DIANA FELT NO guilt at the effect her liaison had on Mosley’s marriage. Even if she had, it would have altered her conduct only in detail. Like the whole of London, she knew that Mosley had had affairs virtually from the moment he and Cimmie had emerged from their wedding reception at Carlton House Terrace. She rationalised it: Cimmie would find it easier if Mosley had one steady mistress, rather than a constant succession with all the pain of fresh deceptions and discoveries.
That summer, Diana and Mosley met constantly: at the balls and parties of the London season, at Emerald Cunard’s fifty-strong supper parties after the opera – where Diana laid the foundations of an enduring friendship with another Cunard habitué, the witty, cultivated and eccentric Lord Berners – and secretly at Mosley’s Ebury Street flat.
They were determined to spend every possible moment with each other. The chic destination for the rich, smart set during the last weeks of August and most of September was then Venice, and the meeting place its smallish and not very pleasant Lido. It was easy to manipulate dates so that the Guinnesses and the Mosleys would be there at the same time. Diana and Bryan had arranged to motor leisurely through the south of France to Italy with Barbara Hutchinson and Victor Rothschild (to whom Barbara was now engaged). Mosley was also motoring, but Cimmie, her kidney trouble aggravating the after-effects of childbirth, was not well enough to drive; she, the two elder Mosley children and her lady’s maid Andrée would follow by train. Desperate at the prospect of being parted even for the seven to ten days the car journey would take, Diana and Mosley planned that he would ‘run into’ the Guinnesses as if by chance in Arles.
But in Avignon, staying at the Jules César, Diana woke with a throat so sore she could not speak, an infection quickly diagnosed as diphtheria. ‘So sorry you are ill with pleurisy in s. of France (to my mind something worse than Maidenhead),’ wrote John Betjeman sympathetically on 12 August. To Diana it was a desperate matter. She was terrified that a letter from Mosley might arrive at the hotel and, because of her prostrate condition, be opened by Bryan. She took Barbara and Victor into her confidence and they managed to get a message through to Mosley in Arles that she would see him in Venice when she was well. She was young, strong and determined to recover as soon as possible; aided by frequent injections from a doctor at the Institut Pasteur she was able to travel on to Venice eight or nine days later.
That September was eventful in the annals of the Lido. The usual group congregated every day on the small beach, where the cabins were allocated year after year to the same people. Diana, Bryan, Barbara and Victor arrived to find the Mosleys and their friends John Strachey and Robert Boothby, Emerald Cunard and a party including her lover Sir Thomas Beecham, Duff and Diana Cooper, Randolph Churchill, Brendan Bracken, Doris Castlerosse, the Austrian Tilly Losch and Diana’s brother Tom. Always there were one or two reigning hostesses, usually American, principessas or duchesses, vastly wealthy heiresses attracted by the glamour of an ancient European title, around whom would group parties of their friends. That year the queen of Venice was the principessa San Faustino, an American known as Princess Jane.
The Lido day would start at about eleven a.m. Every twenty minutes or so the Hotel Danieli’s launch – or as Diana pronounced it, the ‘larnch’ – would disgorge men in short-sleeved, open-necked shirts and linen shorts and women in fashionable beach pyjamas and espadrilles. Mosley, because of his deformed leg, always wore trousers, with a navy blue shirt. Diana, who refused to follow fashion, kept out of the sun as much as possible and wore plain, pale cotton dresses. Most of the huts’ occupants knew each other, and there was much sauntering along the beach to chat. Eventually, like smaller balls of mercury drawn into a larger one, these knots of two or four would eddy towards Princess Jane, grouping around her on cushions. In the afternoons, for those who did not want to swim or siesta, there might be a sightseeing expedition. Most evenings began with drinks at the cafés in the Piazza San Marco, the band playing Lohengrin, before dinner at the palazzo of a friend or at one of Venice’s excellent restaurants. They would return late at night by gondola along some dark canal, silent except for the water lapping its stone sides.
In that rich, rather louche circle many of the men were pugnacious, promiscuous or both. Love affairs and quarrels abounded. What should have been a fête champêtre on Torcello was ruined by a furious row, in which Duff Cooper was the prime mover. Another inevitably involved Randolph, often drunk and as usual behaving badly. After a good-humoured lunchtime discussion at the Lido restaurant, he turned to Brendan Bracken, who had suffered all his life from the rumour that he was Winston Churchill’s illegitimate son, and asked loudly, ‘And what does my dear brother say to that?’ While Diana and the others sat horrified and Brendan made an unavailing lunge at him, Randolph ran away down the beach and into the sea. The much older Brendan lumbered after him, whereupon Randolph snatched off Bracken’s spectacles and threw them in the water.
Venice, romantic and beautiful, with its tiny squares and great dark churches, was a city made for secrecy and assignations. Randolph Churchill was pursuing Tilly Losch the dancer; Tilly’s husband Edward James was pursuing Serge Lifar. Tom Mitford, staying with the Guinnesses at the Danieli, was openly conducting a liaison with the rich, beautiful and stylish Princesse de Faucigny-Lucinge, a woman so chic that wherever she went she was stared at and copied. Those of their circle who had not yet heard of Diana’s entanglement with Mosley were soon made aware of it. On sightseeing parties, the two would suddenly disappear. A few steps round a corner or down some narrow alleyway, and they would be at the water’s edge; once in one of the gondolas that plied every canal, they were invisible, speeding off to spend passionate afternoons in small hotels.
The rest of the party, uncomfortably aware of the anguish of Bryan and Cimmie, would struggle to pretend that everything was normal. Eventually the lovers would reappear, armed with some excuse, in time to join the others for dinner. Once, when all of them had spent the whole day on the Lido so that one of these stolen afternoons was impossible, Mosley leant across the dining table in the Lido restaurant and said to Boothby, ‘Bob, I shall need your room tonight between midnight and 4 a.m.’ Boothby, who was there as the Mosleys’ guest, was so taken aback by this public request – both Cimmie and the Guinnesses were nearby – that he merely asked jokingly, ‘But Tom, where shall I sleep?’ ‘On the beach,’ said Mosley. It was no joke: Boothby had to retire to one of the recliners in the Mosleys’ cabin on the Lido.
So miserable was Cimmie, who wept for much of what she had hoped would be a Venetian idyll with her husband, that her already weakened state of health was exacerbated by despair.
For Bryan, forced to confront publicly the fact that his wife had fallen in love with another man, Diana’s behaviour was not only a dagger through his heart but a bitter humiliation.
After their Venetian fortnight the Guinnesses returned to Biddesden. The daily proximity of her lover in the world’s most romantic city, the aesthetic delight afforded by the buildings, paintings, canals and bridges of Venice, the spice of secrecy, had lifted Diana on to a plateau of happiness. Though she was thrilled to see her two small boys again, once back at Biddesden the familiar sensation of being in a prison returned. Everything irritated her and when she was irritated she became uncaringly cruel. The half-whispering speech that Bryan sometimes affected – especially for the sort of question to which he dreaded the answer – infuriated her, while endless quarrels were provoked over what she saw as his possessiveness. Because of his unhappiness and the realisation that his wife was drifting away from him, Bryan’s anxious questioning had taken on stifling proportions: sometimes Diana could hardly leave the room without being asked where she was going and what she was going to do; and she would round on him furiously.
The truth was that they were basically unsuited. Bryan, gentle, whimsical, poetical, idealistic and uxorious, uninterested in the world of politics or the salon, could not hold Diana. Although neither of them had realised it when they married, she was infinitely the stronger and more independent character – and she needed a strong man. In this respect, Mosley was similar to the father whose character and behaviour had so imprinted her childhood. Both had dominant personalities, both had powerful convictions (or, in truth, iron prejudices) which they expressed freely, both were Alpha males in a household or group of women.
Bryan’s adoration, once so touching, now served only to irritate. When his eyes followed her around the room she would drawl out some remark so brutal that Pam, who often spent evenings with them, would gasp. ‘He worshipped her, and she walked all over him,’ said Pam of that unhappy time. Bryan had never been able to join in the Mitford habit of ‘teasing’, with its vein of savagery concealed beneath irony or wit; against a Diana who had withdrawn her love he was defenceless. For by now Diana believed that her future lay with Mosley. Even in those early days she had, she said, ‘a feeling so definite as to be a knowledge that we were made for each other’.
Mosley, on the other hand, was trying to reassure Cimmie that they could have ‘such a lovely life together if his little frolicsome ways did not upset her’. As a diversionary tactic this failed hopelessly. Cimmie, who by now believed that Diana was a serious threat to her marriage, was in agony. Her letters breathe the despair of love betrayed.
If only you would be frank with me, that is what I beg. If when you refused Mereworth you had said it was because you thought you would like to take Diana out for the day Sunday I would have known where I was. I started by thinking it odd; but as you said nothing about another plan I began to think it must be that you wanted to stay at home and just be with us and I was so pleased. Then you tell me about Sunday as if it was vague and only planned last night – and then I realise the whole thing was arranged before and you had been putting off telling me . . . the feeling that you are not telling me, that you do things behind my back, that you are only sweet to me when you want to get away with something, gives me such a feeling of insecurity and anxiety and worry I am more nervy and upset than I ought or need to be.
In a passion of jealous misery she added, ‘Oh darling darling don’t let it be like that. I will truly understand if you give me a chance, but I am so kept in the dark. That bloody damnable cursed Ebury – how often does she come there?’
The answer was constantly. Diana and Mosley saw each other as often as they could and when they were not able to meet Diana attended his fascist meetings.
The British Union of Fascists rose phoenix-like out of the ashes of the New Party. Cimmie, loyal as ever, helped to design a fascist flag and discussed with her husband how Sousa’s ‘Stars and Stripes’ could be turned into a fascist anthem with words by their friend Osbert Sitwell. Irene, a masterful, forthright figure who moved in the wealthy hunting circles of Melton Mowbray, organised a fund-raising ball and helped to persuade figures such as Lord Rothermere to contribute to the BUF coffers. This was not through any deep belief in fascism per se, as she was swayed not so much by her own convictions as by her brother-in-law’s personality – although her earlier feelings for him had passed, she was still fascinated by his charisma and sexual magnetism. His personality was such that people were either passionately for or passionately against him; if the admirer was a reasonably attractive woman, it was equally in his nature to try to seduce her. This had happened with Irene: their brief affair had begun after they had been to bed one night after a hunt ball in Melton.
On 1 October 1932 Mosley, tanned and healthy after weeks of sunshine and swimming, officially launched the British Union of Fascists with a flag-unfurling ceremony in its offices (formerly those of the New Party) in Great George Street. This was followed a fortnight later by the first public meeting, in Trafalgar Square. Mosley, in dark suit and tie and white shirt, spoke from the plinth at the bottom of Nelson’s column, with his now-customary bodyguard of strong young men. There were eight of them, and one significant difference could be noted in their appearance: all were wearing the black shirts that would soon be infamous. At a later meeting in the Memorial Hall in Farringdon Street, the ‘Blackshirts’, as they quickly became known, took an active role, ejecting several hecklers. In the march down Fleet Street and the Strand that followed, there were scuffles with communist supporters.
Throughout the autumn Diana went to these BUF meetings, usually with a friend, watching admiringly as Mosley, by now in full fascist rig of black shirt, breeches and boots, surrounded by his bodyguard of tough young Blackshirts, strode theatrically on to platforms. ‘All this swagger and vanity to Mrs Bryan Guinness and Doris Castlerosse,’ wrote Irene angrily in her diary – for Cimmie, too, had a bodyguard, in the shape of her two sisters who came to most of her husband’s meetings with her.
At the end of October there were two fancy-dress balls on consecutive nights. The first was given by the Guinnesses at Biddesden and the second by Cecil Beaton, who lived nearby at Ashcombe. Cimmie and Tom Mosley came to both. For the ball at Biddesden on Friday – gatecrashed by Prince Henry (the Duke of Gloucester) – Diana wore a white dress and a silver wig, cleverly constructed out of silver string by Robert Byron. Mosley was a demon-like figure in black; Cimmie was a shepherdess, a symbolic representation of innocence lost on Diana, who spent much of the early part of the evening telling her friends of Mosley’s brilliance and the inspiration of his ideas. ‘It was rather like having a crush on a film star,’ said Lady Pansy Pakenham. On the lawn outside the long drawing room was a bonfire, its flames flickering beyond the tall sash windows as couples danced. By the end of the evening, it was obvious what was happening: as soon as possible after dinner Diana and Mosley had vanished upstairs, only reappearing when it was time to say goodbye. For once, Cimmie was unable to hide her anguish in public; her devastated face as she left Biddesden that night remained fixed in the minds of all who saw it.
It was then that Diana began to think of abandoning Bryan and leading an independent life in London.
She seemed calm, almost insouciant, as she discussed it with Cela, appearing unconcerned at the thought of the difficulties and the social problems facing a young separated woman. Georgia Sitwell, after having tea with Diana on 11 November, described her as ‘youthfully arrogant’.
When Diana told Mosley she was thinking of leaving Bryan, he encouraged her to do so. At the same time he made it perfectly clear that he had no intention of leaving Cimmie. To those who loved Diana his behaviour appeared unspeakable: he was persuading a young and inexperienced girl to leave her husband and home simply to make herself more available for him. In the parlance of those days, it was the action of a cad.
At the end of November Diana finally told Bryan that she wanted to be free. It took her only a few minutes. She said first that she knew she was making him suffer, then, her voice calm and reasonable, continued, ‘I think the only thing is for us to part.’
It was a momentous decision for a girl of twenty-two, married to one of the nicest men in England and with two small children. On the material side, she would be throwing away exactly the sort of life she enjoyed – the beautiful houses with the money to furnish them exquisitely, the means to travel whenever and wherever she wanted, the clothes, the jewels, the ability to entertain anyone she liked on a grand scale. Socially, it was disastrous: while a blind eye was turned to discreet affairs, it was an unwritten rule that there should be no public scandal. Diana was leaving someone who had treated her with love and generosity in order to set herself up as a mistress to a known philanderer who had declared that he had no intention of marrying her.
It was also an extraordinary effort of will on her part, in the teeth of fierce and justified opposition. What carried her through was the Mitford confidence, the intransigence that was later to show itself in her younger sister Jessica’s behaviour – indeed, Diana’s strength of purpose may have served as an example to Jessica, who adored her – and her credo that with sufficient will one can follow any course one chooses.
There was also her belief, now held with the passion of a disciple for a messiah, in her lover’s ideology. As she said later, ‘It was this which gave me the courage to survive ostracism, the anger of my parents (who did not allow Debo or Decca to come and see me), the disapproval of absolutely everyone – the fonder they were of me, the more they disapproved. But in a strange way I think Kitfn1 and I both knew it was “pour la vie” and that we should always love one another.’
Diana’s parents were shocked, angry and wretched. It was a time of dramatic rows, weeping, sleepless nights for Sydney and furious outbursts from David. ‘That man will just cast you aside!’ he shouted miserably at his favourite daughter. ‘If he does, that’s too bad,’ responded Diana. All her friends implored her to reconsider. ‘Please don’t do it,’ said John Sutro. ‘You are leaving something wonderful for something not only unknown, but hopeless.’ All of them knew of Mosley’s reputation, most of them believed that after three months he would discard her.
In the circles in which the Guinnesses and Mosleys moved, sympathy was solidly behind Bryan and Cimmie. Irene Ravensdale wrote in her diary of ‘the hell incarnate beloved Cim is going through over Diana Guinness bitching her life’. Irene, like her sisters, believed that Diana would never have contemplated leaving Bryan had she not intended to marry Cimmie’s husband. Nothing, in fact, was further from Diana’s mind. She had accepted absolutely and unquestioningly Mosley’s statement that he was never going to leave Cimmie; she did not want to break up his marriage but to be free of her own. Nor, disingenuous as it sounds, did she realise Cimmie’s sufferings. As she wrote years later, ‘Our mutual friends like Bob [Boothby] either didn’t know or didn’t think it worth while to tell me.’ Nothing would have made her give up Mosley but, had she known what agony Cimmie was going through, she might have modified her behaviour in various ways.
From Diana’s point of view, Mosley had been unfaithful from the very start of his marriage and even if she gave him up would continue to have liaisons with other women. If Cimmie had come to terms with all these other affairs, she reasoned, why should she not do so with Diana? What Diana did not understand was that Cimmie had realised that her husband’s feelings for Diana were far more profound than in any previous liaison and that, irrespective of physical fidelity, Cimmie would be sharing him on the deeper level which he had assured her was hers alone.
At Swinbrook, Nancy could hardly believe that Diana intended to go ahead with her decision to leave Bryan – or indeed would be allowed to:
Mitty [Tom] is horrified and says that your social position will be nil if you do this. Darling I do hope you are making a right decision. You are so young to begin getting in wrong with the world, if that’s what’s going to happen.
However it is all your own affair & whatever happens I shall always be on your side as you know & so will anybody who cares for you & perhaps the rest really don’t matter.
She followed this two days later on 29 November with a gloomy forecast: ‘Oh dear I believe you have a much worse time in store for you than you imagine,’ and the comment that Tom thought the £2,000 a year she had requested from Bryan was not nearly enough. ‘It will seem tiny to you.’
Neither Diana’s father nor her father-in-law was prepared to see the marriage break up without a fight. They agreed that the only thing was to appeal to Mosley himself; surely, as a gentleman born, he must see that his duty was to influence this young girl to stay with her husband, not to leave him?
The two old gentlemen, as Mosley and Diana called them (both were in their early fifties), telephoned Mosley and made an appointment to see him. Diana was terrified that her lover would be persuaded, for her sake, to give her up. Mosley had no such intentions. When Randolph Churchill asked, ‘What are you going to do?’ his response was, ‘I suppose wear a balls protector.’
When David and Lord Moyne arrived at the Ebury Street flat they plunged straight into their argument. ‘You simply must stop this. You are ruining a young marriage, with young children, and this is awful. She’s only twenty-two – how can you do such a thing? You must give your word you will not see her any more.’ Mosley refused, saying only, ‘Diana must be allowed to do what she wants.’ That night at dinner he repeated the entire conversation to her.
In December, Cimmie and Tom Mosley rented a house at Yarlington, in Somerset, for the Christmas holidays (Savehay Farm was let). Here they held a family Christmas, with Irene, Baba and the three Metcalfe children. Fruity Metcalfe was Father Christmas and the children discovered his red cloak and hat hanging up in the downstairs gents (‘Look – Father Christmas has left his clothes behind!’). On New Year’s Eve they gave a fancy-dress dance, for which a large house party stayed, including Diana. Cimmie had asked her husband’s mistress to stay, perhaps because she believed that, by integrating Diana into their circle as she had done with her husband’s other women, she could somehow neutralise her effect, perhaps because she was persuaded to do so by Mosley or perhaps, even, so that she could study them together for herself at first hand.
To venture into that house alone, to face her lover’s wife and the icy, hate-filled courtesy of the other two Curzon sisters, required astonishing effrontery. Everyone knew Diana was ‘Tom’s new girl’ – though not everyone knew she was in the process of leaving her husband. Diana not only brazened out the situation but made no secret of her feelings. ‘DG and Tom v. irritating,’ recorded Georgia Sitwell, also in the house party, adding, ‘Tom revealed all to me at lunch.’
The next day, Diana took the lease of a small house of her own, 2 Eaton Square, though because of its rundown condition she was not able to move into it for a month or two. There was just room for Diana, her two children and four servants – cook, nanny, house-parlourmaid and lady’s maid. It had been made available to her at a low rent by the Grosvenor Estate on condition she repaired and redecorated it (for which she was given a grant) but its real attraction was its closeness to Mosley’s flat two minutes away round the corner.
fn1 Because her brother’s name was Tom, Diana called Tom Mosley ‘Kit’.