The Dowager Duchess of Devonshire

Victoria, here, lately reading several memoirs by Deborah Mitford Cavendish, Dowager Duchess of Devonshire.  I find them delightful. When I put the book down to attend to other matters, I feel like I’ve been chatting with a friend.

Now, most of my friends are not quite duchesses (more like countesses and baronesses, don’t cha know?), but Debo’s breezy style just feels like an old pal has been telling me about her very long and full life.  Don’t all of your friends cavort with Prince Charles, care for many of the Chatsworth Estate affairs, and feed their chickens?  Actually, I really do have a few friends who feed their chickens, come to think of it.  And Kristine waved at Prince Charles once as he passed her in his limo.

All in One Basket (immediately above) combines two of the Duchess’s previous memoirs into one volume.  They were entitled Counting My Chickens and Home to Roost, collections of stories and essays she wrote earlier.  Wait For Me (top picture) is a memoir of her childhood and marriage to nearly the present. 

At the age of 92, she is living near Chatsworth in a house she redecorated — with a few spare pieces from the Chatsworth attics — after the death of her husband, the 11th Duke of Devonshire, in 2004, Chatsworth became the home of her son Peregrine Cavendish, known as Stoker, 12th Duke of Devonshire. and his wife Amanda, the Duchess.

The excellent website for Chatsworth is here.  We’ve written about Chatsworth on this blog, as have many others.  It is a favorite target of tourists and residents of the British Isles as well.  The first time I visited Chatsworth, quite a few years ago, I was amazed to be greeted by flocks of chickens wandering the parking area.

These were not just ordinary chickens, but lovely exotic feathered works of art — which walked around and seemed hungry.  My suspicion is that the visitors frequently bring treats for the hens and roosters.  When we entered the main house, the doorkeeper cautioned us not to let the creatures inside. “The Duchess,” he said, “does not like her chickens in the house.”

I have visited Chatsworth several times and I would love to go again. And again.  It is the quintessential English Country House and has been in the forefront of developing the Stately Home Industry, if I dare to call it that.  Debo would not approve. However, she has been an inspiration and a guiding force for the movement.

Deborah Vivien Freeman-Mitford was the youngest of the seven children of Lord Redesdale, thus one of the famous Mitford Sisters, of whom so much has been written.  Nancy, eldest of the seven, wrote several novels which are very popular and have been turned into films or tv series; some of these have autobiographical overtones of the sisters’ lives.

Jessica, is famous for her book The American Way of Death, criticising the funeral business. Two other sisters developed fascist sympathies, with Unity trying to shoot herself over the British declaration of war against Germany.  Diana married the head of the British fascist party, Sir Oswald Moseley.  Through it all, Debo ignored politics and remained devoted to each sister in her own way.

When Debo married Lord Andrew Cavendish in 1941, he was not expected to inherit the dukedom. But only four months after his elder brother William Cavendish, Marquess of Hartingdon married Kathleen Kennedy in May, 1944, the Marquess was killed in action  in WWII. Kathleen, sister of future U. S. President John F. Kennedy, died in 1948 in a plane crash.