A footnote to Ian Fleming's Oxfordshire

Earlier this month, the excellent Artistic Licence Renewed website published an article of mine about Ian Fleming's Oxfordshire. The piece takes readers on a tour of the places in the county closely associated with Fleming, including his grandparents' home of Joyce Grove in Nettlebed, and his childhood home of Braziers Park in Ipsden.

Another place worth visiting, though not mentioned in the article, is the Soldiers of Oxfordshire Museum in Woodstock. The museum tells the story of two Oxfordshire regiments, the Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry and the Queen's Own Oxfordshire Hussars. It is this latter regiment that may of interest to Fleming aficionados, because it was the regiment in which Valentine Fleming, Ian's father, served.

Valentine Fleming had enlisted in the yeomanry regiment by the time he had been elected Conservative member of parliament for the Henley Division of South Oxfordshire in 1910. He was in good company; his friend and fellow officer in the Hussars was Winston Churchill. Just four years later, Britain was at war, and in August 1914 the regiment headed to Flanders on the Western Front. Tragically, Major Valentine Fleming was killed in May 1917 while in command of a squadron of Hussars who were defending their position at Gillemont Farm against two companies of German infantry.

The Soldiers of Oxfordshire Museum, which is situated in the grounds of the Oxfordshire Museum, has a display about Valentine Fleming's role in the Queen's Own Oxfordshire Hussars, and his sons, including Ian, are mentioned too. Incidentally, the museum is a stone's throw from Blenheim Palace, which was the home of Winston Churchill, and latterly doubled for the headquarters of Spectre in the latest Bond film.

Speaking of Winston Churchill, the Second World War leader is given a starring role in Peter Fleming's witty novella, The Flying Visit (1940), which imagines Hitler parachuting into England to appeal to the people, but being thwarted by a hard-of-hearing villager, a fancy dress party, and a toilet cubicle. As with his brother Ian, Peter Fleming had nothing but admiration for Churchill, and in this book, Churchill is naturally decisive and suitably pragmatic.

I mentioned in my tour of Fleming's Oxfordshire article that while Ian Fleming knew south Oxfordshire intimately, the county makes only the most fleeting appearances in the Bond books. This is in contrast to Fleming's other haunts in London, Kent and Jamaica, which became important locations in James Bond's adventures.

Peter Fleming does not ignore his home county, with The Flying Visit being set mainly around the hills above Henley, a location that takes in Nettlebed, where Peter lived throughout much of his life. Hitler lands near the hamlet of Bix, which neighbours Nettlebed, and there is a reference to Huntercombe, where Peter's grandmother, Kate, as well as Ian, played golf. And it is not difficult to imagine that the fictional village of Fidney, through which Hitler stumbles, owes something to Nettlebed itself. The Flying Visit is well worth a read.

References:

Eddershaw, D, 1998 The story of the Oxfordshire Yeomanry, the Queen's Own Oxfordshire Hussars, 1798–1998, Oxfordshire Yeomanry Trust
Lycett, A, 1995 Ian Fleming: the man behind James Bond, Turner

Did Ian Fleming base Goldfinger's house on Joyce Grove?

Joyce Grove in Nettlebed, Oxfordshire, was the home of Ian Fleming's grandparents, Robert and Kate Fleming. Nettlebed isn't too far away from me, and so I thought I'd drive there to see if I could get view of the house, now a hospice run by the Sue Ryder charity. As it happened, the charity was hosting a public flea market or table-top sale in its grounds, and so I was able to freely wander about the grounds and take a good look at the outside of the house that Ian Fleming visited during his childhood.

The front gate and drive of Joyce Grove

The original late 17th-century house of Joyce Grove was demolished by Robert Fleming when he acquired the estate in 1903, and a new Gothic-style mansion was erected in its place by the following year. In later years, the young Ian Fleming would visit, and for a time after the death of his father, Valentine, he and his brothers had the run of a wing of the house during weekends. Robert died in 1933, and the estate passed to his widow Kate. On her death in 1937, the estate went to Robert's surviving sons. The house was then given to St Mary's Hospital, Paddington, and subsequently became a nursing home, a role that it continues today.

The house of Joyce Grove

From the outside, the house bears little obvious sign of once being occupied by the Flemings. Apparently the family motto, 'Let the deed shaw', is inscribed on the wall, but I couldn't see it. However, I did spot the legend, 'R.1904.F' (RF = Robert Fleming), which is carved into the stone above a window looking out to the terrace.

Robert Fleming built Joyce Grove in 1904

As with many of his experiences, Ian Fleming's time at Joyce Grove seeped into the James Bond novels, albeit in a small way. In The Spy Who Loved Me, Vivienne Michel's first boyfriend, Derek, gives a false Nettlebed address to the cinema manager, who had caught him and Vivienne in flagrante in the auditorium (chapter 3).

When I saw the house, though, I was reminded of another Bond novel – Goldfinger. Ian Fleming describes Goldfinger's house, The Grange, as “a heavy, ugly, turn-of-the-century mansion”, with a drive bordered by “high Victorian evergreens” that led to a “gravel sweep” in front of the house.” Fleming also mentions an adjoining factory where the “stabling and garages would normally be” (chapter 10). The details aren't an exact match – The Grange has a “glass-encased portico” which Joyce Grove lacks – but Fleming could otherwise be describing the house he knew as a child. Today I walked down the evergreen-bordered drive which terminated in front of the imposing (I wouldn't necessarily say ugly) turn-of-the-century mansion. The stables and garages were there too.

View from the terrace

I can't be certain that Fleming had Joyce Grove in mind when he described Goldfinger's house, but it is not impossible. In any case, I enjoyed visiting (in a more leisurely way than I had anticipated) a place of Fleming history.

Reference
Lycett, A, 1995 Ian Fleming: The man behind James Bond, Turner