The Secret Rooms: A Castle Filled with Intrigue, a Plotting Duchess and a Mysterious Death

John, the 9th Duke of Rutland, had for long been a recluse in a set of five rooms at Belvoir Castle. On 22nd April 1940, after a short illness, he died on a sofa in one of these rooms, having refused to move to a more comfortable bedroom elsewhere in the castle: there was, he had said, “something he had to finish”.The historian Catherine Bailey first came to Belvoir in 2008. It was known that the collection of family papers at Belvoir was unrivalled in its scope, though very few people had been granted access to it. On the death of John, Charles, the 10th Duke, whose relationship with his father was not good, had sealed these five Muniment Rooms which contained the family archives; but Bailey had been allowed access by David, the 11th Duke. John had meticulously organized and added to these archives.Bailey knew that hundreds of the tenants of Henry, the 8th Duke’s estates, not only in Leicestershire, but also in several other North Midland counties, had, at his instigation, volunteered to join the army in the early days of the First World War, and she wanted to research their lives, and also to learn something of the ducal family and the incredibly privileged life they led.Examining the archives, she found that, as far as the papers relating to John were concerned, there were three gaps in the records, and, although she found a lot of material relating to her original aim of research, it was the exploration of these gaps that now became to focus of her research.The first of these was a gap of 87 days in 1894, when John was seven. Later, she discovered that this was the time of the death of John’s elder brother, Haddon, for which Violet, their mother, seems to have indirectly blamed John, whom she sent away to live with her brother, Charlie Lindsay, who became something of a father figure for John.The second gap, of 117 days, came in 1909, when John, then aged 21, had a post at the embassy in Rome. This, she found out, was a period when there was a furious row between John and his father Henry, the 8th Duke, about financial matters: Henry, who was heavily in debt, had wanted John to sign an agreement by which Henry could sell assets that, by trust deeds, had been entailed. John had called in lawyers to contest his father’s wish.But the gap to which Bailey pays most attention is the one of 152 days between July and December of 1915. This began while John was seeing volunteer military service in France. His father had recruited hundreds of tenants on the Belvoir estates to volunteer likewise: 249 of them lost their lives on the western front. But John never took part in any action. His mother had successfully pleaded with her military contacts to have John posted to the division’s headquarters, nine miles away from his battalion’s bloody battle on the Ypres Salient. She even prostituted her own daughter to a sleazy American who was a very close friend of General Sir John French, in order to get French’s help to protect her son, and French promised to do what he could. All this was not because she loved John, but because she needed him to live - and to marry - as he was the only heir of this branch of the Rutland family.In July 1915 John had been sent to England for a few days to recover from an outbreak of diarrhoea in his platoon – but he never returned to active service in the field. Violet, through her contacts with senior figures, had, unbeknown to John, successfully and dishonestly schemed, with the help of certificates from the Rutlands’ family GP, to get his invalid leave extended by medical boards no fewer than fifteen times. (All this while Henry was still recruiting volunteers from his estates!)She kept her secret approaches from John, too; for John was keen to return to the front. But he never did. Bayley discovers what made him, in April 1916 accept a post as ADC to Sir John French, who, after his failures on the Western Front, had by then been moved to the post of C.i.C of the Home Forces.In later life, John was deeply ashamed of this episode, and this would account for his going through the papers and systematically removing all records of it. It was only after his mother’s death in 1937 that he came in possession of a mass of documents she had kept, and he began the task of destroying these. Illness and death prevented this work from being finished.The 480 pages of this book give chronological account of Bailey’s detective work. That is not the same as the chronology of the events she discovered, and it makes for something like a thriller. Alongside of this, we get gruesome descriptions of the battles on the Western Front, and a vivid picture of what was still, in part, feudal England and of the privileges of the upper classes. Even in the army, the conditions in which officers lived when not in action were vastly superior to those of the other ranks.

It was a great read and very informative. It makes me want to revisit Belvoir Castle

The title of this book is a misnomer. It should have been called "The Secret Letters" as the "Secret Rooms" in question were neither secret nor held any great secrets of particular note. Certainly, the "secrets" the writer discovered were most probably replicated in one form or another in most of the aristocratic families in the land.I have given it four stars as it is extremely well-written and researched. It centres on the life of the 9th Duke of Rutland - a man whom the writer describes as "sensitive" but who colluded with his family in avoiding the real horrors of the First World War and for the rest of his life was serially unfaithful to his wife. His decision at the end of his life to excise from the family archives the letters which showed him in a less than favourable light smacks more of self-regard than sensitivity or guilt as the writer would have us believe.The book does, however, capture a period in the nation's history where great wealth and privilege still held sway over the lives of the rest of the population. The lives of the Aristocracy were dominated by protecting that wealth and privilege at all costs. They lacked neither morals nor scruples in defending it. Whilst the fathers and sons of their servants and feudal tenants, urged to "go and do their bit" by the old Duke, perished in the mire of the First World War trenches, for most of the war his son languished at home carrying on his privileged existence and courting the girl he was to marry. That old Great War marching song "The Bells of Hell Go Ting-A-Ling-A-Ling For Me But Not For You..." was never more apt.If John, Duke of Rutland, was an unhappy man at the end of his life, the reader is left with little sympathy and a feeling that, sadly, the contents of the book did not live up to the blurb on the cover or the promise of the first few pages. A good read nevertheless.

Having visited Belvoir Castle many times (well worth a visit) I found this book really brought the castle to life and painted a tangible picture of the aristocracy there and elsewhere around the turn of the 19th/20th century. Whilst revealing and exposing the 'darker' and hideously selfish side of English tradition, hierarchy and politics at this time, it sadly didn't prove to be so shocking, but more despicable. Having recently published my grandfather's memoirs from WWI ('Wal's War' - available from blurb.com - which also includes letters between him and his mother to and from the Front, vastly different to those between John and Violet!!) - those of a shy, humble and unassuming, ordinary man (a postal worker) - the contrast between his experiences and those of the aristocrats 'serving' in the war is stark and shameful. And yet, I found myself deliciously drawn into the mediocrity of daily life for those so privileged through inheritance. I could really feel the excitement Catherine Bailey must have felt as she cleverly pulled together the implications from the various pieces of the puzzle - many of them missing completely. What is so amazing is the vast number of diaries kept and letters that were written back and forth and so incredible that such history has been preserved over centuries it would seem. What is sad (or perhaps a relief for some!) is that all of our 21st century correspondence - emails and postings made on the internet - will vanish into the ether over time and we will never be able to readily put our hands on such valuable, day to day records in a hundred years from now. I have given this a 4 rather than a 5 rating only because I felt slightly let down at the end with the final weak-mindedness that explains why things had happened the way they had - and deeply disappointed, as John Manners himself so rightly felt. Couldn't put the book down though and highly recommend it for a good read.

This book illuminates the importance of the class distinctions in the United Kingdom and the great motivation ducal families had to avoid losing the heir to the terrible war in the trenches. There were about 30 dukes when war broke out with 17 heirs who were of military age, yet only 10 served in the war and most of these in relatively safe staff positions well to the rear of the danger. While several of the lower ranking Earls were killed in the war, not one Duke or heir to a dukedom died serving in the bloodiest of Britain's wars. John Manners, who shortly after the war became the 9th Duke of Rutland, wanted to serve with his regiment, but his efforts were foiled by his mother Violet, his conniving maternal uncle Charles who both shamelessly used their influence with initial supreme commander to keep the future Duke out of harm's way. While he served briefly in France, he did not directly participate in combat with his regiment that had woeful looses in the Ypres salient and was among the first territorial regiments to experience poison gas attacks. The mother's constant efforts to keep her son, heir to the dukedom out of combat is understandable when you anticipate the consequences for the family if the heir should die in the war. John Manner's oldest brother, the presumptive heir, died at age 9. When war broke out in 1914, John Manners was 27 and single. There were no other sons. The line of succession should he die were his two paternal uncles neither of whom is mentioned as playing any significant roll in the heir's life. Second in line was a confirmed bachelor who would go on to die probably childless in 1945. The younger uncle Robert had only a daughter who was not eligible for this line of succession and he died in 1917. In 1945, the title, the vast castle and huge landholdings would have passed to very distant cousin and his mother the dowager duchess and her daughters would have been dispossessed after the death of Henry Manners, the 8th Duke in 1925. indeed, there are instances where ducal estates passed to distant fourth cousins. It would have been helpful if the author had spent more time explaining what was likely to happen had the heir to the dukedom died in the war, especially because this is the central issue in this true story. And what was the relationship, if any, between the heir and his two paternal uncles? How did the uncles die? The uncle in 1945 was killed by a train. Was this a suicide? Was he gay? Did he ever marry? And how did the younger paternal uncle die in 1917? Was he a war casualty? Did he die without a male heir? This information was not readily available through a Google search. While it has been suggested that the author may be capitalizing on the success of Downton Abbey, there is nothing very attractive about the members of this family with the exception of the heir's sister, the glamorous Lady Diana Manners who served as a nurse in the war, became a well known actress and who married Duff Cooper who served as Britain's ambassador to France after the liberation of Paris in 1944.