1957-09-28 — Page 5

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THE CHINA MAIL, SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 28, 1957.

BRITAIN'S BARONETS -ARE BOOMING

HERE is a special flavour about the Tory candidate in Itoday's by-election at Gloucester," a touch, even, of glamour. It is not simply that Mr Francis Dashwood sporta four initials and wears the Old Etonian tie. More than that, he is heir to the Premier Baronet of Grent Britain, Sir John Dashwood,

The Tory candidate at thr la: by-election was brushed with the same glow of chivalry, Indeed Colonel Richard Glyn, who won South Dorset' went

one better than Mr Dashwood. He

the helr to two-

batonutcies. Between them they bring back into prominance Britain's most neglected dignity. Airendy 27 Tory M.P.3 ure baronets; several more will rucceed to the title in due time. These are fortunate men, For they bask in the aplerziour of the hereditary system without being bundled into the obscurity of the House of Lords,

Eccentricity

In the old days baronets were largely Handed. Even today Bantay of them rua to ace. The Dashwoods have a Ane old familly Beat, Wesl Wycombe Park. Some yer

go they prezented it to the National Trust, But they still rit there, though the public get a look inside during two months

in the year.

Sir John Dashwood's le dates from 1707. But there wer batenels tour before that, For It was

I who established the Baronefags us Denies of Dignity, midway in plar and preedener between the Barons and the Keithts, in 1811 The Preinter Burmet of

England is Sir Edmund Bacon, whose newly-discovered Dutr painting is now making news.

For nearly 350 years the nun ber of baronels has contiuued to well until today there are nearly 1500 of them on the roll.

by IVAN YATES

Once upon me baronets had a reputation for eccentricity. Sir Timothy Eden. Bl. their: Mr John Eden, MP), wrote a splendid book about his highly eccentric father, The Tribula- Osbert Sitwell, whose title was tions of a Baronet, And Sir

ronferred on is great-great- grandfather, Sir Sitwell Sitwell bas immortalised his own orkki father in the putes of hi: memoirs.

But increasingly baronels con- Jom like the rest of us. And for all is dignity, being a baronet has its disadvantages. barnets are To most people

Some knights, only more so. people even confuse the two.

Title scorned

Take the Law Officers of the Crown, for instance: Sir Re tak Mammuthun-Buller and Win Sir Harry Hylton-Foster, among us could lay his hand on his heart and sw ́ar he knew which was a baronet (it is S

teginald and which n knight Partiently as both of them were knights a couple of years ago.

On the other hand, everyone knows Sir Edward Boyle is

}}

baronet. He's not old enough te be a knight. (There is, in fact, something strangely demura bout a boy baronet. Rather like a boy bishop).

Some baronets go so far as to veeal the fact that they are batonits. The present Mädern, tor of the Church of Scotland, DI George Macleod, founder Lad Leader of the Iona Com- munity, should be styled the Sir George Macired, Bu Kuv All tlile.

scorts the noe of his

Not so the clerical baronets of the English Establishment, The Trev Chuon Sir Percy Maryon- Wilson. Bt., does not disdain his Inheritance in his parish in the comfortable resort of St Leonard's-on-Sea, Nor doen the Rev. Sir Patrick Ferguson- Davie, B., who combines the running of his estate, Creedy Park, near Crediton, with his honorary

chaplaincy to the Lord Bishop of Exeter,

Mark the prevailing hypheus. Nothing becomes a baronet intre than his hyphen,

Some of them have inore than one-like Sir George Tapps-Gervis-Meyrick, the 5th; baronet, and Sir Thomas {1}=} borne - Swinaerton - Pilkington, the 14th Baronet.

Some baronets inherit their hyphens. Others ereale them. Thus Sir Philip Magnus. BL. who wrole in excellent life of Gladstone a few years ago, took a hyphen after his name and is now Sir Philip Magnus-Allcroft, Bt. On the other hand, Sir John Show, BL, one of the lead- ing

Church layinen in the Assembly, slipped his in befere his surname last year and is now Sir John Best-Shaw, Bt.

Ture is, indeed, no limit to baronels. the ingenuity of nur

Sir Fitzroy Anstruther-Gough- Calthorpe, B., was born Lloyd-

----THE---LINK----

Foix. Southern France. THE Abbe Armand

T Blanchebarbe had just

finished the service in his church at Foix one Sunday morning in the summer of 1943 when a message

whispered to him:

Was

"Six

R.A.F. squadron leaders ar- rive tonight...

For the Able and his 36- sister, Murie year-old Louise, it meant they had only a few hours to put their usual escape plan into operation.

At first all went according to plau, The driver of the train from Toulouse

had his usual

brief: slow

down on

curve just be- fore Fox sty tion to allow

THE ESCAPERS

the squadron leaders to jump off at a spot whore guides awaited them. Marie Louise. 06 CO many occasions previously, had arranged for them to be hidden In French homes.

Then the bla Guac: A white-faced French customs ollicer ran to the Abbe's home. "German troops posted along the line. ons has betrayed us."

IN CODE

are Some.

It was too late to stop the air- men at Toulouset they were already in the train,

All that could be done was to pass a message down the line warning the driver not to slow down at the usual spot, and pray that the squadron leaders could somehow smuggled

ba through the German.control at Foix station,

A DESPERATE CHOICE BUT THE ONLY ONE.

by

FRANK TOLE

No. 4

13

lest brother, and walked to the barrier behind which Gestupo men stood, checking on every- one who passed.

ABBE

PIPE - SMOKING BLANCHEBARBE EVERYONE IN FOIX RE- MEMBERS HIS COURAGE,

bec worse--for it could have been east, ke ro many others," he says.

Nobody remarked that the Ablie seemed to make excep. flomily frequent use of the confessional boxes In his church at Foix, and nobody obviously asked what WAN said there.

But this certain: that by route a southern escape, total of 5.000 people resched freedom, one in every ton being an airman.

in And everyone you msel this region will tell you that the man whose courage they admire most is the quiet Abbe.

A clase seruling from the This Germans as each R.A.F, man passed with questionlig. The French grip on each English- inn's

arm unconsciously tightened but the party kept walking along in uniconcerned fashion until well out into the station yard.

• ONE MAN

י,

Un-

Then, still walking hurriedly, across the bridge into the town and lety.

His most perilous moment? The night of December 14, 1944, when he was on his way, to à resistance meeting.

HIDE-OUT

man stepped

out of the shadows and said: "Go tun further, The Gestapo are here and one man has died under torture. I don't think he talked,

are ransacking

tho place for documents."

The Abbe flew back

A One man only had renson to be terrified after that the Andorran guide who had be trayed the original plan to the

Gestapo,

The customs group were

men knew who but they he was and arrested him as smuggler.

As the train drew in, the Abbe Blanchebarbe and mem- bers of his escape waiting on the station-and not a German in sight. It seemed, and was, too good to be true.

Just as the airmen got out of the train a black Gestapo car sped into the stpilon yard.

ជ

to his

Names? 11 was atriet rule home, burned papers that might

Jever to note them, healthier for all concerned case of torture,

• ARRESTED

The Abbe, trying to look un concerned walked up to the womon escort who had accom- parded the airmen in the train. The air dad in the Pyre- nees, he said-iba code signal capa For danger "follow me." And France,

How

mach ir

did he jain the RAF chain ins Southern

Ive been compromising and took refuge in a monastery.

But he was tracked down and questioned hour after hour.

All he has to say about that experience is: "They got nothing out of me, but it seemed a long time before they let me go."

For most people that would have been enough, but not for this quietly spoken, him. From Lyons he joined the then in a whisper to the airmen, pipe-smoking priest who Vercors Maquis fighters, whom "throw away your cigaretter." rarely talks about his adven- story is one of the most heroke

in tures? oddly-assorted clothes given to He was arrested near Metz in them unill the liberation of his of all the war, and stayed with them by the French, were smak- 1940 far resisting attempts to country.. ing English cigarettes, unaware, make his beloved Lorraine into

(NEXT WEEK: of the rinks.'

a German province. So with his The Abbe's friends took each sister and 89 parishioners ha alman by the arm like long was sent soul. It could hava Marie Claira/

The squadron

Leaders

Anstruther, divested himself of Lloyd wid hooked Gongh- Calthorpe on the end. While Mr John Polo-Carew, when ho succeeded his kingman As Ese 12th baronet, dropped his hyphen altogether and shuffled the order of his names about. He is now known as Sir John Carew Pole, Bt., and todny chairs the Coin- wall County Council.

Hidden title

Soine Baroneleies RTC cun- cented within peerage. Not many people, even in his own party, know that Mr John Strachey is the helr 10 baronatey, When his kinsman, Lord Strachie, dies, the barony will die with him; but the baronelcy which is hid from vlow will pass to the Soelalist Etonian. With such a prepon- derance of baronets on the other side this should, surely, delight the Socialists.

It will add a lustre to their benches which has been sadly locking luce Sir Richard Aeland, the 15th haronet, for- Fook them for the classroom

-{London Express Service).

APSWICH BY-ELECTIONS VOTE CONSERVATIVE

APSWICH BY-HECTON VOTE LIBERAL

JOHN COBBOLD

OLD ETONIAN, BREWER, CHARMAN) ON TOWN FOOTBALL CLUB)

MISS MANLEZA SYKES RESTAURANT OWNER LUNGSPPENS, ŠUMINERS, TELAS

"All the others want now is an Old Etonian brewer who can play like Stan Matthews, cook like Philip Harben, stand on his head and sing like Elvis Presley,"

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