"The telephone book is full of facts, but it doesn't contain a single idea" -- Mortimer Adler

It's Father's Day, Sunday morning, 20 June, and as I write this my girls are still in bed. Last night we went out for dinner at my favorite restaurant and I had a wonderful meal: Fried calamari and bell peppers, crab and corn chowder, mussels in a light garlic wine sauce with tomatoes and basil [left], and crème brû·lée. What happy and satisfied guy I was!

This morning I find myself thinking as much about telephones, though, as anything else. They've caused me to readjust my thinking on several issues related to George Mills and his family, and have also left me with as many unanswered questions as the London telephone records have been able to answer.

George's grandfather, Arthur Mills, died on 12 October 1898. His will was probated in 1899. In 1900, George's father, the Rev. Barton R. V. Mills, lists his address as "The Vicarage, Bude Haven, N. Cornwall." Father's Day seems as food a time as any to delve more deeply into the world of Reverend Mills, George's dad!

By the 31 March 1901 census, however, the Mills family—then Barton, his wife Edith Mills, and young children Agnes, 5, and George, 4, were living at 13 Brechin Place [right] in London. In February, he had already preached sermons at the Chapel Royal at the Savoy as Vicar of Bude Haven, Cornwall, but by 24 November, Barton is listed among the Royal Chapel's assistant chaplains.

Then, by 25 April 1902, the family was found living at 16 Cranley Gardens [left, spelled "Cranley-gardens" in the London Gazette], and on 12 November George's younger sister, Violet, was born.

Later, the year of 1907 brought something else: The family's first telephone! The July 1907 listing read: "Western…. 3184 [MILLS] Rev Barton R. V… .. .. 16 Cranley Gdns." I don't know if it was a party or a private line, but it did cost £5 a year, plus long distance and trunk charges.

The next year, 1908, at the age of 51, Reverend Mills and the Savoy part ways around November for reasons that are not clear. The address of the family's listing in that year's January telephone directory changes their address to 12 Cranley Gardens [right]. The move would have been made sometime in late 1907, before Mills left the Savoy.

The telephone records remain the same until August 1915. The family listing then has a new number and a new address: "Kensington 2397 Mills Barton R. V., Rev. .. .. .. 38 Onslow Gdns SW."

The 1920 book adds a listing for "Victoria .. 2285 Mills Arthur .. .. .. .. .. 91a Ebury st S.W.1 [left]." That listing would be for George's older half-brother, Arthur F. H. Mills, and his wife, Lady Dorothy Mills.

Something else in the on-line copy of that April 1920 book is interesting. A handwritten note at the top of page 713 [MIL] reads "K 3545 Mills Barton R. V. Rev. *e/* R 4/6" [* = illegible character].

On 16 January of that year, Edith Mills's father, Sir George Dalhousie Ramsay, passed away. His home was at 7 Manson Place, S.W.7 [right].

Sir George's listing in that 1920 directory stays the same; presumably the note above simply had been switched the billing of that telephone number to the responsibility of Rev. Mills.

1921 found a big change, however: Two listings, this time in the name of "Mrs. Barton Mills," one for 38 Onslow Gardens, S.W. [Kensington 2397], and one for 7 Manson Place, S.W. [Kensington 3545]. Not only has the extra number been added to this single listing, but it has been taken out of Barton's name.

[Note: It's now three days later, Wednesday morning, and I'm finally getting around to finishing this post!]

Now, it's debatable how many siblings Edith Mills—Mrs. Barton Mills—had. Her brother, Alexander Panmure Oswald Ramsay had passed away in 1897 at the age of 30. Ramsay family genealogists today often show a third sibling, Edith Judith Ramsay, in their family trees, but I can find nothing about her except information that clearly belongs to the life of Elizabeth Edith Ramsay [Edith Mills], like a marriage to Rev. Barton R. V. Mills.

It's likely, then, that Sir George's daughter, Edith Mills, was his only surviving heir—his wife, Eleanor Ramsay, had passed away in 1918 at the age of 90. Barton Mills had been using Ramsay's '7 Manson Place' address as his own since 1919, and after Sir George's passing in 1920, that address is firmly associated with the Mills family by telephone records as well. It seems likely that, any Edith Judith Ramsay notwithstanding, Rev. Mills's wife, Edith, had inherited that Manson Place home.

In 1922, the telephone listing for Kensington 2397 returns to the name of "Mills Rev. Barton R. V." and the old Ramsay number, Kensington 3545, is no longer associated with the Mills household. Perhaps they had either sold the property at Manson Place or were renting it.

1923 brought an interesting addition to that April's London telephone directory: "Kensington 4353 Beauclerk, Mrs. Nelthorpe .. .. .. 4 Hans mans S.W.3." After arriving from America in 1919, this is the first telephone listing for the mother of Vera Louise Beauclerk, the future wife of George Mills. Therefore, by April of 1923, Vera had entered Kensington [coat of arms pictured, right], where George had likely returned after his educational stint at Oxford. Target 1923 as the year during which George meets and begins to court and woo Vera.

The last entry we'll consider here will be the 1925 listings for Rev. Barton Mills. In the archival copy of the April edition of the directory, the address of Rev. Barton R. V. Mills has bee crossed out and a note added. In the October edition, the address of the Mills family is listed as residing at "24 Hans rd S.W.3 [pictured below, left]," an address with which I was completely unfamiliar!

As you'll recall, the wedding of George and Vera Mills occurred in April of 1925. It's hard to say this event occasioned this move of the entire Mills family, but we know George and Vera bought a house in Portslade in 1925 as well. With the Mills family dwindled in size to four members: Barton, Edith, Agnes, and Violet, perhaps it was to a location that was more fitting for a family of four adults.

So, we find ourselves approaching the holidays in late 1925. The Mills are settling in at 24 Hans Road, Mrs. Beauclerk and Hilda live at 4 Hans Mansions, Arthur F. H. Mills and his wife, Lady Dorothy, are ensconced at nearby 91a Ebury Street, and George and Vera Mills are off to the southern coast near Brighton for George's junior appointment as a schoolmaster at Windlesham House.

The phone records will begin to take some interesting twists and turns as we enter the records for 1926. They'll verify some speculation, add detail to some things we already knew, and open up some new questions as they reveal some very unexpected information.

But we'll look at all that next time…

MR. G. R. A. MILLS and MISS V. L. BEAUCLERK

A wedding announcement from the London Times, Friday, 24 April, 1925 reads [with key attendees and locales bearing my own emphasis]:

MR. G. R. A. MILLS AND MISS V. L. BEAUCLERK

The marriage took place yesterday at Holy Trinity Church, Brompton, of Mr. George Acland Ramsay Mills, son of Rev. Barton and Mrs. Mills, 38, Onslow-gardens, S.W., and Miss Vera Louise Beauclerk, daughter of the late Mr. William Nelthorpe Beauclerk, of Little Grimsby Hall, Louth, Lincolnshire, and Mrs. Nelthorpe Beauclerk, 4, Hans-mansion, S.W. The officiating clergy were the Rev. Barton Mills (father of the bridegroom), the Rev. Walter Farnsworth, vicar of Little Grimsby, the Reverend Watkin Williams, and Rev. H. S. Sard.

The bride wore a cream gown embroidered in gold, and a gold and cream brocade train. She carried a bouquet of cream roses. the train was borne by Master Rafael Beauclerk and Master Robert Hart (cousins of the bride), who were dressed in black velvet suits with yellow shirts, and the bride was also attended by three child-bridesmaids, the Misses Diana and Hermione de Vere Beauclerk (nieces) and Miss Isyllt Llewellyn, and two grown-up bridesmaids, Miss Violet Mills (sister of the bridegroom) and Suzanne Flemming, whose frocks were of yellow georgette.

A reception was afterwards held at the Hans-crescent Hotel, and the bride and bridegroom later left for the honeymoon, which will be spent in Devonshire. Mrs. Mills wore a nigger-brown crêpe de Chine frock, embroidered in gold, with a hat to match.

Among those present were :—

Mrs. Barton Mills, Miss Othlie Mills, Miss Verity Mills, Colonel and Mrs. Dudley Mills, Mrs. Nelthorpe Beauclerk and Miss Beauclerk, Hester Lady Hart, Lady Hart, Mrs. Topham Beauclerk, and the Masters Beauclerk, Miss Agnes Mills, the Japanese Ambassador and Mme. Okamato, Don Carlos Dominguez and Mdlle. Dominguez, M. and Mme. de Lembeke, Mrs. R. de Lembeke, Mr. and Lady Isabel Margesson, the Hon. Mrs. Walter Paton, the Hon. Sophia Trollope, Mr. and the Hon. Mrs. Llewellyn, the Hon. Montagu and Mrs. Forbes, Theodosia Lady Hughes and Miss Winifred Hughes, Sir Claude and Lady Mallet, Lady Arnold, Sir William and Lady Adair, Lady Thompson, Sir John and Lady Jordan, Lady Atterbury, Sir Henry and Lady Burke and Master Burke, Lady Pontifex, Lady Addis and Miss Addis, Lady O'Conor, Lady Trollope, Mr. Benson Kennedy, Mr., Mrs., and Miss Wardrop, Colonel F. Gore, Mrs. Daniell, Mrs. Rolls, Mr. William Stone, Mr. Richard Pryce, the Misses Bryant, Ms. Sinclair, Mrs. Lacy Rogers, Miss Ethel Rogers, Mr. and Mrs. Erskine Barrett, Mrs. Alfred Porter, Mr. Gerald E. Maude, Mrs. Hayes Dashwood, Mrs. Eden, Mrs. Rochford, Miss Hughes, Mrs. Lane, Miss Jane Lane, Mrs. Fleming, Mr. and Mrs. Cory, Mrs. Baxter, Mr. and Mrs. Blois, Mr. Jenning, Captain Russell, Mrs. Dudley Morrison, Miss Henrietta Gladwell, Mr and Mrs. Seddon, Mrs. Philip Du Cros, Mrs. Arnold Ellert, Miss Irene Hart, Mr. and Mrs. Arthur Legge, Mrs. Cecil Fleurscheim, Captain and Mrs. Stanley Musgrave, Miss McConnell, Mrs. Leigh Taylor, Mrs. Douglas Ramsay and Master Ramsay, Mrs. Lugard, Mrs. de Vere Evans, Mrs. Ash, Mrs. Duncan Payne, Mrs. Wingate, Mrs. Ronald Wingate, Miss Plowse, Mr. Hamilton and Mr. Norman Lamplugh, the Misses Sanders, the Misses Chance, Major and Mrs. Brodie and Master Michael and Master Alexander Brodie, Mrs. Fardell, Mrs. and Miss Lindsay Watson, Miss Garford, Miss Wyndham Murray, Miss Ricardo, Mr. Derrick Clayton, Mr. Clive Bayley, Mr. and Mrs. Hubert Ansell, Miss Bower, Mr. Watkin Williams, Mrs. Watkin Williams, Mrs. Greenfield, Miss Acland, Miss Griffith, Mrs. Montague(?) Napier, Mrs. Bowra, Mr. and Mrs. A. Hughes, Mrs. Wintringham, Captain and Mrs. Gerald Greig, Miss Sparks, Mr. M. Acheson, Mrs. Leigh-Pemberton, Mme. Challe, Major R. B. Denny, Mr. R. W. S. Seton, Mr. and Mrs. Boyd Bredon, Mr. Eric Sachs, Mrs. Spencer Beaumont, Mrs. and Miss Farnsworth, Miss Standen, Mrs. Cavendish, Mr. and Mrs. Stirling, Mrs. Arthur Mcdonald, Miss Jean Anderson, Mrs. and Miss Vandeleur, Colonel and Mrs. Mortimer, Mr., Mrs., and Miss Seton, Mr. and Mrs. Flannery, Mrs. Griffith, Mrs. C. F. Hughes, Mrs. George Cooper, Miss McEwan, Mrs. Hazlett, Mrs. Darrioch, Mrs. George Lyster, Mr. and Mrs. Godfrey Pharazyn, Miss Ruth Pharazyn, Mrs. Peet, Mr. Mackellar, Colonel Jocelyn, Mrs. Heaton Armstrong, and Mrs. Langley.


It seems quite an international affair, although I'm unfamiliar with most of the names on the guest list. If any of them ring a bell with any readers, I do hope you'll let me know. Notably absent is the older step-brother of George, author Arthur Frederick Hobart Mills of London, born 12 July, 1887 and then 37 years of age. That same year, writing under the name Arthur Hobart Mills [He also wrote for American magazines as Arthur Mills], he published his book The Gold Cat [Hutchinson & Co., London; 1925]. By 1926, it was in its third edition. He was the author of dozens of books found in the British Library, mostly adventure fiction, as well as some memoirs of the First World War that he'd written under the pseudonym "Platoon Cammander" [right]. (The website Great War Dust Jackets charcaterizes the writings of the elder Mills brother as "now long forgotten", much like the published work of George Mills.) A. F. H. Mills is described as "a handsome and well connected man but with little money [in 1916]". One wonders exactly how as yet unpublished—and seemingly by comparison quite unaccomplished— younger step-brother George would have been described at the time of his own wedding in 1925, and if the half brothers got along.

Arthur F. H. Mills was the son of Revd Barton R. V. Mills and the late Lady Catherine Valentia Mary Hobart-Hampden, who took the rank of Earl's daughter at the wedding. Lady Catherine passed away in 1889, and Revd Mills remarried, taking Elizabeth Edith Ramsay, daughter of military man Sir George Dalhousie Ramsay, C.B., as his wife on 10 January, 1894. [George Ramsay Acland Mills was born to them on 1 October, 1896.]

The eccentric Lady Dorothy Rachel Melissa Walpole Mills, a cousin as well as then-wife of Arthur Hobart Mills, was also not in attendance. Lady Dorothy was a half-American who was also a journalist, writer, and well-known world traveler/explorer. In 1925, she had only just returned from becoming the first white woman to reach Timbuktu and had recently published The Arms of the Sun and The Dark Gods [Duckworth & Co., London, 1924 and 1925, respectively]. She likely did not attend the Mills/Beauclerk nuptials as she was undoubtedly traveling [as seen, left], at least some of 1925 in Palestine, and readying herself to publish four books in the next two years: A science-fiction novel, Phœnix, [Hutchinson & Co.: London], and travel books Beyond the Bosphorous and Through Liberia [Duckworth & Co., London] in 1926 and Episodes from the Road to Timbuktu [G. G. Harrap and Co., London] in 1927. She's the author of twenty-some books in the British Library, scattered here, here, and here.

It's conceivable Lady Dorothy was a bit busy in 1925! Incidentally, she is also the subject of a search for information similar to my own being conducted by American James Wallace Harris, who describes Lady Dorothy as "a forgotten writer whose books are about to disappear."

Anyway, it appears that George Mills and Vera Beauclerk boarded their own ship called Matrimony with much ado made of it, even without the reigning heavyweight authors of the family in attendance.

Easter that year was on 12 April, 1925. According to Windlesham, Mills "taught 4 terms at Windlesham House School from Lent 1925 until Easter 1926".

So Mills almost certainly would have been teaching at Windlesham at the time of wedding. As noted previously: "In April George Mills married Miss Vera Beauclerc; they bought a house on Benfield Way, Portslade. [below, right]"

The word "they" would imply that the purchase was made after the wedding, the then-28-year-old Mills opting to settle down near the school in Portslade with his 31-year-old bride.

The association of Mills and Vera lasted until her passing on 5 January, 1942, just months short of what would have been their 17th wedding anniversary.

The association of Mills and Windlesham was far shorter in duration. The list of wedding guests above simply does not appear to be any sort of compendium of British citizens likely to have been wildly sympathetic with the General Strike of 1926. That doesn't mean, however, Mills didn't walk with the million or so labourers who supported the coal miners during the strike's dates of 3 May, 1926, and 13 May, 1926.

According to wikipedia.org and its reference, the 1988 book Two Georges: The Making of the Modern Monarchy by David Sinclair, the Trade Union Congress "feared that an all-out general strike would bring revolutionary elements to the fore. They decided to bring out workers only in the key industries, such as railwaymen, transport workers, printers, dockers and ironworkers and steelworkers."

Mills just seems a terribly unlikely candidate to have been swept up in any fervency [left] on behalf of the coal miners, despite having possibly fought alongside some youngsters whose destiny would soon be found within those mines after the armistice. I find it incredibly difficult to believe, at least from my desk here in 2010, that a "junior appointment" and freshly minted bridegroom and homeowner would've risked his new found position at Windlesham, a situation he apparently loved dearly.

Still, a truly trusted authority on Windlesham, Dr. Houston, has speculated, "[Mills] could, like a handful of other prep school masters, have been excited by the General Strike (that term)."

Stranger things have happened, and "wildcat" involvement in a strike—even though Mills was no longer very much a youngster, being almost 30 years of age by May, 1926—would, indeed, go a long way in explaining his then bouncing from Eastbourne to Windermere, on to Glion, and back to Eaton Gate in London as a preparatory school master over the next decade, instead of having stayed settled at Windlesham.

Was Mills so active politically that it may have had a negative impact on his career at the time? As always, any thoughts, ideas, or information on the subject would be greatly appreciated!

The Eastbourne Local History Society Comes Through!

There's been so much new information found that I'm having trouble keeping up with it all—something that I didn't expect, but that delights me! In the last couple of days, I've spent quite a bit of time in Microsoft Word creating a 21-page time line not only of George Mills himself, but of many people and events in his lifetime, and some from before he was born, that would have influenced him. It's been an undertaking, and I've been neglectful in keeping up with incoming info!

Here's some input from the wonderful members of the Eastbourne Local History Society [who provided the photograph above] regarding my Google-enabled virtual drive around Beachy Head Road outside of Eastbourne near Warren Hill itself. Let me share some...

Society member Maureen [click for her personal website] was the first to respond to my enquiries. Regarding my spotting what seemed to be cricket fields that may have been at Warren Hill School in Eastbourne, she wrote "the sports pitches to which you refer to probably belong to the University of Brighton who have a campus in this area, as does St Andrews School, both of which are still in existence today."

And in reference to some information you simply can't find on Google Maps, "what is now known as Beachy Head Road, has in the past been called Warren Hill Road and New Road."

Also: "The Beachy Head Countryside Centre, based on the A259 coast road, is nothing whatsoever to do with Warren Hill school. this building was formerly a farm and now a conservation centre, at the entrance to the Seven Sisters Country Park."

Thank you so much, Maureen! Okay, so I missed all of that completely...

She closes, "the Compton Estate office may have some info on this site as the Duke of Devonshire owned most of the land in this area."

Thanks so much, everyone! I feel silly now, thinking I could somehow use computer technology and a "spy satellite" to propel myself back into the past…

Also from the Michael in the Society:

"Warren Hill was a well known preparatory school in the town and I'm sure there must be references to it in our various index volumes. I have only a partial index here but see that the school was mentioned in Number 104 (pages 8 and 9). It may well have been referred to in other issues of our quarterly newsletter (Eastbourne Local Historian) and perhaps one of the members can provide details.

The school and its occupants (it was a boarding school) will be on the 1901 and 1911 census returns but unfortunately the 1911 census was conducted during the Easter holidays. The census returns are available on line, as you probably know.

I know of one master at the school ... Eric Streatfeild, who almost certainly taught music. He married the novelist, Kitty Barne, and I am currently researching both of the above. I don't know when the school ceased to exist but can confirm that it is listed in my 1914 directory for Eastbourne. The address is given as Beachy Head Road and the headmaster is A. Max Wilkinson MA. It is described as a 'gentlemen's school'."

I'm actually becoming quite adept at perusing vintage British census reports, and I'll admit some are making for fascinating reading, even if one has no interest in Mills at all. There are two, for example, from Killerton, Devon, that are pertinent to G.M.'s history and that I simply savored.

Now, Windlesham School's belief is that George Mills left Portslade and went immediately moved down the coast to Warren Hill School. If so, we know Warren Hill was open in 1914, and that he could have begun teaching there as early as 1926. Even if that specualtion is incorrect, it appears Mills was definitely in Oxford in 1921 although we can't be sure at this point how long he actually stayed.

Michael has further managed to acquire even more nuggets of information, some of which he reveals in this subsequent message:

Just a little taster ... the location of Warren Hill School is not as you suspect. Beachy Head Road is quite a long road. The school (which no longer stands ... apart from the former hall or gym) was situated on the left-hand side of Beachy Head Road, between Coltstocks Road and Darley Road. [Update: The school was, indeed, located behind the gate in the wall at the right!] The playing field was elsewhere and I will give you more details in due course.

So pse bear with me for now ...

One of our senior members has just e-mailed to say:-

> I remember Warren Hill School as a regular opponent on our fixture lists during the 1930s. Their football field was at the top end of Carlisle Road. But I seem to recall that it was dropped from our fixtures well before 1939, so maybe it had closed by then. It does not appear in my 1939 street directory.

Well done! We now have a location for Warren Hill School—and I've now seen how long a road that Beachy Head is!

I've just now virtually "driven" it both ways: To the east and to the west. I'm not certain, however, which way I'd be traveling for the school's site to be on my left. Would that be the north side of the road or the south? I snapped a couple of photos along the way that I thought [hoped] might have been at least near the school's site. Warning: I do have serious doubts, however, regarding most of my newly-formed geographical notions of Sussex!

We've also narrowed the window around Warren Hill's disppearance. Although the school was no longer in existence by 1939, Mills seems to have referred to the school's "staff and boys" in the same present tense he does Windlesham in his dedication to 1933's Meredith and Co.

With Warren Hill off of the local football fixtures seemingly well before 1939, it's conceivable that, as opposed to Mills leaving Warren Hill for teaching positions in Windermere and Glion, Warren Hill may well have "left" him!

I'll certainly be looking forward to any and all information forthcoming from the Eastbourne Local History Society about Warren Hill School. I'd also be interested in anything else deemed important or distinctive about the era between, say, 1920 and 1933 in Sussex. Somewhere within it all anothrer clue to Mills may be hiding!

Thank you all so much for the help you've given a stranger. I can't even begin to express my appreciation!

Word from Windlesham School!

Yesterday, on a balmy and breezy Sunday afternoon here in central Florida, I tried to do a little internet sleuthing. In my newly-arrived copy of Meredith and Co., the dedication reads as follows [And, yes, I know you can see it, left]:

To MR. J. GOODLAND, sometime Head Master of Warren Hill, Eastbourne; to the STAFF AND BOYS OF THE SAME SCHOOL, and to those of WINDLESHAM HOUSE, BRIGHTON, THE CRAIG, WINDERMERE, and the ENGLISH PREPARATORY SCHOOL, GLION, among whom I spent many happy years, this book is affectionately dedicated.

In trying to track down information on George Mills, I contacted the prestigious and impressive Windlesham School, Washington, Pulborough, RH20 4AY, via an e-mail form at their website, http://www.windlesham.com/. This morning, stamped Monday, March 15, 2010 7:36 AM, I received the cordial and extremely engaging reply below:

Dear Mr Williams,

Thank you for your message which is a most intriguing one. This is so not least as I suspect that I may well have read one of George Mills books in my youth, my father and I both being passionate cricketers. I have subsequently gone onto your 'Who is George Mills?' website, which made for fascinating further reading.

You are correct, I'm sure, in ascribing the dedication as being to this Windlesham House. The school was until 1913 located in the heart of Brighton and then moved out to the suburbs until 1934. Since that time it has been at its present home a short distance away in the heart of the West Sussex part of the South Downs.

A satisfactory answer to your question as to why the dedication should be as you describe it is less easy to establish. There were certainly two brothers and a cousin with the surname Mills at Windlesham in the late 1890s, though none had George anywhere in their names. Equally the school history 1837-1937 makes no mention of a teacher by the name of Mills, but interestingly we are still in contact with a Patrick Mills who left here in 1942, possibly a son?

However, the resources at my disposal are far short of the total archival material that may provide an answer. My role is that of Secretary to the Windlesham House Association, the alumni body. What I will do is to copy into this correspondence Dr Tom Houston, the school historian, a very near contemporary of Patrick Mills. He is currently engaged on an update of the school history and may well have something that can shed further light on the connection.

I very much look forward to his response. I do hope that we can help you resolve a little more about George Mills.

Every good wish.
Richard Martin

An article on the school’s 2010 centenary from Attain, the official magazine of the Independent Association of Prep Schools [IAPS], also describes the school’s history from the its origins: “Windlesham House School originates from a school set up for a dozen or so pupils by Reverend Worsley at Newport on the Isle of Wight in 1826. It was bought by the Malden family in 1837, initially for the children of naval officers, and was moved to Brighton in 1837. In 1913, the School moved to Portslade and in 1934 went to its present site at Washington.”

Right now, we really have no way of knowing how old Mills was when he wrote his books, all published between 1933 and 1939, but is there a clue in Meredith and Co.’s dedication?

When Mills refers to the staff and boys of “WINDLESHAM HOUSE, BRIGHTON”, could he be dedicating his novel to the staff and boys of a school he’d been familiar with as a boy?

A previous posting suggests that Mills attended a school called Parkfield in Haywards Heath. Checking Google Maps, it appears that Haywards Heath may be just 15 or 20 km due north of Brighton, up A273 or B2112, depending which side of Burgess Hill one would be skirting.

If Mills attended Parkfield at a time when he might’ve been acquainted with staff and boys from Windlesham House while it was still in Brighton, the very youngest he could’ve been in 1913 would be about 13 years old. That would have made him around 33 years old when his first book, Meredith and Co., was published, and near 39 when both Minor and Major and St. Thomas of Canterbury went to press. However, he could also have been much older.

Of course, when Windlesham House moved to Portslade in 1934, the school might still have been commonly referred to as being located at Brighton, while meaning the city’s suburbs. That could make Mills at least somewhat younger than a man nearing middle age in 1939.

This would also make sense if Mills served in the military during World War II. Here’s some insight into the climate regarding war with Germany in the late 1930s from historyonthenet.com: When war broke out in September 1939, some men volunteered to join the armed services, but Britain could still only raise 875,000 men. Other European countries had kept conscription between the wars and were able to raise much larger armies than Britain. In October 1939 the British government announced that all men aged between 18 and 41 who were not working in 'reserved occupations' could be called to join the armed services if required.

With a conscription possibly reaching to age 41, and with Nazi “hit and run” bombers working the southeastern coast of England from 1940 on, you don't have to be Hercule Poirot to know it seems likely that the war in some way might have uprooted Mills—or at the very least thrown him off of his usual writing/teaching routines—no matter what age he might have been at the time.

From 1942 to 1943, the heaviest bombing on the south coast was in Eastbourne, home of another locale in Mills’s dedication above. And that’s where we’ll go in our next post.

Meanwhile, as always, please let me know if you have any information about George Mills, his life, his career, or his relationship to 'WINDLESHAM HOUSE, BRIGHTON'!