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2.1: Parents: discovering my initial relationships

My parents were on holiday in Venice at the time when I was probably conceived. They were the guests of Laura Corrigan, the American hostess who, despite her suspect origins (of being a sometime waitress, managing to marry an elderly millionaire who promptly expired from a heart attack,) and despite the fact that New York society had turned their backs on her, was currently making quite some splash upon the European social scene. My father and mother were amongst those of la jeunesse dorée, who had been enticed to her parties with extravagant gifts of jewelry concealed within the napkins of each table setting. In fact they were particular favourites of hers and, for the summer of 1931, they had been invited to stay with her at the Palazzo Mocenigo in Venice, where Byron had formerly lived for a short while. So I have often wondered if it was in Byron's bed that I was actually conceived.

Apparently I was a nuisance during the final month of pregnancy, in that I did not readily submit to birth. I was late, and Daphne found it tedious to be constantly parading her hippopotamus-like shape at social gatherings upon the London scene. But finally, at about 19.00 hours on May 6th 1932, in 95 Seymour Place London W1, assisted by a midwife known universally as Nanny B, my mother gave me birth - to the great rejoicing of the Thynne family, (apart from the distant Thynne cousins, I daresay, who were thus removed yet one step further from the line of succession to Longleat.) To Henry my father, and to Thomas my grandfather, and to all the kith and kin of my father's three sisters, it was indeed splendid news that there was finally, or rather once again, a direct heir within the main branch of the family.

So the feeling of being much wanted, in the sense that I was in some way the fulfilment of a parental ambition, was fed to me within my mother's milk. It gave me an idea of self-importance, I daresay; and in those days it produced a direct bonding between Daphne and myself. It was a warmth of special regard that seemed to emanate from her.

Orbiting thoughtless, I caught my clasp on a comet's
bridal train, to be drawn inside it, and lifted,
as gifts one to the other, lovers at birth,
worth more than any infinite figure.
Big-bosomed to my dripping lips, you slipped me
a safe embrace, bountiful in beautiful grace
and favour. I savoured all with small greedy
gulps, feeling sure how battles are won.
The sun kissed blissfully the window netting,
letting a little of the morning light seep
sweetly in a white mist to the plush carpet,
lushly wrapping our happy feet on the floor.
The toils of life I now could undertake,
no matter how this planet Earth might quake.

My feeling towards Henry had always been more reserved. When he sold the house in Seymour Place, he bought one in Tite Street, Chelsea. It was to be the family's town house over the period that he was a Conservative Member of Parliament, which was only until the election of 1935, although it was not finally sold until 1938.

We were in the dining-room at Tite Street, Henry standing, Daphne seated, and myself on the floor. Dad's general approach towards me was often to adopt a teasing tone, which I frequently misread. He demanded: "Which of us do you like the best? Mummy or Daddy? Come on, you can tell us. We won't be angry." So I told him it was Mummy - and promptly felt uncertain and nervous of myself to perceive his reaction, which was one of evident displeasure. In fact he left the room, and Mum was at pains to explain to me that what I ought to have answered was that I loved the two of them equally, which was such an evident falsehood that I couldn't understand why she wanted me to say such things: along with an inner comprehension, from her coyly smiling expression, that she was really delighted by what I had said, and was merely reproving me from out of what eventually came to be identified as marital loyalty.

The next essential image of my relationship with Henry came a little while later, when I was four. We had moved to Sturford Mead in Corsley, near Longleat, which was a delightful Georgian manor house with a spacious garden including a large pond, plus out-buildings. This was now our principal place of residence, and we were in the dining-room with my father smoking and in a convivial mood. Holding out his hand towards me, he asked: "Would you like to see smoke come out of my ears?.... Well give me your hand, and watch them very closely while I concentrate upon what I'm doing." He was seated, so his head was only slightly higher than my own, and I gazed as bidden with all the interest that his proposition deserved. But while I gazed, he moved his other hand which held the cigarette, to touch (oh so lightly,) the back of the small hand I had innocently entrusted to him.

I can still fiercely remember the fury that I felt. "That was an imp's trick!" I shouted, for an imp was then the vilest form of abuse that I could muster. But Henry was roaring with laughter, and there was nobody sympathetic to my plight. I felt indignation, and resented that it should be dismissed as an inability, on my side, to perceive somehow that it was supposed to be funny.

Did it please you to witness the sudden switch
from rich expectant trust to a twitch of pain,
sadistically gaining titillation for your mad
mania in seeing your titch of a son so cross?
Was it for a wag's giggle, like watching a carpet
sharply tugged, to topple the unsuspecting
pompous child, opening his innocent eyes
to a wiser, untrusting slippery world?
Or thirdly, was it your exhibitionist side,
snidely stealing the spot-lit circle with a rotten
trick, slickly imitating a conjuror's
wondrous ways in magic? - with what a wand!
In treachery, I glimpsed you to the heart
and knew, somewhere within, we stood apart.