Britain’s most famous aristocratic supermodel Stella Tennant has ‘died suddenly’ at the age of 50 after gracing the fashion world with stand-out androgynous looks during her 1990s modelling heyday.
But while Scottish-born Stella commanded attention for all the right reasons, past members of her family weren’t as fortunate – with their scandalous escapades shocking polite society.
Stella was the granddaughter to Deborah Mitford – one of the well-known aristocratic siblings who made headlines throughout the 20th century for their affairs, love of Nazism and an attempted suicide.
The Mitford sisters – Nancy, Pam, Diana, Unity, Decca and Debo – were born between 1905 and 1920 to Lord Redesdale and his wife Sydney and raised in the Cotswolds. They had one brother Tom who was educated at Eton.
But despite their privileged upbringing as members of the aristocracy, the six daughters went on to shock society with their impulsive, hedonistic lifestyles.
The most controversial of the sisters was Diana, known as Honks, who left her first husband and married the founder of the British Union of Fascists Oswald Mosley.
They tied the knot in a civil ceremony in Joseph Goebbels’ drawing room in Berlin in 1936. Hitler was the only other guest.
Here, FEMAIL recalls the eccentric aristocrats’ antics…
A rare picture of the Mitford family together, pictured in 1935. From left: Unity, Tom, Debo, Diana, Jessica, Nancy and Pamela
Bad taste in friends: Unity Mitford was a fan of the Nazi party and admired Hitler who she regularly met up with
While Scottish-born Stella commanded attention for all the right reasons, past members of her family weren’t as fortunate – with their scandalous escapades shocking polite society. Stella is pictured left at her wedding and right on the runway in the 1990s
Unity Mitford was so close to Hitler his girlfriend Eva Braun viewed her as a love rival
Unity Mitford (born 8 August 1914 – died 28 May 1948) was an ardent fascist and travelled to Germany in the 1930s, where she was a personal friend of Adolf Hitler.
The Führer was as equally obsessed with the British aristocrat and met her 140 times while in the middle of preparing for World War Two, a German biography published in 2016, claimed.
Hitler was as spellbound by Unity – one of the famous ‘It; girls of the 1930s – as she was by him, according to the book entitled: ‘I was leafing through Vogue when the Führer spoke to me.’
Bestselling political science author Michaela Karl told how the bond was apparently forged at Hitler’s favourite Munich restaurant, the Osteria Bavaria, on February 9 1935.
Unity wrote to her sister Diana: ‘At 3.00pm I was done with eating when the Führer came in wearing his sweet trench coat and sat down with two other men at his table. I was leafing through vogue when ten minutes after his arrival the innkeeper came over and said that the leader “wants to talk to you.”‘
Author Karl said; ‘Between 1935 and 1939 Hitler and Unity met every ten days – for a busy dictator, who at the same time was preparing for a world war, it was a total of 140 times, therefore surprisingly often.’
Soon he took her to the Wagner Festival to Bayreuth, to the Nuremberg rally and other grand events of Nazism. ‘Unity quickly belonged to the inner circle,’ added Karl. ‘In England she is still well known but in Germany just a footnote in history.’
But Hitler’s secret girlfriend, who would marry him as Berlin collapsed in 1945 to become his bride of one day before killing herself with him, viewed Unity as a rival.
On May 10, 1934, the 23 year old Eva wrote in her diary that the wife of Hitler’s personal photographer Heinrich Hoffmann had told her about Unity. Eva penned: ‘Mrs. Hoffmann, tactlessly and lovingly, told me he has a replacement for me now.’
When war broke out in 1939, Unity shot herself in the head but was saved by surgeons. She returned to Britain but had suffered brain damage.
After the war, a sympathetic spin on her relationship with the Fuhrer was attempted by the Mitfords and the family maintained that Unity’s adoration of Hitler was the foolish attachment of a rather silly young girl.
Diana Mitford married fascist leader following her divorce
Diana at the Nuremberg Rally in 1936: Her support of Fascism led her to allegedly become ‘the most hated woman in Britain’
Diana Mitford (born 17 June 1910 – died 11 August 2003) married Bryan Guinness, heir to the brewing fortune and had two children.
However, she later caused a stir in polite society when marrying Sir Oswald Mosley, leader of the British Union of Fascists.
They tied the knot in a civil ceremony in Joseph Goebbels’ drawing room in Berlin in 1936. Hitler was the only other guest.
As a result, during World War Two she was locked up as an enemy to the Allies in Holloway Prison.
Following her and her husband’s release from jail, they cruised the Mediterranean, before settling together in the Paris suburbs, with the Duke and Duchess of Windsor for neighbours.
Mary S. Lovell, who has written a biography on the Mitford sisters, said Diana ‘became arguably the most hated woman in England for a while.’
However, although many despised the sisters for their political alliances, others admired them for their wit and beauty.
The sisters also had a brother, Tom, who died during World War Two in Burma. The girls were raised in stately homes in relative isolation as their father didn’t believe they should go to school to be educated.
Deborah, Dowager Duchess of Devonshire, saved one of Britain’s favourite stately homes
Blushing bride: Deborah, Dowager Duchess of Devonshire, married Andrew Cavendish, who succeeded his father as 11th Duke of Devonshire in 1950
Legacy: The Dowager devoted her life to running the Chatsworth estate (pictured)
The youngest sister, Deborah (and who is the grandmother of the late Stella Tennant) met Andrew Cavendish at the outbreak of World War II.
They married soon afterwards. After the death of Cavendish’s father, her husband inherited the title 11th Duke of Devonshire and the family’s home of Chatsworth House.
The Dowager, who died aged 94 in 2014, devoted her life to running the family estate with her husband.
And while many other stately homes have fallen into disrepair, the Derbyshire house remains not only a home but a successful business as a popular tourist attraction which is testament to the Dowager’s efforts.
She oversaw the restoration of paintings and furniture to the state rooms and the construction of a farm shop, cafe, restaurant and gift shop. Visitors were delighted to find her behind the shop counter with a silk scarf tied around her neck.
At Christmas, she would decorate the busts of Roman Emperors which lined the corridors with garlands of tinsel over their laurel wreaths.
Andrew and Deborah were wonderfully hospitable. Prince Charles, a close friend, was believed to visit in October to make a start on signing his Christmas cards.
Chatsworth’s most famous visitor was President Kennedy. His sister, Kathleen, had been married to Andrew’s older brother, Billy Cavendish, for four short but rapturously happy months before his death.
He was killed in action in the Second World War and Kathleen died soon after her husband in a plane crash and was buried at Chatsworth.
The Dowager was the last of the surviving Mitford sisters but their legacy remains in their works of literature and at Chatsworth.
Nancy Mitford became a famous writer with her books still popular today
While most of the sisters became writers, Nancy, the eldest born in 1904, was the most successful with her entertaining stories about outlandish characters based on her own family.
The Pursuit of Love and Love in a Cold Climate were her most popular novels and their appeal endures today with the former currently being adapted into a BBC series starring Lily James and Dominic West, which is set to air in the new year.
As a writer with an affluent background, Nancy was a natural fit with the ‘Bright Young Things’ – the name given to the group of young aristocrats and socialites in 1920s, including Evelyn Waugh, who raised eyebrows with their partying.
While most of the sisters became writers, Nancy, the eldest born in 1904, was the most successful with her entertaining stories about outlandish characters based on her own family. Pictured is Unity (left), Diana (centre) and Nancy (right) in 1932 at the wedding of Lord Stanley of Aldernay and Lady Audrey Talbot i
Nancy was educated at home by a governess along with her sister Jessica, who is known as Decca.
Despite the lack of formal schooling, she became a successful novelist with a string of books.
She also wrote for Vogue when she moved in with author Evelyn Waugh and his wife, before marrying Peter Rodd, but their relationship was a disaster, ending in divorce in 1957 after a lengthy separation.
During World War Two she had an affair with Free French officer, Gaston Palewski, who became the love of her life.
Nancy was educated at home by a governess along with her sister Jessica, who is known as Decca. Despite the lack of formal schooling, she became a successful novelist with a string of books.
Nancy married Peter Rodd, but their relationship was a disaster, ending in divorce in 1957 after a lengthy separation
She moved to Paris after the war and died aged 69 in 1973.
In 1955, she established the concept of U and non-U which is still used by society bible Tatler today.
The monogrammed moniker refers to a list of language. U, stands for upper class while non-U, represents the aspiring middle classes.
In her later years she also had wrote biographical studies of Madame de Pompadour, Voltaire and King Louis XIV.
Jessica (Decca) Mitford married Churchill’s communist nephew
The second youngest of the six sisters, born in 1917, Jessica ‘Decca’ Mitford turned her back on the privileges of her upbringing and joined
Unlike Diana and Unity, Jessica was a firm communist and ran off to Spain with Winston Churchill’s socialist nephew Esmond Romily after meeting in 1937 aged 19.
They eloped to Spain during the civil war causing the British government to send a war ship to the country to try and bring them home.
The second youngest of the six sisters, born in 1917, Jessica ‘Decca’ Mitford turned her back on the privileges of her upbringing and joined
In 1939, Mitford moved to the United States. With her husband she travelled around working odd jobs.
During the war, Romily joined the Canadian airforce and Mitford moved to Washington D.C.
Romily was shot down during WWII while fighting for the allies. Jessica left Britain and moved to the United States where she married Robert Treuhaf, and eventually settled in Oakland, California.
Her memoir Hons and Rebels which describes their upbringing became a classic and shed light of the famous family’s upbringing.
In a 2006 article for the San Francisco Chronicle, she children described how she approached her motherhood in a spirit of ‘benign neglect’.
Jessica, aged six, is pictured with Unity aged nine, in the garden of their house in Asthall in the 1920s
The second oldest of the family, Pamela was the least ‘newsworthy’ of the girls known as ‘the quiet sister’ who married millionaire fascist Derek Ainslie Jackson.
Pamela Mitford: The quiet, rural, sister
The second oldest of the family, Pamela was the least ‘newsworthy’ of the girls known as ‘the quiet sister’ who married millionaire fascist Derek Ainslie Jackson.
Born in 1907, little is known about her, but she has been called ‘the most rural’ of the family.
Poet Laureate John Betjeman, who was in love with her, referred to her the ‘most rural of them all’ and was more content on the farm than at a glamorous cocktail party.
Her husband was a physicist and bisexual who married six times.
After their divorce in 1951 she spend the rest of her life with Giuditta Tommasi, an Italian horsewoman.
In The Mitfords: Letters Between Six Sisters, published in 2007 her sister Jessica said she became a ‘you-know-what-bian’ following her divorce.
She died in London in 1994, aged 86.