Yes, she was 94. Yes, time passes and mows down various generations with it. People die every day. I myself am subject to the laws of decay and death, I’m told. And yet: Age, thou art shamed. Rome, thou hast lost the breed of noble bloods.
Deborah, Dowager Duchess of Devonshire, has died; she was the last of the Mitford sisters. They are all now gone from the earth.
The Mitford sisters fascinated – and sometimes scandalised – British society in the 1940s.
Unity was a friend of Hitler, Diana, the second wife of British fascist leader Sir Oswald Mosley, and Jessica a left-wing polemicist.
Deborah was more focused on her home life.
Nicknamed the “housewife duchess”, she made Chatsworth one of the most successful and profitable stately homes in England after marrying Andrew Cavendish in 1941.
But along with her siblings, during her lifetime she moved in the same circles as Sir Winston Churchill, John F Kennedy and Evelyn Waugh.
She also accompanied her sister Unity to tea with Hitler in 1937, was painted by Lucian Freud, and amassed a collection of Elvis Presley memorabilia.
She was not my favorite Mitford — a list of my favorite Mitfords, and Nicole’s too, can be seen here — but she was a Mitford, dammit, and worthy of respect. Attention must be paid.
Her sister Unity’s infatuation with Hitler saw the young Deborah invited to tea with the German dictator, although the visit made little impression on her.
“If you sat in a room with Churchill,” she later recalled, “you were aware of this tremendous charisma. Kennedy had it too. But Hitler didn’t – not to me anyway.”
She probably thought that was such a sick anti-Hitler burn, too. “Well, he wasn’t like one of ours, darling, if that’s what you mean.” God bless and keep the simple duchesses of the world.
Any anti-aristocratic sentiments in the comments will be heartily banned. I must mope for the rest of the day.
“Truly there were giants on the earth in those days, heroes of old, men of renown.”
Tags: aging, death, deborah mitford, mitford sisters, why
NOOOOOOOO
This is unutterably sad. She lived a grand, long life, but a world without a Mitford sister is a bleak prospect.
“Life is sometimes sad and often dull, but there are currants in the cake, and here is one of them.” – Nancy Mitford, The Pursuit of Love.
At least we had them, the hons and the rebels.
We also have Debo’s wonderful interviews on YouTube and the like. May we all find comfort in that.
Debo has joined them all in that great linen cupboard in the sky.
Michael King St.Clair, Mill Bay, British Columbia, Canada
And, as someone has pointed out downthread, Decca’s rendition of “Maxwell’s Silver Hammer.”
“housewife duchess”, hunh? A woman that made a vast, archaic feudal estate successful and profitable in war-torn Britain? Sounds like a brilliant executive officer, to me.
No, an executive officer would dive in to strip the estate bare, learning nothing, then take off with a severance bonus. Successful management in hard conditions? Definitely housewife caliber.
I love that her son’s name is Peregrine. I don’t know why, I just love that.
I gave serious thought to naming my son Peregrine. Ultimately I decided against it, but I still really like the name.
“Pilgrim by name, pilgrim by nature.” (RIP Angela Carter.)
Sadly, Peregrine Cavendish actually goes by Stoker, but as the son of a Mitford, it was inevitable that he would have a nickname.
And they all have such unusual nicknames, too! Although, with a nickname like Stoker, I wonder if he was a morbid little child who ran around pretending to suck people’s blood.
I read in the Guardian that Nancy’s nickname for Debo was “Nine”, because that was her mental age, according to Nancy. I love Nancy so much, but I don’t necessary take her word for things. She was good at nicknames, though.
Just a housewife? She was a CEO of Duchessing. Many a male peer has failed to make ends meet, that’s for sure. RIP, Your Grace
Can anyone recommend a Mitford biography that is not uncomfortably fascist-apologist?
I did enjoy that one for the most part and found it really engrossing, but the biographer was definitely pretty soft on Diana and quite harsh toward Decca. I got the feeling she didn’t want to take the obvious point of view of “Nazis = Bad, Civil Rights Activist with Communist Leanings = Good” so she overcorrected. She almost made feel sorry for poor, fascist Diana, cruelly separated from her children while in prison. It was uncomfortable for sure.
I didn’t feel she overcorrected, I think “soft on fascism, harsh on communism” was her genuine position. I too found myself almost feeling sorry for Diana in the prison bits, and was infuriated. I was deeply disgruntled by this book.
Fascinating/horrifying collection of letters to and from all the sisters came out in 2007 edited I think by Debo’s was it granddaughter in law? Anyway well worth checking out-So Mitford!
Charlotte Mosley, Diana’s daughter-in-law. I think she did a fantastic job of it.
It’s hard. I keep turning back to Hons and Rebels.
Ah, farewell to the last Hon!
People always say Diana was the most beautiful, but for me it was always Debo…
Man, did she ever turn Chatsworth into a commercial success. That place is beautiful, and so expensive to visit.
Just yesterday I was seriously considering writing self-insert Mitford fanfic, where Debo and I were of course besties. So sad!
Please go ahead. Tell me when you’re done.
Apropos of Mallory’s and Nicole’s Mitford lists, I re-read Unity’s. Are we aware that Unity Valkryie Mitford was apparently conceived in Swastika, Ontario? I know some parents go to great lengths to turn their children into doctors or lawyers or middle managers in paper supply companies, but these people seemed to have really, really wanted a Nazi.
aaaaaah man, loves me some Mitford Sisters.
fun Harry Potter-related-fact: Jo Rowling was so enamored of Hons and Rebels/Jessica Mitford (because WHO WOULDN’T BE?) that she based three characters (the Black sisters, specifically) on three of the sisters!
Unity = Bellatrix
Jessica = Andromeda
Diana = Narcissa
dunno of this is a well-known thing that has been discussed here, but I geeked hardcore when I found that out
I love Harry Potter as much as anyone but she did not do a great job recreating that Mitford tone
I feel like Jo did the Jo thing and said “oh neat, a sick thing from history, let me use it as inspiration and adapt it for my purposes” (not that this is A Bad Thing, necessarily)
But in this case, her purposes were as background characters with an interesting dynamic which was never adequately explored, and I don’t know that they got any kind of tone at all. I really wish she had explored it, though, because HOW COOL WOULD THAT HAVE BEEN
And she named her daughter Jessica! Big fan.
This I did not know! Thank you, you have made my evening.
Oh, I’m so sad.
🙁 I was not a huge Debo fan (really close to Diana, considered her “a saint”, super conservative, sneery about The Modern World and women in politics and people who disapproved of fox hunting) but she was still a Mitford and fascinating.
I try to remind myself of what Decca says in Hons & Rebels. She herself was very aware of that they were brought up to love each other and not much care about the rest of the world, basically. Debo stayed in that sort of society her whole life.
Rest in peace, Debo, Your Grace. May your guests at your banquet table never impose their food allergies on you.
Sometimes she wore a ball gown to feed chickens. That and she was the last link to my beloved Jessica Mitford and Nancy Mitford. I am 100% bummed.
That picture is fantastic. I love it, thank you for bringing it to my attention.
Never picked her as an Elvis fan. You learn something every day!
Playing Jessica Mitford’s “Maxwell’s Silver Hammer” in tribute.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPz7g3-Wu5w
Good lord. Wow. That is … something, as the big folks used to say when I was growing up (the same big folks who didn’t realize they’d shelved books like The American Way of Death where I could get at them). Thank you.
Like many of you, I am now very sad. I will console myself by watching the 2001 movie. Cannot recommend it enough for those times you need a Mitford fix but are too busy/tired/drunk to actually read a book: http://www.amazon.com/Love-Climate-Elisabeth-Derm…
“The Mitfords: Letters Between Six Sisters” is wonderfully entertaining AND a great resource for sorting out who is your favorite Mitford… as if you didn’t already know.
And
But really, try to track down the 1980 version of LiaCC. It’s utterly brilliant, with Judi Dench as Aunt Sadie.
Like many of you, I am now very sad. I will console myself by watching the 2001 movie. Cannot recommend it enough for those times you need a Mitford fix but are too busy/tired/drunk to actually read a book: http://www.amazon.com/Love-Climate-Elisabeth-Derm…
"The Mitfords: Letters Between Six Sisters" is wonderfully entertaining AND a great resource for sorting out who is your favorite Mitford… as if you didn't already know.
And
Crying because the Mitford sisters’ various writings defined my high school years, and I went through extended phases of attempting to live my life as each of them, much to the annoyance of others (my Unity and Diana phases were short, I swear). I still love Debo the most, and I wish I had Nancy’s life, but I am ultimately a Jessica at heart. Where is the Buzzfeed quiz that tells you which Mitford you are?
I’m sorry it’s not Buzzfeed, but here’s one: http://www.quibblo.com/quiz/aT3Hu5Q/Which-Mitford…
I vacillate between Nancy and Debo, and I’m pleased as punch with this.
Oh, thank heavens, I’m Decca. Nancy and Debo would’ve been OK as well, but Decca I adore.
I've been trying to read those novels for years, but I never got interested enough in them. NOW I DO.