The Malta Independent on Sunday
That’s what I call a holiday
Cheltenham which is filled with Georgian architecture became known as a fashionable Regency spa and now as a town of colleges, churches and festivals. It was largely built on wealth from sugar plantations in the West Indies. I was there, and not for the first time, thanks to a kind friend who gives me the keys to his property and trusts me with it.
According to local historian, David Elder, in his latest book Secret Cheltenham, many of the fine houses were built with money earned from sugar estates in the West Indies.
“One significant beneficiary of slavery-derived wealth was James Robert Scott who spent nearly £100,000 on the construction of Thirlestaine House in Bath road. Much of this almost certainly derived from his inheritance of a share in four estates in Jamaica from his uncle.”
*** The Barretts too owned an estate in Jamaica. Elizabeth Barrett Browning was a niece and believed that her family was cursed through accruing wealth from slavery. Her anti-slavery poems, A Curse for a nation and Runaway Slave at Pilgrim’s Point show her strong anti-slavery views and she helped the abolishinist cause.
The author, David Elder has identified 50 slave owners who lived in Cheltenham owning nearly 10,000 slaves between them. “Following the abolition of slavery in the British Empire in 1834 the government paid out a total of £20 million to the slave owners in compensation for their loss of income,”he writes.
In a fair world it is the slaves who should have been compensated. No doubt they will get their reward in heaven.
One prominent personality who lived in Cheltenham was Sir Ralf Darling who was at one time governor of Mauritius. His anti-slavery stance made him unpopular with sugarcane estate owners there. He objected to slavery on moral grounds. It is thanks to people like him that slavery was finally abolished.
*** It is the tranquillity of the people and the landscape, as well as the fine Regency architecture which I find so attractive in these parts after our over-populated and noisy island now over run with some ghastly architecture.
The centre of town is never overcrowded. I was saddened to see that a number of shops have closed down though John Lewis have opened a huge shopping mall. It is the little shops which give a town its character. High street shops can be found anywhere in the world including Malta.
*** The Cotswolds have a beauty of their own with their cottages, well kept gardens, churches and great expanses of unspoilt countryside.
A stay at Pear Cottage in Windrush, the weekend retreat of my faithful friends Judith and Anthony Duvivier, is something to which I look forward to immensely. Their hospitality and kindness is out of this world. Judith’s no-fuss but excellent cooking are to be enjoyed. I do so admire her unflappable ways.
They are both medical doctors. Anthony is still practicing his dermatology and Judith helping those who need help and participating in committees which work at making it a better world. They both have meaningful lives.
*** Sitting in their backgarden, overlooking a large expanse of land in such good company, watching sheep graze is already relaxing to the mind and spirit. But there is always food for reflection in something they say.
Judith pointed out that it is a sad moment when the sheep disappear into a truck, a sure sign that they are going to be slaughtered.
*** This year we went to Coln St Aldwyns Children’s Fête and Produce Show dedicated exclusively to raising money for local children’s charities and activities. It was held in The Mill House gardens, the Earl of St Aldwyns home. We went to support Judith’s brother Nicholas Brett who organised this year’s fête.
Coln St Aldwyns has the prestige of being one of the ten most desirable villages in England.
Development in this part of the world has been kept firmly at bay.
The now-listed farmhouses, barns and agricultural labourers’ cottages are immaculate. They have been bought up and tarted up by the very rich. This part of the world is pure heaven for those of us who have watched our towns and villages slowly deteriorate before our very eyes, so that some of them are hardly recognisable.
*** In this part of the world crime is almost unknown. This is a world of fox-hunting and polo playing and where Kate Moss has a home and where Joanna Trollope once lived and wrote her “Aga sagas”.
*** We were blessed with a fine afternoon and the fête was in full swing when we arrived.
There was a tombola with some excellent prizes – last year one prize was two mornings of ironing! Moreover someone sold off their prize on eBay which is not acceptable at all.
There were lots of childen’s games and entertainment, live music from Josie &The Outlaws, stalls, afternoon teas and a Pimm’s bar. “Our twin aims are to make it a fabulous fun day out for children and their families and to raise lots of money for local children’s charities,” Nick Brett pointed out.
Last year’s fête made a record profit of more than £8,000.
*** I helped for a short while at the tea stall and was given a huge yellow teapot to manoeuvre. There were several enticing cakes which sold almost in a flash.
Judith’s brother Nick won first prize for his dahlias. On the way back home we passed by his allotment which is planted with a host of multicoloured dahlias. Here they take their gardening seriously.
Nicholas was Features Editor of The Times before moving to the BBC where he has worked for many years, first as Editor of Radio Times and then Editorial Director of BBC magazines where he oversaw the launch of nearly sixty magazines.
Together with his wife Judith Brett – another Judith in the family – they have brought up two daughters, Camilla (Millie) who’s an obstetrician and Harriet (Hattie), who is editor of UK Grazia, the women’s weekly magazine.
My stay with the Duviviers always includes a visit to at least a couple of old churches and Mass on Sunday morning. The Catholic community is small but fervent and the sermon short but meaningful.
*** One evening Dallas and William Ariotti, a few cottages down, invited us to drinks. I was very happily surprised to find that they had invited Elizabeth who had come out to Malta as a medical student some 50 years ago and whom I hadn’t seen again since then. Now she is a sophisticated and polished mother of two daughters and she too, has a cottage in the vicinity.
*** “Goodbyes” at this stage of my life have an underlying sadness. We know that by next year, one or more of us may have passed away. We are the last of the Mohicans really. We hug warmly and assure each other and ourselves that Anthony will be popping another bottle of champagne next year. But who knows. I have a dream too, that we shall be having a meal together in Malta or in their part of the world as soon as possible.
Life is so ironic. It takes sadness to know happiness; noise to appreciate silence and absence to value presence.