The Mitford Girls

Im reading a biography of the Mitford family, by Mary S Lovell. I find myself unable to like it very much. It is well written but I find that there is a little too much sympathy for the fascist members of the family, particularly Diana Mosley. David Freeman-Mitford, father of the family, was eccentric and right wing. He had a hot temper and was difficult to live with. He married Sydney Bowles. His wife was a cool but gentle woman, who seems to have married for security but they were relatively poor by aristocratic standards. David was a younger son, and his father in law got him a job as editor to a magazine when he got married, so as to provide a bigger income. David was not much of a reader, so it was an odd choice of career. David's older brother was killed in World War One, and left only 2 daughters, so he became the heir to the title and estates. With 7 children, money was tight by upper class standards. Nancy was the eldest of the family which consisted of 6 daughters and 1 son, Tom. In the 1920s and 30s, as the children grew up, quite a few of them seemed to veer toward the right, in politics. While I like Nancy, who was a mild liberal who became rather more conservative, as she grew older, I find the family's political leanings unnerving. Even Nancy, though she was anti Fascist, was inclined to tolerate her siblings' right wing views, perhaps to avoid family rows. But she did speak to the British authorities when World War Two broke out, and advised them that Diana was overly sympathetic to the Nazis. As a result, Diana, who had just had a baby, was imprisoned with her husband under wartime laws for her alleged Nazi leanings, even though Mosley had told his followers to fight for Britain once they were at war. Unity the second youngest girl was not just right wing but unstable. She went to Germany to study and became obsessed with Hitler and supported his anti Semitic policies. When war broke out, she shot herself because she was upset that her country, and Germany which she loved, were fighting. Tom, the only boy, also "liked Germans" and did not want to fight them. He joined up but managed to get posted to fight against Japan. He was killed in the later stages of the war. Jessica ( called Decca) was a non fascist, she was sympathetic to the Communist party. She ran away and married a nephew of Churchill's wife, Esmond Romilly... who was an upper class Communist. Nancy disliked him, as she felt he was nasty and unpleasant, and that he had led Jessica into rebellion against her family and a difficult life. Jessica and Esmond were very poor after their marriage and lived in Rotherhithe, a working class district, near the docks. They had a daughter, Julia, who caught measles as when only a few months old. The child died, and the couple were devastated. However, their very loud pro Communist activities provoked their upper class relatives and friends to be hostile to them. In the beginning of their marriage, if they visited relatives, they stole small items from their houses, on the grounds that the upper class did not need the things. Jessica did repent to some extent of her Communist views in later life, whereas Diana was ambivalent about her pro Fascist viewpoint. Jessica and Esmond went to the US and when War broke out, he joined up. They had another daughter, Constantia, but Esmond was killed. Jessica remained in the US and married a Jewish left wing lawyer, Bob Truehaft. She and he had 2 more children and pursued left wing causes, as journalists and activists. But Jessica never made up with her sister Diana. I hope to write a bit more later.