- 289
Barrie, Sir J.M., and the Llewelyn Davies family.
Description
- Barrie, Sir J.M., and the Llewelyn Davies family.
Catalogue Note
arthur llewelyn davies: eight autograph letters signed ("A Ll Davies", "ALlD", etc.), including two to his son Michael, three to his son Peter, others to Margaret Llewelyn Davies (his sister, about the boys) and Dolly Ponsonby; together with a telegram to his own father, and a series of arthur's autograph messages written when he was unable to speak and on his deathbed, the latter chiefly in pencil, c.50 pages in all, 8vo, envelopes, 12 June 1905 to 15 April 1907
The boys' father Arthur Llewelyn Davies writes to Peter cheerfully about his condition ("...I am gradually getting better...") and general news, mentioning the presence of Barrie sitting with him reading the newspaper ("...Don't you think Mr Barrie is a very good friend to all of us?..."). He writes to Michael about coming home to Berkhamsted "in Mr Barrie's motor car" and wanting to see all that the boys have done. In what was probably the last letter Arthur ever wrote, on 15 April 1907, three days before his death, he expresses hope that "my boys are getting lots of happiness out of their people's kindness to them and their own kindness to other people every day", and adds:
It would be fine to have a magic carpet and go first to London, across from Euston to Holborn Viaduct or Victoria, & on to Ramsgate...
In some fifteen notes written in his last months when he could no longer speak, Arthur writes down his thoughts, expressing his concern for his family ("...Thanked me for going to Peter Pan & said it would be dreadful if the children lost their pleasures..."), and declaring at Christmas 1906: "This last 6 months has been the happiest of my life."
The barrister Arthur Llewelyn Davies (1863--1907), the model for Mr Darling in Peter Pan, was the second son of the Reverend John Llewelyn Davies, a brilliant scholar and theologian who went on to outrage Queen Victoria with a blistering attack on Imperialism from the pulpit at Windsor. Arthur grew up in a formidably intellectual atmosphere in Kirkby Lonsdale in Westmorland--to where his father had been transferred and given a rectorship--and was called to the Bar in 1891. Arthur met his future wife Sylvia du Maurier at a society dinner party in 1889: they were engaged a few weeks later. They made a strikingly handsome couple, although their families could not have been more different: "in contrast to the Spartan austerity of the Llewelyn Davies family, the du Mauriers epitomized the gaiety and Bohemian frivoloty of the `nineties. At about the same time as Arthur's father was being ordained, Sylvia's father [the writer George du Maurier, author of Peter Ibbetson and Trilby] was leading the dissipated life of an impoverished art student in Paris" (Birkin, p.47). Sylvia and Arthur were happily married, and Sylvia gave birth to the five boys between 1893 and 1903. Inevitably, however, the equilibrium of the family was forever altered after Sylvia met J.M. Barrie at the society lawyers' New Year's Eve dinner party on 31 December 1897 . The present death-bed notes made by Arthur, when he was no longer able to speak, testify to his great generosity of heart and gratitude felt towards Barrie for all he had done for his wife and sons, despite the intrusion the author had made into his family. Barrie himself was well aware of Arthur's previous sentiments. It is Mr Darling--based upon Arthur--who bemoans to his wife his acceptance of an invitation to dine when he returns home to find that his children have flown away to Neverland with Peter Pan.
sylvia llewelyn davies: some twelve autograph letters, about family news, from 1885 to 1910, to her mother; Mary and Margaret Llewelyn Davies (referring to her "beloved Nicholas"); Dolly Ponsonby ("...My Nicholas is a dear creature...", "...happiness is the most precious thing on earth..."); May; her own son Nicholas ("My darling fat Nico"), 3: one with a drawing of him with a dog, also some locks of his and Michael's hair; and Jenny Hodgson. Sylvia's papers also include her draft autograph wills. An early, four-page one (beginning "I may die at any time but its not likely to happen yet") expresses warm affection for various members of her family and concern about the future of her beloved sons, ending:
...I should like all my dear one's love letters to me to be burnt unread...& lie with me & Arthur in the Hampstead churchyard close to that other dear grave...Of one thing I am certain -- that JM Barrie (the best of friends in the whole world) will always be ready to advise out of his care for
this unfinished sentence followed by an inscription in J.M. Barrie's hand: "This page which ends thus was found after Mrs Davies's death. It was evidently written (as relatives agree) at Berkhampstead soon after Mr Davies's death. J.M Barrie". Her later, revised, autograph will, written in pencil on seven pages, is inscribed by Barrie at the top, "This was written by Mrs Davies on her deathbed at Ashton, Exmoor, Devonshire. She had told me that she was writing it. J.M. Barrie". it is this will which contains the crucial word that barrie would mistranscribe. On the first page a sentence reads: "What I wd like wd be if Jenny wd come to Mary & that the two together wd be looking after the boys...". This is followed by Barrie's five-page autograph transcript of the will, which, in a lengthy subscription, he declares to be "an exact copy...of pages found by me at 23 Campden Hill Square on March 24 1911...written by her at Ashton, Exmoor, a few days before her death...J.M.B." Here, however, in the sentence above, the word "Jenny" reads instead "Jimmy".
Sylvia Llewelyn Davies (1866-1910), J.M. Barrie's intimate friend and mother of the five `lost boys', was the third child of the writer George du Maurier and his wife Emma (neé Wightwick), and sister to the soldier Guy and actor Gerald du Maurier. J.M. Barrie had already befriended her sons George and Jack in Kensington Gardens when he met her and her husband Arthur at a New Year's Eve dinner in 1897: with a tip-tilted nose, wide-spaced eyes, black hair and a crooked smile she was "the most beautiful creature he had ever seen" (quoted by Birkin, p.45). A close friendship ensued, with Barrie availing himself of every opportunity to visit Sylvia and the boys at 31 Kensington Gardens, and spending his own holidays with his wife Mary close to the Llewelyn Davies family at Rustington and elswhere. Even after Arthur Llewelyn Davies moved his family out of London to Egerton House in Berkhamsted (twenty-five miles away) Barrie was a frequent visitor, and even accompanied Sylvia, Jack and Michael to Normandy on holiday (lot 290 contains photographs taken by Barrie on this trip). Sylvia was devastated by Arthur's death in 1907, and the family situation was made more difficult by the absence of any substantial legacy. It was then that Barrie intervened with offers of financial assistance, although Sylvia initially declined this. It was also at this time that Sylvia made her first (incomplete) will, present here. In the summer of 1909 Barrie's marriage collapsed when his wife's adulterous affair with Gilbert Cannan was exposed. The playwright took up temporary residence at the flat of his friend, the author A.E.W. Mason, and was advised to restrain his friendship with Sylvia in case her name was dragged into the divorce proceedings. Two days after Barrie's divorce case ended Sylvia suffered the first in a number of physical collapses, and was eventually diagnosed with cancer, although it was decided by the family and her doctors to keep the truth from her, with family life continuing as usual. She eventually died whilst on holiday at Ashton Farm on Exmoor in August 1910 (it was miles from the nearest doctor but had been selected by Sylvia because of the excellent fishing for the boys). Shortly before her death, she composed a second will (also present in this lot), although it was not actually found until several months after her death. Barrie's later mistranscription of the will (present here), replacing the name of "Jenny" [i.e. Jenny Hodgson, the boys' nurse and nanny Mary's sister] with that of his own, "Jimmy", has caused some controversy. Andrew Birkin is clear that "the mistranscription was no doubt unintentional, atlhough the word `Jenny' is clear enough, and Barrie can have had no illusions that his presence at Campden Hill Square would be `nice for Mary'. In the event, Jenny's services were not called upon, and Mary was obliged to tolerate Barrie's omnipresence at Campden Hill Square, in accordance with Sylvia's supposed last wishes" (Birkin, p.194). So Barrie became co-guardian with Mary of the five `lost boys': he was, after all, the only candidate with the time and the means to assume full responsibility for them. In any case, Barrie had increasingly been seen by the boys and Sylvia herself, certainly from 1907 onwards, as a kind of leading uncle (they called him "Uncle Jim"), a step-father or guardian angel actually directing the boys' destinies. When Nico Llewelyn Davies married in 1926 Barrie made a gift to his wife of some of Sylvia's jewellery, and also made a rather remarkable claim: that if Sylvia had lived, she and Barrie would have been married. There is no evidence for this in any of the surviving letters in the family archive. Barrie does record in his notebooks that he began writing to Sylvia once a year after her death, providing reports on the boys' progress, although he later destroyed these letters (see Birkin, p.206).
george llewelyn davies: two autograph letters signed, both in pencil, both written from the Western Front: one to his brother Peter, expressing his view that "it's getting bloodier & bloodier" and commenting on the routine of trench digging, etc.. 4 pages, 8vo, envelope with censor's stamp, [30 December 1914]; the other to Mary [Hodgson], with news that he is "off to the trenches again soon, after a fine rest", 2 pages, 8vo, [11 February 1915]
...when I get home I shall never get up in the mornings at all...As an officer I don't sleep at all in the night...when I get back I shall be more conceited than ever...
George Llewelyn Davies (1893-1915), one of the two main models for the character of Peter Pan, was killed in action on 15 March 1915. For a note on his friendship with Barrie, see lot 286.
jack llewelyn davies: two autograph letters signed: one, aged seven, to Mary Hodgson, about a train journey; the other, half a century later, to his brother Peter, reminiscing about their father (who told him about his illness: "...He drove me to tears -- an easy matter!...") and George, 4 pages, 8vo, 17 March 1901 to [May 1950]
Jack Llewelyn Davies (1894-1959), the second of the `lost boys', was perhaps the least closest to Barrie, and the one who occasionally felt some resentment at the playwright's assumption of the guardian role after his father's death.
peter llewelyn davies: some thirty-two autograph letters signed: to his Aunt Margaret (abour cricket and his reading matter at Eton); to Mary Hodgson, two when he was on active service in the First World War, reassuring her at length at the time of her distress about the boys' behaviour and about Gerrie, Jack's wife, and another in 1921 notifying her of the funeral of Michael at Hampstead; then a later series to Mary, from 1931 onwards, when he apologises for the horrifying and vular announcement in the papers of his forthcoming marriage, thanks her for the nicest letter he has received, sends her a formal wedding invitation (present), sends her presents of books and photographs, invites her to the christening of his son, passes on news of the family, writes about her legacy, sends greetings and other information, and, in 1945, when telling her of his visit to George's grave in Belgium, he reflects on how much she did for the "unruly crew" ("...How I wish one could think more of the happy beginnings and less of the melancholy end..."); also with one letter to Jack in 1950, [1913-1954]
...Through J.M.B. and through Margaret Ll.D., I came into possession of a large number of old letters...I began destroying them, but hadn't the heart to complete the destruction...
...Alas, the more one learns of those sad days, the sadder the tale becomes. Still, I think it is all worth preserving, if only for the benefit of Jack (whom I never see now), Nico & myself...
For notes on the close relationship between Peter Llewelyn Davies (1897-1960) and his brother George, Peter's wartime experiences, and the accumulation by Peter of the family papers he termed The Morgue, see lot 286. In later years he became a succsessful publisher, operating as Peter Davies Ltd., but a combination of emphysema, the recurring effects of shell shock, the tragic deaths of both his parents and his brothers George and Michael, and a continuing battle with depression, led him to commit suicide at Sloane Square tube station on 5 April 1960.
michael llewelyn davies: some ten autograph letters and a card signed, one typed letter and a telegram: one a nine-page letter to George on the Western Front on 3 March 1915 written from Eton, about theatrical matters, etc., and referring to "Uncle Jim's new burlesque" [Rosy Rapture, or the Pride of the Beauty Chorus, starring Gaby Deslys], also saying (twelve days before George's death) "I think it is about time you got leave home"; subsequent light-hearted letters to Mary Hodgson, about school life and inquiring about his brothers ("...My tutor told me he wished I was like Nico; he says he's the heart & soul of the house..."); and one to Gerrie (Jack's wife), about plays and other activities; an "absolutely serious" letter to Mary in 1918 assuring her that he and Nico will not be able to continue living with Jack and his wife ("...when a man marries his family is the one he is setting up for himself...none of your absurd ideas of pride or absurd ideas of Uncle Jim not wanting you! ...Think how glad he'll be to get us off his hands for a time!..."); his last letter to her (jokingly referring to his "reformed handwriting") entirely typed; other letters in 1920 to Nico (including a rude limerick) and to his Oxford tutor Dundas pleading to be allowed to "creep into the House again in October" ("...I dislike always bringing up the whole question of my existence before you...") and, on 16 April 1921 (a month before Michael's drowning), telling Dundas about his "Fatal mistake" in joining the army, 1915-1921
In these letters Michael Llewelyn Davies (1900-1921), the chief model for Peter Pan, and the closest of the five boys to J.M. Barrie, refers to the difficult domestic situation early in 1918 when his brother Jack and his new wife Gerrie moved into the family home at Campden Hill Square. A clash with the boys' co-guardian Mary Hodgson ensued: see note to lot 288. these letters of Michael's to Mary testify to the boys' abiding love, care and affection for her, despite Mary's rivalry with Barrie, and her jealousy of the boys' wives. For a note on Michael's tragic drowning at Sandford Pool in May 1921, also see lot 288. He was buried on 23 May 1921 in Hampstead Churchyard, close to the graves of his mother and father.
nicholas ("nico") llewelyn davies: some one hundred and twenty-five autograph letters signed: one to his mother, Sylvia, as a very small child (asking for new pyjamas); one as a twelve-year-old to his brother George on the Western Front, on 21 February 1915, with humorous sketches ("...I went to Peter Pan a few weeks ago and the new Peter is quite good..."); and then a lengthy series almost entirely to their nanny Mary Hodgson ("Dearest Mary", etc.), from April 1915 to December 1962, with extensive news of his life, his brothers and their family, school activities (Eton and later Oxford), and occasionally J.M. Barrie, one letter written in verse
...Uncle Jim is not very well. He is in bed with a temperature of 101...
...The beds here are very big. Michael's bed and Uncle Jim are very springy. Mine is not!!!...
...Jack...has got a Turkish hand-grenade also a Turkish shrapnel with a few bullets in it...
...Did you hear that Uncle Jim's nephew who was at 23 was killed the other day...
...Michael has just been made a cadet officer which is good news, isn't it? Gosh it is hot. I am reading the Time Machine by Wells in which a man goes flying into the future...
...If I fail in these schools I shall die of grief if I pass I shall die of joy...
Nico also invites Mary to his wedding in 1926 to the Hon. Lady Beatrix James, reminisces about earlier days ("...we have the room I have always slept in here. Michael & I in 1911 Peter & I in 1924..."), referring to "the beloved house we first inhabited 30 years ago", and, among a stream of other family news in often lengthy letters over the years, refers sometimes to his brothers Jack and Peter, and, in 1949, starts systematically gathering information about their early family life
other later communications including Nico's invitation to his daughter Laura's wedding in 1951, exchanges of early photographs (of Michael, etc.), and, in his last letter to her on 1 December 1962, reflections on this being "A silent and very happy start to my 60t year".
Nicholas Llewelyn Davies, affectionately known as Nico (1900-1980) was the youngest of the five boys, and survived his brother Peter by more than twenty years. He was, perhaps, the brother least affected by his parents' early deaths (being only three and six years old at the time), and certainly the one with the sunniest personality. His childhood letters to Barrie are included in lot 286. It fell to him to preserve the family papers after Peter's death in 1960. When Andrew Birkin's researcher Sharon Goode tracked him down in 1975 he replied that "I am certainly ready to help in any way I can, but I must warn you that I am entirely devoted to Barrie's memory, by which I mean that you will hear little but praise from me" (Birkin, quoted in Introduction).
members of the du maurier family: letters, chiefly autograph, by: George Du Maurier (the novelist, Sylvia's father): 9, three to his wife Emma about his visits to Belgium, France, etc.; Guy Du Maurier (Sylvia's brother): 2, to Sylvia ("Sweetest & best of sisters") in 1879 and c.1890; Gerald Du Maurier (Sylvia's brother, the actor who performed Mr Darling and Captain Hook in the first production of Peter Pan): 2, to Sylvia (with congratulations on her engagement, etc.); Emma Du Maurier (Sylvia's mother): one, to Sylvia and c.12 to her daughter May; Trixie and May Du Maurier (Sylvia's sisters: several); and Daphne Du Maurier (the novelist, Gerald's daughter): to Nico, two remarkable letters (4pp. and 5pp.), the first meditating on Peter's suicide and a possible plaque (12 April 1960):
...I was making...too much of darling Peter's action, and condemning him to an interminable tete-a-tete at a purgatorial junction with Cynthia Asquith...let them have it out, with uncle Jim telling them both where he himself got off...and then...both cynthia and Peter shake hands...and Peter rushes to aunt Sylvia's arms, because really it was about time he did, having regretted them for about 50 years...I don't think emphysema, in itself, would have given Peter melancholia. It's a bloody thing, but surely Jack had it too, and Jack, though very bitter about life, was not a melancholic...
the second having read the family papers contained in The Morgue (Menabilly, 27 April 1963)
...am so much moved I can hardly speak...I suppose that having been brought up to the story of uncle Arthur and Aunt Sylvia...and having been always steeped in it...makes it now all the more poignant, especially in the light of the later deaths, George's, Michael's - then Jack's, and above all Peter's...The fall from grace, after 1914, if one can be so pompous, hits one between the eyes. No one would write today, or behave today, in that very remarkable fashion...
Lady Cynthia Asquith, to whom Daphne du Maurier refers to here, was the daughter of the former Prime Minister, and was engaged as Barrie's secretary during the summer of 1918. She was the same age--thirty--as Sylvia du Maurier had been when Barrie had met her in 1897: "like Sylvia, Cynthia has an elusive beauty that artists strove to capture but rarely achieved; like Sylvia, she had, at that time, two boys...unlike Sylvia, she had tremendous ambition: to write, to paint, to act..." (Birkin, p.280). She became a close friend and played an important role in Barrie's life after this date. Her memoir, Portrait of Barrie, appeared in 1954.
mary hodgson (the boys' nanny and surrogate mother), several autograph letters (some signed "Dadge"), to her sister Nancy, saying in 1912, "J.M.B. is well & much better than I have seen him for some years" and commenting on George's playing cricket at Lords, 1912-1920
For an account of the key role played by the five Llewelyn Davies' boys' nurse, nanny and co-guardian Mary Hodgson, and (despite the rivalry with Barrie) the warm affection in which she was held by them, see above and note to lot 288.
henry james: two autograph letters signed ("Henry James"), to Sylvia: rhapsodising in characteristically expansive style over a lampshade she gave him, and exuberantly congratulating her on her engagement, 8 pages, 8vo, 34 De Vere Grdens, London, [1888] to 27 March 1890
On hearing the news of Sylvia's death in 1910 James wrote to her mother Emma that "Sylvia...leaves us with an image of such extraordinary loveliness, nobleness and charm -- ever unforgettable and touching" (quoted by Birkin, p.193). Earlier, in 1909, James had been a co-signatory to a letter to the editors of Fleet Street, asking them to refrain from exploiting the news value of Barrie's divorce proceedings, "as a mark of respect and gratitude to a writer of genius" (quoted by Birkin, p.181).
others: a quantity of other letters by relatives and family friends, including John Crompton (to Arthur Llewelyn Davies's mother, Mary), and Mary: several, to John Crompton, her son Arthur, and Sylvia (welcoming her marriage to Arthur); Margaret, Theodore, Harry and Maurice Llewelyn Davies; Hugh Macnaghten (George, Michael and Nico's housemaster at Eton) ; Sir John Everett Millais (to George Du Maurier, with congratulations on Sylvia's engagement); Montague Rendall and Eleanour Clough (condolences and warm tributes to the deceased Arthur Llewelyn Davies); Aubrey Tennyson (Lord Alfred's son, to Peter Llewelyn Davies, giving an account of George's death in action and his comrades' reaction to it: "...his brother officers felt when he was killed that even though they had only known him such a short time, they had lost one of their best friends...", 30 May 1915); Lionel Cecil; and others, including several letters of condolence on the death of Michael in 1921 ("..Isn't this too tragic! dear Michael to have escaped the war for this..."); a copy of the Eton College Chronicle with the poem "Eilean Chona" published in memory of Michael, 15 June 1922; a letter by William Nicholson (arranging to visit Nico and give him all the information he can "about the 'Originals' of the Peter Pan designs", 1937; a letter of consolation to Nico signed by Cosmo, Archbishop of Canterbury, on the death of Barrie (""...You know how deeply I sympathise with you and your brothers. I realise fully what the loss of such a friendship must be to you...", 1 July 1937); a letter of consolation to Nico signed by Roger Senhouse (Peter's friend, and previously a close friend of Michael's), on the death of Peter in April 1960 ("...Your family were endowed with perennial wisdom and grace...", 25 April, 1960)
This lot also includes two folders of Peter Llewelyn Davies's transcriptions of various of the letters in the archive (and letters in lots 286-289): one of handwritten transcriptions, and one of typed. This was originally part of the Morgue project which he worked on for many years before his suicide in 1960 (see introduction, lot 286 and note above).