Lives in Cricket No 26 - HV Hesketh-Prichard

96 Married Man for the Coronet Theatre, at the Elephant and Castle, so not quite the West End, and would set out in September next with a production of Don Q. Hunting Camps in Woods and Wilderness , greatly liked by Teddy Roosevelt, was published this year, with a foreword by Frederick Selous and pictures by Lady Helen Graham. This was based on pieces that had appeared in magazines already, with some additions, and talked about shooting in Norway, Newfoundland, Patagonia and so on. In the introduction, Hex says apart from the game I was forced to shoot in order to feed a comparatively large party in crossing Patagonia, I find that during the trips dealt with in this book, as far as I can calculate, I fired at an animal once every six days’ hunting. I mention this because an idea seems to be prevalent among a section of the community that big game shooting is inseparable from slaughter on a large scale. For some of course, it was, but Hex never seems to have shot for numbers. In December 1910, returning on the R.M.S.Mauretania , he caught influenza, then relapsed and followed it up with malaria, so was unwell into the New Year. * * * * * * * There was little cricket in 1911 for Hex: he spent the first part of the year recovering from illness. Then 1911 was George V’s coronation year and the King was to follow that with a visit to Ireland, which will have kept Hex busy. Hunting Camps in Wood and Wilderness had come out in 1910 and been well received, and Through Trackless Labrador was to come out at the end of 1911, so Hex will have been working on this book for part of the year. By this time, too, Hex and Lily were fully involved in the aristocratic social round. According to Parker, they spent the first part of the London season in Lancaster Gate and then Queen’s Gate, at houses belonging to relatives of Elizabeth. At the 1911 census, taken on 2 April, Hex and Elizabeth were not at home at Prae Wood, and indeed were shown at 83 Lancaster Gate. This was a house which belonged to Viscount Grimston’s father-in-law, Lord Meath, and was occupied by the young Viscount and his wife Violet, Hex and Lily, Viscount Grimston’s younger sister Vera, and ten servants. Violet said in her diary: ‘Mother lent me 83 Lancaster Gate for the season with Hex and Lily, Sibyl and Vera.’ 51 Viscount Grimston is shown as a motor-tyre manufacturer. It sounds a bit odd, but the family business was in rubber, and tyre making was cutting edge at the time. The census shows Kate at Prae Wood, named in her full pomp as Kate O’Brian [sic] Heskett [sic] Prichard, giving her occupation as ‘author’, but another column shows her as ‘mother’, indicating that the head of the household was away. The children were at Prae Wood with her. The London ‘season’ normally coincided with the sitting of Parliament . In 1911 Parliament resumed on 31 January but the season usually began in earnest after Easter session break, since many families remained in the 51 Life Diary of Violet Grimston, held in the Hertfordshire County Archives, D/EV/209.