MY MADCAP MOUNTBATTEN JEWEL HUNT
What do you do when your elderly mum has put the family heirlooms in a bank vault — but can’t remember which one? That was the dilemma top designer INDIA HICKS faced. The result? This pricelessly funny story . . .
MY MOTHER, Lady Pamela Hicks, turns 90 in April. Although she is razor sharp and shows no indication of losing her capacity to dazzle an audience with stories from her eventful life, I still thought it time we tracked down her family jewels.
She had placed them safely in a vault in a bank in London; this much my mother knew absolutely.
However, quite which bank was custodian of the gems — some of which had belonged to my maternal grandmother, Edwina, Countess Mountbatten of Burma — was the conundrum.
Nonetheless, undeterred, we set off one rainy day a few months ago — my mother in a wheelchair as we expected an arduous day of searching — on our trawl through London to see if we could unearth them.
Our first port of call was a bank on the Strand where my mother had been a customer for 60 years. We were ushered in with great ceremony and offered cappuccinos and custard creams.
My mother described her missing jewellery case in great detail: it was leather and embossed in gold leaf with my grandmother’s initials, EM for Edwina Mountbatten.
Off the staff went to see if anything fitting this description languished in their safety deposit boxes. ‘Sorry, Lady Pamela. We don’t seem to be holding anything more than this box,’ they apologised, producing a large, old-fashioned cardboard carton with leather corners.
We opened the box knowing immediately it wasn’t the one we were looking for. Inside, was a strange ornate piece of headgear. ‘ When on earth do you wear that?’ I asked my mother.
It looked like a bride’s headdress; wired, ribboned and lavishly ornamented, and, apparently, it was traditionally worn by women when they didn’t want to sport a tiara.
Tiaras are heavy, require hairdressers to adjust them and lots of insurance.
My mother — still a great raconteur — told me she once travelled from Britain to Sweden for a grand ball wearing her tiara under a huge hat — to make certain she did not lose it.
THERE’S another quirk about tiaras: you have to be married in order to wear one, which means I wouldn’t have qualified as I remain a sinful unmarried woman, (although I have four children with my partner, David Flint Wood).
Perhaps it’s just as well my mother’s was sold a few years ago.
Anyway, I digress. What next on the quest for the jewels?
After visiting two banks unsuccessfully, we went to the Wolseley Cafe on Piccadilly for tea and to recover ourselves. We also phoned my brother, Ashley, to see if he had any bright ideas about what to do next.
We scoured our memories for all the banks that mother had been to, and hit on one nearby that might be able to help. Third time lucky, perhaps?
As I manoeuvred mother’s wheelchair through the wooden revolving doors — the only bit of the modern, glass edifice that remained from its original incarnation — it seemed to awaken a memory.
‘I clearly recall having a safety deposit box here,’ my mother said emphatically, despite the bank having changed almost out of recognition.
There was no longer a doorman in a top hat greeting valued longstanding customers. Instead, there was a young chap from Poland who kept asking my mother for her online banking details so he could ‘access’ the system.
Only then, apparently, could he tell if there was anything down in their ‘Batcave’ that might belong to my mother.
Like so many of her generation, my mother belongs to an era before internet banking and passwords. Their modern system was not equipped to deal with people such as her.
And as more online details and security codes were demanded, the more resolutely emphatic she became that her jewellery case was definitely in this bank.
My mother is amusing company. She is also determined and formidably well-connected. She is a great- great- granddaughter of Queen Victoria and was present at some of the 20th century’s key moments.
She was one of the tiny group with Princess Elizabeth in Kenya in 1952 on the morning she heard her father, George VI, had died and she was now Queen. She was a bridesmaid, too, at Princess Elizabeth’s wedding in 1947. Once my mother sets her mind on something, she is not to be trifled with. But, impervious to a woman of such a pedigree, the bank official remained bravely intransigent.
Unless there was a paper trail that proved she was the legal owner, he insisted, there couldn’t be a jewellery case.
At this point, knowing my mother would never capitulate, I asked to see the manager.
Wisely, the young chap from Poland sensed trouble brewing. He went to get the manageress, who was also Polish and very young.
We spent quite a bit of time trying to convince her to get someone to descend into the vaults and search for the elusive, handmade jewellery case with the initials EM on the front.
But how could we persuade the manageress without the requisite banking passwords?
My mother has a sharp memory for detail. She recalled there was a small French lock by the
handle of the case. ‘ The key to which I have here,’ she announced proudly, conjuring a small brass key from her handbag.
No tiresome online details, but a small brass key — and my mother’s passport to verify that she wasn’t an imposter but was (had they chosen to check) the daughter of the 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma and first cousin to Prince Philip.
OUR production of my mother’s passport seemed to clinch it.
‘Wait here,’ instructed the manageress, and although there were no cappuccinos or custard creams in this bank, she returned triumphant from the ‘Batcave’ an hour or so later, my mother’s jewellery case in her hands.
Of course, my grandmother, Edwina Mountbatten, travelled the world extensively, and had amassed quite a collection.
For my part, I had underestimated the size of the case, the fact it was raining, my mother’s wheelchair, the revolving door, and London’s foot traffic.
Getting my mother to the farthest corner of Iceland would have been easier than making our way out of the bank — with the case of priceless gems resting on her lap — and across London.
No wonder, by the excursion’s end, we were in fits of giggles.
Once home, there was the excitement of opening the case.
The small brass key fitted perfectly into the lock. But then the key turned . . . and turned and just turned. No amount of effort could get it to open the case.
Eric the handyman was duly summoned. He arrived from the garden with a dramatically large drill in his hand. ‘Stand back, Lady Pamela!’ he said gruffly, as the drill forced its way into the poor case.
The lid opened and some small velvet cushions were removed to reveal a staggering array of sparkling gems.
My grandmother was the last Vicereine of India during the final months of the British Raj in 1947. Opening her jewellery case was like turning the pages of a photo album: every piece prompted a memory from my mother.
We spent the rest of the afternoon enthralled by my mother’s stories that the jewellery triggered.
She was born into an era when women sparkled with diamonds; some of the pieces were designed by my father, David Hicks, others were inherited from my grandmother, Edwina, who had the most exquisite taste.
My mother picked out a diamond bracelet that reminded her of an ornate necklace Edwina had worn in India, which could be taken apart and worn as a three banded bracelet.
‘ Your grandmother certainly knew how to outshine everyone,’ said my mother.
And there, spread out before us, was the glittering evidence that in every way, she truly did.
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