mitfordgirls - Tumblr blog

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“You were terribly spoilt as a little child, and by all. You used to get in tremendous rages, often shaming us in the street. In fact until Pam was born you reigned supreme." - Lady Redesdale in a letter to Nancy, 1952

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Bryan and Diana Guinness at their house in Buckingham Street, where every guest was encouraged to come dressed as if from the year 1860.

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LILY JAMES in THE PURSUIT OF LOVE (2021) “Oh, goodness, how funny it all is — so wonderfully old-fashioned. The shopping! The parcels! The flowers! So tremendously Victorian. People have been delivering cardboard boxes every five minutes. What an interest you are in one’s life, Linda dear.”

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"When she rested after lunch, Bryan would scatter rose petals round her sleeping head and leave a poem on the pillow." - Anne De Courcy

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Diana's engagement to Bryan Guinness is announced in The Sketch, 1928

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Jessica Mitford and Esmond Romilly at their wedding ceremony, 1937

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"Having worried for days that Decca might have run off to join a Communist cell, or even that she had been taken by white slavers, Mitford legend says that David sank into a chair muttering, 'Worse than I thought. Married to Romilly!' - Mary Lovell

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How that battered washed-out woman could have produced those six hooligan girls I do not know.

Irene Curzon on Lady Redesdale, 1938

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Nancy and Unity photographed by Madame Yevonde for Tatler, 1932

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New Penguin Essentials cover of The Pursuit of Love

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Bryan Guinness and Diana Mitford on their wedding day, 1929.

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history dream cast: the mitford sisters NANCY MITFORD: “Oh darling, you know I don’t know how to take things out of ovens, one’s poor hands.” PAMELA MITFORD: "A terrible thing happened, my sister Pamela was born.“ DIANA MITFORD: "You no more have to learn sex than how to eat a Mars bar.”  UNITY MITFORD: “I felt quite faint & my knees were giving, you know how one does when one sees the Fuhrer unexpectedly.” JESSICA MITFORD: “Dear sirs; King George and Queen Elizabeth are not the only people leaving these shores for America this year. I am also coming.“ DEBORAH MITFORD: “Oh, don’t speak about Elvis. Wasn’t he wonderful? I never became a fan until after he was dead, otherwise I would have been a stalker.”

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In the 1950s my mother-in-law did voluntary work in the East End of London. She was a friend of Bunny Mellon, wife of the Anglophile philanthropist Paul Mellon...She heard of the poverty among the women and how cheered they would be by some new clothes, so on her return to America she arranged for what looked like cardboard coffins to be sent to Moucher at Eaton Square. Out came wondrous garments by Balenciaga: brocade evening dresses, a black winter coat lavishly trimmed with black mink, and piles of less showy but beautifully made coats, skirts and cocktail dresses. Moucher said that my sisters and I could take our pick, which we did, replacing the Balenciagas with decent, unworn clothes of our own that satisfied my mother-in-law's charitable purposes. The master couturier's clothes had come to a good home: they were well out of our reach to buy first-hand, but no one could have appreciated them more and we wore them time and again. Diana looked dangerously beautiful in the black coat with black mink facings. We met for lunch one day in London, at the Aperitif Restaurant in Jermyn Street, she a vision in The Coat. We sat down and looked round. I spied Paul Mellon and said, 'Oh, I must go and say hello.' Diana gave a scream and tried to make herself look small (impossible), terrified that he would recognize his wife's coat and snatch it off her back. She and Nancy shared a white satin evening dress they called 'Robeling', which was kept for the grandest occasions. Nancy also had one of those simple linen dresses that are immediately recognizable (by those accustomed to such luxuries) as the very height of haute couture. She wore it in Venice where a friend remarked on it. 'Oh well,' said Nancy, 'I always think one should have ONE good dress.' It was so like her not to admit to its origin.

Deborah Mitford

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I was enrolled in a dancing class which met weekly, rotating among various neighbors’ houses. Little girls in organdy dresses and cashmere shawls, accompanied by starched nannies, were delivered by their chauffeurs at the appointed place to await the teacher, who came out from Oxford by bus. One fateful afternoon, the teacher was an hour late, and I took the opportunity to lead the other children up to the roof, there to impart some delightful information that had just come my way concerning the conception and birth of babies. “And - even the King and Queen do it!” I added impressively. The telling was a great success, particularly as I couldn’t help making up a few embellishments as I went along.

Jessica Mitford, Hons and Rebels

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Nancy Mitford, 1933.

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When Bryan introduced Diana to his mother he broke staggering news: ‘And she can cook, Mummy.’ Lady Evelyn, a delightful eccentric who only ever spoke in whispers, was dumbfounded. ‘I’ve never heard of such a thing. It’s too clever,’ she said faintly. Diana was modestly self-deprecating, and explained she could only fry eggs. ‘Anyone can do fried eggs,’ she said lightly. But it was too late, the word went round and soon even the nursery staff at Bailiffscourt had taken up the refrain: ‘To be able to cook – too wonderful.’

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Nancy Mitford and Hamish St. Clair Erskine at a party, 1932.