“The Notorious Mitfords”
Above: Unity, Tom, Deborah, Diana, Jessica, Nancy and Pam
A Talk By William Cross, FSA Scot
Cwmbran, South Wales: 21 January 2026
The six famous Mitford sisters led notorious lives in feats of scandal, love, adultery, divorce and following fascism as part of the 20th
century's greatest high jinx tales, and
real history and folklore. No one
was allowed to ignore the Mitford clan. They are still talked about. The
TV drama series called “Outrageous” is a word that sums them up perfectly.
The girls were Nancy (1904-1973), a
writer, Pamela (1907- 1994), ( Rural
Miford ), Diana ( 1910-2003 ), who
deserted her first husband for the dangerous Oswald Mosley), Unity ( 1914-1948)
( who pursued Adolf Hitler), Jessica
(1917-1996), (a Communist, a writer,
& who became an American citizen), and Deborah, ( 1920-2014) , the youngest
of the tribe who became Duchess of Devonshire & chatelaine of Chatsworth
House in Derbyshire. There was one boy
in the line up, third born, Tom, ( 1909-1945). He was not a
headline seeker like his sisters, but a barrister, soldier and talented concert
pianist. Yet, he is as controversial as
his sisters with a mangle of love
tangles & affairs involving both sexes. A handsome devil with a passion for
married women.
The Mitford parents were minor British aristocrats. David
Freeman-Mitford , the 2nd Baron Redesdale ( known to his children as "Farve"
) and his wife Sydney Bowles ( known to
her children as “Muv”). They married,
for love, in 1904, but it was a
underlying business deal. The Great War affected David’s position as the
family’s “spare” after his elder brother was killed in action and so he became
the Redesdale heir on his father’s death in 1916.
One
Mitford ancestor was a Lord Chancellor of
Childhood for the Mitfords was in
Farve was an upright figure, a farmer/squire
& Peer, eccentric, a stickler for rules, one being that girls
should not be educated at any school,
only at home. Tom however the family
heir was sent to preparatory and public
school. Muv was a curiously hands on
character, with rules on food, health, based on her own upbringing with a ban
on pork and shellfish and bizarre beliefs that the good body did not need any medicines, the good body would eventually heal itself, Muv was
a watchful wife and kept Farve from straying into the arms of other women, but he
flirted with several domestic staff. Later, he had a mistress whom he lived with for many years, separating from Muv in the 1940s. He died at Otterburn, a Mitford homestead in Northumberland in 1958.
Muv survived until 1963, and died in
Farve admired Muv’s ability with housekeeping
budgets, seeing that all six girls were
prepared for presentation at Court as
debutantes and experienced foreign travel. The idea being that this route would
find them husbands. The girls had they own ideas and each of them were a
trouble to their parents all their adult
years. Tom was
Farve’s pride and joy. And Tom was also always there for his sisters, despite
their many antics at home and
abroad and choice of husbands and lovers
and friends and politics. When troubles
hit hardest Farve bought a
Will Cross
has made a close study of the Mitford clan for a biography entitled “ TOM MITFORD : A FEARFUL OLD
TWISTER” & written articles for the
Mitford Society Journal. He is a writer and lecturer based in
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