IN RURAL ENGLAND

Evening Post, Volume CXIII, Issue 1, 2 January 1932, Page 6

IN RURAL ENGLAND

LADY MAY'S HONEYMOON

The first part of the honeymoon of Lady May Cambridge and Captain Henry Abel Smith, who were married at Balcombe, Sussex, recently, was spent in the heart of rural England—at Didlirigton Ball, which had been lent them by' Colonel and Mrs. Herbert Smith. Colonel Smith is a cousin of the bridegroom (states a London writer). _ Didlington Hall, which is situated in one of the most romantic spots in Norfolk, is about eight miles from Swaffham. Bound about are many large shooting estates.

The house, a fine brick building in the Italian style of architecture, stands in a park of about 1500 acres, a feature of which is the lime trees planted nearly 300 years ago. There is a charming sheet of water nearly fifty acres in extent, picturesquely dotted with many small islands.

The original part of the Hall, the west wing, was built in the seventeenth century, the south front in 1774, and the north in 1816, by members of the Wilson family. The centre of the building, the cast wing, and the tower, were erected by Lord Amherst, of Hackney, in 1856. The pleasure grounds cover seventy or eighty acres, and the park extends into four parishes, Didlington, Colveston, lekburgh, and Mundford.

On the doors of the stables are plates of several racehorses, including Lord Berners's Phosphorus, which won the Derby in 1837, and was trained in the grounds of the park.

Later Lady May and her husband went to Ireland, Captain Abel Smith having secured four months' leave of absence from his regiment.