John Betjeman Mentions Shipton Moyne

John Betjeman Mentions Shipton Moyne

In 1937, John Betjeman visited Shipton Moyne to view the parish church. He briefly wrote of his views of the village to his friend Bryan Guinness, the son of Lord Moyne and later the 2nd Baron Moyne. Guinness's "new wife" was Elisabeth Nelson, whom he married in 1936. His first wife was Diana Mitford (divorced in 1933 when she deserted him for the British fascist leader Sir Oswald Mosley).

Below is a transcript of the letter:

To Bryan Guinness

Shipton Moyne Post Office
Tetbury
Glos.

[1937]

Dear Bryan,

Happening to drive through this tremendously unimportant village in order to look at the church, I thought you might like to have a letter from it because of its name.

The church is Victorian and expensive. Family called Estcourt.

The village is lost in elms and it is raining today.

The stamps on the envelope are the first to be sold of this kind from Shipton Moyne P.O. Love to your new wife whom I haven't seen.

Yours devotedly, John Betjeman

John Betjeman Mentions Shipton Moyne In 1937