They are really rather a depressing back-biting tribe & I have to sit for hours with them…’, she confessed. ‘I’m thinking of taking a cookery book to Balls. I could be hunting up tasty dishes … to try, instead of listening to their gossip.’79
For non-debutantes, on the other hand, the many social events associated with the London Season offered opportunities for marital infidelities, for those so inclined. That was true of Lady Edwina Mountbatten and her friend, Jean Norton, who had become the close companion of the newspaper tycoon Lord Beaverbrook. Edwina, bored by her husband’s frequent absences on naval duties and seemingly by his lack of expertise as a lover, by the mid-1920s was beginning to seek sexual satisfaction elsewhere. One of her biographers claims that by this date her ‘promiscuity was legendary among her friends and acquaintances, to whom moral discipline was foreign anyway.’80
Edwina’s first serious relationship seems to have been with a long-standing friend, Hugh Molyneux, but when in October 1925 he left England for India, a replacement was readily found. He was Laddie Sanford, a wealthy American polo player and man-about-town who was regarded as a ‘bounder’ by many male members of London society. He was said to know ‘every demi-mondaine in London’. Edwina’s affair with Laddie lasted for some years, but she also became involved with Mike Wardell, manager of the Evening Standard, a good-looking member of the Beaverbrook circle. It was in these circumstances that her cousin, Marjorie, described ironically how a servant at her London home, Brook House, announced that he had shown Lord Molyneux to the morning room and Mr Sanford to the library, ‘but where should I put the other gentleman?’81 When Dickie Mountbatten learned of Edwina’s infidelities he was bitterly hurt and shocked, but ultimately he reluctantly accepted the situation. After all an open scandal and marital break-up would not only have been humiliating for him but would have seriously damaged his naval career and perhaps his connections with his royal relations. As Edwina’s sister declared, when attempting to defend her promiscuity, both girls had been ‘brought up to consider the media, … and only a tight little coterie knew if there was a love relationship between individuals.’82
Meanwhile, if extramarital affairs were largely hidden from public view in the 1920s, except for those in the know, they did not impinge on the lives of the debutantes in their first Season. However, in 1927 they did have a new ritual added to their presentation year, at the instigation of Lady Howard de Walden. This was the introduction of Queen Charlotte’s Ball. The innovation apparently arose from Lady Howard de Walden’s post-1918 interest in London’s maternity hospitals, of which there were seemingly only two in London at that time. Queen Charlotte’s concentrated on catering for unmarried mothers, who were given priority over others when having their first child. However, the facilities available were sadly deficient. A large new hospital was needed and Lady Howard de Walden set about raising the necessary funds by holding concerts and dinners, but most of all by inaugurating Queen Charlotte’s Birthday Ball. This was held on the first Tuesday in May and, under her presidency, it quickly became established as part of the Season’s traditions. A card issued for the ball pointed out that Queen Charlotte, the wife of King George III, had been the ‘first influential lady to take a personal, compassionate and practical’ interest in the plight of poor women, ‘ill, in childbirth, or homeless’. The ball was intended to ‘re-enact her Birthday Party, with a Birthday Cake and a Guest of Honour’ to represent the queen. To her the ‘Maids of Honour’, selected from the current year’s debutantes, made obeisance.83 All those connected with the ball gave their services free, so that Jackson’s of Piccadilly donated the giant cake, and each year a different cosmetic company provided presents for the Maids-in-Waiting, drawn from debutantes from a previous year, and the current year’s Maids of Honour. The ‘Guards of Honour were the favoured girls who actually dragged the cake into the ballroom’. The morning of the great day was spent in rehearsing the ceremonial under Lady Howard de Walden’s critical eye. As Angela Lambert comments, if ‘228 girls [were] to sweep in pairs down two staircases and curtsey in twos to the Guest of Honour and a cake, it [had] to be done wi
th military precision, otherwise laughter … could ruin the effect’.84 The cake was decorated with candles representing the number of years since Queen Charlotte’s birth. By the end of the decade, therefore, Queen Charlotte’s Ball had been accepted as an integral part of the process of ‘coming out’.
Leading London Hostesses
Among other changing aspects of the London social scene during the 1920s was the emergence of a new kind of ‘High Society’ hostess, ambitious to make her mark, and sometimes of American origin. Before the First World War it had been the wives of the great aristocratic families, like the Cecils and the Greys, who had ruled society. Grand hostesses of this kind had entertained as naturally as they breathed, for it was part of the tradition in which they had grown up. Many exercised political influence, too, at a time when females were without the parliamentary vote, through the opportunities they gave Party leaders to meet together at the dinners and weekend gatherings they organised. However, following the economic upheavals after the First World War that situation changed. Town mansions were sold along with some country estates, and as incomes declined so the authority wielded by the nobility and gentry waned. Many families played a very limited role in the London Season itself, perhaps renting a property for a brief period or making a special effort when a daughter was to be presented at Court, as happened in the case of Daphne Vivian’s Cornish family. In 1933 Patrick Balfour lamented the fact that ‘the pageantry of the aristocracy itself [was] no more’. Even the great houses – Devonshire, Grosvenor, Dorchester and the rest – where they had once resided, had gone ‘and with them the principle of large-scale formal entertaining for which they stood’.85 A few years earlier Lady Milner had similarly noted with regret that the ‘Great Hostess’ had ‘passed with the great House’.
