THE UNKNOWN SISTERS

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20060, 5 October 1939, Page 8

THE UNKNOWN SISTERS

BRITISH PRIME MINISTER PEACE FOR CHAMBERLAIN QUIET VILLAGE HOME Two tlnmble-shaped yew trees guard ponderously the door of the Misses Chamberlain’s house at Odiiiam, Hampshire, writes Constance Waller in the London Sunday Express. Tail fees throw dark shadows on the front windows, and the almost ecclesiastically quiet garden at the back is shielded by high walls. These two sisters of the Prime Minister rigorously cloister themselves away from the fierce light that has burned on the Chamberlain family for GO years. “There is enough limelight on other members of our family,” Miss Ida Chamberlain said with a chuckle. “We want to keep right out of it." Yet the family tradition ot service is so strong in them that they are among the leaders of Odiham's and Hampshire’s public life. When they went to Odiham during the war the village—once a market town with historic royal associations —was truly rural. Work For Women The Misses Chamberlain set to work and organised branches of the

Women’s Institute in Odiham and neighbouring Hartley Wintney. Miss Ida became president of one and Miss Hilda of the other. They built them up into a flourishing liveliness. Miss Hilda saw that the members were taught not to ape townswomen, but to become more efficient countrywomen. She taught them how to make full are of, their farms and kitchen gar* i dens in cooking, how to use local i ‘ materials for handicrafts, such as ■ 1 rushes for making baskets, j Then the Misses Chamberlain rent! red from office, but remained active members, for a typical, reason. ■' They thought that the institutes ( should not be carried on by influential i "ladies,” but by the ordinary mcm- ! bers themselves. ! | Two or three years ago Miss Hilda ' Chamberla.n evolved a scheme for • the financial organisation of the 1 National Federation of Women’s Ini slilutcs. The Chamberlain Will The executive committee turned it down—but they co-opted Miss Hilda , on to the commit'ce. ■ The next year they adopted the ■ scheme. . 1 "That was typical,” a local member 1 e" the institute said: “Once the Misses ' Chamberlain make up their minds on 1 , anything it is done. ! "They have tremendously strong ■ wills and wonderful heads for figures and facts. We all admire their ’budgeteering,' as we call it,”

Both sisters, Miss Ida especially, are intensely interested in Housing. Miss Ida has been a member of the Hartley Wintney Rural Council for 21 years. She is on the finance and general purposes, the housing and town planning, and the Odiham drain v. go commi t ees. She is an alderman of the Hamp-I shire County Council, and a member ~f the education, finance, public as : sUlance and public health and heus-' ing committees. She is on the Odiham sub-committee for old age pensions. Gave Houses Away Her views are strong. She believe' :.i progress and the rights of the human being to a full life. She disapproves of the they-only- ! '.mt-coals-in-the-batii attitude to hous ing improvement. Shortly after the war the sis'.ers built a row of workers’ houses and made a gift of them to ‘he rural district council on condition that the council never charged more than 5s a week rent. They bought a field, had it made into a recreation ground and presented it to the village. Their generosity is never hap: hazard and indiscriminating. Their work- for children, aeain, is 1 practical, not sentimental. They do not give Christmas parties where they could play the ladies Bountiful. They give of their brains and their time to education committees and local school management. Miss Hilda works hard at the infani welfare centre, and was once one of a deputation to Whitehall to ask the

Minister of Health for more milk for babies. She is on the Odiham Hospital Committee and on the committee of the District Nursing Assocaton. For some years the district nurse lived in ,i suiie of rooms in the Chamberlains' house. Patriotism Wins When the Government announced that an airdrome was to be built near Odiham they were upset and there was talk of their leaving the district. But the airdrome lias arrived and the Chamberlains are still thereworking for the proper housing of the ’drome workers. One or two people who felt the same way about the threatened airdrome lioped that the Chamberlain sisters would "use their influence” with brother Neville to have it diverted. That is not in the character of the Misses Chamberlain. They seldom see Neville nowadays, but they telephone him, especially to encourage him during crises. He has not been to stay, with them since he has been Prime Minister, but he used to go when he was Chancellor of the Exchequer. It is said that one of his Budgets was composed in the peace of their back garden. Usually a Cabinet Minister has a bodyguard of policemen when he goc: away. The police of Odiham were asked not to take any notice of Mr. Chamberlain’s visit. He wanted ti-o piete sanctuary of his sisters’ house.