Stevie‘s review of Black Diamonds: The Downfall of an Aristocratic Dynasty and the Fifty Years that Changed England by Catherine Bailey
Biography published by Penguin Books 30 Dec 14
I’m a massive fan of twentieth century history, whether fiction, fact, or speculation pieced together from extensive research, and I’m particularly fond of narratives set in parts of the UK other than those of the major cities that are most popular with the current crop of historical romance novelists. So I’m very pleased that Catherine Bailey’s book about the Fitzwilliam family of Yorkshire has finally been given a US release, especially as that pushed me to finally read it (something I’ve been promising I’d do since its original UK release). I enjoyed The Secret Rooms, even if I didn’t agree with all Bailey’s theories as to who did what and why, so I was keen to see the treatment she gave to another set of mysterious happenings up in my part of the world.
In 1972, almost all papers relating to the Fitzwilliam family: the Earls Fitzwilliam of Wentworth Woodhouse and all their descendants and activities, were systematically destroyed by burning over a three-week period on the orders of the 10th and last Earl. Only a few documents survived – the correspondence of two distant family members and some papers held in public and private collections elsewhere – although many others had already been destroyed in a series of not-always-related conspiracies and cover-ups. Catherine Bailey set out to discover what lay behind this seeming paranoia of future scandals, but her book reveals more mysteries than it solves.
At the heart of the story are two big questions: was the seventh Earl an imposter, switched at birth for an unwanted daughter, and was the elder brother of the tenth earl really born illegitimate and so excluded from the line of succession? Bailey failed to solve either puzzle, but her book traces the many changes that took place in the area over the twentieth century – leading to the end of ways of life for not just the aristocracy, but also for many ordinary people employed in the great houses, on the big estates and – most tellingly – in the coal mines that produced much of the wealth for their employers.
It’s easy to look back and see how wrong so many people’s actions were in how they went about disrupting the way the coal industry was run – not that it didn’t need changing, when many workers faced appalling conditions both in the mines and following accidents or illness due to the industry – but the battles that raged in the resulting class war seem so pointless now that the UK has almost no mines left (I’ll spare people my rant about what went on in the 1980s).
Bailey touches on far more than just the politics, however, and has obviously gone to a lot of trouble to track down the words and memories of people – from all stations in life – who were actually there for each and every event she writes about. I’d have liked a little more theorising this time – especially about the background to the court case between the tenth Earl Fitzwilliam and his brother – and I’m sorry that my beloved Sheffield Simples cars got barely a mention, but this is another story in which the truth is so unbelievable that it would never work as fiction.
A book, like Bailey’s previous US release, that really needs to be read in print – if only to properly appreciate the pictures.
Grade: B
Summary:
From the New York Times–bestselling author of The Secret Rooms, the extraordinary true story of the downfall of one of England’s wealthiest families
Fans of Downton Abbey now have a go-to resource for fascinating, real-life stories of the spectacular lives led by England’s aristocrats. With the novelistic flair and knack for historical detail Catherine Bailey displayed in her New York Times bestseller The Secret Rooms, Black Diamonds provides a page-turning chronicle of the Fitzwilliam coal-mining dynasty and their breathtaking Wentworth estate, the largest private home in England.
When the sixth Earl Fitzwilliam died in 1902, he left behind the second largest estate in twentieth-century England, valued at more than £3 billion of today’s money—a lifeline to the tens of thousands of people who worked either in the family’s coal mines or on their expansive estate. The earl also left behind four sons, and the family line seemed assured. But was it? As Bailey retraces the Fitzwilliam family history, she uncovers a legacy riddled with bitter feuds, scandals (including Peter Fitzwilliam’s ill-fated affair with American heiress Kick Kennedy), and civil unrest as the conflict between the coal industry and its miners came to a head. Once again, Bailey has written an irresistible and brilliant narrative history.
No excerpt found.
