August 10th 1939.

Dear Daddy

We had a most satisfactory visit to Forde Abbey on Tuesday. In the morning the Collingwood’s took Cyril and Michael to Crewkerne to do some shopping and I was left to my own devices, I walked up to Odcombe to see a wren’s nest I had discovered last week. The two hungry babies that I saw last week were fully fledged and fluttering round. I rescued one which fell on his back and put him back into the nest; he did not seem hurt.

We did not get to Forde until 4:30 as Mrs Clive had forgotten that she had invited some people to lunch and could not get rid of them very early. Of course there were several people there as usual. General Snow (Cousin Tom) in an invalid chair and a Sister of Mercy who was his eldest daughter, several grey-haired ladies and one or two younger ones. Geoffrey (Mrs Roper’s eldest and only surviving son, hair to the property) is a very charming man, but considerably aged. He cannot spare much time for social life. He has to be up at 5 a.m. and works very hard indeed. I think the estate is a very great responsibility. Mrs Clive says there is not much money there, and he is giving up his chickens and running a nursery. He markets the fruit and vegetables. The fruit is lovely. There are rows of greenhouses (as Michael says) “just like Kew Gardens”. We even found an orange tree with quite a lot of ripe looking fruit but its purpose was decorative only, of course not commercial.

The lawns, lakes and flowers gardens are exquisite but I did not see much of them. Miss Marsh wanted to hear all the news so I sat and talked to her most of the time while Cyril and Michael went with Geoffrey to introduce queen bee into the hive. She had just arrived by post in a wooden box sealed at one end with sugar and with a little netting window at the other. The other bees eat off the sugar door and release her. This was all very interesting and I was sorry to miss it. Geoffrey lit up a smoke box, and by pumping bellows he blew smoke at the bees to dope them. He had to brush several stings out of his hands when he had finished handling the hive, in spite of the smoke, and Cyril said that the black retriever “Jackdaw” yelped as if he had been stung too.

After that they went to see the wire enclosure where the cattle graze. The park land or meadow whatever it is, is so big that they have a wire enclosure which they move about as required. Wire alone will not keep the cattle in, however, as they will push through or under it, but Geoffrey has introduced an idea from America which soon teaches them to keep clear of it altogether. The wire is charged with electricity, not enough to hurt them but enough to startle anyone who touches it. Michael was most impressed and kept pretending to be a cow and getting a shock.

I met Diana (i.e. Mrs Geoffrey Roper who had the bad motor accident two years ago) again, of course, and the two little boys, who are very sweet. Very pretty children both of them, and the family are expected to be increased shortly. Young Mark had a plaster on his forehead as he had tumbled off the donkey and hit a stone. His father says that John (the younger, aged 2½) shows signs of being the more capable rider of the two. He is really beautiful though still in petticoats and rather “coy” with strangers.

Mrs Clive and Mrs Roper dashed about the garden with a trowel, admiring and gloating respectively over rare trifles of vegetation. Part of the time Cyril and I followed to carry Mrs Clive’s loot. She says she hates to visit a garden and go away empty handed – a thing which she admits that she very rarely does. Little scraps grown from seeds sent from all over the world were carefully uprooted and wrapped in newspaper. Other little morsels in pots (destined to become large trees at some very remote future date) were collected from frames and handed over to Cyril, Mrs Roper meanwhile enlarging on the beauty that each would ultimately achieve, and Mrs Clive gloating with enthusiasm and beaming with joy as her pile of spoil grew larger.
A most satisfactory visit all round, as we discovered when on the way home Mrs Clive espied a large newspaper parcel by her chauffeur’s feet.
“Trask, what is your loot?”
“Pardon? Madam.”
“I see you have managed to get some loot as well. What is it?”
“Oh! That, Madam, carnations, Madam, they was being thrown away”
“Thrown away? What for? Why should anyone throw away perfectly
good carnations, Trask?”
“I dun’no, Madam – too many of one colour I expect, Madam, and as they was being thrown away, I thought they might as well be thrown to Odcombe, Madam.”
“Quite right, Trask. Quite right.”

Yesterday Mrs Clive went to Taunton and asked if we’d like to go with her and call on Mrs Brain, while she went to a meeting. But we thought that visiting two days running would be too much strain especially for Michael so we turned it down and went walking instead. She did intend spending the day in Taunton, the morning on the bench (i.e. the bench of magistrates, of whom Mrs Clive is one) and the afternoon at this business meeting. But on ordering her car the great Trask informed her that she was not due on the bench that day at all. It was last Wednesday when she had gone to London for the day on business, and next Wednesday when she had invited 300 people to tea in her garden!

As a gardener she is great, but at keeping appointments she does not seem to shine. But she is so nice. We went to Ham Hill today in the wind and rain. Michael has been waiting for two years to repeat his first visit there. Every day we have told him to wait until we had better weather for the view, but we dared delay no longer. Mrs Clive was sending Trask to Yeovil to meet a train and bring back a visitor to tea and to spend the night. She ordered him to take us to Ham Hill on the way (it lies in the opposite direction) and to pick us up and bring us home on the way back!

Cedric Collingwood has been working on the farm all this week as the farmer is short-handed and as his family all went to Cornwall for the day leaving here at 8 o’clock, we had him to dinner and took tea out to him in the fields after we returned from Ham Hill. It has poured pretty well all day, so he was glad of it. He is a very shy solitary sort of young man, but very pleasant. Aunt Amy would love him, he has a wild poetic sort of look. A student of nature and with deep firm views on subjects like peace and war, which have to be wrung from him, as he rarely volunteers a remark.

Yesterday evening we had Malcolm Grey down to supper again, and fed him and filled his pockets with refreshment for the morrow. He has settled down well, and although still under canvass, and still wet and underfed and worked until he is fit to drop from 6 a.m. until 6:30 p.m., he seems on the whole happy. This will be my last letter from here as we return home on Saturday morning with a firm resolve to return next year.

Tomorrow, if it is not too far away, we want to see the sheep dipped. We met 70 on their way back today. Those lovely horned Dorset sheep which look so Biblical and we watched the shepherd catch one with his crook, aided by his dog, and anoint and bind up a sore ear. He said there were 300 more waiting to be dipped, and we thought it would be interesting to see if we can manage it.

The hay crops around here have never been cut and will now be no use as hay even if they do get some sun. The wheat is ready for cutting but is waiting for the rain to stop, and all the farmers are in despair. They fear the stock will starve through the winter.

Your loving daughter

Veronica

Tuesday 4th August 1939

Dear Daddy,

I am afraid I did not have time to continue this yesterday as we had a glorious day and were in the garden until dusk, and then played paper games and lexicon with the Collingwood party until 11 o’clock. Michael and all the other children went to tea at the farm, so we had an afternoon entirely free from worry.

Your letter which arrived yesterday morning quite disturbed me. Please do not worry about the bathing pool. Only people who can swim are able to leave the wooden step ladder, and no one except a very keen expert would want to bathe alone. Mrs Clive herself is an excellent swimmer and life saver. All the grown-ups are swimmers and the children never go near the place alone. Also the weather is not bright enough to make the idea attractive.

I have a chance to catch the post, so good bye and don’t worry.

Your loving daughter

Veronica

Monday, August 7th 1939.

Dear Daddy,

We have been exploring the country side in spite of the wet, since I last wrote.
Brympton is a tremendous place still, in spite of sales and bad times. You have to walk a long way to get away from it. The “abominable” aeroplane factory is just outside the border in the Yeovil direction and it is separated from Montacute by a tiny village called Lufton. This village has a church, an enormous vicarage, but no vicar, and a population of 21. Our parson takes charge of Brympton church, Lufton and Odcombe. Lufton Manor belongs to a cousin.

We have had another cricket Sunday. Cyril and Mrs Clive were once again the choir as all the maids were busy preparing for the lunch and tea for the cricketers.

Mr Lawrence Collingwood was the organist as the “regular” was missing for some reason or another, and Mr Braithwaite sat with his children and helped his little son to read the hymns. Michael of course was quite at home even during the sermon. Young Mrs Nicholas sat alone in the family pew while her husband was playing cricket. He really is an enormous man and exactly like his bull dog. They have the same walk exactly.

After church we watched the cricket a bit. Mrs Collingwood and her son and elder daughter did not go to church. I don’t know why. Mrs Collingwood knows nothing at all about cricket and made the most amusing remarks. She thought it such a shame to make “the poor young men run so hard”, and also said it seemed a very sad sort of game because “the poor young men always seemed to stand about with bowed heads”.

Mrs Roper came over after lunch with Geoffrey and some friends so I did not stay to watch the cricket but entertained her in the house and garden. We hope to go to Forde Abbey on Tuesday. Mrs Clive has some very special breed of ducks which she introduced on to her lake for decorative purposes. They are white with grey speckles and look very nice. However, they are spoiling her island which she has been making in the centre of the lake, so she is now gradually eating them all, as she had decided that she hates ducks in gardens.

The island is rather a pet of hers. She started it in the first place to get rid of surplus mud from the lake sides and bottom. Then she realised the decorative possibilities and got keen about it. Stone sides were placed to make the island keep shape, but whenever she got it just right the stones slid out and “the island was sick all over the lake”, as she expressed it. Then wire was fixed round the stones and the wretched island took to itself the shape of a large match box. She was in despair. However, it is now a nice irregular shape and covered with flowers.

One Bank Holiday, when all the gardeners were off for the day, she decided that it was a good time to attend to the island. She put on a bathing-dress and rowed across to get on with her work. She was well into it, mud and all, when to her HORROR she saw some strange people wandering in her garden and picking her lovely delphiniums. Even she was unable to cope with the situation, clad in a bathing suit, standing in the mud and cut off from the main land, she could not give chase. She stood up and shouted at them as hard as she could. They said something about thinking the flowers were growing wild (which was utter nonsense) and departed.

By the way, we have discovered that Miss Collingwood’s name is Mariana and her brother is Cedric. He is 20, studies forestry or something of that sort and is a conscientious objector to military service. He has to appear before the tribunal next month. Nice names, are they not? Mariana, Cedric and Francesca.

Michael has been playing in the old Ballroom most of the afternoon with the other children. They have a grand time together. They had a concert without audience. Michael played an organ he found there. He tells me “it had lots of little knobs, and made a noise but no tune.”

Georgina Clive-Ponsonby-Fane, the heiress, aged 2½ is a very sweet little person, dainty and very good looking, with a charming and most polite way of speaking. She is named after the lady through whom the estate came to the Ponsonbys – Georgina Fane, Duchess of Westmorland. Some great artist painted a beautiful portrait of her as a child among the crags and hills of Westmorland (or so I presume – any way crags and hills). It really is a lovely picture. Two original sketches hang in the house; the painted portrait hands in the Tate Gallery.

I went over the house today with Mrs Roper. Mrs Clive really does not do the place justice inside. Scarcely any of the rooms are used, and those that aren’t are crowded with furniture and treasures. Not half of them can be properly seen. Even the pictures are not seen to advantage. It is a great pity, but when Montacute was sold Mrs Clive brought numbers of pictures and treasures from her Aunt’s house to her own. I think that is what causes the congestion. Forde Abbey, on the other hand, looks so fresh and inhabitable. Mrs Clive always lives in the garden. She usually eats in the garden too, when it is fairly fine, so she only has to go in to write her letters and sleep.

I must go to bed, I’ll continue tomorrow.

Your loving daughter,

Veronica

Thursday, August 3rd 1939

Dear Daddy,

I think I told you all the news up to Sunday.

I’ll report for Michael first. He has a wonderful time in the farm most of the mornings playing in the barns and hay-lofts when it is showery, and the children have built a beautiful Peter Pan house in the woods. It holds five of them and is furnished with boxes for seats and table and has a first rate fire-place covered with an iron grating to hold the pots and pans and is finished off with an iron pipe chimney and a coal chute and larder. A garden has been plotted out around it and they have a clothes line and garden gate, the whole thing being completely screened on all sides by trees and shrubbery. Yesterday they cooked their “dinner” there – soup made out of potatoes and carrots; stewed plums; baked apples. What a game!

Apart from falling into the pig wash he has had no mishap up to date. We have been swimming in the little swimming pool and rowing on the lake, and on Tuesday we spent the day at Weymouth, having a bread and cheese lunch at an inn en route and tea at Sherborne on the way home.
We only had time for a mere glance at the Abbey and School which was a great pity as the Abbey especially was lovely. However, I bought a guide book for myself and you!

Another church we inspected was the parish church of West Coker, a village very near here, about two miles across the fields, I should think. It was most surprising. Very beautiful of course, but what amazed me was the Lady, Altar and Lady Chapel. So very definitely not just a place where “ladies may sit”. The altar was all blue and had an odd sort of frontal decorated with four circles and wings and eyes. The four circles interlaced . Each had four wings at regular intervals on the circumference and human eyes in between the wings embroidered on the gold circumference. Presumably a representation of the four Beasts (?) but there were no heads. What do you think? (I imagine that this was an attempt to represent the Seraphim as described in Ezekiel 1: 15-21). The reredos was blue and in the centre was a representation of Our Lady holding the Holy Child and standing on a crescent moon. All is done in bas-relief and coloured. Each side were similar representations of the Annunciation and Visitation. All most unusual, I thought for the country at any rate round here.

While we were at Weymouth Mr Millar called. I was so sorry we missed him, but we are going to try to return his visit if we get the chance. Ilminster is 11 miles away, I believe. If we get the car again it will be easy, but we may have to get a bus from Yeovil which is not so good when we have Michael with us as there is bound to be a lot of walking as well.

Yesterday we entertained Malcolm Grey to supper. He came over from the camp about 7:30 and we fed him with sausages, bacon and kidneys, apple pie and blancmange. He is not getting a lot to eat in camp and he was glad of the meal. The left-over sausages we spread with mustard and salt and wrapped up for an early morning snack. Cyril also gave him some cake and biscuits and fruit in his various pockets to keep him going. He seemed very happy to have the chance of a change as usually he stays in camp too tired to go as far as Yeovil (three miles away) when there is nothing to do there but walk about. Next weekend he hopes for weekend leave and will go back to Fulham. He says 120 boys have been sent to Plymouth with pneumonia so far. Now that the weather is improving they hope that that is the lot. They are still under canvas but the next lot will have huts.

Michael and I had a dip this afternoon. He has to stand on the steps all the time as the water is much too deep for him to stand. I must say I feel a bit doubtful about it as the weeds cling to your legs as you swim and the sides of the “bath” are overgrown with brambles and nettles. Most “unsporting” of Mrs Clive, we told her, as one must simply sink or swim once the steps are left behind.

We hope that a visit to Forde Abbey will be arranged for us. Mrs Clive asked if we’d like to visit Mrs Brain as well, but our holiday is too short for much visiting, and Michael would get bored and I don’t like to leave him to the mercy of the farm boys. Mrs Clive herself loathes visiting unless it is to a very great friend like Mrs Roper, and she is a very vague person about time.

We hear amusing stories about her sometimes. She once had a very unwelcome duty visit to make. It was a tea engagement to return to some new comer in the district. She ordered the car for 4 o’clock when she gave her orders in the morning, and then went off to spend her day in the garden. Coming out of the Priest-house (which is now a sort of store house and museum) about 4:20 in the afternoon she was surprised to see the chauffeur and car drawn up.
“Why have you got the car out, Trask?” she asked.
“You ordered the car for 4 o’clock, Ma’am” he told her.
“Did I?” she said. “Why did I do that now?”
“You were going out to tea, Ma’am, and I was to get you there by 4:15.”
“Was I? Oh yes – what a nuisance, I had quite forgotten.”

With that she put down her basket, drew off her gloves, and got into the car. She poked the wisps of hair into her hat, looked at her hands, wiped them on her stockings, took off her shoes one by one and tipped the mould and dust out into the car and put them on again. “I suppose I look fairly presentable for tea, don’t I, Trask?” she asks, and off she goes. Greeted by her friends at the door, she apologised profusely, and explained that “some wretched people called to be shown over the house and she could not possibly get rid of them – had to push them out in the end!”

Another time she had a luncheon engagement for 1:30 about 60 miles away. She asked how long it would take, and the chauffeur said two hours, and should he have the car round by 11:30? “Nonsense” she said. “I can’t possibly leave the garden all day like that, I’ve so much to do. I’m sure twelve will be soon enough.” So at about 12:15 she set off. At 1 o’clock they were still miles from their destination, and she said – “I’m going to be late, Trask. You must stop at a phone somewhere, and I must phone up. I don’t know what I can say. Something must have gone wrong with the car. What sort of things do go wrong with cars?”
“Well, Ma’am” said the faithful chauffeur, “there is always the ignition.” “Ignition” she replied, “What’s that? How long does it take to put right?” “That’s all according” he explained, and went into a few technical details. “Oh all right, that’ll do. Stop at the next phone.” She said. When they arrived at the lunch engagement nearly half an hour late, the chauffeur was asked by his comrades below stairs how the car was? Had he had much trouble &c putting it right? And the trusty fellow replied that the car was now running beautifully.

I can’t vouch for the truth of these stories, but they are so like her (and “Lord Emsworth” One of the characters in the stories of P.G. Wodehouse) that I am sure there must be more than a little foundation for them, and any way they do make good stories, don’t they?

I must finish now, as it is really late, and one of the lamps has burnt out already.

Your loving daughter,

Veronica

Monday, July 31st 1939.

Dear Daddy,

We left home at 8 o’clock and were in good time for out train at Waterloo. It was a good thing that we had reserved seats, as the train was packed to overflowing with holiday people and crowds of workmen. Carpenters and plumbers are being sent by the hundred from London to the Militia camps which you probably know are knee-deep with mud, and most unhealthy places to live in.

Malcolm Grey is in camp quite near here. They are still under canvas, and although it is drying up a little now, the mud has really been knee-deep, and the boys have had to sleep on straw surrounded by mud and water. They have no facilities for drying their clothes or their bedding, and a few have had to be sent away with rheumatism and pneumonia. Wooden huts and concrete roads are being constructed as quickly as possible and adequate drainage is being arranged. It should all have been done of course before the boys were called up, but the Government could not foresee the weather which has been worse in Somerset apparently then elsewhere. Last Friday they had four cloud-bursts!

We hope to be able to see Malcolm and to give him a decent meal while we are here. Well to go back a bit. Trask, the chauffeur, met us with the same old car – it looks even more like a drawing of Heath-Robinson than ever.

Mrs Clive was hovering in the garden to greet us. She has not altered. Her black dress was hiked up nearly to the knees, because of the weather I suppose, and about four inches of black bloomers appeared beneath, which, strapped below the knees, seemed to keep up (most inadequately) her concertina stockings. She escorted us to our temporary home, “Blacktops”, (named after the bailiff who lived there in her grandfather’s time); then she left us to our own devices.

Our home is reached by a flight of outside stone steps; the front door opening off a little stone platform leads into a passage. Three bedrooms lead off this passage, only two of which we require. These are both panelled and painted duck egg green, with plain dark wooden floors and rush mats. There is a connecting door as well as a door from each room on to the passage. The windows with iron bars and leaded panes are set in stone frames and have deep window seats. Continuing down the passage we come to a sort of drawing room, which is not yet fully furnished. It is panelled and painted in two shades of pink with a few mirrors let into the walls. The floor is plain dark stained wood and the furniture consists simply of a couch in the window, covered with calendared pink flowered chintz, a writing table and a chair. You cross this room to another door, go down one step and enter the kitchen-living-room. This is a bright room with windows on sides, linoleum covered floor very pale pink, white-washed walls and light green paint. There is an enormous (green) chintz-covered couch in one window, two large easy chairs and a small “Michael-sized” one. A large oval dining table and chairs, a green painted dresser and cupboards – sink and kitchen table &c in one corner and fire place in another. Green rush mats on the floor. All the furniture is old fashioned, slightly shabby, and very comfortable.

Right opposite the door from the “drawing room” into the kitchen is yet another door, leading into a passage whence one reaches the bathroom and usual offices combined, also airing cupboards and meat safe. The passage ends in a door bolted on both sides which divides us from our next door neighbours who are occupying the “farm” which we had last time we came. The beds are marvellously comfortable and warm.

Our neighbours are a large party consisting of Mr Collingwood (Sadlers Wells Conductor), Mrs Collingwood (a Russian) a tall good looking daughter about 20 whose name I have not heard, and a tall good looking foreign sort of son whose name I have not heard. His age might be 16 or 23 or anything between. I imagine he is under 20 but his face conveys nothing as to his age. His hair is rather long and he wears shorts and sandals and has been on a holiday already for a fortnight. Then there is another child, a little fair haired daughter of eight years old named “Francesca” and a Belgian governess about the same age as the tall daughter. That completes the Collingwood family, but they have a car of their own and have kept themselves to themselves so far.

With them however is another little party of friends. They live together, but do not necessarily go about together all day long. These consist of Mr Warwick Braithwaite (another conductor) who wears a fine black beard like Henry Wood’s, his daughter Barbara aged about twelve and his son Roderick aged seven. Mr Braithwaite seems far more human than Mr Collingwood, though they all seem nice people. Mr Collingwood walks about with a little black beret on his head smoking a pipe. He and Mr Braithwaite sometimes stroll together with bent heads, slowly pacing round the lake, and we imagine they discuss counterpoint and things like that. The older Collingwood’s and the Belgian girl we scarcely see and Mrs Collingwood seems to be occupied indoors most of the time.

The children all play together in the farm yard next door with the farmer’s two boys and a girl. The farm yard is filthy. One side of the cow sheds is so muddy that it reaches the top of Michael’s gum boots. However, the children all wearing gum boots and old clothes play in and out of the mud and sheds and hay lofts and barns and orchard. Michael adores it. He has already tried to milk a cow with some degree of success but no idea of direction. He got the milk all over himself! The farm boys have a grand time pulling his leg. I went out to fetch him for dinner and found him marooned in a hay loft with no ladder to get down, under the impression that the bull was loose. The farm boys were round the corner shouting and crying to give a realistic effect to their story.

He had been picking and eating green apples and doing everything that children always do on a farm. Unfortunately he is making every effort to acquire a Somerset accent and he lies in bed practising it. “Have a shut lud” is what the boy said when he asked Michael to have a shot at milking the “coo”.

On Sunday we went to Matins, the only morning service. The little Braithwaite’s and Francesca Collingwood went on their own with the farmer’s small daughter. Cyril and Mrs Clive formed the choir as the maids were all busy preparing for “young Mr Nicholas’s” cricket party which started at 11:30. Nicholas was not in Church as his guests were arriving. That was the second of his parties and he has another next Sunday.

A pitch has been prepared where his father and great-grandfather used to hold their cricket weeks. A marquee is erected and a large coke stove for boiling kettles &c and two barrels of beer.

He has a team of his friends and neighbours, brings his own team and as many of their relations and friends as care to come. An amusing crowd to watch (as we were invited to do) containing many a “Bertie Wooster” and “Bingo Little” (Characters in the novels of P.G. Wodehouse). We watched most of the afternoon but Michael and the Collingwood’s retired early to play in the farm, and the Collingwood’s only showed up for a few minutes just before tea. The Braithwaite children were in the farm playing cricket with Michael and the farm boys. We all met in the tent for tea, however, and a very nice tea it was.

Nicholas Ponsonby-Fane is fatter than ever and enjoys his cricket to be full. He hit an enormous swipe first ball and was out second ball through a catch. As he lumbered to the pavilion afterwards his wife (Petronella) called to him “Darling, we are not impressed”, but he was shaking with laughter. He walks just like his dog Solomon (a bulldog of sweet disposition) only not so elegant. Solomon insisted on a deck chair from which to watch his master’s game. He is a lovely dag, so gentle and affectionate and so ferocious looking.

The little daughter, Georgina, (now about 2½) has not yet appeared. She stays at Salisbury where the young Ponsonby-Fanes made their home when they were first married. They will not come to live at Brympton in Mrs Clive’s lifetime but are frequent visitors.

Mrs Clive was (I believe) born here. Any way she spent all her childhood here except for visits of long duration to her aunt at Montacute House about three miles away. All her girlhood was spent here with her grandfather and she always refused to go to their London house. When she married Captain Clive she still lived here (her own father only enjoyed ownership for about six months). When she was widowed she still lived here. Her brother lived mostly in London and Japan, and they were apparently joint-heirs. Anyway Brympton is her whole world and although not so big an estate as it was, still stretches for miles in all directions. I do not know how many farms and cottages are on the estate but most of our walks seem to be on Brympton land. The militia Camp is a great grief to her. It stands on land that years ago was sold to a farmer. He made a lot of money out of a deal with the Government who have proceeded to make a very ugly blot on the landscape which is visible for miles because it is on a hill. To add to Mrs Clive’s trials Westland Aeroplane factories have opened up about three or four miles away, and planes have the audacity to fly over her land. How she does loathe it!

Your loving daughter,

Veronica

Sunday Aug. 1st 1937.

Dear Daddy,

Here we are after a journey of nearly four hours!! I suppose it was on account of the holiday that the trains were so bad yesterday, but I understand that it is never easy to travel from Yeovil to Bath.

The Garden Party was a great success, and Mrs Clive was so pleased when it was over. She says she can work in the garden from dawn until dark without feeling tired, but being sociable just leaves her whacked. She looked very fine in a black net frock edged with white ruffs at the wrists and neck, and reaching to the ground. Mimsie said “Mrs Clive’s frock is a scream. I’m sure she gets her clothes out of a rag bag. It must be at least 100 years old, in fact I’m sure now I look at it more carefully, and that it the self-same dress she wore last year”. As a matter of fact I thought she looked very nice, but not at all dressy like her guests.

Mim was very sweet to me – in fact made use of my arm the whole afternoon. She said nice things about Michael, and told me about the Christening. She has not changed much, but told me that I had. I told her that one does change between the ages of 12 and 31. However, I gather that I have improved as she asked me to write to her and give my address. I had very little chance to speak to Mrs Roper, who, poor soul is in bad trouble again.

Her daughter-in-law, Diana, was involved in a bad car smash outside Bridport the day before. She was with her own mother and baby. I do not know what happened but the baby is safe, though poor Diana lies seriously injured in Bridport Hospital. Her arm is so badly injured that they cannot say for some weeks whether or not they can save it. Only the bare bone is left – all the muscle and flesh has been torn away. She went under the car and was dragged along. The poor girl is under morphia all the time and Geoffrey is frantic of course. They can do nothing but wait. Poor Mrs Roper! She adores Diana. She was nearly in tears when she told me, and she was only at the party because she had promised to bring friends and she could do nothing if she stayed at home. Mrs Clive, who has implicit faith in the curse (i.e. the “Curse of the Abbeys”, Mrs Roper having inherited Forde Abbey from an uncle), said to me – “Of course it was meant for the baby”. I gathered that it was in saving her baby that she got injured, but I could not ask the poor soul any questions and Mrs Clive scarcely saw her as there were over 130 guests to be attended to.

Your loving daughter,

Veronica

Thursday, July 29, 1937.

Dear Daddy,

We don’t go to Monkton until Saturday, and we hope to remain there for a week. Tomorrow I shall have no time to write, as there is a Garden Party! I gather that we are included in the function, as Mrs C. tells me I will have the chance to meet Mrs Roper again. And who else do you think is coming? Mimsie!! (Mrs Brain of Canonsgrove, Taunton) and a Mrs Bob Hole and daughter.

Forde Abbey defies amateur description. It is magnificent outside and in, and the gardens are superb – what we saw of them. Nearly all ceilings are figured all over – most elaborate – the furnishings are Chippendale and that sort of thing. Indigo Jones converted the Abbey into a dwelling house.

To start with we were staggered to be met at the drive gates by a running footman in livery, who directed us to another gate as the main gate was undergoing repairs. Cyril paled, and said he felt frozen all over!! But Mrs Roper is so homely and sweet that you just accept the place as her setting, and forget the grandness of solid silver tea trays and what not brought in by the footman.

We had tea in a colossal hall, the enormous fireplace laid with a fire ready to light and topped with logs 2 ft. long – no nearer 3 ft. long, I should say. The tapestries Miss Marsh showed us were such that even I could see the beauty in them. One set “The Triumphs of Charlemagne”, are believed to have belonged to Charles I. It is known that he possessed such a set, and when the Commonwealth began the chap living at Forde Abbey was the man who had the job of disposing of the King’s personal effects &c. Whether he acquired this priceless set of tapestries like Jack Horner’s plum, no one knows – but of course he may have paid a good price for them. Another set of tapestries – all biblical in subject, and still of vivid and beautiful colouring – hangs in the salon, and cover the walls completely. These were made by imported Brussels craftsmen for Charles II, and it was his wish that English people should learn the craft from them. And the Duke of Devonshire (?) had a set, and the Duke of Buccleuch had a set which he lent to furnish the Annex at Westminster Abbey for the Coronation. But they are not considered as fine as those at Forde, and so are assumed to be copies. Queen Anne gave them to one of her gentlemen at court, by the name of – I forgot. He was some sort of official and was highly valued by her, but as he had no son she permitted him to leave them to his son-in-law, Gwyn, who lived at the Abbey after him. Sir Edmund Prideaux was one of the earliest, if not the first who lived there, and his coat of arms ornaments the ceiling of this salon.

The Abbey Church was utterly demolished, but the old Chapter House makes a lovely little chapel. The Vicar of the parish (two miles away) takes a service there once a month, but if they have a clerical visitor of course they have a Celebration every Sunday. Mrs Roper’s cousin, the Bishop of Ottawa (I believe) stayed a long time with her recently, and another episcopal visitor was there when we went over, the Bishop of Arizona. Miss Marsh has promised me some cards of the place. She is such a dear.
At the foot of the huge staircase was a pair of solid oak gates – “Dog –doors”, to prevent the dogs from going upstairs – in the olden days, not used now. The last Abbot was named Forde.
Michael spent the afternoon with Mark and his nurse and baby brother in a sort of summer house hidden away down the gardens and flanked by a sand pit and spades &c where he had a picnic tea. I did not meet Geoffrey, but his wife was very nice. Cyril is champing at the bit and wants me to go out.
I’ve just time to tell you that I have verified a little more of Mrs C’s lineage. Two of her great grandfathers were the Duke of Westmorland and the Duke of Bessborough. Mr Nicholas has arrived for the Garden Party with Solomon, but I don’t know whether the entire family came as well.
We have been to Lyme Regis for the day today – complete with car and chauffeur, while Mrs C, got on with her gardening as usual. She does what she can to amuse her guests, but does not try to be “social”. She’ll talk if you can find her in a clump of flowers somewhere, but you must search for her if you want her.
P.S. Apropos of the big tapestries in Forde Abbey salon. I forgot to mention that the Pope has a set at the Vatican – but even they are not as good as the Forde set. His holiness had all the high lights done in gold and silver thread, and this has tarnished and gone black. Whereas those at Forde, done in silk, are as clear as the day they were made almost.

I went out last night as requested, and Mr Nicholas collected us and insisted on taking us on the lake. The poor little boat groaned under the weight of him and his wife and Cyril and me.
They rowed in circles, got becalmed in the middle of the water lilies, played “wobbles” and “rocky-rocky” – had mud digging competitions with the oars – in fact tried everything they could think of. When we landed Mr N. insisted on getting out first – and then he pushed us off again and refused to let us land. At last he “repented”, and helped us to the landing stage, removed one oar and shot us adrift again. After a bit as it was by this time quite dark, and his wife was in evening dress and terrified of bats, he threw the oar into the pond and Cyril very cleverly got us back. Then Cyril had an idea to play croquet by torch light. This proved excellent fun and we continued until a quarter to 11. So exciting did it prove that Mrs Clive was fetched out. She was engaged in sewing her petticoat “against the Garden Party”, but left it, and appeared to our surprise in evening dress!! – black silk and long with lace sleeves. She looked very nice but gathered her skirt up and wore it as a cloak, to keep her warm. Fortunately it was too dark to see her much – but she must have looked very odd.

Your loving daughter,

Veronica

Monday Evening (July 26th)

Dear Daddy,

I have not long returned from Forde Abbey, but I do not think I can tackle a description of the most lovely spot I have ever seen tonight. It is perfect, but I’ll attempt the task another time.

Mrs Roper is topping – rather reminded me of Auntie Ger. About the same height, slight, with the same sweet patient humorous expression. Her hair is white and she wore a beautiful blue dress with a high lace collar, like the aunties used to wear years ago – and a necklace of several strands of seed pearls.

Miss Marsh is older, and was very pleasant, and showed us over part of the house. Mrs Clive honoured the occasion by putting on a different black dress – a little longer – and another black straw hat – a little newer – and a necklace of beautiful pearls. She is a character. Her amazing dry humour kept the tea table chuckling (silly expression, isn’t it?) One of her stories about herself and some people called Gibbs (one member of the family seemed to be Lord —– someone-or-another, and I wondered if they might be the tooth paste people) – Kate Gibbs and the old Lord were discussing Mrs Clive, and she calls the story (repeated to her later by another member of the family) – “The Generosity of my Friends”. Lord —–. “I shall send this little plant to Violet (Mrs C.) Kate Gibbs. “Oh no! It’s so pretty.” Lord —–. “Yes, I shall. It’s dying anyway. I shall send it”.

I am afraid this letter has grown to an alarming length, and now I have not told you about the Priest’s House. It is assured, on what evidence I know not, that this was at one time a cell of Glastonbury. It is definitely of a very early date, and contains one beautiful plaster ceiling and a gallery reached by an external spiral stone staircase. It is now used for wheel barrows, tools, carpentry, seeds, and a sort of museum of pottery, coins &c.

One extraordinary thing about this place is that nothing is ever locked up. Every door seems to be left open day and night, and all these priceless treasures just lie about anyhow, and Mrs C. practically lives in the garden. She has what she calls a “Beastly Garden Party” on Friday. She loathes Society functions.

More news later.

Your loving daughter,

Veronica

p.s Mrs Clive, although she loathed the idea of the fête and “Beastly people” overrunning her garden, nevertheless worked hard all day at it, conducting parties round the gardens and Church &c. Cyril took children for ld (1/2p) for rows on the lake. She gave a pig as a prize for skittles and provided the ice cream. It was in fact her fête. Raised £30 – £40 for the Church.

[The reference to the Priests House - our present day 'Castle House' is interesting; it is unlikely to have been a 'cell of Glastonbury' though as the building dates only from 1350!]

Monday morning (July 26th)

Dear Daddy,

I finished this letter in the dark last night but I don’t suppose you noticed any difference in the handwriting.

In bed last night I recalled a bit more. One of the rooms is papered in a heavy dark green and black paper. This is the oldest completely wall-papered room. (The oldest wall paper I mean). It was put up when the room was built nearly 300 years ago.

There is a huge portrait of Monmouth, referred to as “our duke of Monmouth” because he slept at Brympton House the night before Sedgemoor. I enquired how it was the family managed to retain the house and discovered that the owner at that time was only 8 years old.

The house came to Mrs Clive from the Westmorlands. Georgina Duchess of Westmorland left it to Mrs Clive’s grandfather, Sir Spencer Ponsonby, on condition that the name Fane (her name) was continued. I cannot remember the relationship between the two. I’ll try and find out. Mrs Clive’s father did not long survive old Sir Spencer who died aged about 95 – and so her brother, Richard Ponsonby-Fane inherited. He is a bachelor who lives mostly abroad and Nicholas is the next in succession. Mrs Clive spent her childhood here and at Montacute House about 4 miles away. Her aunt and cousins lived there – by the name of Philips. Montacute House was destroyed by fire at the end of the 16th century and rebuilt completely about 1600. It is very large and very beautiful and being the work of one period throughout has a sort of finished and planned look. The family have the original plans and the diary of the work as it progressed.

It is empty now except for a few fine portraits – but it is a glorious place and the gardens are very fine. I think I told you it belongs to the National Trust now. We hope to go there again if we have time.

Your loving daughter,

Veronica

[Veronica got the spelling of the Phelips family of Montecute slightly wrong! The Richard Ponsonby-Fane she refers to lived for most of his life in Japen, coming home to Brympton only to follow the cricket!]

Sunday July 25 1937

Dear Daddy,

I hurry to convey my impressions to paper before my visit to Forde Abbey tomorrow. If I attempt the two together I fear the result will be unintelligible.

After Church today I hung about looking at tombs &c and was greeted by the Rector who attempted to tell me something if its history. The Church is 13th century but contains no coloured glass and is built entirely of yellowish Bath stone like everything else in this district. There is really very little to interest a novice like myself. Some old figures now removed from their tombs and unnamed are preserved there – a Crusader and a lady of enormous stature wearing a wimple (?) and treading on two minute dogs.

The Church is built like a cross roughly. I have sketched this plan and labeled it A,B,C for you!
A is a sort of chapel or vestry only cut off from the chancel by an enormous old tomb highly ornamented with coats of arms in various colours and surrounded by skulls and bones. The little organ is here and stands on top of other tombs, and there is a little safe and a table all quite visible to anyone in the church. B is of course the Chancel cut off b y a stone screen. C is Mrs Clive’s chapel – no one sits in it but her family and it contains shelves for their books and a peep-hole is cut obliquely in the corner wall so that people sitting round the corner can see the chancel. The font is also in A. It used to be in the proper (or usual) spot in the West end, but the aisle was so narrow that there was not much room to pass it. A very stout old lady used always to sit at the back and always had a struggle to get round the font. Mrs Clive’s grandfather, Sir Spencer Ponsonby-Fane and the old Rector tried to make each other ask the old lady to change her pew. Neither would do so – so they moved the font!

While counting the collection the Rector handed me a fine chalice of beaten silver – and also a silver flagon – both very old and pre Charles I. He said that very few such pieces existed as Cromwell took them all. However, I hope to see more of the Church.

This evening Mrs Clive asked if we would like a “personally conducted tour of the house”. We were overjoyed, but some other people who had just arrived on a holiday kept us waiting, so we had to hurry the tour rather. Also she is quite off-hand and just rushes from picture to picture.

The front of the house is the east, and that is the oldest. The outside is early 16th century though the house itself is pre-Conquest. What used to be a courtyard is now enclosed and forms a huge entrance hall. (This was done in 15 something). A huge fire place faces the door and a hiding place can be reached by popping up the chimney and turning either right or left. The walls are hung with weapons of all kinds and ages – some old pieces of armour and mail – pewter – and a hundred and one things – like a huge museum. Everything is unlabelled. In the centre an enormous table covered with relics and curious including six black hats of Mrs Clive’s, which she uses for the garden – all in varying stages of dilapidation – also two old “leather bottles” really leather jugs which used to be used for cider.

Here the old manorial courts of justice were held – and there is a warders’ room and a room where prisoners used to await their trial.

We were rather hustled from room to room, so my impressions are rather mixed. Pictures of all the ancestors and many Kings by Vandyke, Romney, Leley (or some such name) and one of Cardinal Wolsey by a painter who began with an H. It might have been Holbein, but he may have been the man who was responsible for a room full of black and white prints. Any way the chap did one picture of Wolsey which is now used to advertise under-wear I believe, and this particular picture is remarkable because it was done when both were young men. We saw Charles I’s warming pan, Queen Elizabeth’s ivory walking stick, also one given to Queen Victoria by some Indians (also ivory) and one given by King Edward VII to Queen Victoria on occasion of her Jubilee, and given by Edward to Mrs Clive’s grandfather after the Queen died. Sir Spencer Ponsonby-Fane was 60 years at court.

In the state bedroom on the ground floor there is the most wonderful old furniture including a dressing case of gold and another of pearl. Rather funny – one of the farm men got something in his eye and someone sent to the house for an eye-bath. The only one available was made of gold and belonged to this dressing case.

Most of the best rooms are on the South side, looking over the lake. This was designed by Inigo Jones, who is also responsible for part of Forde Abbey. The walls are still covered with a sort of damask tapestry instead of wall paper. It was put there when that part was built in 16 something. Some of the rooms are hung with pictorial tapestry but the name escaped me.

The staircase is said to be the finest in the country and runs almost the length of the house as it mounts one floor. The whole place is a museum of pictures, china, glass, furniture and curious. One room containing 5 of those large windows (in the p.c. of the Indigo Jones side overlooking the lake) is full of junk at present, but used to be Nicholas’ nursery.

The other side of the house is furnished with older stuff. Some of the curtains are Jacobean embroidery – hand-embroidered in the house on linen woven in the house – and one bed is covered with a comparatively modern imitation not much more than 100 years old. The beds in some of the rooms are most elaborately carved, and pretty well everything is of interest.

Cyril took a great fancy to a pair of those fire screens that just keep the blaze off your face. They were made from the standards of George IVth’s trumpeters. You know those things that hang down from the trumpet. Also a piano – one of the oldest pianos in the country as distinct from harpsichords and spinet – 1773 was its date.

I fear that is about all I can recall at the moment except that there is a coat of arms carved on the front of the house. I asked what it was and Mrs Clive told me it was Henry VII. The man responsible for it was in rather an awkward position. His wife had been found guilty of some connection with the Rye House plot (I hope that is right) and his father had just been hung for treason, so he thought he ought to show his loyalty in every way he could….

Your loving daughter

Veronica

[Some of the paintings that Veronica talks about are still at Brympton; Mrs Clive was wrong though when she told Veronica that the coat of arms on the west front were those of Henry VII - they are actually the arms of his son Henry VIII !]