Rose: My Life in Service to Lady Astor (7 page)

When he came to speaking of our ‘Lordy’, as he was familiarly called in the servants’ hall, Mr Lee of course did not pass any opinion or judgement. I was left with the view that his character must be near-flawless, otherwise Mr Lee would not have stayed in his service. Don’t misunderstand me, by that I don’t mean that ‘Father’ was pompous or priggish, but he had his standards, those of his position, and he kept to them. It stood to reason that if his employer didn’t measure up to them, he would prefer to work for someone who did. He would have been able even when I first knew him to have picked any job in the land. In the event I found Waldorf Astor what I can only describe as the epitome of an English gentleman. However extraordinary his father may have been, he had seen to it that his son was brought up as an Englishman of his rank, wealth and times should be. He went to Eton where he was Captain of Boats, while at New College, Oxford, he represented the University at polo, and got an honours degree in history. He grew up with the British and foreign nobility, hunting with them and staying in their country houses or castles. His manners were easy and gentle; there was nothing assumed or false about him. He had his moral and religious standards but he didn’t expect everyone to live in his way and showed wonderful understanding of human frailty in others. He loved and was proud of his beautiful wife and showed it in his every action all through his life. One knew that he couldn’t have approved of many of the things she said or did, but he never showed it. If only she could have returned half the affection he gave to her he would have been a rich man in every way. I used to long for her to do it and I went as far as I could to tell her of my longing. It wasn’t any good. She wasn’t equipped to show love. He was a wonderful father; he tried to anticipate everything his children might want, though he didn’t spoil them. Mr Michael, one of his sons, has written a book called
Tribal Feeling
about his family. Although most of it concerns her ladyship, it’s my opinion that ‘Lordy’ was very much the head of the tribe.

Of Lady Astor’s family, the Langhornes, there was not much Mr Lee could tell until he came to her father and mother. Chiswell Dabney Langhorne was born into a family that owned a tobacco estate in Virginia which was run with slave labour. The victory of the Northerners ruined him and others like him. While fighting in the war he had met and married Nancy Witcher Keene, another Virginian, whose family was of Irish extraction. The first fifteen years of their life together in the ruined Southern states was a struggle. He had a variety of jobs, among them nightwatchman, piano salesman, tobacco and horse auctioneer. Insecurity didn’t prevent raising a large family, my lady being the seventh of eleven. Her birth seemed to bring him luck. A general whom he’d known during the Civil War employed him to handle his coloured labour constructing railroads. He quickly advanced to become a contractor himself and within a few years he had made a lot of money. He moved from Danville, where her ladyship was born, to Richmond, the capital of Virginia. He lived there until she was thirteen, and then with the philosophy that, as he would say, ‘Only niggers and Yankees work,’ he bought a large estate and house called Mirador near Charlottesville in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains, and retired.

My lady loved all the places of her youth and I was later to visit them with her and share her affection. She left home when she was seventeen and went to a finishing school in New York. She later stayed with her eldest sister Irene, who was by then Mrs Dana Gibson, wife of the celebrated artist. It was she who inspired him to create the famous Gibson Girl pictures. Through Dana, Nancy, my lady, met a Bostonian of good family, Robert Gould Shaw, and eventually married him. According to Mr Lee he was a ‘wild one’ and much given to the drink. So much so that after the birth of her son my lady could stand it no longer, and left him. It was Mr Lee’s opinion too that it was Mr Shaw who gave her her lifelong hatred of alcohol. During the next few years and while divorce proceedings were taking place, she visited Europe and England. She enjoyed a hunting season here and it was on a journey for another visit in the autumn of 1905 that she met his lordship, then Mr Waldorf, who was on the same ship. They were married in 1906.

When he spoke to me about Lady Astor’s character Mr Lee was guarded, choosing his words very carefully. He told me later that he hadn’t wanted to say anything that might influence my opinion of her. He described her as a character, a great personality in her own right. ‘She is not a lady as you would understand a lady, Miss Harrison,’ I can remember him saying. By that he meant that she didn’t conform to what society thought a lady’s behaviour should be and to what had been my experience of ladies in service up till then. ‘You won’t find her easy,’ was his final remark, but it was not a criticism. I understood him to mean that she was a challenge and that if one was able to meet it, it would be rewarding; or am I perhaps being wise after the event! Anyway I don’t propose to sum her ladyship up, as I have Lord Astor, because it would be beyond me. What I felt about her can only come out as I write.

After this Mr Lee told me about the children: Mr Billy, twenty-one; Miss Wissie, eighteen; Mr David, sixteen; Mr Michael, twelve, and Mr Jacob, nine – Jakie, as he was known to everyone. The ages I’ve put by them were their ages at the time I joined Lady Astor. ‘You’ll like them,’ he said, ‘and they’ll like you.’ One of the best things about being in service for any length of time is growing up with the children. He was right, for although I came so much later to the Astors than he did, this was something I shared with him. As I’ve said, her ladyship had another son by her first marriage, Bobbie Shaw. ‘He’s not an Astor,’ Mr Lee said, meaning by this that he was different from the others. I found him different. He was the stormy petrel. It is my opinion that he felt he never quite belonged in their world and resented it. Some unkind things have been said and written about him, though never by the family. Some of the criticisms he has perhaps deserved, although, as I hope to show later in the book, no one demonstrated greater love or devotion to his mother than he did, particularly towards the end of her life.

That then was Mr Lee’s outline, embellished by some remarks of mine, of the family that I was to serve. I say family for although I was employed to work for Miss Wissie, and shortly afterwards for Lady Astor, I had the feeling that I belonged to them all. Indeed, I did serve them all, because by keeping her ladyship happy, I made their lives a lot easier, and they used to tell me so.

It’s difficult to understand about my job and my life without also knowing the places where I had to work, their size and the scale on which they were run. Cliveden, although the largest and the most famous, was only one of the Astor houses. The others were: 4 St James’s Square, a great town house; Rest Harrow, Sandwich, Kent; 3 Elliot Terrace, Plymouth, what might be called their political house, which his lordship bought when he first stood for Parliament there; and Tarbert Lodge, on the Isle of Jura in the Inner Hebrides, where the family went for deer-stalking and fishing holidays. I’m glad to say I only went there twice. That kind of isolated, open air life did not appeal to me.

I suppose we looked on Cliveden as the hub of the Astor estates although possibly more of my time in my early years was spent at 4 St James’s Square. Cliveden may not be one of the most famous, but it is certainly one of the most magnificent country houses in England, and its setting on steep wooded heights looking down on the Thames from the north and on to an immense terrace and gardens from the south makes it one of the loveliest. It was only thirty miles from London which meant that it could be easily and regularly used every weekend as a home.

The house was composed of a centre block with east and west wings. On the ground floor of the centre block there was a huge front hall, the long drawing-room overlooking the river, the library with its panelling of rare Sabicu wood, the Louis XV dining-room, Lord Astor’s study and Lady Astor’s boudoir. Above were the main bedrooms with names like the Tapestry, the Rose, the Orange Flower, the Snowdrop, the Lavender; also the day and night nurseries. In the east wing were guest rooms for about forty visitors. In the west wing were the offices and staff bedrooms. The basement contained the kitchens, the servants’ hall, the Pugs’ Parlour, the men’s brushing-rooms where all the visitors’ clothes were pressed and cleaned, the china room, the wine cellar, the butler’s pantry where the silver was washed in teak sinks before being polished and the silver safe. Along the passage were railway lines on which the food used to be wheeled from the kitchens to the service lift. This practice had stopped before I joined and the food was carried by the odd men on butlers’ trays to the lifts and transferred to the large hot-plate in the serving room next to the dining-room. Considering the distance travelled, it’s amazing that meals were eventually served piping hot.

My room at Cliveden was large, well decorated and comfortably furnished with a bed, two easy chairs, a couch and two big wardrobes. Unfortunately there was nowhere near at hand I could hang bits of washing, for although there was a laundry there were still some things I preferred to do myself. So I rigged a clothes-line across the room. It was like my childhood days, I always seemed to have underwear looking at me. All my lady’s clothes were pressed and cleaned in my room so I was constantly dashing between floors with armfuls of things.

The inside staff employed to run the house were Mr Lee, the steward/butler, a valet, an under-butler and three footmen, two odd men, a hall boy and a house carpenter; in the kitchens the chef, three kitchen-maids, a scullery maid and a daily; a housekeeper, two stillroom maids, four housemaids and two dailies; four in the laundry, two ladies’ maids for Lady Astor and Miss Wissie, a telephonist and a night watchman. The outside staff was much larger, with estate maintenance men, gardeners, farm workers for the stud and home farms and chauffeurs. These men lived in cottages and rooms on and around the estate. Unmarried gardeners were housed in two bothies. A bothy provided dormitory-like sleeping quarters and a dining-room and sitting-room. Cooking and cleaning was done by the housekeepers, but the food was ordered and paid for by the men.

During the week the majority of inside servants would move to 4 St James’s Square. In this way they were responsible for the running of two houses. It was a system that worked well and everyone was kept happy with the mixture of town and country life.

No. 4 St James’s Square was a large and elegant town house of the eighteenth century. On the ground floor there were two large halls leading on to the Square, the morning room, the lower dining-room, Lord Astor’s study, the controller’s room and the menservants’ quarters. Lord and Lady Astor’s bedrooms and dressing-rooms were on the first floor and so was my lady’s boudoir, also there were two drawing-rooms, the large dining-room and the ballroom. Above were staff and visitors’ bedrooms and at the top of the house a squash court. In the basement were the kitchens which faced on to Regent Street, the Pugs’ Parlour, the stillroom, the wine cellar, the butler’s pantry and silver safe and countless other rooms, many of which were stored with furniture. There was a service lift to the top dining-room, but the food was carried to the lower one.

My room here, although attractively furnished and with a fitted carpet, was small considering the work I had to do in it. However there was a room nearby for the washing and drying, though since I was blessed with a fireguard I hung pieces on it to air and so once again was continually kept clothes-conscious.

Rest Harrow was built for the Astors in 1911. It was a seaside country house standing in large grounds near two golf courses, which Lady Astor used constantly when in residence. It was a comfortable house. There were two halls of which the inner could be used as a sitting-room, a drawing-room, a dining-room, schoolroom and kitchens on the ground floor and a patio leading to the gardens. Lord and Lady Astor’s bedrooms were on the first floor, with three visitors’ rooms. On the second were the day and night nurseries, more visitors’ rooms and the servants’ quarters. In the gardens there was a miniature golf course, a squash court and kennels. The house had a resident housekeeper and housemaid.

Here my room was everything I could have wished. It had a lovely’ view out to sea, was light and airy and delightfully furnished.

No. 3 Elliot Terrace, Plymouth, overlooking the Sound, was one of eight terraced Victorian houses with a basement and five floors. The main rooms were therefore separated by staircases. The kitchens were in the basement, hall and dining-room on the ground floor, sitting-room and secretary’s office on the first floor, Lord and Lady Astor’s bedrooms on the second floor, visitors’ rooms on the third floor and staff and spare rooms on the two top floors. There was a resident secretary in charge, a housekeeper, a cook and a kitchen-maid.

My room at the top of the house can very easily be imagined. It was typical of the Victorian period, a servant’s attic. Fortunately it was better furnished than was usual and I found I was able to cope quite easily.

Tarbert Lodge was more like a farmhouse. It was comfortable, but comparatively spartan, not a place to be lived in, more one to come back to after a day’s sport. It was run by the resident factor, a Mr Maclntyre, and his wife.

My immediate concern when I arrived at Cliveden was of course Miss Wissie. My friendship with Mrs Vidler, Lady Astor’s maid, made settling into the house, and the job, much easier. She showed me around. Miss Wissie had her own suite: a bedroom, sitting-room and bathroom. She could, if she wanted, be independent of the rest of the house, do her own entertaining and have her meals sent up. She was a typical young lady of the times, good-looking with big dark brown eyes, a wonderful complexion, tall but slim. She took after her father and there was nothing of her mother in her. She was timid and shy and I think resented, at any rate in her younger days, her mother’s theatrical and unpredictable behaviour. She had no dependence on her mother. I’d like to say that she’d cut loose from her mother’s apron strings, but that wouldn’t be very apt because I don’t think Lady Astor ever wore an apron in her life, at any rate I never saw her in one. What I mean is she didn’t look to her mother for help or advice. She got interference of course; none of the children could avoid that, nor indeed could any of the staff. I remember, soon after I joined her, that I went with Miss Wissie to her cousin Mrs Winn’s home in Charles Street, where she was to spend the night, to dress her for a ball her aunt, Lady Violet Astor, was giving for her at her house in Carlton House Terrace. Before we left Lady Astor called for me and told me that Miss Wissie had to wear a particular dress, white chiffon with a wreath of roses that I’d had to tack right round the back. Miss Wissie hated it and refused to wear it. ‘Well,’ I thought, ‘it can’t really be that important,’ so I just made a few noises of protest and then let her have her own way. She wore a gold one and by the time I’d finished with her she was a sight for sore eyes. She was indeed the belle of the ball; everybody had said so, Mrs Winn told me the next day. When we got back to Cliveden Lady Astor sent for me and cross-examined me. ‘I’m told Miss Wissie was the belle of the ball,’ she said.