The Marquis and his Lady enjoy publicity

Press, 6 July 1983, Page 13

The Marquis and his Lady enjoy publicity

From

DIANA DEKKER

in London

The Marquis of Tavistock and Lady Tavistock, owners of the preserved Maori head which is to be returned to New Zealand, are no strangers to publicity. They live at Woburn Abbey and run the highly publicised Woburn Park. It was in the old dairy there that the head was originally discovered. The Marquis took over the property in 1975 when his father, the Duke of Bedford, emigrated to France with his French wife. The Marquis, now 42, and his wife Henrietta, 41, objected strongly to being landed with the eighteenth century property, its 120 rooms, its 3000-acre park and its 13,000-acre estate. Lady Tavistock, former debutante of the year Henrietta Tiarka, publicly castigated her father-in-law. “My husband was enjoying life,” she was reported as saying. “It was cruel to make him a prisoner of his inheritance and cruel to make me the ‘Jailer’ of Woburn.” More recently she said: “If my eldest son was to marry young I think it would be much better for him to have Woburn right from the start rather than have it thrust upon him, as it was on us, at the wrong time.” The Tavistocks have three sons — Lord Howland, 21, Lord Robin Russell, 20, and Lord James, eight. Lord James, who was born after the family’s move to Woburn, evidently loves the estate. Lord Tavistock has said that his youngest son’s “real love” for Woburn gives him confidence for the future, despite his own lovehate relationship with the property. Woburn Abbey has been open to the public since 1954 when the Duke of Bedford decided it was the only way to pay off more than a million dollars in death duties. Now it boasts a safari park, an antiques centre, pubs, restaurants, and two championship golf courses.

One of the star attractions is a display of tapestry done by Lady Tavistock who claims that she was smoking 40 cigarettes a day before she took up needlework.

“I don’t sew in church quite, but I do it at social gatherings which causes the odd raised eyebrow,” she said in one interview. She added that when she was 70 she would sew during balls because such behaviour would be acceptable because of her age. Only last month Woburn Park was the scene of a grand opening for a haute cuisine restaurant. The new venture, in the magnificent grounds, will serve such dishes as “puff pastry feuillete of finely sliced lambs’ tongues in a light cream sauce with a touch of tarragon and wild mushrooms, and galantine of turkey with a light mousse of turkey foie gras and fines herbes served with little slices of artichoke heart and herb mayonnaise.” Ever since their marriage in June, 1961, the Tavistocks have been in the news. On the afternoon of the wedding, strong police reinforcements were required to hold back the sightseers mobbing the couple and their 400 guests at St Clement Danes in the Strand.

Both the Marquis and his wife were regularly featured in gossip columns. Sometimes they courted the publicity. On April 10 this year, Lady Tavistock inserted an advertisement in “The Times” birth column to announce the birth of “Moss to Mrs Moss at Woburn Abbey.” Mrs Moss is one of Lady Tavistock’s horses.

One story which appeared in the “Daily Telegraph” last year concerned the Marquis of Tavistock’s appetite for baked beans. Evidently a dinner guest at Woburn Abbey, expecting something grand, had arrived elegantly dressed, only to find his lordship in jeans and sweater. “Steak and kidney pie, okay?” asked the Marquis, who then swiftly opened up a can of baked beans. The Marquis confessed that

he was a baked beans fanatic, with a soft spot for the Heinz brand. “I adore beans, especially with ketchup. So does all the family. Our cook, Alison, often prepares them. In fact, we have six guests staying here at the moment and we will be having beans with our buffet lunch.

“It’s something safe to give guests, isn’t it? Beans are part of everyone’s childhood so you can be sure people will like them.” “Tavistock improved his knowledge of beans in America when he was a student at Harvard,” the “Daily Telegraph” commented. “He used to stay with Henry John Heinz II.”

Other expendable pieces of information about the family that have been rushed into print in recent years have included the reaction of the Duke of Bedford’s youngest son. Lord Rudolph Russell, when his brother took over Woburn.

Lord Rudolph claimed to have been kicked out of Woburn and took over a three-bedroomed topfloor flat at Charlton Park, the Wiltshire home of the Earl of Suffolk and Berkshire.

Meanwhile, the family business goes on losing money — $550,000 in 1981 — and the Marquis and Lady Tavistock go on doing their best to stem the tide. Near the staff entrance at Woburn is a sign saying: “The Abbey’s electricity bill for the past three months was £7288.07. Save it. Tavistock.”

The couple, who have said they now have a sense of duty towards Woburn rather than a great affection, say they will retain Woburn as long as the expenditure can be justified in their own consciences. The Duke of Bedford, warm in the balmier air of France, has never returned to Woburn to see what he left behind.