FEBRUARY 29th - TAKE COVER, GENTLEMEN !

The 29th of February only comes around once every four years, with the tradition that it is the one day upon which a lady may propose marriage to an eligible gentleman. Which led to lots of press speculation, at least back in the United States of 1928:

Gene Tunney was an American boxer and WW1 U.S. Marine, holding the World Championship belt from 1926 - 1928 (see his WIKI HERE). Charles Lindbergh, of course, needs no introduction. And for all followers of the Hereford VBCW blog, nor does the third most eligible bachelor in America, and he's not even American....

Note: on 10th December 1927, Wallis Simpson's divorce from her first husband, Earl W. Spencer, was finalised. On 21st July 1928, Wallis Simpson married her second husband, Ernest Simpson, at the Chelsea Register Office. The events of 1936 - and 1938 - were a long time in the future.....

CAMOUFLAGE MEA CULPA - 1930s PAPER SOLDIERS

After the embarrassment of "the three colour camouflage mea culpa", some images in further evidence, drawn from contemporaneous sheets of paper soldiers:

German Reconnaissance Troops. Probably early 1930s on the basis of the three
colour camouflage and the absence of armoured cars. All these troops wear gasmasks.

More familiar German armoured cars - Kfz 13, Sdkfz 221, 231, 232 -
 but all still in pre - July 1937 three colour camo. It is likely that any
German vehicles shipped to the Hereford VBCW in 1938 would 
still be in this camouflage scheme.

The motorcyclists are back, accompanied by a "dinky" armoured car, probably a Kfz13 with
a little artist's licence. While the Kfz13 is still in three colour camo, the motorcycles are now 
in "panzergrau" - save for the three colour panniers! Images probably, therefore, late 1937.

PROPAGANDA AGAIN !

In the ongoing "Propaganda Wars" preceding the Spring Big Game 2024, it is often said that Commissar Moody of the Presteigne Soviet's "Bureau Desinformatzya" learned "everything he knows" from previous experience in Spain. This is not quite true, as the Commissar also received extensive training in "photographic manipulation and airbrushing" (see HERE) direct from the Moscow School of Advanced Creative Arts. But the Commissar certainly looks back on his time in Spain with great fondness:

Contemporaneous "Paper Soldiers" sheet illustrating Republican propagandists at work.
Most notable, the "re-education class" being conducted on a blackboard, the mobile library
(state approved works only), and an armoured mobile loudspeaker (and support vehicle).
Could that be Comrade Moody himself - centre on podium, in blue boiler suit - addressing the troops ? 

SPRING BIG GAME 2024 ("HM MASSIVE COUNTER-ATTACK") - ALL YOU NEED TO KNOW

This year's Spring Big Game 2024 ("HM Massive Counter-Attack") will take place at the Yarkhill Village Hall, Herefordshire on Saturday 9th March 2024 from 10am - 5pm (doors open c. 9.30am). For information about the Hall, SEE HERE For the campaign background, SEE HERE and for area maps SEE HERE.

The cost for the day is £15 per person, payable on the BIG DAY itself. Please remember to bring the exact money, as the Umpires won't have enough £5 notes to create change for everyone! In addition your £15 campaign contribution, please remember to bring:

(a). your lunch. We provide tea and coffee.  If you want something to eat during the course of the day, pack it with your troops! Please note that there are no shopping facilities at the Yarkhill Village Hall (although there is a nice 'outside lunch' area).

(b). your troops. Goes without saying, really. Your troops as per the VBCW Platoon Generator HERE Note that we allocate experience ratings to sections on the morning of the BIG GAME as per the Platoon Generator rules, so it's helpful to have brought along a pencil and piece of paper to note down the results.

(c). your camera. If you intend taking pictures of the inevitable triumph of your troops, and the destruction of the enemy. The Umpires really like photographs of the action to illustrate the After Action Report.

(d). your paraphenalia. Dice, rules, measuring tapes, scatter terrain - all the "small stuff" that you usually use. The Umpires are always grateful for telephone poles, road signs, hedges, gates, bushes, sandbag emplacements etc. etc. - any small items of VBCW scenery that add to the overall effect. Rules are "WTDW" (Mort Version 11) - if anyone doesn't already have a copy, please email the Umpires.

And that's all there is to it ! Any questions to the Umpires via the Email Group, alternatively, in case that fails, via the LAF thread. 

Important PS : 

(1). as things stand, it looks like the A438 (West) table will be a 3 v 2 Battle between the Blackshorts and "a Far Left Alliance", while the A438 (East) table will be a 2 v 2 Battle between HM Crown Forces and a force of "Local Defence Volunteers". These will be set up in "classic attack v defence" formation, the originally mooted idea of "a crossfight" on each table having been shelved for now;

(2). The Umpires always have a discretion in relation to additional troops, exercised on the basis that additional forces should not fundamentally upset the balance of power within the intended game. Any player who wants to play "something extra" should get in touch with the Umpires by email, or bring the additional kit along on the Big Day and then have a chat with the Umpires. At the moment, the Umpires will "look kindly" upon requests from HM Crown Forces on the A438 (East) Table (to big up the attackers in a 2 v 2 Encounter) and from the Far Left Alliance on the A438 (West) table (to mitigate a repeat of the 'Disaster at Dinmore' and an early end to play in a 3 v 2 Encounter)

(3). Remember that the Umpires will be awarding the "Players Prizes""at the end of the Big Day! 

(4). And please remember the Modelling Challenge 2024 ("Ladies ! To the Barricades !")

It is always possible that requests for "more troops" can be misinterpreted. Here,
Mr Benn of the Independent Labour Party realises that he should have been
 particularly specific when asking for "more armour"

STOKKIES STEALS THE "GUNS OF TOBLERONE" - AND MORE

The splendid "Megablitz and More" blog always carries interesting posts, and one of the more recent - titled "Where Seagulls Dare", with a reference to a predecessor game, "The Guns of Toblerone" - struck a particular "wargames terrain" chord:

Brilliant! Terrain for "Where Seagulls Dare". Pens & Postcards and
Snakes & Ladders. Now start at the "Deserted Barn"....

Pass the Gestapo HQ....It must have taken lots of hours and not an inconsiderable
amount of cash to construct this highly detailed 28mm representation.

Destination - the Secret Bunker beneath the (Elastolin) Castle.
As all proper captions say, "28mm Figure for scale".

The same principles for the predecessor game, "The Guns of Toblerone". Not one, but
 three Airfix snap-fit Coastal Gun Emplacements (lovingly left completely unpainted)
 are the crowning glory of this terrain, featuring roads, mountains, hills, woods,
 a radar station (?) and of course "The Eagles Nest".
Yet storage is strangely not an issue....

As the Umpires mull over the possible rules and set-up for "a little escape sub-game" to the main Autumn Big Game 2024 ("Springtime for Stokkies"), these posts could not have been better timed! For all the detail, see the original Megablitz & More posts:

(1). "Where Seagulls Dare" see HERE

(2). "The Guns of Toblerone" see HERE

The Megablitz "Guns of Toblerone" was a replay of an original concept introduced at the 2005 Conference of Wargamers - Bob Cordery's Wargames Miscellany blog has a fully illustrated write - up of the original game HERE.

Hollywood is fond of trilogies, and so there must be one last such game to do - something along the lines of one of our favourite VBCW films of all time, as per this unseen trailer:

A sub-intrigue as to the appropriate title for such a wargame - perhaps "The Mallard has Skidded"? Better suggestions welcome in the "Comments" box.....

A BALEFUL PORTRAIT (COLOURISED)

A baleful portrait in our series of "colourised" photographs:

Chancellor Adolf Hitler

 Colourised Adolf Hitler

Perceptive readers of this blog (and who is not ?) will already have noted a significant omission from the recent "European Tour" undertaken by Edward VIII and Queen Wallis. While the Royal Couple visited both Spain and Italy, there was no visit to Germany. It is understood that the Wilhelmstrasse "let it be known" that such a visit "would not be appropriate at the present time" - a sure sign that the strain in relations caused by Reichsmarschall Herman Goering's "unauthorised intervention" in Herefordshire (see the Battle of Mortimer's Cross, Autumn Big Game 2019) has yet to be healed.

Comfortably ensconced in the Castle House Hotel, the Reichsmarschall has been sunk in depression. He had hoped that "a Royal Visit" to Berchtesgaden would smooth the way to the resumption of his close friendship with Adolf, but now....... now, something dramatic will clearly be required to change the Chancellor's mind. It is time for the Reichsmarschall to put aside his train set, take once more to the battlefield, and claim a momentous victory over the forces of International Bolshevism! "Noch einmal in die Bresche, liebe Freunde !"

Notes

(1). For the full history of Reichsmarschall Goering's involvement in the Hereford VBCW, see HERE

GERMAN WAR TOYS 1930s (and CAMOUFLAGE MEA CULPA)

There is nothing more evocative of the late 1930s than the beautifully manufactured German War Toys of the era:

Hausser Elastolin Staff Car in Three Colour Camouflage

Lineol Staff car in Three Colour Camouflage pattern

Lineol Staff Car with slightly different Three Colour Camouflage

Lineol Panzers of the 1930s.

We've previously looked at German War Toys HERE and HERE - and that's made necessary the "Three Colour Camouflage Mea Culpa". It was previously suggested that "....It is somewhat of a curiosity that the German War Toy industry seems to have adopted three colour camouflage schemes (at least as an option) for scale Wehrmacht vehicles, well in advance of the actual German war industry for real vehicles..."

Wrong ! A schoolboy error brought about by "Panzergrau" memories, mental laziness and a childhood making too many late war armour kits:

Tamiya Kit. Unknown painter.

This Panzerworld Site clarifies the position - basically, between 1927 and 1937, the German Army DID use Three Colour Camouflage. It was only from as late as July 1937 that armour and vehicles were ordered to change to "Panzergrau" (in fact, officially, until July 1940, a two tone scheme of "dunkelgrau" and "dunkelbrun"), and then, from 1943, the familiar late war "three colour pattern". So the contemporary German toy manufacturers were not in advance of reality, but closely following it - it's well worth a visit to "Panzerworld" for the full detail. 

The only relevance of this, of course, is that it is rumoured within Herefordshire that a certain fat person who shall remain nameless for the moment has recently been as busy with his paintbrush as his train set....

SPRING BIG GAME 2024 - CADBURY'S RECONNAISSANCE

At the request of a certain fat person who shall remain nameless for now, and with the permission of Sir Charles Tite-Wadde, Bt., Commander of the Combined Corporate Guard in Herefordshire, the Cadbury's Tiger Moth (piloted by F/O "Top" Cover) has been busy carrying out an aerial survey of the A438:

The Cadbury's Tiger Moth, piloted by F/O "Top" Cover (Pre Paint Corgi model).
Photo & photoshop by Rob B.

Notwithstanding many hours in the air, it appears that F/O Cover has yet to discover the location of the "strong opposition forces" said to be interdicting the A438. As they say in all the best films, "It's quiet out there.....too quiet....." 

BLAST FROM THE PAST - SECOND BATTLE OF FOY

As we build up to the Spring Big Game 2024 in just a few weeks, we can equally travel backwards in time some ten years :

Spring Big Game 2014 - the Bishop of Ludlow and his Ludlow Expeditionary Force
are introduced to the Hereford VBCW. The Rev. Duff-Postin, No.2 to the Bishop,
is seen carrying the Ludlow Standard (probably to safety).

Mort, co-inventor of the VBCW period and rules guru, provides some practical guidance
to a youthful Bishop of Ludlow (appropriately clad in ecclesiastical purple). The 2nd Battle
of Foy is now best remembered for the Ludlow Light Lancers heroically charging
head first into the railway embankment strung across the middle of the table.

CHAMBERS OF COMMERCE POSTERS 1930s - CLAUDE BUCKLE

With the advent of the affordable motor car and an extensive network of railways, the 1930s was an era of mass travel. Local Chambers of Commerce and the railway companies worked together to encourage Britons to take short excursions around the country: 

The classic view of central Hereford - the Old Bridge
in the foreground, Cathedral in the background.

A fine view of Ross from the River Wye.
St Mary's Church dominates the background.
The centre of Anglicanism in Herefordshire during the VBCW.

The artist for many of these posters was Claude Buckle (1905 - 1973). For more on Buckle, see HERE and HERE,

Notes

(1). The sharp eyed reader will already have spotted that the Ross-on-Wye poster is sponsored by Great Western Railways ("GWR") while the Hereford poster is sponsored by London Midland & Scottish ("LMS"). Although Hereford Station is traditionally associated with GWR, it was in fact a "shared station" between GWR and LMS. This fact caused a great deal of conflict between both unions and managements at the start of the VBCW. In any event, the start of the VBCW promptly brought the era of "short excursions" (at least on a voluntary, unarmed basis) to an end.

SPRING BIG GAME 2024 - SPECIAL PLAYERS' PRIZES!

The Umpires always like to give away a "Free Prize" at the end of each Big Game, and most of the time (when we've not forgotten, or are lost for inspiration), we've managed it. This year, a healthy mix of pure nostalgia, dumb luck and 1930s "airmindedness" has proved the spur:

Aaah ! Dogfight Doubles ! A splendid Airfix marketing ploy to sell more 1/72 kits
- and every small boy's perfect present (at least in the 1970s).

First introduced back in 1966, the "Dogfight Doubles" range covered everything from WW1 through to the Jet Age, usually in boxes (as above) dramatically illustrated by the splendid Roy Cross. For some reason, the "original range" didn't match the Spitfire with it's obvious "double", the Me 109 - instead we got the slower and more vulnerable twin-engined Me110.

However, that can be changed - here in the Hereford1938 Campaign, we've now got TWO Airfix bagged "Dogfight Double" kits of the Spitfire (Mk.2) v the Me109-E to give away as "high quality plastic injection" Player Prizes for the Spring Big Game 2024 !

The Me 109-E was introduced into service in late 1938 (although its predecessor marks had been around since 1937) and the Spitfire Mk2 came into service only in late 1940 (although it's visually practically indistinguishable Mk1 predecessor had been around since mid 1938), so these aircraft must be considered - with the "usual squint" - as "rare beasts" in Hereford1938. But to possess such a rare piece of ultra high technology in such a time of conflict.....well, a dream for any faction.

Given that we've got TWO prizes this time round, it's only right that we label one as "The Colonel A.D. Wintle Memorial Prize" (for Colonel Wintle, SEE HERE) awarded, as usual, to the "most VBCW player" during the day of the Big Game, and label the other as "The Umpires' Special Prize" awarded to the player most in need of a morale boost at the end of the Big Day. Who can tell where these double kits will eventually land.....

MODELLING CHALLENGE 2024 - LADIES ! TO THE BARRICADES !

Well, it's that time of year again - when we preview the chosen piece of cruddy vintage plastic that is to be the subject of the annual Modelling Challenge, collectable in person at the Spring Big Game and playable FREE by it's painter/converter/bodger/new owner at the Autumn Big Game !

Over the years, we've gleefully handed out vintage plastic boat hulls, cheep scale-free Chinese mini-planes, old Hong Kong tanks, Chinese manufactured "Shoddy" Tanks, etc. etc. It's only occasionally that cheep toy supplies have inexplicably failed, and we've been reduced to handing out a "high value concept" for players to conjure with...for the historical records of the Modelling Challenges, see the Modelling Challenge blogpost labels in the column to the right.

This year is different. Not because toy supplies have failed (we've still got a goodly few 1960s plastics stuffed down the back of the sofa for future Modelling Challenges), but because the Campaign Co-Ordinators/Umpires need your help.

Hence the title of the Modelling Challenge 2024 - "Ladies ! To the Barricades !" [note 1]

As already announced in the Gamers' Notes to this blogpost, the Autumn Big Game 2024 ("Springtime for Stokkies?") will set the scene for a daring escape attempt by that lecherous  lascivious South African lothario darling of Royalist boudoirs drawing rooms, the rootin' tootin' shootin' commander of the notoriously boisterous King's Colonials, Stokkies Joubert. And a game involving Stokkies, as any fule kno', must involve lots of ladies.

Happy memories - a group of Royalist ladies note Stokkies' entrance to a Herefordshire garden party.

So the first part of the Modelling Challenge 2024 is to provide a lady - or ladies - for the Autumn Big Game 2024. Quite how such a lady - or ladies - will form part of Stokkies' escape attempt is yet to be determined (but will be by Autumn, in time honoured fashion, with a variety of barely legible scratchings on the back of an old envelope) - but that's rather beside the point. "Ladies provided" will not confer any competitive advantage upon the relevant player - we're going for pure aestheticism this year, and the opportunity for you to provide the best painted female 28mm figure(s) that you possibly can.

Miss Universe 1935. See [note 2] below.

So what kind of ladies and what are the rules of the Modelling Challenge 2024? Well, as to 'rules', they've always been rather loose - guidelines might be a better description - and as to ladies, well any kind, really, as long as they can plausibly fit into the 1930s world of the Hereford VBCW. We're not stuck on glamour girls - the grimly efficient "females of war" are equally welcome:

1930s Royal Glamour Girl - the Duchess of Kent. I say !

Grim Efficiency - Mrs Ada Bracegirdle, testing machine
guns at the Rotherwas Firing Range, VBCW Herefordshire, 1938.
Don't shoot! We surrender!

Nor are we stuck on faction, for Stokkies' tastes are notoriously indiscriminate. So your lady (or ladies) could be, say, a hard-line Communist pilot, or a Nazi Hell - Bitch female member of the BUF, of any faction or none:

Red Pilot (aka Janet Leigh, 1957). Golly !

Oh, no - you just know that someone is going to do this in 28mm....
.....the effect on Stokkies is "yet to be determined"
(but, come to think of it,  Ilsa may have had something to do
with the notorious disappearance of Captain Arrowsmith).

And finally, to indicate our complete relaxation (to the point of being practically horizontal, a la Stokkies) as to eligibility criteria, nor are we too troubled about the "historical period of origin" of your 28mm lady(ies). For example, if you are truly determined to resuscitate a 1970s D&D "Chick in a Chainmail Bikini" for your entry, so be it - provided always she has got a "plausible backstory" placing her in Hereford in 1938 !

No chainmail, and not much bikini - but this nicely painted Hasslefree "Libby"
will still need a "plausible backstory" for the Modelling Challenge 2024, as
bikinis weren't invented until the 1950s. The Celebrity Judging Panel cares
 about these historical details, obviously. [note 3]

Whether you want to produce a section of ladies, or simply an individual figure, as long as your entry is female (with a back story as necessary) and painted, you're in the competition to win the Autumn Modelling Challenge 2024 ! Hurrah !

Hang on, there's a catch ......... let's think ........ what was it again ? Hmmm............ah yes, now we remember! Something about the Challenge Title ! The second part of the Modelling Challenge 2024 !

[THE SUBSEQUENT PARAGRAPHS DO NOT APPLY TO INTERNATIONAL (OR INTERGALACTIC) ENTRANTS TO THE MODELLING CHALLENGE 2024. SEE NOTE 4.

AND HELLO LAF BEARWOODMAN !]

Again, your Campaign Co-Ordinators/Umpires need your help. One of our Big Games in 2025 (hey, we like to think ahead) needs lots of very familiar urban buildings, and the Umpires are already hard at work on all these pieces. But a recent "forward planning review" has disclosed that we need/must have at least 60 - 80 feet (that's right, sixty to eighty feet) of "Urban Barricades" for the very same game. Sandbags (lots of sandbags), upturned domestic furniture, burnt out cars, tumbledown walls - we need lots and lots of it, preferably arranged on, say, 1 inch wide and 6 or 12 inch long bases, some of them "corner" bases.

Barricades by Warlord. It's this kind of thing the Umpires
need (but more 1930s and imaginatively put together)

Battlefield Debris by Warlord Games (other wargames manufacturers are available).
Some nice 1930s pieces here - eg. the sofas and the furniture barricade.
(But the price of £59 (!!) is not in the Hereford VBCW league)

As the Umpires are already busy making buildings, this time we're asking everyone in the campaign to come to the aid of the party. Being believers in sticks as well as carrots, female entries for the Modelling Challenge 2024 will only be eligible if accompanied by a deb's delight barricade (or, preferably, lots of barricades) of whatever description, usable in the 2025 Big Game. That ok ? We'll be putting up some blogposts in the next few months with cheep barricade ideas, for in the spirit of Hereford VBCW, more kudos attaches to barricades built from household bits and bobs with some imagination, rather than expensively purchased 'store products' (whether from Warlord or elsewhere.....) Oh, and chances are, if you attend the Big Game in 2025, you'll find your troops sheltering behind the very same barricade(s)....

So there we have it, VBCW Chaps, the Modelling Challenge 2024 - "Ladies ! To the Barricades !"

Notes:

(1). Previous (but discarded) titles included "Girls! Girls! Girls!" and "Dude! We want your women!". We do have some standards.

(2). "The title 'Miss Universe' was first used by the International Pageant of Pulchritude in 1926. This contest was held annually until 1935, when the Great Depression and the events preceding World War II led to its demise." See HERE.

(3). The Celebrity Judging Panel is yet to be announced, but is known to include the anthropomorphic Mr Wolf, Tank Commander Oddball, the Dowager Countess of Grantham, and a Mr Terry Thomas. Make of that what you will...stand by for further announcements.....and note the further guidance below!

(4). International or Intergalactic Entries - the 2023 Modelling Challenge was enlivened by an entry, for the very first time, from a modeller not (a physical) part of the Hereford VBCW Campaign - LAF Bearwoodman ! (see his entry HERE and the results HERE). As the 2024 Modelling Challenge doesn't involve a FREE GIVEAWAY provided to players at the Spring Big Game, but requires chaps to fall back on their own resources, we thought we would throw this year's Competition open to anybody (international or intergalactic) who wanted to enter a painted 1930s Female Figure - all that's necessary is a nice photograph of your entry sent to "Leadboy" on the Lead Adventure Forum ("LAF"). No requirement for "a barricade" from international or intergalactic competitors. "Golden Demon" standard painting not required - VBCW sense of place/humour mandatory.  Entries no later than 1st October 2024 - heat up the Modelling Challenge this year with your entry !

(5). Additional Guidance (GIF category) -

Miss Bren Gun, 1938. An entry likely to gain the favour of the Judging Panel -
cinematic violence "capable of enthusiastic boyish imitation" and
 historical authenticity all rolled into one.

Oh, do grow up.........whatever her back story, "Miss Brassiere Auto - Gun" is more likely to give
some of the Celebrity Judging Panel an instant coronary than provide a prospect of success.
Think of the effect on the Dowager Countess of Downton...and the hot shame of receiving
 only the "Ian Fleming Scroll for Ridiculous Implausibility" rather than the "Winner's Cup".
[Still, from an armourer's point of view only, a more successful weapons system than
the fondly remembered American "crotch mortar" featured IN THIS BLOGPOST]

GOOD LUCK WITH THE 2024 COMPETITION, VBCW CHAPS !

MITFORD MANIA !

As the Hereford VBCW sustains a sudden spasm of Spodemania, news that the Ludlow Peace & Reconciliation Institute has been suffering from a similar psychological condition - a long term bout of "Mitfordmania", with a variety of (relatively) recent blogposts on the notorious sisters:

Diana Mitford (subsequently Guinness subsequently Mosley)
dressed as the Goddess Venus. Mistress and thereafter wife of
"The Leader" himself.

Diana as the Goddess Venus - "colourised".

These photographs, of Diana as Venus, were taken by a remarkable lady photographer of the 1930s, "Madame Yevonde" (aka Yevonde Middleton), either at a party in Claridges in 1935, or at a subsequent studio sitting in the same year for Madame Yevonde's "Goddess" series i.e. English society ladies dressed as Classical Goddesses.

The Ludlow Peace & Reconciliation Institute's blogposts (so far) -

(1). The Mitford Sisters - What would they have done ?

(2). Hitler Groupie - Unity Mitford

(3). "The Leader's Mistress" (and then Wife) - Diana Mitford

(4). Diana and Unity Mitford

(5). Unity, Diana and the "Osteria Bavaria"

(6). Diana and Unity at the Nuremberg Rally, 1933

Whew ! Next up (sometime soon), the Stalin-loving "Red Sheep" of the Mitford Sisters, Jessica. And it surely can't be long before some 28mm "Mitford Sisters" appear in the Hereford VBCW itself.......

After marriage but before "the Leader" - Diana seems to have
 enjoyed dressing up - and displaying a rather arch sense of humour.

Add Edit: The late great Christopher Hitchens, while reviewing Jan Dalley's "Diana Mosley : A Biography" for the London Review of Books back in 1999, caught something of the causes of Diana Mitford's enduring notoriety:

"...We are confronted, here, with the worst and not the least bright of the Bright Young Things: with a vile mind and a gorgeous carapace, and with a maddening class confidence allied to a tiny, repetitive tic of fanaticism. It is easy to see how Diana Mitford/Guiness/Mosley attracted the obvious cliches about the huntress and the nymph. Anyone with her first name, and a pleasing profile to boot, can earn such leaden gallantries.....She kept a circle of gay male friends, from Gerald Berners to Cecil Beaton, at a time when homosexuals were being whacked to a pulp in German and Italian prisons. When occasion demanded, she could speak with conviction about the 'old gang' of politicians, and about the woes of the unemployed. But something else made her different from dozens of other women and men of her class, who didn't share her Bloomsbury connections but did echo her enthusiasm for the New Order and the New Germany. Just this: she kept it up longer than most of them did and in more arduous conditions....it isn't quite accurate to say, as Dalley rather awkwardly phrases it, that "in her personal story there is an almost eerie absence of the horrors that underlie all our thinking about fascism, Nazism and the Second World War". Sir Oswald, for example, always tried very strenuously to distance himself from the horrors after 1945 and, though he was unconvincing in his rewriting, at least made the attempt. His widow has never even bothered to feign that effort, and is sometimes too languid and spiteful to conceal her prejudices even now. The subject clearly fatigues and irritates her. A part of her, like the ghastly girl in Patrick Hamilton's Hangover Square, was and is secretly gleeful about fascism. Dalley describes as "unusual" her attendance at a Hyde Park rally in 1935, where she threw up her right hand in a Nazi salute while Clement Attlee was addressing a mild-as-milk protest against Hitler's early barbarities. It is improbable that she just stumbled on such an opportunity, or simply found herself taking it. That's on a par with her claim that Adolf Hitler was chief guest at her wedding because he lived so handily nearby and chanced to drop in. The illicit thrill of evil is the point - a thrill indulged by someone whose own circumstances and life chances gave no evident cause for complaint."

Diana Mosley by Jan Dalley

OPPOSITION PROPAGANDA COUNTER COUP (2) !

Commissar Moody, of the Presteigne Soviet "Bureau Desinformatsiya", has eagerly seized on the growing "grassroots" anti-Spode campaign:

Somewhere just off the A438, Commissar Moody and his Propaganda Van.

The Commissar's printers have been working overtime, abandoning their usual poster production to launch a new series of "attack leaflets":

Will Spode's morale collapse in the face of this vicious personal onslaught ? Will the Blackshorts now dare to venture out from Hay - on - Wye ? Is His Majesty's Massive Counter-Attack doomed to early failure ? All these, and even more important questions, can only be answered by attendance at the Spring Big Game 2024 on Saturday 9th March 2024, Yarkhill Village Hall, Herefordshire !

OPPOSITION PROPAGANDA COUNTER COUP (1) !

In the face of the sudden outbreak of Spodemania in the Hereford VBCW, Opposition Forces are placing their faith in a young man of good family, who claims to possess "the code word" that will put an end to Spode's aggression:

For those not aware of Spode's history, see "The Code of the Woosters". Or see HERE.

WHAT MIGHT HAVE BEEN - LADY ROSEMARY LEVESON - GOWER

Lady Rosemary Leveson-Gower, daughter of the 4th Duke of Sutherland, was the only woman (so far as is known) to whom Edward VIII proposed marriage - other than Wallis Simpson. In 1917,  at the age of 23, Edward proposed to Rosemary, but the marriage (on family rather than personal grounds) was vetoed by his parents, George V and Queen Mary.

Rosemary Sutherland Leveson Gower.
A sketch by John Singer Sargent, dated 1919

Rosemary Sutherland-Leveson-Gower.
Unknown photographer, prob 1920s

After the royal veto, Rosemary "let it be known" that she had never wished to marry the Prince of Wales, as Edward then was, and then moved rather rapidly in the romance stakes, marrying William Ward, Viscount Ednam, 10th Royal Hussars (later 3rd Earl Dudley), on 8th March 1919.

Rosemary Leveson-Gower.
Cover Girl for "The Sketch", 19th February 1919.
Her then fiance, Viscount Ednam inset.

The marriage produced three sons in fairly rapid succession (and a daughter, sadly stillborn). Nevertheless, it seems not to have been the happiest of unions, for William is commonly believed to have fathered a daughter, born in 1923, by Venetia Stanley, and Rosemary maintained her friendship with both Edward (godfather to her eldest son) and the Conservative MP (and discreet roue), Duff Cooper.

On 21st July 1930, aged only 37, Rosemary died tragically in an aviation accident ("the Meopham Air Disaster"). The details of the accident are still hard to read : see WIKI HERE and WIKI HERE.

Fatal Flight - Lady Rosemary Leveson - Gower (second from right) at Le Touquet airfield
 on the morning of 21st July 1930, standing in front of the Junkers aircraft
 that was the centre of the  Meopham Air Disaster.
Fellow passenger, the Marquess of Dufferin and Ava (previously Lord Frederick Blackwood), on left.

In 1936, when Edward VIII (as he then was) was intent upon marrying Wallis Simpson - notwithstanding all family and constitutional objections - it may be that Queen Mary had cause to regret her earlier veto of Rosemary Leveson-Gower. Certainly, history would have taken a very different turn had there been a "Queen Rosemary" rather than a "Queen Wallis"...and our own Very British Civil War might never have come into being.

Add Edit:

(1). For Rosemary's mother, Millicent Leveson Gower, 4th Duchess of Sutherland ("Meddlesome Millie") and her magnificent portrait by John Singer Sargent, see HERE.

(2). For Venetia Stanley, see HERE. For more on Venetia, HH Asquith, Viscount Ednam and Judith Montagu, see HERE. Venetia died in 1948.

(3). For Rosemary's husband, Viscount Ednam and thereafter 3rd Earl Dudley, subsequently well known (in very different ways) to such disparate characters as Mandy Rice-Davies and Peter Tatchell, see HERE. The 3rd Earl died in 1969.

Another photograph from Le Touquet, 21st July 1930.

Later the same day. G-AAZK downed at Meopham.