An archive of lively and beautifully descriptive letters written by young Sylvia Duckworth (b. 1899, daughter of Major Arthur Campbell Duckworth and Viola Davies-Evans of Orchardleigh, Frome - a relative of Julia Jackson, Duckworth - Stephen - Virginia Woolf’s mother) who navigates the changing world of 1920s England as she embraces the opportunities offered by a mix of new freedoms alongside more traditional expectations. The last of the letters dates from just before her marriage to Major Le Gendre George William Horton-Fawkes in 1924 who inherited Farnley Hall, Otley, in Yorkshire where the couple went on to live.
Early letters penned to Sylvia’s mother are dated 1917 and sent from the family home at Orchardleigh or from the home of the Cairns family at Farleigh House, Bath and are full of gossip and fashion. By the early 1920s letters from 64 Holland Rd, W14 find Sylvia living in London, attending parties at Bloomfield Terrace and involved in animated conversations on socialism, social reform, capitalists and the working man, ‘the Arthur Hobhouse’s then appeared. They are rather charming people’. There are visits to Holland Park roller skating rink and The Ideal Home Exhibition in Feb 1920, ‘some of the so called ‘labour saving’ devices really seem rather absurdly unpractical’. Letters follow from her Aunt Evie’s home at 19 Chester St, SW1 dated 1922, ‘I feel it is an honour to be staying in a house that entertains such large numbers of the aristocracy’….. ‘I can’t at all get used to the feeling of being absolutely free, no duties whatsoever except to be moderately polite and pleasant to my hostesses’. Descriptions of visits to the opera (to see Ruddigore) and flirtatious encounters with young men fill her letters to her darling mother, ‘‘we wink at each other occasionally; a pity he’s not the eldest son, I’d have no objection ‘going for him’ (Hush what a shocking way to speak)’.
By Spring 1922 Sylvia has arrived in Italy in the somewhat limiting company of her companion Millie. Trips to Pisa, Siena and San Gimignano reveal an appreciation of the arts ‘certainly the 14th century painters knew what colour was even if they were a little vague about form’ and also offer an opinion on early mass tourism as our writer describes 600 Americans who arrive for a day in Pisa from a steamer at Leghorn, ‘isnt it a curious idea to ‘do’ Italy in a mass like that’.
2 letters dated 1917 from Orchard Leigh, Frome to Mrs Duckworth, Sylvia’s mother.
1 letter dated 1917 sent from Olive Cairns of Farleigh House, Bath to Sylvia’s mother.
1 letter dated 1917 sent from Sylvia to her mother on Farleigh House headed paper.
2 letters sent from Sylvia’s brother Arthur to their father from Cambridge University, ‘I’ve got into the Pitt Club – it gives me some sort of standing’.
1letter dated Feb 1920 sent from 64 Holland Pk from Sylvia to her mother.
2 letters dated Feb 1922 sent from 19 Chester Square, SW1 to her mother.
3 letters from Italy dated March – April 1922 from Hotel Victoria, Pisa and Grand Royal Hotel, Siena) sent to Sylvia’s mother.
