Now starts one of my favourite bits. It goes on for a few chapters after this too.

It was nearly September 1903 but May and Muriel had not yet started back at the Victoria Institute, which now that the Workers Educational Association had been formed, had branched into all sorts of new courses and activities. The WEA had actually officially started in 1902, but the idea was slowly catching on and now Worcester was able to take advantage of it. The girls of course, were not actually workers, as such, but they hoped to take part in any new initiative. And typewriting was a skill that they both felt they should learn.

‘Muriel,’ said May, ‘what ever happened to your quest to find that ring or at least learn more about your supposed noble ancestors?’

‘You remember that girl who was at the Walker dance back in 1901? Well, when she first wrote back to me, I rather felt she was not at all interested and just pushed me off onto some other people who had the right name. I did write to the various Paulet’s as she suggested but nothing came of it. Then out of the blue, a letter came from her again and she suggested I find a copy of Burke’s Peerage, as she thought it might have the answers I was looking for.’

‘Where does one find Burke’s Peerage?’

‘I went to our library, but they didn’t have a copy. But then I thought of the Beauchamps. Earl Beauchamp’s family (you know he is really called William Lygon) has been in this area for many generations, and although he went off to Australia to be governor of New South Wales, he didn’t like it very much and came back here. I thought that since Madresfield Court is nearby, he might be willing to let us see his copy of the book. He was Mayor of Worcester in 1895, you know, so I wrote to him and his wife.’

‘And, what happened next?’

‘I was invited to come to their home at Madresfield Court in Great Malvern last Wednesday when you were away. I took the 9.50 train from Worcester and arrived at 10.17, and it was only a short walk down the hill to their house. It is really a wonderful place. The Earl’s wife, Lettice, (seeing May’s expression she added, ‘she told me to call her that’) anyway his wife (they were only married last July 26) told me all about the house. Built in 1593, it was remodeled in the 1800s to look like an Elizabethan house and it contains about 100 rooms. It has a perfect moat and Lettice says it is noted for its wonderful display of daffodils in the early spring. Anyway, she showed me into the library and let me look at the most recent copy of the book. The entries go back to the 13th Century.

‘I was looking for any entries that mentioned the Marquis of Winchester, but she told me that from early days the Winchesters also had the title of Earl of Wiltshire. So I looked for anyone with that title too.’

‘Don’t keep me in suspense. Are you related to Charles I or Henry VIII?’

‘No, but you are not too far from the truth. If the line proves true, and I have no reason to doubt my mother’s source saying we descend from Peter Paulet, then his ancestors were first mentioned in 1459 and 1472 for the first and second Earls of Wiltshire. But the interesting thing is that Ann Boleyn is certainly mentioned in connection with one of our ancestors. So don’t be so sarcastic when you talk about Henry VIII.’

‘What else did you discover?’

‘Well all about the Beauchamps, and Lettice was pleased to point out go they back even further than my family does, with the first one being mentioned in 1348 as one of the founder group of the Knights and Ladies of the Garter. That was Thomas de Beauchamp – the 11th Earl of Warwick. After that there were many Beauchamps listed in each century.’

‘You aren’t related to them too, are you?’

‘Oh no, but since I was looking at the book in her house, I had to show as much interest in her husband’s family roots as I have in my own.’

‘And were any of your other forebears famous?’

‘Perhaps not so much famous, as infamous. Here let me get my notes.’

Muriel rushed to her desk where she carefully kept all her information about her quests in order. She brought back her book and read out the following:

Marquis of Winchester to be attached.

Ordered, That the Gentleman Usher attending this House shall bring the Marquis of Winchester to this House presently, to acknowledge his Offence committed against this House, he being taken in Arms at Basing House; and then this House will take into Consideration how to dispose of him further; and the Gentleman Usher to take him into Custody wheresoever he shall find him.

‘Then comes the next entry.

‘Another entry says:

‘And what happened next?’

‘I don’t really know. I expect I should find out if I can have another go at reading more from that book.’

‘That wasn’t in Burke’s Peerage, was it?’

‘No, that came from the Proceedings in the House of Lords, October 20th, 1645. The Beauchamps have quite a library, but I didn’t feel that I could spend too much time looking at things, as they were doing me a favour.’

‘What else did you find out?’

‘It did say in one part that the names Paulet, Paulett, Poulet, Poulett, and Powlett were all part of the same family – just that the spelling had changed over the years.’

‘So that fancy Miss Poulett probably was a relative of yours after all.’

‘I dare say she and I share some ancestors.’

‘Any other famous names to brag about?’

‘Well, yes, as a matter of fact, John Paulet the 5th Marquis of Winchester said that his family motto was ‘Aymez Lyante’ which means Love-Loyalty. I think that is nice and would do for our family too.

‘And the 2nd Marquis was the son of Sir William Capel, and he was the Lord Mayor of London in 1503, so how about that!’

‘Do you know what I think? I think we should both go back there and spend as much time as we can to find out everything about your family, and then we can write a book about it.’

‘Do you really think we could? I think that is a wonderful idea – a sort of fitting end for my quest, even if I don’t get to have the ring that Peter Paulet’s family was given.’

So Muriel again wrote to the Beauchamps requesting that she and a friend spend another day in their library. Lettice wrote back and said she would be delighted to have them when they were next in Madresfield Court which wouldn’t be until October. She invited them both to come at 10.30 on October 14th to research and stay to lunch with time afterwards for more work if they so wished. They were beside themselves with excitement.

Soon October 14th came for the visit to the Beauchamps to find out more about Muriel’s noble relatives. Muriel prompted May, ‘Now, we must be very systematic about this. We must go through the reports for the House of Lords, and copy down anything interesting about the Marquis of Winchester, or any of his family, and we must make sure we have the dates for it all. Then we can assemble them all into a sort of story when we have finished. But we have only a day, so don’t waste time putting down anything that isn’t interesting. If it only tells that the person was born and died, we don’t need to know that.’

‘But I think you should make a family tree.’

‘All right then, take note of names of each new Marquis of Winchester, and his children, but our main job is to find things that will make for good reading.’

The girls laden with notebooks and pencils, and dressed in their finest clothes, again caught the 9.50 train from Scrub Hill Station. By 10.30 they were in the gardens of Madresfield Court, and May was as impressed as Muriel had been.

The butler let them in and they waited in the front hall for Lettice to come and show them again into the library. It had been several months since Muriel had first visited, and she thought that Lettice looked a bit plumper than she had previously. She wondered if she was expecting, but of course she wouldn’t dream of asking.
Lettice showed them the place where the books they wanted were located. She said she would leave them to browse the library at their leisure, and she would ask the maid to bring them coffee at 11.15. Then she would expect them in the small dining room for lunch at 1.

They took copious notes, and their day was very full. At the luncheon party which consisted only of themselves and Lettice they had very simple fare – game soup, homemade bread, a lovely salad with cheese, and fresh fruit salad and cream. May thought that the fruit must have been imported, as she hadn’t seen its like in the local shops or market. Everything was beautifully presented on wonderful china and with crystal water glasses they were afraid to touch, much less drink out of.

They left at 4.30 and ran all the way to catch the 4.42, puffing and panting at running up hill. Back in Scrub Hill at 5.05, they had a leisurely walk back to their homes, and agreed they would start fresh in the morning and compare notes to see what they had found.