Born in November 1916 to the Marquess and Marchioness of Granby,
Lady Ursula was a sprightly and charming lady whose memoirs of her
uniquely glamorous life make riveting reading. Describing herself
as having been an observant child, she records life at Belvoir
Castle, Leicestershire, as maintained on a feudal scale until
September 1939. Her vivid accounts include the numerous servants
and their roles from liveried footmen to the pig man. She also
describes her close relationship with her father who succeeded as
9th Duke of Rutland in 1925, and whom she helped as a girl in his
sensitive restoration of another Manners family seat, the mediaeval
Haddon Hall, Derbyshire. We hear of her coming-out Ball at Belvoir
Castle in 1934 at the age of seventeen and her role in the
Coronation of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth in 1937. Dressed
by Norman Hartnell, she was one of the Six Maids of Honour who bore
the Queen's train in Westminster Abbey. In 1938 she accompanied the
new King and Queen on their triumphant first state visit to Paris
and Versailles. By contrast, her war work was soon to include being
in charge of hundreds of women at a munitions factory in
Springfield, Grantham. Her activities here were described in
letters which her celebrated aunt, Lady Diana Cooper, wife of Duff
Cooper, 1st Viscount Norwich, sent to their son, John Julius, while
a schoolboy. They are quoted here by his kind permission. Lady
Ursula recalls her close friendships with men as varied as Rex
Whistler, the Maharajah of Jaipur and Paul Getty. The story told is
unforgettable, and though it has touches of Brideshead and Downton
Abbey, it is utterly novel for, unlike them, it is actually real.
General
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