Category Archives: British Isles

Hughenden Manor: Winning the War in the Icehouse

Who was the man getting the surprise ice-water bath above, and what did he have to do with victory in World War II? One day in 2004, a National Trust guide at Hughenden Manor overheard an intriguing conversation. An old man was very quietly describing to his grandchild how he had once worked in the very room they were standing in. Hughenden Manor was the country home of Benjamin Disraeli, the Prime Minister and friend of Queen Victoria.

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The house was a dusty relic of Victorian times. But it turned out that the house played a pivotal role in the Second World War, totally unknown to anyone except the 100 or so people who secretly worked there in the 1940s.

When the Battle of Britain and the London Blitz ended in late 1940, Britain’s Royal Air Force, the RAF, had overcome all the odds and held off the German Luftwaffe. Adolf Hitler had believed that the British would fold under heavy bombing, negotiate a peace treaty, and become his allies. How wrong he was. About 3,000 young pilots, averaging 20 years of age, did battle daily over the Channel, outnumbered by 5 to 1 in both equipment and flyers. They were not all British; some of them were Polish, Czech, Belgian and French. According to the RAF, 544 of them were killed in the Battle of Britain, and another 814 died later in the war. Winston Churchill famously summed up the Battle of Britain: “Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few.” To this day, pilots who fought are referred to as “The Few.”

But the war was just beginning. It was necessary for Allied forces, soon including the United States, to knock out German infrastructure. The only maps available at the time were made for tourists. They showed roads, cities, railways and sightseeing destinations like castles and cathedrals. Bombers needed detailed maps to accomplish their missions of destroying armament factories and other strategic targets.

Hughenden Manor became a secret command center for the vital mission of creating detailed maps for bomber pilots to use. British Spitfires and later Mosquitos were dispatched across the Channel with automatic cameras in their gun bays. Since the gun bays had no guns, the planes had no protection. The pilots, as brave as any of The Few, flew thousands of surveillance missions over Germany. Over the course of the war, they took 36 million photos. The camera film was carried by courier to Hughenden Manor, where the 100 or so top-secret mapmakers went to work.

The old Hughenden icehouse was the darkroom.

Mapmakers were on duty at all times; someone always slept in the icehouse.

Inside, mapmakers worked day and night, translating the surveillance photos into maps for bomber pilots. Target maps were drawn by hand, with the target in the middle, surrounded by concentric circles one mile apart.

Today, the visitor can try out the equipment, which in its day was high-tech. Completed maps, thousands of them, were sent seven miles up the road to Bomber Command. Often, couriers used bicycles, so as not to draw attention.

The entire map-making operation was a military secret, protected by the Official Secrets Act. People who worked at Hughenden, military and civilian, took an oath to keep the operation secret for their entire lifetimes. When the National Trust accidentally learned a little about the amazing World War II history of Hughenden, they went to Parliament and eventually received permission to make the secrets public. Today, the icehouse and the basement of Hughenden hold an enthralling museum of this vital part of victory for the Allies in World War II.

Veterans of the secret operation were tracked down and interviewed on video, before their stories were lost forever. People sent in their personal diaries and photos. The almost-lost history came alive.

And the man getting the surprise ice bath? Newbies were invited into the icehouse to have a wartime picture taken, to send to the folks at home (of course, the location was always kept secret). The helpful icehouse staff posed the unsuspecting person under an icy water outlet in the brick ceiling. Someone pulled a lever at the exact moment the camera snapped. Everyone, including the victim, laughed uproariously.

The result was a nice wartime keepsake, and a personal reminder of undaunted British spirit when the odds of victory seemed slim. British self-deprecating humor and camaraderie were a big part of that spirit.

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I’d recommend a visit to Hughenden Manor. Join me next time for more explorations in the art and history of Europe and the British Isles!

Mary Anne Disraeli: the Woman Behind the Man

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Why is a Victorian carriage door prominently displayed on a wall at Hughenden, the country home of Queen Victoria’s friend and Prime Minister, Benjamin Disraeli? The Prime Minister himself removed it from the carriage and preserved it as a tribute to his wife, Mary Anne. One evening the ambitious politician and his doting wife set off from his London house to Parliament, where he was to deliver a very important speech. When the carriage door was closed, it slammed shut on Mary Anne’s thumb. What did she do? She suffered in silence, all the way to Westminster. She didn’t want to upset the man before his speech. A placard next to the carriage door explains that Mary Anne said not a word until Disraeli was safely out of the carriage and on his way into the corridors of power. The placard remarks drily that her words when her thumb was released were not recorded.

Mary Anne was 12 years older than her husband, and the marriage began as one of convenience. But it grew into a true love match.

According to the guidebook sold at Hughenden, Disraeli was a novelist and something of a playboy in 1830s London. He had written a novel, Vivian Grey, which was a thinly veiled self-portrait of a young man on the make. His friend Bulwer-Lytton described him thus: he wore “green velvet trousers, a canary coloured waistcoat, low sleeves, silver buckles, lace at his wrists, his hair in ringlets.” He cut a wide swath through bohemian London salons, finally gaining an entree into the highest circles. He tried five times for a seat in Parliament before he won an election. His maiden speech was a disaster; he was shouted down. What worked in drawing rooms did not work in the House of Commons. He famously ended by saying, “I will sit down now, but the time will come when you will hear me.”

Mary Anne, my photo from Hughenden guidebook

What Disraeli needed was a rich wife. He met Mary Anne Wyndham Lewis in 1832, when she was just another older married woman he enjoyed flirting with. He thought her “a pretty little woman, a flirt and a rattle” which according to the guidebook meant “incessant chatterer.” But her deep-pocketed husband obligingly died in 1838, leaving her a rich widow. Her appeal increased and Disraeli married her in 1839.
Disraeli soon learned what a treasure he had found. He wrote, “There was no care which she could not mitigate, and no difficulty which she could not face. She was the most cheerful and the most courageous woman I ever knew.” High praise indeed; Disraeli had known and depended on many, many women in his rise to power in Victorian England.

A visit to Hughenden is a window into the Victorian past.

The estate is under the care of the National Trust, and beyond the quintessentially Victorian rooms there’s a surprise, new since I first visited years ago. The estate was a secret location for surveillance work which was crucial to victory in World War II. This work was so secret that not even the National Trust knew a thing about it until very recently. I’ll be writing about what went on in the wartime rooms and the icehouse soon.

Join me next time for more explorations in the art and history of Europe and the British Isles!

Queen Victoria and Queen Elizabeth II

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Queen Victoria in her coronation regalia, public domain

Britain’s beloved Queen Victoria died on January 22, 1901, ending the Victorian Era. She was also Empress of India all through the heyday of the years when the sun never set on the British Empire. Her image still appears everywhere in Great Britain. The coronation portrait by George Hayter is in the Royal Collection (Public Domain now). It still appears in reproductions in some tradition-loving British homes.

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Other homes display mass-produced images like the one above, spotted in the very regal Wimpole Estate.

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Victoria’s image, dressed in black in her widowhood and with her little diamond crown perched on top of her head, is instantly recognizable. The little model above holds pride of place in an exhibit of military models at Blenheim Palace. That unusual crown served as a canny early version of a prominent person creating a unique brand for herself.

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How did Victoria see herself? The sketch above, Public Domain, was Victoria’s own self-portrait as a young girl. She already has some kind of little whatsit balancing on top of her head. She looks apprehensive. But when she unexpectedly took the throne at the age of 18, after everyone else in the line of succession had died, she rose to the occasion and she kept rising. She reigned over England for over 63 years.

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We tend to think of Victoria as a dour old lady. But in fact she laughed often. The Public Domain photo above shows her in a jolly mood, even into her old age.

A statue of Victoria stands serenely at the entrance of Windsor Castle, the thousand-year-old complex that is one of the favorite homes of the current Queen.

Queen Elizabeth II has now reigned longer than her ancestor, the redoubtable Victoria. Whatever one thinks of the institution of the monarchy, there’s no doubt that Queen Elizabeth is a cracking good Queen. The photo above is from the shop at Sandringham, the country estate in Norfolk that Queen Victoria wisely bought as a private retreat for the Windsors. When I was there, neither the Queen nor her Corgis were in sight, but their presence was felt everywhere. There’s nothing more British than the Queen and her beloved Corgis. I wish them all well.

Join me next time for more exploration in the art and history of Europe and the British Isles!

Remembering Captain Eustace Lyle Gibbs at Tyntesfield

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Eustace Lyle Gibbs, born March 10, 1885, was the second youngest son of Antony Gibbs. He was educated at Eton and Magdalen College, Oxford. Then, as expected of him, he joined the family shipping business.

Eustace was already a member of the North Somerset Yeomanry. When World War I broke out on July 28, 1914, he was among the first British troops sent to France. Wealth and rank did not exempt men from serving; in fact, those of high rank mostly felt even more obligation to fight than those less fortunate. They generally entered the war as officers.

Eustace had a short home leave in December 1914. While visiting his family at their beautiful Victorian country house, Tyntesfield, he gave an interview to the Western Daily Press. Asked how people at home could help soldiers at the front, he said the troops always needed gloves and socks. And they really missed chocolate. When he returned to the front, he brought donations of these items with him, and handed them out to the men of his “B” Company, British Expeditionary Force.

During his leave, Eustace no doubt spent time in the Billiard Room at Tyntesfield, a wonderfully masculine space designed for the men in the family. Eustace would never see his home again.

Eustace died on February 11, 1915 of wounds received fighting near Ypres. He was 29 years old. His portrait was painted in 1916 from a photograph of him in his uniform. The artist was Albert Henry Collings.

1915 was the 100th anniversary of the beginning of the Great War. I wrote about the spectacular display of close to a million ceramic poppies in honor of fallen British soldiers at the Tower of London. The The photo above is from The Guardian at http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/sep/01/tower-of-londons-ww1-remembrance-installation-share-your-photos-and-videos. The post is at https://castlesandcoffeehouses.com/2014/09/26/remembrance-of-wars-past/.

That post also remembers another aristocratic young man who gave his life for his country, Edward Wyndham Tennant. He died at age 19 in the Battle of the Somme, 1916. On the plaque above his marble relief portrait, a fellow soldier describes the young man’s leadership: “When things were at their worst he would go up and down in the trenches cheering the men; when danger was greatest his smile was loveliest.” His grieving parents commissioned the touching memorial to him in Salisbury Cathedral.

Fighting in the Great War ended “at the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month” of 1918. Virtually every town and village in Britain (and also in other countries like France) lost young men to the carnage of the First World War. About 20 million people lost their lives. On Armistice Day, in England and in other places, there are ceremonies honoring the fallen.

Americans actively entered the war in its last few months, after supporting the Allied side indirectly. No one knows exact numbers, but about 110,000 Americans lost their lives in the fighting. In the United States, November 11 is Veterans’ Day, when all who have served their country in the military are honored. Today, women serve as often as men do. And as in times past, whole families and communities feel the effects of loved ones marching off to serve. We need to salute them all.

Mary Russell, Flying Duchess–and Much More

All Saints’ Church at Kedleston Hall

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Kedleston Hall is the spectacular showplace home of the Curzon family, designed by Robert Adam, finished in 1765 and open to visitors before all the plaster was dry. The housekeeper led visitors (of the right sort, of course) on a tour through the state rooms. The point was to impress visitors with the wealth, power and taste of the family. Not everyone cared for the place, though. Dr. Johnson remarked, “It would do excellently for a town hall.” I have to agree. Entering the lofty Marble Hall feels like entering a courthouse. Visitors stop in their tracks and speak in hushed voices.

My favorite part of the estate is All Saints Church on the grounds outside. The church is an important historic site, cared for by a special organization separate from the National Trust, which manages the house.

Curzon ancestors, dating all the way back to Norman times, were buried inside and in the churchyard. When Sir Nathaniel Curzon inherited the estate in 1758, he lost no time in razing the medieval village where his ancestors had lived quietly for centuries. But he kept the village church where they slept in their tombs.

As the plaque above explains, various Curzons maintained and restored the church over the years. But its pristine condition today is mostly because of a sad love story.

Photo by Chris Hoare, Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic

The photo above shows the exquisite marble memorial of Lord George and Lady Mary Curzon. It was created between 1907 and 1913 by Bertram Mackennal. (Visitors can’t get the complete view above, because the side chapel is separated from the main church by a gate). This is one of the most beautiful and intriguing of all the many tombs I’ve seen in old churches. Who were these people?

Mary Leiter was a fabulously wealthy, cultivated and beautiful young woman from Chicago. Her father was Levi Leiter, founder of Field and Leiter stores, which eventually became Marshall Fields. (Yes, Mary Leiter was an inspiration for Cora, the perfect wife of Lord Grantham on the TV show “Downton Abbey.”) Mary Leiter married George Curzon in 1895. He very soon afterward became Viceroy of India, the highest title available to an Englishman, during the heyday of Victorian empire. Mary gave birth to three daughters, but failed to produce the all-important son. The years she spent in India were happy ones, but her health suffered and she died in 1906, aged only 36.

Her husband immediately set to work memorializing her, even as he moved on to various mistresses and an eventual second wife. He never really recovered from his grief at losing Mary. So he built a neo-Gothic addition to the family church. The addition blends almost seamlessly with the original medieval church. He commissioned the beautiful marble memorial. Mary was buried in the newly-created family vault underneath. My understanding is that Lord Curzon had Mary’s effigy placed on the plinth as soon as the chapel was complete. His own effigy was finished and kept in storage until he died. Then it was placed next to his beloved Mary, and he took his place in the vault below.

Victorian technology allowed Lotrd Curzon to install a hidden elevator in the marble floor next to the memorial, so that coffins could be lowered into the vault at the push of a button. The friendly church guide recalled the spooking of a lady in recent years. She walked into the church just as a workman rose slowly from underground, standing on the moving section of floor. The terrified lady fled.

The guide pointed out that Lord Curzon’s right foot is uncovered, a Victorian convention indicating that the effigy was created while the person was still alive. Lord Curzon was a stickler for detail, and he expected the same from his family and everyone who worked for him.

The sculpture depicts two angels hovering over the sleeping figures. What are they holding? It’s the Crown of Life–a fairly obscure Biblical reference. The crown is wrapped in a veil. Why? My thought is that nobody gets to see their heavenly reward until they actually receive it in the Great Beyond.

The sculpture stands serenely in its own side chapel, surrounded by nine stained glass windows depicting various Marys from the Bible and other sources. Impertinent questions come to mind. Considering that there are two people lying in state, why is there only one crown? Is the sleeping couple somehow supposed to share the crown, or is it meant for only one of them? If it is for one of them, would that be Mary? In some traditions, Mary the mother of Jesus became Queen of Heaven after her death. But this is an Anglican church, and as far as I know has no such tradition. Anyway, wouldn’t it be just a bit sacriligious to insinuate that one’s wife was destined to be Queen of Heaven? The guide had an information booklet, but there was very little explanation of the mysterious veiled crown. I would not use a vulgar term like “control freak” for Lord Curzon, but I half expected his ghost to tap me on the shoulder and set me straight about the crown. He did not suffer fools gladly.

Lord Curzon never found another person who could compare to his Mary, and by all accounts he often said so. How could any actual living person compete with a sainted ghost? After Mary’s death, Lord Curzon was soon battling his daughters for their shares of the money Mary had left. He ended up estranged from them. Toward the end of his life, he was also estranged from his second wife, Grace. All the same, according to the guide, Lord Curzon kindly reserved a space for her in the family vault. But Grace did not care to spend eternity directly underneath the effigies of her husband and his first wife, depicted in everlasting marital bliss. Instead she chose a burial plot for herself in the far corner of the churchyard.

Every trip leads me to buy books which I may or may not find time to actually read. I’ve already devoured the book above, The Viceroy’s Daughters by Anne de Courcy. The Curzon family history, especially in the 20th century, is riveting. The book is a window into British aristocratic life from Victorian times all the way through World War II. I’ll be writing more about the glamorous Curzons.

Join me next time for more explorations in the art and history of Europe and the British Isles!

The Chapel at Tyntesfield

Norwich: Refugees in the Cathedral

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In the middle of the biggest and most heartbreaking refugee crisis in Europe since World War II, I came face to face with larger-than-life refugees in the middle of beautiful Norwich Cathedral in England. Ana Maria Pacheco, a sculptor from Brazil, had her ten-figure group on exhibit in the North Transept. The installation is called Shadows of the Wanderer. It was created in 2008. But it is especially powerful today, when people are dying every day in a desperate flight away from violence and grinding poverty in their home countries. The nations of Europe are struggling to come to terms with the vast number of refugees arriving on their shores and at their train stations. All over Europe and Britain, while governments dither, ordinary people get on with the business of helping their fellow human beings. They collect diapers, food, water bottles, blankets and tents, and they simply appear where they are needed.

The lead figure in the sculpture group is a young man carrying his elderly father on his back. Father and son are carved from the same huge block of wood. The son literally cannot leave his father behind; his father is part of him, and he is part of his father. The origin of this stunning work of art was the story of Aeneas, who carried his aged father Anchises from the ruins of battle at Troy. The son is about to step off the exhibit plinth and join us, the viewers.

How will we react to these desperate people? All the figures are larger than we are, about 7 or 8 feet tall. The situation they depict is bigger than we are, too.

The remaining figures show possible reactions: Shock, dismay, disapproval, indifference.

Will we look around, wondering who is going to get this problem out of our sight?

Will we look the other way, complacent as we go about our regular business?

The draped figures following the desperate father and son have their arms and hands hidden. If the father and son fell backward, would anyone catch them? Will no one reach out a helping hand? These are the questions that ordinary people are asking their leaders right now. Each one of us could become a refugee for reasons beyond our control. The current crisis is a test of our humanity.

Norwich has one of the most welcoming cathedrals I’ve ever seen. Many great cathedrals charge admission, often as much as $15 or $20. At Norwich, visitors are greeted by volunteers asking what they are most interested in seeing. I’m sure donations are gratefully accepted, but I arrived late in the day and didn’t realize until after I’d left that I never saw a place to donate. The business of Norwich Cathedral is to welcome and to minister to its visitors.

When I arrived, a lovely young volunteer asked about my interests, then described this special exhibit. She offered to lead me directly to the North Transept so I wouldn’t miss this powerful work of art in my limited time. I am grateful to her.

Join me next time for more explorations into the ever-fascinating and ever-challenging history and art of Europe and the British Isles.

St. Jerome and His Lion

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Niccolo Antonio Colantonio, “Jerome in his Study,” c. 1440-1470, Public Domain, National Museum of Capodimonte

One of my favorite saints is Jerome, AKA Saint Hieronymous. Why? Because he befriended a lion in the wilderness–or at least so the legend goes. In the painting above, the lion has ventured into the saint’s dusty study with a thorn in his paw. Jerome sets his book aside and carefully removes the thorn. In other depictions, the saint comes across the lion, writhing in pain, out in the wilds. Either way, the legend is that from the moment Jerome extracted the thorn, the lion never left his side.

Jerome was born around the year 347 A.D. He lived mostly in what is now Croatia. A scholarly fellow, he became one of the earliest Doctors of the Church, before titles like “Cardinal” existed. One of his main accomplishments was translating the Bible into Latin, from its original Aramaic and Greek.

Jacopo Tintoretto, “St. Jerome,” c. 1570, Public Domain, Vienna Kunsthistorisches Museum

In paintings, the lion often lurks under a table or in a dark corner.

I took the two photos just above in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna. I love the legend, and whenever I’m in an art museum I’m on the lookout for images of Jerome and his lion. They have been painted countless times.

Whenever I spot Jerome and his lion, I move in for a closeup.

Workshop of David Gerard, Saint Jerome in a Landscape, about 1501, my photo taken in National Gallery, London

To me, Jerome’s friendship with his lion is part of his concern for the whole creation.

Antonello da Messina, “Saint Jerome in His Study,” about 1475, my photo taken in National Gallery, London

Sometimes the lion is not underfoot, but he’s always close by.

The faithful lion is always present. In the painting of Jerome in the large study above, he’s patrolling the perimeter. No matter what, the lion always had Jerome’s back.

Giovanni Bellini, Saint Jerome Reading in a Landscape, circa 1480-5, my photo taken in National Gallery, London

If the lion’s face is shown, he always has a friendly, grateful, loyal face–much like a shy family dog. He tends to look a little wary–who is about to disturb his friend Jerome?

Are these paintings just sentimental portrayals of a serious saint who should be remembered for much more than a story that may not have happened at all? The subject is the medieval and Renaissance equivalent of sharing cute animal videos online.

On a busy day, a couple of minutes spent watching photogenic animals feels to me like a guilty pleasure. What am I accomplishing by watching a gorilla rock a kitten to sleep or a sheepdog rescue a teacup pig from drowning? Well, I’m not getting a thing done, but I’m pausing in a busy day to learn compassion from animals. Like those videos, the images of St. Jerome and his lion give us an appreciation of our bond with the animals who share our world. The animals mostly treat each other and our world better than we humans do. If I were St. Jerome, I wouldn’t mind being remembered as an animal lover as well as a high-powered scholar.

Join me next time for more explorations in the art and history of Europe!