THE BALDWINS WERE HOUSE HUNTING

Otaki Mail, 25 January 1943, Page 4

THE BALDWINS WERE HOUSE HUNTING

From palatial Astlev Hall, near Stourport-on-Sevcrn, Worcestershire, elderly Lucy Baldwin, wife of Britain’s pre-war Prime Minister, recently set out to look for a house. Reason: The Government had commandeered stately Astlev Hall, complete with its sweeping lawns and gardens, two gardeners goldfish, pigs, costly tapestries, and Earl Baldwin of Bewdley’s much-dis-cussed iron gates. Although 40 tons of iron railings disappeared into tho melting pot last year, when they were re quisitioned for munitions, the still stood majestically alone. On top of them remained the ornamental Earl' coronot and Baldwin’s crest, encircled by tlic .Garter. Great has been the furore raised by those gates; its echo took something from the sympathy that would normally have been extended to an ageing couple looking for hearth and home. For, when the gates and railings were requisitioned by the Government for scrap, Baldwin sot lip a hue and cry that the gates, presented to him by the Worcestershire Association as an “enduring token of esteem and affection,” should stay because of their artistic merits. The railings went, the gates remained. Last week through the gates that were flanked by neither fence nor rail diovc the Baldwins.

In an England where one in five homes had been damaged or destroyed by bombs since he had thrice governed its destinies as Prime Minister, househunting was no easy task even for one who could cap, a huge private fortune with a £2UOU a year pension. Doors through which he could once have strode by right were long since closed to the man who admitted that he refused to tell the country the truth about its need of armaments lest his party be shattered at an election. Before settling in at Worcestershire the Baldwins had had two London residences. One, their town house in Eaton Square, had been let on a long lease on the strength of the agent’s assurance it was a “charming house, with four baths and an oak floor.” The other, No. 10 Downing Street, looked like being ou an equally long lease to Winston Churchill. This week-end it seemed as though Stanley and Lucy Baldwin might have to make do for a while with a shake-down at some place as the Dorchester. Said Lady Baldwin. “It has all been too inconsiderate. 1 don’t want to talk about it. It’s too painful.”