SEATED BESIDE
I’m sure she would have enjoyed conversations with all her table companions: a friendly chat with the successful Eleanor Farjeon, tales of America from Harriet of Philadelphia, and perhaps some interesting observations on the role of criticism in literature from Richard. Herself, although the youngest and not always confident, hopefully full of spark and ready for debate. This may have been heady company.
WHAT’S ON HER MIND?
Another opportunity to hear Sir Norman Angell talk in a different setting, and a great chance to meet many more of the high achievers of her time in a relaxing environment.
BARBARA’S STORY SO FAR
Barbara was born Phyllis Barbara Hayes on 17th October 1910, baptised 27th November 1910, her parents living at 87 Abbotts Road, Southall at the 1911 census, the daughter of Helene Jacoby (1.7.1875 – 1968 ) and William Hayes, (1883 – 1969) carriage builder.[3] Her mother Helene was the daughter of the German born (Altona, Hamburg?) violin musician Martin Jacoby and his partly deaf Paddington born wife Laura Jane Turner (herself the daughter of a horse dealer). Her paternal grandfather was also a carriage builder, the family coming from Lancashire and Lincolnshire.
Barbara took a diploma at the LSE and in the year before the dinner resumed as Angell’s secretary. She was a political person with a commitment to progressive causes, which Angell respected. She was secretary of the Labour Association for the London University seat and would have strongly disproved if her “uncle” had left the party. She also became co-secretary of her local LNU youth group in Finchley where she lived with her parents William and Helene (at Bredon, Finchley).
WHAT BARBARA DID NEXT
Sir Norman moved to the US during WW2 and in 1941 Barbara was appointed Head of the Speaker’s Section of the British Library of Information in New York.[4]
Barbara was awarded an M.B.E.. Later she and John Jacoby (I presume her cousin John Martin Jacoby) created a memorial to Norman Angell in Haslemere but she did not attend the unveiling as she was becoming unstable. Barbara died aged 75 on 12th June 1986 at the Arthur Rank Hospice, Cambridge and was buried in Saffron Walden.
BACK TO TABLE 11
[1] Martin Ceadel, Living the Great Illusion: Sir Norman Angell, 1872-1967 OUP Oxford, 16th July 2009
[2] British Newspaper Archive The Tatler 16.10.1935 p12 ©Illustrated London News/Mary Evans
[3] Phyllis Barbara Hayes, Find a Grave
[4] Robert Calder, Beware the British Serpent: The Role of Writers in British Propaganda in the United States, 1939-1945, McGill-Queen’s Press, MQUP, 2004, page 65
[5] British Newspaper Archive The Tatler 16.10.1935 p12 ©Illustrated London News/Mary Evans
The Dinner Puzzle 