‘Queen of the Desert’ gifts from a king sold
THE international fascination with the North East’s “Queen of the Desert” Gertrude Bell saw worldwide interest in a weekend auction of gifts presented to her by a king.
Gertrude, born in Washington in what was then County Durham, played a key role in establishing King Faisal as the first monarch of Iraq.
Two carpets given to Gertrude by Faisal were offered for sale by Tennants auctioneers in Leyburn in North Yorkshire, with an estimate of £500-£800 each.
But each carpet fetched £1,900 after interest stretching from the Middle East to the United States, with the successful bids coming from the UK.
It is thought that the carpets decorated the courtyard when Faisal was crowned and they were among items in the auction from Gertrude’s later family home at Rounton Grange, near Northallerton.
Recently, Newcastle University’s archive of almost 10,000 items, spanning photographs letters, diaries and other papers relating to Gertrude Bell, dating from 1871 to
1926, was recognised by UNESCO as being of world importance.
She has also been the subject of two recent films. The documentary Letters from Baghdad is based on the letters and writings of Gertrude and the people who knew her, including Lawrence of Arabia.
Queen of the Desert, by director Werner Herzog, and starring Nicole Kidman as Gertrude Bell, was shot on location in Morocco and Jordan.
Scholar, archaeologist, adventurer,
explorer, mountaineer and diplomat, she was one of the few Britons to have travelled extensively in the Ottoman Empire before the First World War, and when hostilities broke out between Britain and Turkey she worked at a high level with British military intelligence in Mesopotamia.
When in 1921 Winston Churchill held a conference in Cairo to discuss the Middle East, Gertrude was the only woman present, when she was pictured with Churchill and Lawrence of Arabia.
She helped to oversee the transition to the modern state of Iraq, and founded the national museum in Baghdad.
Her father was the North East industrialist, Isaac Lowthian Bell, whose growing wealth saw him leave the first family home at Washington New Hall and buy the East Rounton estate in 1866.
He commissioned leading Arts and Crafts Movement architect Philip Webb to build his new home, while Arts and Crafts leader William Morris played a leading role in designs for the interior.
A pair of woven woollen curtains designed by William Morris, and other curtains made by his company, estimated at £1,000-£2,000 in the auction, sold for £3,500.
In 2014 the Newcastle University archive acquired textiles Gertrude collected during her adventures, and which had come up for auction. The pieces were taken by Gertrude to Wallington Hall in Northumberland, where her half-sister Molly lived, and where they stayed until they were auctioned late last year.