1954-01-23 — Page 7

THE CHINA MAIL, SATURDAY, JANUARY 23, 1954.

The Fabulous Mountbattens

DEATH OF A LONELY

Into the fabulous story of the Mountbatten family come a man who arrived in Britain from Ger~ many with only a bag of clothes

MILLIONAIRE

and 0 violin. He died, worth ituence with His immenre wealth stli hod trial, and he took to spending a £6,000,000, leaving a large part of the Kaiser to be administered but his nan- couple of months in one of hi tcial machination; on behalf of country estates. ilowever, with it to his granddaughter Edwinam

Casse i's the British Government started the end of the war, his life who was

to become Lady Louis relationship to go awry. His work, it seem- entered a short Indian summer.

With victory, there Was Mountbatten – and the aunt of the own King.

nothing to remind him ine earlier atmosphere of prejudice, Duke of Edinburgh. The millionaire From 1900

and there was a

was a second genera- of tion grown and he almost un

womanhood was Sir Ernest Cassel -

to the out- Pince Louis of Battenburg. lighten died, despite his wealth, a lonely, break of father of Lord Iouls Mount-

they batten unhappy old man.

T

0 consolidate his position in London society Sir Ermest Cassel bought, in 1905, the Park Lane MULTI- sion, Brook House,

Immense sums were spent Onl its

and renovation decoration, and he moved into three years later.

Unlike his Royal master, King Edward VII, Castel was not a fountain laste, and although teak the best advice and acqu.red The

valuable objects that money could buy the pansion becuine

mained of vulgar opulence.

He Imported eight hundred tons of marble fren Michelan- KP os quarrie in itoly Even the six kitchens were lined with 11, and the dining-reon, panelled ent.rely in ook, wa designed to seat a hundred guests in comfort. The wall T The entrance J. liby were panelled with alternating lupis lazılł atel Peer-veined cream-coloured marble.

The double, dours Del fast single doors leading off it were

of looking-glass, and the +1)

hull grand staircase and gallery were of white marble,

Than

wa:

The braty on the Upper Brook Street corner furnished entirely in cherry wood, with small oval comeos of Block Wedgwood insel under the bokcases.

Classe was one of the princi- pat ellents of Sir Joseph Duveen, the great art dealer, who trow best new-rich millionaires Wi

ver America and Europe vying with each other In

into

the

purchase of valuable pictures tand #bJlt `a[

Value of it all

THE house was crammed with

Je

THE

$ A 12 cryslat ware and old salver gablets.

There was never any hint that Casci quired a real appreciate. of value artistic iton of the the e beautiful things,

His daughter, Maul, who, by

ot 1906, was the mother

Two little girls, Edwina and Mary, ueled as hostess in this palatial e tuulishleat for a while-unth she died of consumption after Cassel had vainly poured wealth in try to save her.

For

with hia ed to Cassel, had tost its favour.

The fuul eru bing blow come ne when he was piliorfed by the same group of prople who had brought about the downfall

m

were e

h

movers in what, 4013 three nearly became occasions, sucer ssful attempts to halt the

growing rivalry between Ger-

May

by and Great Britain which led to the outbreak of the First World War

1914, Ballin

and Castel were still lobbying minis- frs in un attempt to reach some arrangement, but by now it was too late.

Friends who snubbed

AIR-WEATHER friends who

1105-

TO

to

days. His two grandilaughters, Ed- wina and Mary, had often comė from

school to see him during the wot and ht wird over them benevolently.

תר וזנות

Edwina was his levourite, and early in 1919, when he was 17, The came to live with London. Afici

A carefully chaperoned months visit to Italy for some to finish her education, she cune which out at a great ball Brook House took on all its old opulence.

ho less

for

Edwina now acted as

bad baffened

at is pitality for years and had lob- bed hamelessly for the huvita- tions that would bring them into Coll with Intimate contact clreles now openly shunned him, Str Ernest hd probably long been under no illusion as to the charmeter of their friendship - Hitle is hidden 10 Н

A man with for the new wave of entertain- his knowledge of affairs bul

He ing with the snubs

which Sir Ernest must have hurt.

her in society. Bul turned now to amper oral bene launched factions

the friends were nearly all his, and to his 1wp

young the

bu! two generations his grunddaughters as nn cutlet for not one,

older than the stim. wide-eyed which He the affections

had re-

girl of the table, It was not bed N many severe rebusts.

that Sir Erne

e was ungrateful or Rave Dway some ag team and a hatt grackens, but often she was just

In the meantime the momen- tum of Ca sel's life had started to diminish. Edwardt VII. his and putron, died in May

1910

Cassel was the Just * inbmutes to see him alive, bad an appointment with the

Krug on the morning of den, best was advised by

tas

The

t

Brook House, Park Lane. A picture taken before it was pulled down to make way for an office block.

bored.

Death alone

IN the autumn

1351-

01 1020 SIF Ernest's doctors sent him to the South of France for the Winter, and next year he bought for £88.000 the beautiful Vill de Cedres, lying in 40 acres at Cap Ferrat.

It was Sir Ernest's last luxury. and he never ret foot in it ** The owner, The end came sud- denly, almost exactly a month later, on September 21. Tenth found him. Attingly,

akcne. collapsed over the desk in office in Brook Hou e.

"Grend wealth,

heurt, great influence.

H

Sir Ernest Cassel. His friendship with King Edward VII was a remarkable thing. They had nothing in common except a strong physical

resemblance,

But it is the first

time that

Ifis father had just died, and he hud left for The funeral, the combination came to shelter great Edwina had promised 10 Join and gulde the formative years

was who and was actually making of a young man

some him.

tu

affection, more suspicion, C the long train journey back to become the First Gentleman of inuch untappiness marked

the London the doy her grandfather the Realm-the Duke of Edin- life of Erne Cassel," The

died.

burgh, Times Obituary noted two days Sir Ernest Ca sel's estate was after his death. It is possible tu proved at more than £7,500,000, name one more entry in calogue: much loneliness.

C'ourt physicians that His pounds in the last six years of Duchess of Sutherland. Majesty was too unwell to see his life

This hits.

Bhat

f which some £4,000,000 r

his

It remains one of the greatest

over amas*ed in fortunes single generation.

A

money

*

Lord India

NEXT SATURDAY: Louis Mountbaten is as A.D.C. to the Prince of Wales He and Prince Louis of Bat-mained for distribution in

will. tenburg

died within 11 day of

his wife-to-be--owner of a cach other. Neither of them had

vast fortune -- burrows £100 inkling that their respectiv

passage money to go to see him granddaughter and son were in

... they are married and with Yet, as he himself the throes of a ripening mutual

become acknow- the Prince

of Wales affection,

edged, it had brought him lite leaders of the Bright Young Edwina had been in Sectlund happiness,

Thlings. with the staying

and Duke

the A large part of Ligut-

went to Edwina and Mary, the enant Lord Louts Mountbatten twy granddaughters. Edwina This series of articles is abridged

and

from the book "Manifest De- was to marry Lord Louls. of outpurig

phulan- was a fellow hou e-gurat, The King was not to be put thropy was

twu

by Brian Connell, and were young people

It is not the first time that stiny,** curiou.ly mutched the

lake

and off and, rising, dressed him elf with maute petty econom

ccnsiderable wealth

birth have in starting lo

been pubished by Cassells at 155. united in Britain's social history, notice of each other,

This series to World Copyright, Castel be his private fe. and demanded Bhut

R mily have been a slighty sent for.

Following the Privy Council

sense of humour, or per- Krim meeting the morning after

the hups a throw-back to the spario King's death, Casel went to call days of his youth, but Sir Ernest un Margot Asquith, the wife of gave up wearing his starched the Prime Minister, and they sat white walsteout? when he found wept quietly together on the laundering charge had In- granddaughter, and

the solu.

dining. a, Sir Ernest developed a

ertosed to is. 8d. The Soon it was the wreck of his room staff found they had tu affection, and later-when

whole life which Cassel had to account for the odd cold part- she was 17-he, in turn, 10 hostess in the

Le

mourn. His personality did not ridge that disappeared between big Park

and the same echo ku the new the day and the next. The staff Lane house.

Later still. after she had Court.

were put on board wages. But this was as nothing com- married Lord Louls Mount-

the third family batten,

with lar pared was to arrange

which came to blight the sale of the house. On top of cal mily

Life. Cassei's daughter, the office block which replaced his

Maud, was now deeply stricken

she

vist

was

It she and Lord Louis lived in fabulous penthouse which

the talk of London.

During his years in

was

Brook House Cassel was to play a not- able part in a of state,

No longer healthy

to

continued entertain the irlends whu her mother, and in the spring were left to him. He kept kids

on his Moulton Paddocks estate. of 1911 she died.

The double blow Was 100 to combat the shortage of meat.

with the disease that had killed he still

high transaction much.

WHY DID THE MAORIS

TAKE OFFENCE?

ARTHUR BRITTENDEN. looks into the question of native pride

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Gaddi's

carvings and the significance, not as a clinging to native decoration Rotorua (New Zealand).

Naera's It is equally fair to make the but in Mr and Mrs HEY have gone

point that the Arawa gave their personal ability to make them.

the Rotorua For

ceremony The

who greeting to the Queen and Duke Maoría

they of Edinburgh here at Rotorua the community in which here came

their and not at the Waitangi cere- live produced hundreils of fibre

for seen by so skirts welcome mony, which was

Mooris elsewhere the many onlookers

of the true Maori ritual.

been a Waitangi may have

loyalty by 200 gesture of intense

in

to

on the roada

His health, normally never a thousands To all intents and pur- poses he retired from business, mutter for concern, started to their Queen are

He still ured Old Broad give him trouble.

on way home It was a curious affair, with The little offor in

his Street was closed, and he put a to tramp round Hyde Park and many undertones, involving

great few clerks into a new block at Kensington Gardens for an hour which will take them friend, Albert Ballin, the

Green Street,

Grosvenor every morning, but he was find- and 300 miles over German shipping magnate, who 51,

a Zealand's two islands. ing the winters in London had acquired a position of in- Square.

It was quiet in

Sir John Sargent's portrait of Lady Lonis Mountbatten as a girl. Sargent was the most fashionable portrait painter of the day. For Bir Ernest Camel it was a favourite portrait of a favourite: grandda

£3

a travesty who wished to wear them be- fore the Queen but had lost the craftsmanship.

But those who contrive this But as apparently successful, malching

New those who took part.

other Maoris Bee it they were of native and European life

of tribes

who were are now being faced with tno members

among tho Arst to become problem as inherently danger-

a

geyser dotted Whakare scattered by European infiltra- ous as the dispersal in another

with their

warewa Reserve and In tion Into New Zealand and the century of weaker tribes. their sitting-room Tom and first to lose touch Nini Naera had time to tradition. talk.

The proudest

How do those tribes con=

to

duct themselves which try retain their native, characteris- ing

New

spur

Their young people are turn- to European-type houses

ties, yet have absorbed enough an estates often

far away,

of the different European way Marriages between Maoris and of life to meet its inevitabla Pakeha (Europeans) are in- creasing And the official policy challenge to Maori survival?

I joined them to see if, in this moment

of after

In the room where I talked for schooling is: Mix. math; we could find

were a to Mr and Mrs Nacra balance between the things three-piece suite, a display which you at home have cabinet, carpets of a kind found read of the Maori people in any English house. In their kitchen- refrigerator; ari and the unhappiness of electric clothes press, a with- many Macris that they ing-machine. should ever have been set down.

He is chairman of the Whaka. Tribal

Labour-saving

What effect will the nows paper reports on the Woltarl

(the

securacy of seremony which is not denied) have now has sim- that the resentment

Mrs mared down? I believe Nacra

is right in saying "In the end they cart only bo counted a pin-pricks."

Queen said in her speech at Rotorua: "I hope that you will always hold fast Committeo, Over the furniture were lald

to your own language and cul- she is the Maori Welfare Maori mate of flax and kiw!

feathers. Photograph frames ture, your arts and crafts, and Offloer for the Arawa dia were of carved, tolara wood in-

that you will always cherish trict. Both belong to the laid with a stone which has the the traditions which have been Arawa tribe. in which die appearance of mother-of-pearl. handed down from, your fore-

fathers." tress is perhaps most deep from a wall hung a paddle ins

who hap The Maoris tricately carved, ly felt at the criticism of: The electric

gadgets. Mrs tained those traditions, know- the Maoris. For the Arawa Naera Docs as a sensible and Ing the honour in which are the proudest upholders hygienic aid to her housework Queens hold among all their of their native, beliefs and it only 50 years since the people, look on this as a new Minoris were fewer than 45,000, spur, forestoring native pride crafta.

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