AU10/102/1/206

Typewritten letter

29 February 1972

From: 1972 To: 1972

"I arrived back home last Friday, just in time for a power cut! What an awful winter you have been having in England! We devoured the papers every day, and read with consternation about the picketing, the power cuts - and we saw on French TV the marching crowds in London - it gave the impression that England was heading for revolution. Then there were the horrors in Ireland - troops firing on civilians - bombs exploding even in England ... I began to wonder if I should return to find Kingsgate Castle in ruins!! I suppose things seem much worse when you read about them abroad. Now I find myself faced with a mountain of correspondence from all over the world. I shall be busy at my typewriter for many days to come. I am also feeling rather like Cinderella after returning from the Ball, after luxurious living in a house with a butler, housemaid, cook and gardener! It was a great joy to be living again in my grandmother's house in Menton. I must have told you that my cousin Marcel Pelletier took the house over from me over 20 years ago - it came to me during the war through my mother. His wife died 5 years ago: she was the widow of his best friend, with two young daughters when he married her in 1945 - a very wealthy woman. Both the girls are now married, and the son, Philippe, is on the staff of Prince Rainier's Oceanographic Centre at Monaco. The house is a large Italian style villa, on an avenue lined with pepper trees, overlooking the harbour at Menton. On Christmas Day we were sitting out in the sunshine at mid-day - my French was beginning to come back to me - my mind went back nearly 70 years to my childhood, when my parents used to visit my grandmother every winter, and my brother (who was killed in the first World War) and I were playing in the same garden. My cousins have a tremendous social life, so people are coming and going ... and I was taken out to luncheons and dinners all along the Riviera from Nice to San Remo in Italy. Marcel would like me to go and settle there. I did think of it at one time, and bought a flat at Villefranche ... but I am too attached to England, in spite of its climate, and I should miss all my friends and interests here. The Riviera life is very artificial ... gossip and scandal ... it hasn't changed much in 50 years: except that there are no Grand Dukes around now! Marcel gave a luncheon party for 10 on my birthday: two or three of my old friends came, especially my dear friend Henri Lafaury from Antibes. We were at Oxford together in the '20s: now we are old gentlemen in our 70s! Most of my birthdays in the last 10 years have been spent either at sea or in some distant part of the world. I think this birthday - my 73rd - was the best of all! I called in a Paris on the way home and stayed a few nights with another old friend - Valentin Vinogradoff - a Russian emigre from the Revolution in 1918. I used to spend nearly all my Oxford vacations in Paris - it was ridiculously cheap for English in France in those days - and VV and I used to explore the French countryside together. This time he drove me out to Versailles, Malmaison and Chartres - places we visited so long ago. He drove me to my other French relations at Argentan in Normandy, where I stayed a few days before taking the hovercraft from Calais to Ramsgate. I have promised to return there later on. So you see, for an old gentleman of 73, I am getting around a great deal. I am thankful to say that my health continues excellent. I do not have any ailments, and never take a pill of any kind! People say that I am exceptional, and much younger than my years. I can never give any reason for it, except that I do enjoy life. Do you get books from your local library ... Ampthill or Bedford? If so, you should try to get a book recently published LORD WILLIAM RUSSELL AND HIS WIFE by Georgina Blakiston (John Murray £7.50). They were the grandparents of Constance and Romola Russell. They had no connection with Ampthill, except that their son, Lord Odo Russell, became the first Lord Ampthill, the Miss Russell's father. But it is a fascinating story. I see that my friend Cyril Eastaugh, Bishop of Peterborough, intends to retire in August. My other Bishop friend, Lawrence Brown, of Birmingham, is still in his 60s, so I expect he will go on for a bit yet. I have just looked at your letter - December 13th. I was interested to read about the Feoffee almshouses. I always remember one dear old lady there whom I taught to ring the Angelus, and how thrilled she was to do it. Nothing stopped her - in storm and rain and tempest she would issue forth and mid-day and at 6p.m. I gather that this excellent custom is no longer observed. A pity! I remember buying Millett's picture "The Angelus" and hanging it in the Baptistry. Does anyone ring hymn-tunes on the bells now??? Do you remember how I used to do it before the Sung Eucharist? Miss Gertrude Barton used to do it on weekdays, I remember. My neighbour Mrs.Olley sold her flat last September, and is now living in a guest house near by on the North Foreland. She has aged a great deal - but is still lively. I must go and see her. I hope you have survived the winter without too much discomfort. England is certainly a place to get out of, if one can, between December and March! Yours sincerely,"

item

Hillam, John George,
Grimmer, Honora,
Pelletier, Marcel,
Pelletier, Philippe,
Lafaury, Henri,
Vinogradoff, Valentin,
Russell, George William,
Russell, Elizabeth Ann,
Blakiston, Georgiana,
Russell, Constance,
Russell, Romola,
Russell, Odo William (1st Baron Ampthill),
Eastaugh, Cyril,
Brown, Lawrence,
Barton, Gertrude,
Olley

letters, typescript, power cut, newspapers, television, TV, labour disputes, strikes, oceanography, Christmas, World War One, birthdays, parties, Oxford University, health, libraries, books, almshouses, bellringing, weather, AMPTHILL, Broadstairs, Northern Ireland, Ulster, Versailles, France, Normandy, Monaco, Villefranches, Paris, Calais, BEDFORD, Ramsgate