Fr. John Basil Lee Jellicoe, Part 2

When I was a boy, my parents used to drag my brother and me on family holidays to camp in a caravan at various scenic locales in the eastern portion of the United States. Almost invariably, my father would strike up a conversation with some fellow around a campfire and inform him we were from Pennsylvania.

That chap, no matter where he himself was from, would typically say something to my father along the lines of, "Oh! Pennsylvania! Do you know our friends, the Smiths?"

After politely assuring him that the Smiths (or whomever) that we knew were very unlikely the same Smiths that he knew, Dad would still grumble later about the fact that a couple of million people lived in The Keystone State, and about people's stupidity in general.



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Sometimes I wonder if my father wouldn't have a good long rant about me and what I'm doing here, in essence asking the entire U.K., "Say, do you happen to know a bloke named Mills?"

I mean, sure, George Mills was an officer's reserve military paymaster (in WWII) and went to Oxford (Christ Church) and was concerned about the Anglican Church and Roman Catholicism. And Father J. B. L. Jelliocoe was an officer's reserve paymaster in the military (in WWI; perhaps this is where Mills got the "reserve officer" idea) and went to Oxford (Magdalen College) and was concerned about the church as well. And A. B. H. Bishop went to Oxford (Jesus College) at the same time as those two, and was Head of Magdalen College School at Brackley during the same period Jellicoe was head of the Magdalen College Mission in Camden. Oh, and Bishop was raised in Cornwall, where George Mills was born, but raised quite near George's Acland family ancestral home at Killerton in Devon.

And it likely is just a coincidence that Mills and Bishop left Oxford and each became involved in independent preparatory schools. And that Mills was writing books about those preparatory schools at the same time that Bishop was advancing his career in the schools. And it's likely just a coincidence that George's father was a social reformer in London, based in Kensington, during the 1920s and early 1930s, while Jellicoe was a London social reformer in nearby St Pancras during that same era.

Small world, isn't it?

So it's probably just a colossal coincidence that, when the young but worn-out Jellicoe passed away in 1935, his memorial service was attended by a gentleman named "Mr. H. E. Howell," a chap bearing the same moniker as a gentleman who, as an old friend of the author, had helped George Mills by reading the manuscript for his first novel, Meredith and Co.: The Story of a Modern Preparatory School, in 1933.

This Howell attended the service as the representative of All Saints Margaret Street, a Victorian Anglo-Catholic High Church that rests almost midway between the Kensington address of the Mills and the St. Pancras parish to the northeast, where Jellicoe had worked so diligently on behalf of the poor.



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So much of what we've discussed above may all simply be coincidental. Let's look at some hard-copy evidence.

Here's is how the London Times documented Jellicoe's death on 26 August 1935:


THE REV. J. B. L. JELLICOE

SLUM CLEARANCE IN ST. PANCRAS

The Rev. John Basil Lee Jellicoe died on Saturday in a nursing home of pneumonia in his thirty-seventh year. He will be remembered for his remarkable work as the chairman and organizer of the St. Pancras House Improvement Society, Limited, which has demonstrated that the improvement of slum areas by private enterprise is a sound financial proposition. The elder son of the Rev. T. H. L. Jellicoe, of Sullington Warren, Pulborough, Jellicoe took his degree from Magdalen College, Oxford, and after preparation at St. Stephen's House was appointed in 1922 head of the Magdalen College Mission and curate of St. Mary's, Somers Town. He resolved that he would not rest till his people had homes fit to live in, and the rehousing schemes started by his society have already provided many excellent flats with gardens, trees, ponds, swings for the children, and other amenities. Although the rents charged are not more than what the tenants paid for the old slums, the loan stock receives 2 per cent. and the ordinary shares 3 per cent. In 1929 Messrs. Whitbread entrusted the control of the rebuilt public house in Stibbington Street to Father Jellicoe. It was licensed to sell beer but not spirits, and was provided with a roof garden, a restaurant, and various games. When it was proposed to form a college for publicans, to be conducted by Church of England clergymen, Father Jellicoe said it was hoped "to attract young men of the best type who would regard the office of publican as a great and honourable profession. They should regard it also as a magnificent opportunity of social service by providing decent and happy recreation for their fellow-men." The progress of the society was steady, with the support of the Prince of Wales, the Archbishop of Canterbury, the late Minister of Health (Sir Hilton Young, now Lord Kennet), and others, and more blocks of flats were opened. But, as a letter in The Times last June showed, the society still needs at least £150,000 in loan stock and Ordinary shares to rebuild three verminous and overcrowded sites in Somers Town already in its possession. Last year Father Jellicoe moved to St. Martin-in-the-Fields as curate.


In that obituary we find that by 1935 Jellicoe had moved his career locale even closer to Kensington (and George Mills, who was probably teaching at Eaton Gate in Belgravia), taking over as the incumbent at St. Martin-in-the-Fields at Trafalgar Square. By the way, 1922 was the year that Mills ended his pursuit of an Oxon degree.

Details of Jellicoe's funeral were published in the Times on 29th August 1935 [my emphases]:



THE REV. J. B. L. JELLICOE

The funeral of the Rev. Basil Jellicoe took place at Chailey Parish Church {right]yesterday. The service was conducted by the Bishop of Dover, assisted by the Rev. H. J. Boyd and the Rev. H. H. Matravers. The choir boys of St. Mary's of the Angels Song School, under the Rev. Desmond Morse-Boycott, took part in the service. The principal mourners included:–
Mrs. Jellicoe (mother), Lieutenant-Commander C. J. L. Jellicoe (brother), Mrs. I. L. Murray (aunt), the Rev. John and Mrs. Murray, Mr. Felix St. H. Jellicoe, Mr. St. Alban Jellicoe, Miss Jellicoe, Mrs. Jellicoe and the Rev. Arthur H. Boyd and the Rev. Halbert J. Boyd (uncles).

Among others present were:-
Mrs. Madge Waller (representing the Under 40 Club), Mr. Eric Beetham and Mr. R. D. Just (representing the Fellowship of St. Christopher). the Rev. N. Scott, Miss E. Terry, Mr. R. L. Atkinson, Mr. L. Day and Mr. Ian B. Hamilton (representing St. Pancras House Improvement Society), the Rev. J. C. Nankivell (representing the Isle of Dogs Housing Society), the Rev. N. G. Powell (representing Canon Carr, St. Michael's Housing Society, Penzance), Mr. Donald G. Pelly (Strichard Housing Society).

The Rev. C. P. Shaw (representing the Church Union Housing Association), the Rev. Percy Maryon-Wilson and the Rev. Lorimer Reece (representing the Magdalene College Mission), the Rev. H. W. Grepe, the Rev. W. T. Norburn, the Rev. Hampden Thompson, Canon H. L. Pass (representing the Dean and Chapter of Chichester Cathedral), the Rev. C. W. Handford, the Rev. A. R. H. Faithfull, the Rev. C. E. B. Neate, the Rev. F. G. Fincham, the Rev. Montague Cox, the Rev. Donald V. Beckingham, the Rev. W. A. C. Ullathorne, the Rev. B. Thackeray, the Rev. E. I. Frost, the Rev. C. P. Orr, the Rev. C. G. Earmaker, Mr. and Mrs. R. C. Blencowe, Mr. and Mrs. I. Blencowe, Miss Blencowe, Mrs. Morse-Boycott.

Mrs. Maryon-Wilson, Miss Bartlett Blake, Elsie Lady Shiffner, Mr. and Mrs. J. H. Boyd, Lieutenant-Commander and Mrs. E. B. Martino, Mr. Alan L. Todd, M.P., Miss Margerson, Mr. and the Hon. Mrs. Maryan-Wilson, Mrs. Hampden Thompson, Mr. and Mrs. Basil Henriques, Lady Kenderdine, and Mrs. Reginald M. Mason.

A memorial service was held at St. Mary the Virgin, Somers Town [left], yesterday for the Rev. John Basil Lee Jellicoe. The Rev. Percy Maryon-Wilson officiated, assisted by the Rev. H. L. O. Rees and the Rev. T. M. Parker.

Among those present were:-
Mrs. D. G. Morris, Mr. Halliday McCartney, Miss Critchley, Mr. S. Rundle, Mr. and Mrs. John Gillard, Mr. W. H. Sheppard, the Rev. Langtry Williams (New York). the Rev. Eric Bailey (All Saints', Margaret Street). The Rev. T. A. S. Marsden, Mr. P. Henniker Heaton, Mr. A. J. Stewart, Miss Hunt, Mrs. Kightley, Mrs. M. White, Mr. John F. Dell, Mr. L. Myers, Mr. and Mrs. Toop, Miss E. Miller, Miss S. G. Saunders, Mr. Charles Low, Miss E. M. Evans, Miss Oaker.

Miss F. A. Day, Mrs. M. P. Leonard, Mr. W. L. Cooke, Miss Packer, the Rev. L. Jones, the Rev. J. W. E. Hooton, Mrs. A. Clark (St. Mary's Schools). Mrs. Ayrton, Mrs. Davidge, the Rev. Adam Fox (representing Magdalen College).

Miss Collet, Sister E. Armstrong, Miss De Rougemont, the Rev. Nigel Scott (representing St. Pancras House Improvement Society), Councillor F. Howson (former Mayor of St. Pancras), Mr. E. Ormnan, Mrs. Hunt, Mr. W, Bell, Miss Crowe, Miss Gedge, Miss E. Ayr, Miss E. Perry, the Rev. Norman Haigh, Mrs Henley Chater.
The Rev. J. A. Gorton, Brother Kenneth (B.S.F.A.), Mr. H. E. Howell (All Saints', Margaret Street), Sister Gent, the Rev. M. Le Marrino, Father Biggart (representing the Community of the Resurrection), Mrs. W. Sharp, Father Ferguson, the Rev. C. D. Horsley, the Rev. A. Swift, Mrs. E. A. Taylor, Miss Horsley.

Miss Edith Neville (chairman of the St. Pancras House Improvement Society) was unable to be present owing to absence abroad, and Lady Warren was unable to be present owing to serious illness.


I did not transcribe the above myself (my thanks to Chailey 1914-1918), so I do not know how accurate any of it is. For example, there's a fair chance that "Miss Margerson" may be "Miss Margesson," daughter of Mr. M. and Lady Isabel Margesson, a couple that attended the wedding of George Mills and Vera Louise Beauclerk in 1925. In addition, not only did they attend the wedding of George's brother, Captain Arthur F. H. Mills, to Lady Dorothy Walpole, but Mr. Margerson gave the bride away (as she was not on speaking terms with her family because of the couple's union that day).

As a frequent transcriber of the predominant font of that era's London Times (and with the crow's-footed bifocal squint to prove it), an "ss" as in Margesson can appear to resemble a "rs" as you can see in the name "margesson" in the fine print of this item [right] from the Times regarding the Mills-Walpole nuptials.

Nonetheless, there's no reason to think that the Mr. H. E. Howell mentioned there is part of any transcription error.



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Anyway, again dispensing with what may be simple coincidence and looking more at facts, the contemporary "Jellicoe Community" of today still allows students from Oxford to volunteer and work in the community to meet the needs of the local people, just as it did back in the days of Camden's Magdalen College Mission.

Even before the days of Jellicoe's stewardship, students volunteered. From the 1916 text In Slums and Society: Reminiscences of Old Friends by James Granville Adderley, we read an instructive description of the Magdalen College Mission: "I shall never forget my initiation to that 'open house,' where burglars and undergraduates fed and played and slept under one roof."

That was written during a time just before Jellicoe, Bishop, and Mills all attended various constituent colleges at the University of Oxford, from which the mission drew those compassionate undergraduates.

Moving forward in time, into the 1920s and 1930s when Fr. Jellicoe became established at the Mission, we read this from a website entitled The Jellicoe Blog describing the sometimes theatrical nature of the legendary reformer: "Jellicoe had been born into privilege and used his many connections to assemble a powerful alliance for change - enlisting the support of the Prince of Wales, the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Housing Minister in his St Pancras House Improvement Society. He understood the importance of dramatic flourish – erecting vast papier-mâché effigies of the rats and bugs that infested the slums, and ceremonially torching them as the first slums were demolished. And he used the ‘new media’ of his age: making an early film of the conditions in which his parishioners lived, and making a mobile cinema in a trailer, so that those who lived in prosperity up and down the land could see what life in the slums was really like. After each showing he told them: 'Now you know what life is like. You have no excuse for inaction.'"

Back to (almost) unbridled speculation…

We know George Mills attended Harrow School at The Grove, the school's house strong in drama and the arts, and that Mills worked in with children at Windlesham House School in Portslade in performances, dramatic productions, and even musicals. Again, would it be a stretch to consider that perhaps working with the ever-present and attention-starved (as well as quite often actually starved) children of the slums that followed Jellicoe around could have been what helped nudge Mills along towards becoming a schoolmaster after departing Oxford?

Still, London and its environs comprised populous and bustling metropolis that was the crossroads of England and the rest of the U.K., if not the entire Empire, upon which the sun never set.

What were the actual chances that all of these men knew each other well? What were the chances that all of these circumstantial occurrences were anything other than sheer coincidence?
We've no evidence these men ever met while attending Oxford, or that any save Jellicoe ever worked at the Mission. There's no evidence that the Howell at the 1935 funeral service is the Howell thanked in the 1933 preface of Meredith and Co. And, although their names rest alongside each other's for eternity in that preface, we have no proof that Howell and Bishop ever met, even though they both knew George Mills. And, finally, George's father, Revd Barton R. V. Mills was a much older man than Basil Jellicoe, and although they both crusaded for social reform, each man in his own way, they may have run in completely different circles and may never have so much as met.

There also is no solid reason to think that it's noteworthy that Jellicoe, born in 1899 and son of a cleric, was raised in Chailey, Sussex, just 15 miles or so north of—of course!—Seaford, East Sussex, a coastal town that simply won't stop cropping up coincidentally in the story of George Mills. But if you do think 15 miles is simply too far away from Seaford to connect it with Mills, let's discuss the fact that Chailey sits just four miles or so east of the location of Parkfield School in Haywards Heath, where George, born in 1896 and son of a cleric, attended classes.

What we do know is that, in some way—even loosely—these men somehow are linked to George Mills, circa 1933, perhaps if only in a way similar to the logic behind Six [or, depending on whether or not the teller understands the concept, Seven] Degrees to Kevin Bacon [right]. Exactly how they were linked is the mystery, one we may never solve.



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It has been over a year since my first messages to All Saints Margaret Street, Magdalen College School, and the Old Brackleians were sent. No replies with research assistance have been forthcoming so far, and may not ever be.

We may never know more than we now do about these men who seem so tantalizingly close to each other—personally, historically, and even spiritually. Perhaps this is all a series of overblown coincidences, neatly if not randomly arranged on an undreamed-of internet some 80 to 90 years later, and even if it is true these men did know each other, that in itself doesn't make any one man's behavior at the time in any way causal in regard to any aspect of another's life.

But I find it hard to believe that such strong-willed, talented, and outgoing men wouldn't have influenced each other in many ways, directly and indirectly.

In a way, all of this seems suspiciously as if a nearby camper asked my father if he knew the "Smiths" from Pennsylvania, and the more the fellow described them, the more it became apparent that they—out of millions—actually had been our neighbours…


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Fr. Jellicoe inspired a stage musical [left] that recently played at the Shaw Theatre on Euston Road in London, and his memory is held fast by the communities he helped, as well as a more figurative, charitable community that still works in his memory.

I'll close with these words from Fr. Rob Wickham, rector of Hackney:

Jellicoe was angry. He saw 5 children to a bed, he saw children with breathing difficulties, and he saw the effect that mass unemployment can have in a community. He saw loan sharks at work, and he saw people every night affected by fleas, bed bugs, rats and cockroaches. “How can I preach Jesus when people live in such filth? The devil is the Lord of Somers Town," came his cry.

This vision of a new Jerusalem led him to use a local workforce to charge the same rents after the rebuilding as before, and to keep a community strong through its nurseries, rent clubs, furniture clubs and even a pub – a place where clergy and churchwardens might go after evensong!

This vision holds dear today. It is a vision which undergirds the principles of the Jellicoe Communities and Community organizing. Local people doing something – galvanizing their efforts to make a difference in the communities in which they live and where they service.



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For more information about the Jellicoe Community today, see http://www.theology-centre.org/jellicoe-community.

Exclusive: A Photographic Tour of North Cornwall

A good friend of Who Is George Mills? is David Harcourt Maule Wingate, a distant relative of George Mills, who recently traveled to North Cornwall. David was kind enough to send me images of the 'old stomping grounds' of the Rev. Barton R. V. Mills, his wife Edith Ramsay, Barton's son, Capt. Arthur F. H. Mills, Barton's daughter, Agnes Mills, and her younger brother, George.

Admittedly, Agnes was 6 years old, George, 5, and Arthur away at Wellington College when the family left Cornwall for London, where they would spend the rest of their days. Still, these photographs capture places they knew and loved, places in which grow the roots of our story of George Mills.

I hope you'll enjoy seeing them as much as I have! At the upper left, you can see the windows of St. Olaf's Church in Poughill, where Barton Mills was Vicar from 1887 to 1889. You can click any image to enlarge it for a better look. Now, here are more images of St. Olaf's...































































































And here are images from St. Michaels & All Angels Church in Bude, where Rev. Mills had been a "Steward of the Mystery" from 1891 to 1901...

David also sent photographs of St. Andrew's in Stratton, Cornwall...

The window to the right is dedicated to Rev. George Wingate, David's great-grandfather.

Above, we see the final resting place of Major Reginald Ramsay Wingate, D.C.L.I., David's grandfather, next to his father, Rev. George Wingate. We read about Maj. Wingate once before.

Finally, below, we see the World War I Memorial form St. Andrews Church in Stratton. I'd like to take a moment to thank David for taking us along on this whirlwind tour of beautiful North Cornwall before he headed for holiday on the Isle of Man. It was very kind of him to include us, and I want to express my deepest gratitude!

Eleanor, Edie, Baby Alexander, and Sir George Dalhousie Ramsay

Another outpost heard from while I vacationed was the Isle of Man, where friend of this website David Wingate was on holiday with his fiancée. I'd been pestering him for a while about forwarding me an image he has of Edith Mills, mother of George Mills. Here's an excerpt from David's latest e-mail:

Hi Sam,

Attached is the picture of Edith as a young girl… Pictures of St. Michael's, Bude; St. Olaf's, Ploughill; and St. Andrew's, Stratton will be on their way to you on Monday.

Have a nice weekend,

Regards

David

You see the long-awaited image above, at the left. It features a photograph of "Edie," her father, Sir George Dalhousie Ramsay, his wife, Eleanor Juliat Charteris Crawford, and Edie's brother, Alexander Panmure Oswald Ramsay, who died on 15 February 1897 at the age of 30.

"Edie" was born Elizabeth Edith Ramsay on 27 July 1865 in Kensington, London. She married Reverend Barton R. V. Mills at St. George's Hanover Square in Kensington on 10 January 1894. Their first child, Agnes Edith Mills, was born in Stratton, Cornwall, on 11 June 1895.

Their second child and first son, George Ramsay Acland Mills, was born on 1 October 1896, also in Cornwall where Rev. Mills was vicar of Bude Haven.

After the family moved to London in 1901, Violet Eleanor Mills was born on 17 November 1902.

Reverend Barton passed away suddenly on 21 January 1932 in London. "Edie" lived at Cadogen Gardens in Kensington afterwards with her daughters Agnes and Violet, and possibly her son, George, at times.

"Edie" Mills passed away in nearby Chelsea, probably at the Royal Hospital, during the last few months of 1945 [Oct/Nov/Dec] at the age of 80.

Knowing as we do that George Mills suffered through the deaths of his wife, Vera, in 1942, and a young friend who was important to George's career as an author, Terence Hadow, in the Burmese campaign in 1943, his mother's passing near the end of the war in 1945 certainly made it a difficult three years for Mills, already, as we know, in failing health—he relinquished a commission as a lieutenant in the Royal Army Pay Corps due to "ill-health" in late 1943.

Thank you, David, for this wonderful portrait of Edith Mills with the family of her youth. I'll look forward to receiving those images from Cornwall via snail mail!

Jerseys, Guernseys, Pullovers, Jumpers & Sweaters

So much has been going on! It's a busy time of year at work, closing out the school year. I've been teaching my daughter, Emlyn, how to drive. I've been trying to get the bank before it closes, and eventually will. And I've been welcoming more information related to the Mills family…

David Wingate has sent me some very interesting items by snail mail that I want to scan and share, and the Diocese of Middleborough archivist is helping discover if Barton R. V. Mills did, indeed, convert to Roman Catholicism. More on all of that in due time.

Today, however, I received a message from Barry McAleenan that I simply had to share. Is it related to my pursuit of George Mills? No! But, again, I'm trying to construct a world around Mills and his family, and it's a world I'm fairly unfamiliar with. I enjoyed learning this, regarding a photo in an earlier post, "Dogs in Church":

Sent: Wednesday, May 12, 2010 10:13 AM
To: Williams, Harry (Sam) - Madison Street Elementary
Subject: Jerseys, Guernseys, Pullovers, Jumpers & Sweaters.

Dear Sam

The photo of Rev. Hawker shows him wearing a Guernsey - a kind of crew-neck pullover. Wikipedia has a long article on them. As I understand it, one of the reasons that they were so popular with Cornish fisherman is that the 'parish patterns' included variations particular to an individual. This allowed washed-up bodies to be identified by their widows if they had been lost at sea weeks or months earlier.

In my biking days, I always wore one in the winter with a silk scarf round my neck; this was a lot more comfortable than wearing a polo neck sweater (aka jumper).

Kind regards

Barry

Being a confirmed landlubber [Is that an American word or British?] who mostly deals with water in a pool or by the bottle, I wouldn't have been prone to think of the need to identify washed-up bodies in an era before C.S.I. After all, I grew up in Philadelphia, where large bodies of water erupted from faulty fire hydrants and ships were most often seen floating in the bathtub.

Thanks once again to Barry, and everyone else, who is making all of this such an enjoyable learning experience for me!

Of Parisian Night Clubs, Mysterious Blondes, Devil's Island Shackles, and Failing Marriages

Having finished The Road to Timbuktu, I've diverged from the path of Lady Dorothy Mills and begun reading The Apache Girl by Arthur Mills, her husband and elder half-brother of George Mills. It was first published in 1930.

Now, I know we've seen that Lady Dorothy's marriage may not have been all bliss, but perhaps the fact that divorce and marital infidelity keeps cropping up in the relatively little I've read of her writing is purely coincidental.

On the other hand, I had read less than three pages of The Apache Girl last night when I came to this, regarding our hero, Harry Rolyat, a British art dealer who has inherited a huge estate, Flairs, and a priceless collection of Chinese porcelain from an elderly client of his:

Curiously enough there had been no proviso in the old lady's will about not selling the porcelain or ultimately bequeathing it to the nation. Harry was perfectly at liberty to sell Flairs and all its treasures any time he wished. There was, however, a codicil to the will that could affect him very materially. Brought up in a strict Victorian era, the old lady, in the later years of her life, had been deeply shocked by modern standards of conduct. The number of divorces that had taken place immediately after the war had filled her with horror. And though well pleased with Harry's marriage, she had seen fit to safeguard his future—as she thought—by inserting a clause in her will that in the event of his marriage being dissolved the property she had left to him, or any money accrued to him through the sale of it, should revert to the next of kin.

It was a surprising codicil for a shrewd, worldly wise old woman to make. For Harry said, when he told Meriel [his wife] about it: "She knew we married for love; why should she think we should need money to keep us together now?"

To which Meriel answered: "Well, money is always useful."

A page later, Harry is silently ruminating on his marriage when the narrator of the story adds: He wondered whether this money they had now was really making them any happier.

Still, this was simply the beginning of the book, and it's a book pegged as an adventure. Things would surely begin to unfold more quickly, and the pace was bound to become less contemplative, right?

After Harry dances and sips champagne with a mysterious, intriguing blonde in a Parisian night club [at his wife's behest, might I add, while she entices another man], we meet a murderous apache gangster [depicted in stereotypical garb, left] who has escaped from his shackles on Devil's Island and paddled away on a barrel to the coast of Central America. He has made his way back to Paris where he ends up in Harry's iron choke hold after we discover he's the evil and abusive husband of the blonde—and, yes, we're still in Chapter 1!

Soon, in Chapter 2, Harry and his wife are back at their Paris hotel:

For a while he watched his wife intent on her beauty preparations. The thought flashed oddly through his mind that there had been a time when Meriel had never put cream on her face until after he had kissed her. What days those had been when no other woman in the world existed for him and no other man for her! But one could not expect that sort of thing to last forever.

And, via the narrator, we soon know:

They had completely redecorated Flairs, putting in central heating, electric light, and several bathrooms. It had been necessary, for the old Baroness Mollot, in spite of her wealth, had lived there under Victorian conditions, refusing to have even a telephone installed. New carpets and wallpapers had been bought, ceilings repainted. These matters Meriel had supervised, ordering everything of the best without question as to price. She was the same over clothes; her frocks, some of which she would wear only once, were fantastically expensive. Though it did not matter, they were for the moment almost without ready cash.

I'm sorry, but I'm thirty-some pages into this book, and that's a lot of talk of divorce and marital discontent. And at this same time, 1930, we've read that Lady Dorothy is discussing faithless, divorce-minded Arab husbands in her autobiography and in the newspapers, making it clear that one needs to have one's eyes wide open before entering into a marriage!

The last excerpt above is actually not lifted from the married life of Arthur and Lady Dorothy, but appropriated from the lives of her father and mother, Robert Horace "Robin" Walpole, heir to the Earldom of Orford, and his American bride, Louise Corbin, a daughter of American railroad magnate D. C. Corbin [right].

Walpole inherited the Earldom and its estates, Mannington and Wolterton Halls, both of which were in states of neglect and disrepair. Countess Walpole [née Corbin] worked to modernize both edifices, updates that were covered famously by the press. Here's a snippet of what is really a rather lengthy and ghastly tale for another time, from historylink.org:

In 1888 Louise married Robert Walpole, 12 years her senior, soon to be the fifth earl of Orford, making Louise a countess and the mistress of Mannington and Wolterton halls in Norfolk, England. At first glance, the marriage bears the marks of a late nineteenth-century stereotype: “rich American girl marries into English aristocracy, replenishing the sagging fortunes of her husband and his family while providing her tycoon father with titled in-laws to add luster to the company letterhead.”

Typical of many such English noblemen, Robert Walpole was land-rich but cash-poor, and the two stately homes he soon inherited were badly in need of restoration. D. C. Corbin was 56 at the time of his daughter’s marriage, and the earl could reasonably have expected her to outlive her father. However, in 1909, after two decades as a minor ornament of English society, Louise died…

When D. C. Corbin died in 1918, he left to that branch of the family only a trust fund for his granddaughter [that would be Lady Dorothy] from which she could not draw income until the death of her father, the earl. In the meantime, Lord Orford’s diary makes it clear that, during his marriage, little money had been forthcoming from his rich American father-in-law.

So, in 1909, Lady Dorothy was left motherless at the age of with a father who, among many other faults, had spent far more in his life than he earned or inherited. She was 18 years old, barely two years from having been presented to society, when her mother, according to the New York Times, "dropped dead."

Seven years later, Lady Dorothy marries Arthur Mills, already described as "a handsome and well connected man but with little money." The couple pound out stories for periodicals and newspapers to make ends meet at home, and, as we know, each publishes a book in 1916.

Money, though, seems as if it would have always been a concern for Lady Dorothy's family, and as a bright, only child, I'm certain she'd have been aware of discussions regarding expenses, finances, and resentments. Perhaps I should have written that 'lack of money' was the concern, although it didn't stop the Walpoles from traveling internationally and leading the lifestyle of sophisticated modern gentry.

And we have seen the stately home of Arthur's grandfather, Arthur Mills, Esq., M.P., in Cornwall [left], and know that Mills' family of origin was quite wealthy, even if just a few short years later he came back from France wounded and relatively light of cash.

Money certainly seems to have been a concern of both young Lady Dorothy, 25, and limping war hero Arthur Mills, aged 31, circa 1916. By 1930, however, there seems to be plenty of money—but she is recovering from what apparently was a devastating car accident, he is just about to be caught in an adulterous liaison, and each is writing of love, marriage, and divorce with an edge as sharp as a razor and all the tenderness of a bayonet.

Back to the book:

The pleasures of the rich, hunting, shooting, the best of everything in the way of houses and servants, had been theirs by chance of birth. And yet, when they married and had to forego everything, neither had minded. They had often talked of what they would do, in those days, if they ever did have any money. Hunting was sport of which each was passionately fond. And then money had come to them and Flairs—a beautiful house in one of the best hunting centres of England. What had they done with it? This winter they had gone away in the very middle of hunting season, because Meriel said she wanted to see Egypt.

Egypt, huh? That was obviously a bone of contention already, although Lady Dorothy's letter pictured at the right was written later from Luxor, when she was still planning to write another book that never quite came to fruition. She applied for that Egyptian visa alone in 1931, without an acccompanying one for Arthur.

Is Arthur Mills writing an exciting, mysterious adventure novel here, or simply brooding aloud? And Lady Dorothy was renowned for her love of hunting and fishing from her earliest childhood. I assume Arthur hunted as a boy in Cornwall and Devon as well. I'll finish with this excerpt:

His body was tired but his mind would not let him rest. Where was all this leading to—that was the thought that obtruded itself persistently. In the eyes of the world he and Meriel had everything to make them happy—a beautiful home, plenty of money, and no worry about illness. They had not in fact, in the literal sense of the word, a care in the world. And yet Meriel was not really happy, not like they used to be when they were living hand to mouth.

Knowing how the marriage of Arthur and Lady Dorothy came out, that's all so very sad. I know that danger, mystery, and mayhem await in this somewhat melodramatically written adventure, but I still can't help wondering about page 250, the last one: Will Harry and Meriel have resurrected their flagging marriage, or will have taken up with the beautiful night club blonde, Yvonne Levard?

What was Mills' vision of the future back then in 1930? It'll be interesting to see if he'll reflect on it as thoughtfully and as often as he has his past—through just these first 36 pages!

Replies and Records Concerning the Revd Barton R. V. Mills

I just received a couple of e-mails I'd been awaiting, so here are some thoughts on the Revd Barton R. V. Mills, father of George Mills…

Revd Prof Peter Galloway, Chaplain of the Queen's Chapel of the Savoy, had recently suggested checking with the City of Westminster Archives regarding Rev. Mills and the possibility that he had not, indeed, ever been an assistant chaplain at the Savoy.

This is from Hilary Davies of those Westminster Archives:

Thank you for your e-mail of 5 April concerning the employment of Rev Barton RV Mills at the Savoy Chapel Royal, 1901-1908.
I checked the volumes for which you supplied the references (thank you), and found him preaching in the chapel regularly, though not frequently, from 1901 (Ash Wednesday & Good Friday) onwards. He is listed as celebrating Holy Communion on the 24th Sunday after Trinity and Christmas Day in 1907. He is clearly noted down as being an Assistant Chaplain.
I hope this is helpful to your research.

Yours sincerely
Hilary Davies (Ms)
Senior Archives & Local Studies Assistant

Good to know! Thank you, Hilary. But that left Revd Galloway—and me—with the problem of why a man who'd renounced the Anglican Church [according to the 1885 book, Converts to Rome, by W. Gordon Gorman] was preaching in the Chapel Royal. From Revd Galloway:

I am pleased you managed to discover a little more about Barton Mills, though the facts are certainly confusing. I think it highly unlikely that Mills would have been allowed to preach at the Chapel Royal, if his conversion had been known. My first instinct is to question the accuracy of Gorman's assertion that Mills was a convert to the Roman Catholic Church. My second instinct is that you try the records of the diocese of Truro - the diocese which covers Cornwall - held at the Cornwall County Records Office to see what papers they have regarding Mills. You can contact them at:

cro@cornwall.gov.uk

I hope this helps and I look forward to hearing more.

Having e-mailed them promptly, I very soon received this well-researched reply:

Thank you for your email.

I began by checking the entry relating to Barton Mills in the 1896 Crockford’s Clerical directory which we hold. This states that he was ordained deacon in 1882 and priest in 1883 in the diocese of Rochester. Therefore any records relating to his ordination would be held in Kent. He took his degrees at Christ Church College, Oxford who may hold records relating to this period of his life. This also says he was vicar of Poughill 1887-1889 and of Bude from 1891.

We hold registers of institutions and licences to benefices for the Truro diocese. These are indexed by the name of the parish. I have looked in the register covering his period at Poughill (D/R/275). I have found the entry for institution of Barton Mills to the vicarage of Poughill which was dated 9 May 1887. The institution of the next incumbent was dated 11 October 1889 and was due to the resignation of Barton Mills. Budehaven was a perpetual curacy so I looked in the register of licences to perpetual curacies (D/R/286). He was admitted to Budehaven 3 March 1891 and the next incumbent was admitted 7 June 1901.

I have also searched our parish collections for Poughill and Bude. We hold a register of services for Poughill 1887-1890 (P192/2/22) which I have looked at. This begins on 15 May 1887 when Barton Mills is the preacher. The last service he takes is 7 October 1888.

I hope this information is useful to you. If you have any further questions please do not hesitate to contact us.

Yours sincerely

Jennie Hancock
Archivist
Cornwall Record Office

Thanks, Jennie! This message presents us some interesting information. None of it, however, addresses a possible conversion to Roman Catholicism by B. R. V. Mills.

First, though, we now know the years in which Mills was ordained a deacon and a priest: 1882 and 1883. Even more interestingly, despite Mills being from a family that is heavy on its relationship with southern England, from Cornwall to Sussex, and London, he does this work in the Diocese of Rochester. That's a brand new pin on my big, figurative George Mills Map, and may mean something.

We also are able to work out the "turn around time" it takes from the time someone is named a vicar through to the time one actually takes the pulpit. Mills was named the vicar of Poughill the day after Ash Wednesday, 24 February 1887. His actual institution in the Diocesan records is 9 May, with his first sermon being delivered on 15 May—about seven weeks later. His first child would be born on 12 July 1887.

The last service he takes at Poughill is on 7 October 1888, just 17 months later. He is the vicar of record, however, until 1889. The new vicar is instituted at Poughill on 11 October 1889—just over a year after Mills delivers his last sermon from the pulpit at Poughill.

Let's say that over four weeks is fairly normal for a vicar's resignation to be accepted, a new vicar named, for him to be instituted in the records, and for the new incumbent to arrive with his belongings and cassock. That would still have left Sundays in Poughill, if I understand it all correctly, having been handled by the deacon for well over ten months during 1888-1889.

And we know that Lady Catherine Mills, Barton's wife and the mother of infant son Arthur, passed away on 25 September, just 16 days before the institution of the new vicar.

Would I be wrong in assuming that Lady Catherine likely suffered a protracted illness or recovery from an injury? Would I also be wrong in assuming that Mills must have been very much the worse for wear after a long year that must have ended in tragedy, fully knowing he would no longer be able to handle his duties in the small Poughill parish. In fact, is it likely that he already resigned and had a replacement on his way to Poughill by the time of his wife's actual demise?

We don't truly know exactly what kept Mills out of the pulpit for a full year, or what led to the death of Lady Catherine, but hopefully we'll hear soon about Mills and his affiliation with Roman Catholicism. I'm waiting to hear back from the Catholic Church in England and Wales.

Perhaps we'll know something soon!

A Glimpse into a 19th Century Acland Family Photo Album

On this warm and wonderful afternoon here in Florida, due to the modern miracle of the internet, we're about to travel back in time to "see" the world through the eyes of young George Mills, his half-brother Arthur Frederick Hobart, and his older sister, Agnes Edith.

Thanks to a portfolio donated to the University Of Canterbury [Te Whare Wānanga o Waitaha, in Maori] in Christchurch, New Zealand, by the Acland family [descendants of Sir Thomas Dyke Acland, 10th Baronet, of Killerton, Broadclyst, Devon, the maternal great-grandfather of George Mills] after they emigrated, we can see Cornwall, Devon, and much of southern England exactly as it looked to the very young Mills siblings, circa the late 1880s or the 1890s. [Click an image to see it full-sized.]



This amazingly unexpected photograph is labeled "Mills driving horses," so I suppose we're to assume that's George's grandfather, Arthur Mills, Esq., M.P., there at the reins. The passengers may be visitors to his home, but if so, would I be wrong in assuming he'd be sitting with his guests? My hunch is that he's taking out the family, but what do I know?

Would it also be wrong of me to assume that smartly dressed fellow in the carriage could be Revd Barton R. V. Mills, Vicar of either Poughill or Bude, and he could be sitting with his mother, Lady Agnes, and possibly his first wife, Lady Catherine [who passed away in 1889] or Elizabeth Edith Ramsay Mills, whom Barton married on 10 January 1894?
Lady Agnes died on 23 May 1895, so if that is both Elizabeth and Lady Agnes, that certainly narrows the list of possible dates on which this image could have been taken. Should it perhaps be Lady Catherine, this image would then be of an 1887 to 1889 vintage.

Barton's brother, Col. Dudley Acland Mills, was an officer in the Royal Engineers who is not found anywhere in either the 1891 or 1901 census. It seems unlikley that the he's the gentleman in the carriage. Barton, however, was listed in the 1891 census as living at 128 Efford Down, Cornwall, with his mother Agnes Lucy, father Arthur, and his son, young Arthur F. H. Mills, who was then 3 years old. Put this address, Efford Down Park, Bude, Cornwall EX23 8SE, UK, into Google Maps and see if you don't think this is the same place!

This is the lovely church at Poughill. Reverend Barton R. V. Mills was rector there from 1887, to 1889. Arthur Frederick was born in 1887, and Lady Catherine, young Arthur's mother, died in 1898. Is it likley this was taken during that time by the Aclands to show visitors the church where their grandson Barton was vicar?


This beautiful picture was taken on one of the Acland estates. Young George Mills was born in 1896, and his half-brother Arthur was 9 years older than George. Is it possible that this healthy looking lad could be young Arthur visiting Killerton?


This gorgeous image shows the Cornish coast that the Mills family must have known and loved so well. While I know that could be anyone who just happened to wander into the photograph, it still makes me wonder...


Why are this boy and, I suppose, his mother, so disinterested in someone taking outdoor photographs in Bude Haven in the 1890s? Could that have been such an everyday occurrence, compared to seeing a sailboat? It occurs to me they must have had the same interest as the photographer, having accompanied him to this spot: That wonderful vessel! Could that lad be young Arthur—or even George Mills himself? After all, how many tots in Bude would have likely been that disinterestedly close to a party of traveling, photographing, parasol-wielding Aclands?

If that is, George, date this image 1898 or 1899. And, if it's Arthur, make it 1891 or 1892. And perhaps it was different in the late 19th century, but I can't imagine why the Aclands would've taken the camera to Bude if not on an visit to see Arthur, Barton, and the children...

And in this photograph of the coast, we see a panorama of Bude Haven. It features the stately home of Arthur Mills, Esq., M.P. resting comfortably atop the hill.

Here's yet a closer shot of the Mills family's residence in Bude. Nice place, eh? I wonder what it costs to heat, though...


This image depicts Killerton in Devon. Barton and Dudley Mills were raised there as young boys until it was off to boarding school. The only residents of this manor listed in the 1861 census were Sir Thomas, himself, and "Barton Reginald Vaughan Mills (age 3) and Dudley Acland Mills (age 1) (Children of Arthur Mills, Esq., M.P.), + 18 servants." The boys' father would have been either in London, serving at the time as the Tory M.P. from Taunton, or may have been on one of his many excursions abroad. Mills had recently published his definitive book on the costs of the Sepoy Mutiny and the state of the colony, India in 1858.

This time, we've actually entered Killerton of the 1890s. The painting is entitled "Great Sir Thomas Dyke Acland, 10th Baronet," and was painted by William Owing. Sir Thomas had died in 1871, having been succeeded by Sir Thomas Dyke Acland, 11th Baronet, but obviously is still watching son-in-law Arthur Mills like a hawk.


Before returning to the 21st century, let's just take a look at a few images of the southern England of the late 18th century that the family of George Mills must have loved so dearly...