David Freeman-Mitford, 2nd Baron Redesdale
Encyclopedia
David Bertram Ogilvy Freeman-Mitford, 2nd Baron Redesdale, (13 March 1878 – 17 March 1958), was an English landowner and was the father of the Mitford sisters, in whose various novels and memoirs he is depicted.
landed gentry
, dating back to the 14th century; Redesdale's great-great-grandfather was the historian William Mitford
. His father, Bertram, called Bertie, was a diplomat, politician and author, with large inherited estates in Gloucestershire
and Oxfordshire
as well as Northumberland. He was raised to the peerage in 1902, and thus his son then became known as The Hon David Freeman-Mitford, although the surname Mitford was more commonly used.
's novel White Fang
, although in fact he read most of his daughters' books.) His lack of academic aptitude meant that he was not sent to Eton
with his older brother, but rather to Radley
, with the intention that he should enter the army. But he failed the entrance examination to Sandhurst
, and was instead sent to Ceylon
to work for a tea planter. In 1900 he returned to England and joined the army for the Boer War
, in which he served with distinction and was severely wounded, losing one lung.
, a journalist and Conservative MP, who in 1863 had founded the magazine Vanity Fair, and some years later the women's magazine The Lady
.
The couple had one son and six daughters, who all used the surname Mitford rather than Freeman-Mitford; the girls were known collectively as the Mitford sisters:
, where Mitford owned a gold claim near Swastika, Ontario
: no gold was ever found there, but he enjoyed the outdoor life. His neighbour Harry Oakes
did strike gold nearby in 1912.
On the outbreak of the First World War in 1914 he immediately rejoined the army and served as a transport officer in Flanders
, gaining a mention in despatches for his bravery at the Second Battle of Ypres
. His elder brother Clement was killed in 1915 in the Battle of Loos
. With only one lung he was invalided out of active service, and, after his father's death in 1916, being now Lord Redesdale, he was briefly appointed Provost Marshal
for Oxfordshire
, with responsibility for ensuring the enlistment of new recruits.
, and in 1917, when he was invalided home from Flanders, was appointed Assistant Provost Marshal
of Oxford, in charge of training reservists in the county.
Although Redesdale was now a large landowner, he was not a wealthy man: the estates were poorly developed and rents were low. With seven children to feed and five servants to pay, he could not maintain the expense of his large home at Batsford
in the Cotswolds
. He bought and extended Asthall Manor
and then moved to nearby Swinbrook
. Here he indulged his passion for building by building a new large house, named after the village, which appears as the family home in the books of his daughters Nancy and Jessica. The expense of these moves nearly ruined Redesdale, who was a poor manager of money. This, plus his increasing disappointment that all his later children were girls, led to the deterioration of his temperament which became legendary through his daughters' portrayals of his frequent and terrible rages.
, then a wholly hereditary chamber. He attended the House conscientiously, although he was not really interested in party politics or in legislation, except for being opposed to nearly all change. In the 1930s, however, both he and his wife developed a strong sympathy for fascism
, and Redesdale became known for his extreme right-wing views, particularly anti-Semitism
. His daughter Diana, herself a keen fascist and from 1936 the wife of British fascist leader Sir Oswald Mosley
, described him as "one of nature's fascists." As a result he was permanently estranged from his daughter Jessica, who was a communist
from her teenage years, and partly estranged from his eldest daughter Nancy, who was a strong anti-fascist though not as left-wing as Jessica.
Redesdale was an instinctive xenophobe
: he came back from World War I with a dislike of the French and a deep hatred of the Germans. He was widely quoted as saying that: "Abroad is bloody". As Uncle Mathew put it in The Pursuit of Love: "Frogs are slightly better than Huns or Wops, but abroad is unutterably bloody and foreigners are fiends." Thus he was initially scornful of the enthusiasm shown by his daughters Diana and Unity for Nazi Germany
and Adolf Hitler
: Hitler was, after all, a Hun. In November 1938, however, the Redesdales accompanied their daughters to Germany
, where they attended the Nuremberg Rally
and met Hitler, with whom Unity and Diana were already acquainted. Both the Redesdales were immediately won over by Hitler's apparent charm and his declarations of Anglophilia
. Redesdale later spoke in the House of Lords in favour of the Anschluss
and of returning Germany's colonies
, and became a strong supporter of Neville Chamberlain
's policy of appeasement
towards Germany. Lady Redesdale went further, writing articles in praise of Hitler and in support of National Socialism.
The outbreak of World War II
in 1939 precipitated a series of crises in the Mitford family. Redesdale was above all a patriot, and as soon as war was declared he recanted his support for Hitler and once again became violently anti-German. Lady Redesdale stuck to her Nazi sympathies, and as a result the pair became estranged, and separated in 1943. Unity, who was in love with Hitler, attempted suicide in Munich
on the day war was declared and suffered severe brain damage. She was brought home an invalid and Lady Redesdale cared for her until her death in 1948. Diana and Oswald Mosley were intern
ed in 1940 as security risks and spent three years in prison. Jessica's husband, Esmond Romilly
, was killed in action in 1941, deepening her bitterness towards the "fascist branch" of the family - she never spoke to her father again, nor to Diana until 1973, although she was reconciled with her mother in the 1950s.
, which he had purchased in 1938. Later he moved to Redesdale
in Northumberland, his family's ancestral property. He lived there as a virtual recluse. By 1950, when Nancy visited him, he was "frail and old." He died there in 1958 and was buried at Swinbrook
, where three of his daughters (Nancy, Diana and Unity) are also buried. His title passed to his brother Bertram.
(1945), and in Jessica's memoir Hons and Rebels
(1960). In a typical passage from the former: "As soon as breakfast was over, he would begin striding about the hall, bellowing at the dogs 'Come here, blast you! Get off that coat!' Kick. 'Stop that noise, blast you!' - shouting for his loader [gun], damning and blasting anyone rash enough to cross his path." He would keep his bloodhound
s in practice by having them track his children. Uncle Matthew also kept a wartime entrenching tool
on a chimneypiece that still had an enemy's hair and brain parts on it. Nevertheless, both daughters' accounts make it clear that between rages Redesdale was an indulgent father who loved riding and hunting with his children.
Uncle Matthew was played by Michael Aldridge
in the 1980 Thames Television
series Love in a Cold Climate. In a 2001 BBC
production he was played by Alan Bates
(see Love in a Cold Climate (TV serial)
).
Ancestry
Redesdale was the second son of Algernon Bertram Freeman-Mitford, 1st Baron Redesdale and Lady Clementine Gertrude Helen Ogilvy. The Mitfords are a family of NorthumberlandNorthumberland
Northumberland is the northernmost ceremonial county and a unitary district in North East England. For Eurostat purposes Northumberland is a NUTS 3 region and is one of three boroughs or unitary districts that comprise the "Northumberland and Tyne and Wear" NUTS 2 region...
landed gentry
Landed gentry
Landed gentry is a traditional British social class, consisting of land owners who could live entirely off rental income. Often they worked only in an administrative capacity looking after the management of their own lands....
, dating back to the 14th century; Redesdale's great-great-grandfather was the historian William Mitford
William Mitford
William Mitford , English historian, was the elder of the two sons of John Mitford, a barrister and his wife Philadelphia Reveley.-Youth:...
. His father, Bertram, called Bertie, was a diplomat, politician and author, with large inherited estates in Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire is a county in South West England. The county comprises part of the Cotswold Hills, part of the flat fertile valley of the River Severn, and the entire Forest of Dean....
and Oxfordshire
Oxfordshire
Oxfordshire is a county in the South East region of England, bordering on Warwickshire and Northamptonshire , Buckinghamshire , Berkshire , Wiltshire and Gloucestershire ....
as well as Northumberland. He was raised to the peerage in 1902, and thus his son then became known as The Hon David Freeman-Mitford, although the surname Mitford was more commonly used.
Early life
Mitford's legendary eccentricity was evident from an early age. As a child he was prone to sudden fits of rage. He was totally uninterested in reading or education, wishing only to spend his time riding. (He later liked to boast that he had read only one book in his life, Jack LondonJack London
John Griffith "Jack" London was an American author, journalist, and social activist. He was a pioneer in the then-burgeoning world of commercial magazine fiction and was one of the first fiction writers to obtain worldwide celebrity and a large fortune from his fiction alone...
's novel White Fang
White Fang
White Fang is a novel by American author Jack London. First serialized in Outing magazine, it was published in 1906. The story takes place in Yukon Territory, Canada, during the Klondike Gold Rush at the end of the 19th-century, and details a wild wolfdog's journey to domestication...
, although in fact he read most of his daughters' books.) His lack of academic aptitude meant that he was not sent to Eton
Eton College
Eton College, often referred to simply as Eton, is a British independent school for boys aged 13 to 18. It was founded in 1440 by King Henry VI as "The King's College of Our Lady of Eton besides Wyndsor"....
with his older brother, but rather to Radley
Radley College
Radley College , founded in 1847, is a British independent school for boys on the edge of the English village of Radley, near to the market town of Abingdon in Oxfordshire, and has become a well-established boarding school...
, with the intention that he should enter the army. But he failed the entrance examination to Sandhurst
Royal Military Academy Sandhurst
The Royal Military Academy Sandhurst , commonly known simply as Sandhurst, is a British Army officer initial training centre located in Sandhurst, Berkshire, England...
, and was instead sent to Ceylon
Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka is a country off the southern coast of the Indian subcontinent. Known until 1972 as Ceylon , Sri Lanka is an island surrounded by the Indian Ocean, the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait, and lies in the vicinity of India and the...
to work for a tea planter. In 1900 he returned to England and joined the army for the Boer War
Boer War
The Boer Wars were two wars fought between the British Empire and the two independent Boer republics, the Oranje Vrijstaat and the Republiek van Transvaal ....
, in which he served with distinction and was severely wounded, losing one lung.
Marriage and children
In February 1904 he married Sydney Bowles, whom he had first met ten years previously, when he was 26 and she was 24. She was the daughter of Thomas Gibson BowlesThomas Gibson Bowles
Thomas Gibson Bowles , generally known as Tommy Bowles, was the founder of the magazines The Lady and the English Vanity Fair, a sailor and the maternal grandfather of the Mitford sisters.-Parents:...
, a journalist and Conservative MP, who in 1863 had founded the magazine Vanity Fair, and some years later the women's magazine The Lady
The Lady (magazine)
The Lady is Britain's oldest weekly women's magazine. It has been in continuous publication since 1885 and is based in London. It is particularly notable for its classified advertisements for domestic service and child care; it also has extensive listings of holiday properties.The magazine was...
.
The couple had one son and six daughters, who all used the surname Mitford rather than Freeman-Mitford; the girls were known collectively as the Mitford sisters:
- Nancy MitfordNancy MitfordNancy Freeman-Mitford, CBE , styled The Hon. Nancy Mitford before her marriage and The Hon. Mrs Peter Rodd thereafter, was an English novelist and biographer, one of the Bright Young People on the London social scene in the inter-war years...
(Mrs Peter RoddPeter RoddLieutenant-Colonel Peter Murray Rennell Rodd was a younger son of Rennell Rodd, 1st Baron Rennell.He was educated at Wellington College and Balliol College, Oxford. On 4 December 1933 he was married to the Hon. Nancy Mitford, one of the noted Mitford sisters...
) (1904–73) - Pamela Mitford (Mrs Derek JacksonDerek Jackson (physicist)Professor Derek Ainslie Jackson, FRS, DFC, AFC, OBE was a spectroscopist.Derek Jackson was one of the outstanding atomic physicists of his generation, but there was very little in his life that could be called conventional....
) (1907–94) - Major Thomas Mitford (1909–45) (killed in action)
- Diana MitfordDiana MitfordDiana Mitford, Lady Mosley , was one of Britain's noted Mitford sisters. She was married first to Bryan Walter Guinness, heir to the barony of Moyne, and secondly to Sir Oswald Mosley, 6th Baronet, of Ancoats, leader of the British Union of Fascists; her second marriage, in 1936, took place at the...
(Mrs Bryan GuinnessBryan Guinness, 2nd Baron MoyneBryan Walter Guinness, 2nd Baron Moyne , was an heir to part of the Guinness family brewing fortune, lawyer, poet and novelist...
, then Lady MosleyOswald MosleySir Oswald Ernald Mosley, 6th Baronet, of Ancoats, was an English politician, known principally as the founder of the British Union of Fascists...
) (1910–2003) - Unity Vallkyrie MitfordUnity MitfordUnity Valkyrie Mitford was a member of the aristocratic Mitford family, tracing its origins in Northumberland back to the 11th century Norman settlement of England. Unity Mitford's sister Diana was married to Oswald Mosley, leader of British Union of Fascists...
(1914–48) - Jessica MitfordJessica MitfordJessica Lucy Freeman-Mitford was an English author, journalist and political campaigner, who was one of the Mitford sisters...
(Mrs Esmond RomillyEsmond RomillyEsmond Marcus David Romilly was a British socialist and anti-fascist, now remembered mainly for his marriage to Jessica Mitford, one of the Mitford sisters...
, then Mrs Robert TreuhaftRobert TreuhaftRobert Edward Treuhaft was an American lawyer and the second husband of Jessica Mitford.The son of Hungarian immigrants, he worked for labor union and radical left causes much of his life...
) (1917–96) - Deborah Mitford (now the Dowager Duchess of DevonshireAndrew Cavendish, 11th Duke of DevonshireAndrew Robert Buxton Cavendish, 11th Duke of Devonshire KG, MC, PC , styled Lord Andrew Cavendish until 1944 and Marquess of Hartington from 1944 to 1950, was a British Conservative politician...
) (born 1920)
Work and war
For a time his father-in-law employed him as manager of The Lady, but he showed no interest in or talent for this. The Mitfords travelled regularly to CanadaCanada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
, where Mitford owned a gold claim near Swastika, Ontario
Swastika, Ontario
Swastika is a small community founded in 1908 around a mining site in Northern Ontario, Canada, and today within the municipal boundaries of Kirkland Lake, Ontario....
: no gold was ever found there, but he enjoyed the outdoor life. His neighbour Harry Oakes
Harry Oakes
Sir Harry Oakes, 1st Baronet was an American-born British Canadian gold-mine owner, entrepreneur, investor and philanthropist. He earned his fortune in Canada and moved to the Bahamas in the 1930s for tax purposes. He was murdered in 1943 under notorious circumstances in the Bahamas...
did strike gold nearby in 1912.
On the outbreak of the First World War in 1914 he immediately rejoined the army and served as a transport officer in Flanders
Flanders
Flanders is the community of the Flemings but also one of the institutions in Belgium, and a geographical region located in parts of present-day Belgium, France and the Netherlands. "Flanders" can also refer to the northern part of Belgium that contains Brussels, Bruges, Ghent and Antwerp...
, gaining a mention in despatches for his bravery at the Second Battle of Ypres
Second Battle of Ypres
The Second Battle of Ypres was the first time Germany used poison gas on a large scale on the Western Front in the First World War and the first time a former colonial force pushed back a major European power on European soil, which occurred in the battle of St...
. His elder brother Clement was killed in 1915 in the Battle of Loos
Battle of Loos
The Battle of Loos was one of the major British offensives mounted on the Western Front in 1915 during World War I. It marked the first time the British used poison gas during the war, and is also famous for the fact that it witnessed the first large-scale use of 'new' or Kitchener's Army...
. With only one lung he was invalided out of active service, and, after his father's death in 1916, being now Lord Redesdale, he was briefly appointed Provost Marshal
Provost Marshal
The Provost Marshal is the officer in the armed forces who is in charge of the military police .There may be a Provost Marshal serving at many levels of the hierarchy and he may also be the public safety officer of a military installation, responsible for the provision of fire, gate security, and...
for Oxfordshire
Oxfordshire
Oxfordshire is a county in the South East region of England, bordering on Warwickshire and Northamptonshire , Buckinghamshire , Berkshire , Wiltshire and Gloucestershire ....
, with responsibility for ensuring the enlistment of new recruits.
Lord Redesdale
In 1916 his father died, and Mitford became the 2nd Lord Redesdale, his elder brother having been killed in action in 1915. He took over the family estate in OxfordshireOxfordshire
Oxfordshire is a county in the South East region of England, bordering on Warwickshire and Northamptonshire , Buckinghamshire , Berkshire , Wiltshire and Gloucestershire ....
, and in 1917, when he was invalided home from Flanders, was appointed Assistant Provost Marshal
Provost Marshal
The Provost Marshal is the officer in the armed forces who is in charge of the military police .There may be a Provost Marshal serving at many levels of the hierarchy and he may also be the public safety officer of a military installation, responsible for the provision of fire, gate security, and...
of Oxford, in charge of training reservists in the county.
Although Redesdale was now a large landowner, he was not a wealthy man: the estates were poorly developed and rents were low. With seven children to feed and five servants to pay, he could not maintain the expense of his large home at Batsford
Batsford
Batsford is a village and civil parish in the Cotswold district of Gloucestershire, England. According to the 2001 census it had a population of 99. The village is about 1½ miles north-west of Moreton-in-Marsh...
in the Cotswolds
Cotswolds
The Cotswolds are a range of hills in west-central England, sometimes called the Heart of England, an area across and long. The area has been designated as the Cotswold Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty...
. He bought and extended Asthall Manor
Asthall Manor
Asthall Manor is a gabled Jacobean Cotswold manor house in Asthall, Oxfordshire. It was built in about 1620 and altered and enlarged in about 1916The house was the childhood home of the Mitford sisters.-History:...
and then moved to nearby Swinbrook
Swinbrook
Swinbrook is a village on the River Windrush, east of Burford in Oxfordshire, England. The village is in the civil parish of Swinbrook and Widford.-History:...
. Here he indulged his passion for building by building a new large house, named after the village, which appears as the family home in the books of his daughters Nancy and Jessica. The expense of these moves nearly ruined Redesdale, who was a poor manager of money. This, plus his increasing disappointment that all his later children were girls, led to the deterioration of his temperament which became legendary through his daughters' portrayals of his frequent and terrible rages.
Political views and family splits
As a peer Redesdale was a member of the House of LordsHouse of Lords
The House of Lords is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminster....
, then a wholly hereditary chamber. He attended the House conscientiously, although he was not really interested in party politics or in legislation, except for being opposed to nearly all change. In the 1930s, however, both he and his wife developed a strong sympathy for fascism
Fascism
Fascism is a radical authoritarian nationalist political ideology. Fascists seek to rejuvenate their nation based on commitment to the national community as an organic entity, in which individuals are bound together in national identity by suprapersonal connections of ancestry, culture, and blood...
, and Redesdale became known for his extreme right-wing views, particularly anti-Semitism
Anti-Semitism
Antisemitism is suspicion of, hatred toward, or discrimination against Jews for reasons connected to their Jewish heritage. According to a 2005 U.S...
. His daughter Diana, herself a keen fascist and from 1936 the wife of British fascist leader Sir Oswald Mosley
Oswald Mosley
Sir Oswald Ernald Mosley, 6th Baronet, of Ancoats, was an English politician, known principally as the founder of the British Union of Fascists...
, described him as "one of nature's fascists." As a result he was permanently estranged from his daughter Jessica, who was a communist
Communism
Communism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, revolutionary and stateless socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production...
from her teenage years, and partly estranged from his eldest daughter Nancy, who was a strong anti-fascist though not as left-wing as Jessica.
Redesdale was an instinctive xenophobe
Xenophobia
Xenophobia is defined as "an unreasonable fear of foreigners or strangers or of that which is foreign or strange". It comes from the Greek words ξένος , meaning "stranger," "foreigner" and φόβος , meaning "fear."...
: he came back from World War I with a dislike of the French and a deep hatred of the Germans. He was widely quoted as saying that: "Abroad is bloody". As Uncle Mathew put it in The Pursuit of Love: "Frogs are slightly better than Huns or Wops, but abroad is unutterably bloody and foreigners are fiends." Thus he was initially scornful of the enthusiasm shown by his daughters Diana and Unity for Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
and Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler was an Austrian-born German politician and the leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party , commonly referred to as the Nazi Party). He was Chancellor of Germany from 1933 to 1945, and head of state from 1934 to 1945...
: Hitler was, after all, a Hun. In November 1938, however, the Redesdales accompanied their daughters to Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
, where they attended the Nuremberg Rally
Nuremberg Rally
The Nuremberg Rally was the annual rally of the NSDAP in Germany, held from 1923 to 1938. Especially after Hitler's rise to power in 1933, they were large Nazi propaganda events...
and met Hitler, with whom Unity and Diana were already acquainted. Both the Redesdales were immediately won over by Hitler's apparent charm and his declarations of Anglophilia
Anglophilia
An Anglophile is a person who is fond of English culture or, more broadly, British culture. Its antonym is Anglophobe.-Definition:The word comes from Latin Anglus "English" via French, and is ultimately derived from Old English Englisc "English" + Ancient Greek φίλος - philos, "friend"...
. Redesdale later spoke in the House of Lords in favour of the Anschluss
Anschluss
The Anschluss , also known as the ', was the occupation and annexation of Austria into Nazi Germany in 1938....
and of returning Germany's colonies
German Empire
The German Empire refers to Germany during the "Second Reich" period from the unification of Germany and proclamation of Wilhelm I as German Emperor on 18 January 1871, to 1918, when it became a federal republic after defeat in World War I and the abdication of the Emperor, Wilhelm II.The German...
, and became a strong supporter of Neville Chamberlain
Neville Chamberlain
Arthur Neville Chamberlain FRS was a British Conservative politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from May 1937 to May 1940. Chamberlain is best known for his appeasement foreign policy, and in particular for his signing of the Munich Agreement in 1938, conceding the...
's policy of appeasement
Appeasement
The term appeasement is commonly understood to refer to a diplomatic policy aimed at avoiding war by making concessions to another power. Historian Paul Kennedy defines it as "the policy of settling international quarrels by admitting and satisfying grievances through rational negotiation and...
towards Germany. Lady Redesdale went further, writing articles in praise of Hitler and in support of National Socialism.
The outbreak of World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
in 1939 precipitated a series of crises in the Mitford family. Redesdale was above all a patriot, and as soon as war was declared he recanted his support for Hitler and once again became violently anti-German. Lady Redesdale stuck to her Nazi sympathies, and as a result the pair became estranged, and separated in 1943. Unity, who was in love with Hitler, attempted suicide in Munich
Munich
Munich The city's motto is "" . Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" . Its native name, , is derived from the Old High German Munichen, meaning "by the monks' place". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat...
on the day war was declared and suffered severe brain damage. She was brought home an invalid and Lady Redesdale cared for her until her death in 1948. Diana and Oswald Mosley were intern
Intern
Internship is a system of onthejob training for white-collar jobs, similar to an apprenticeship. Interns are usually college or university students, but they can also be high school students or post graduate adults seeking skills for a new career. They may also be as young as middle school or in...
ed in 1940 as security risks and spent three years in prison. Jessica's husband, Esmond Romilly
Esmond Romilly
Esmond Marcus David Romilly was a British socialist and anti-fascist, now remembered mainly for his marriage to Jessica Mitford, one of the Mitford sisters...
, was killed in action in 1941, deepening her bitterness towards the "fascist branch" of the family - she never spoke to her father again, nor to Diana until 1973, although she was reconciled with her mother in the 1950s.
Later life
In 1945 Tom Mitford was killed in action in Burma, a blow from which Redesdale, already depressed by the break-up of his marriage, never recovered. According to Nancy Mitford's biographer: "Although she [Nancy] was deeply grieved by his death, it did not mean for her, as it did for her parents, that all pleasure in life was over." Redesdale retreated to Inchkenneth, an island In the Inner Hebrides off the west coast of ScotlandScotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
, which he had purchased in 1938. Later he moved to Redesdale
Redesdale
Redesdale is a valley iin the western part of the county of Northumberland, in northeast England. This area contains the valley of the River Rede, a tributary of the North Tyne River. Redesdale includes the settlements of Elsdon, Otterburn, Rochester, Byrness and Carter Bar.Historically this...
in Northumberland, his family's ancestral property. He lived there as a virtual recluse. By 1950, when Nancy visited him, he was "frail and old." He died there in 1958 and was buried at Swinbrook
Swinbrook
Swinbrook is a village on the River Windrush, east of Burford in Oxfordshire, England. The village is in the civil parish of Swinbrook and Widford.-History:...
, where three of his daughters (Nancy, Diana and Unity) are also buried. His title passed to his brother Bertram.
In fiction as "Uncle Matthew"
Redesdale appears as Uncle Matthew, Lord Alconleigh of Alconleigh, in Nancy's novel The Pursuit of LoveThe Pursuit of Love
The Pursuit of Love is a novel by Nancy Mitford, first published in 1945. It is the first in a trilogy about an upper-class family in the period between the wars...
(1945), and in Jessica's memoir Hons and Rebels
Hons and Rebels
Hons and Rebels is an autobiography by political activist Jessica Mitford which describes her aristocratic childhood and the conflicts between her and her sisters Unity and Diana, who were ardent supporters of Nazism...
(1960). In a typical passage from the former: "As soon as breakfast was over, he would begin striding about the hall, bellowing at the dogs 'Come here, blast you! Get off that coat!' Kick. 'Stop that noise, blast you!' - shouting for his loader [gun], damning and blasting anyone rash enough to cross his path." He would keep his bloodhound
Bloodhound
The Bloodhound is a large breed of dog which, while originally bred to hunt deer and wild boar, was later bred specifically to track human beings. It is a scenthound, tracking by smell, as opposed to a sighthound, which tracks using vision. It is famed for its ability to discern human odors even...
s in practice by having them track his children. Uncle Matthew also kept a wartime entrenching tool
Entrenching tool
An entrenching tool or E-tool is a collapsible spade used by military forces for a variety of military purposes. Survivalists, freedivers, campers, hikers and other outdoors groups have found it to be indispensable in field use...
on a chimneypiece that still had an enemy's hair and brain parts on it. Nevertheless, both daughters' accounts make it clear that between rages Redesdale was an indulgent father who loved riding and hunting with his children.
Uncle Matthew was played by Michael Aldridge
Michael Aldridge
Michael William ffolliott Aldridge was an English actor. While it was his role as Seymour in the television series Last of the Summer Wine which made him widely recognised, his long career as a successful character actor on stage and screen dated back to the 1930s.-Early life:The son of Dr...
in the 1980 Thames Television
Thames Television
Thames Television was a licensee of the British ITV television network, covering London and parts of the surrounding counties on weekdays from 30 July 1968 until 31 December 1992....
series Love in a Cold Climate. In a 2001 BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
production he was played by Alan Bates
Alan Bates
Sir Alan Arthur Bates CBE was an English actor, who came to prominence in the 1960s, a time of high creativity in British cinema, when he demonstrated his versatility in films ranging from the popular children’s story Whistle Down the Wind to the "kitchen sink" drama A Kind of Loving...
(see Love in a Cold Climate (TV serial)
Love in a Cold Climate (TV serial)
Love in a Cold Climate is a British television serial drama produced by the BBC in association with WGBH Boston, and first broadcast in two parts on BBC One on 4 and 11 February 2001...
).