1. Diana, Lady Mosley, known as Diana Guinness between 1929 and 1936, was a British fascist aristocrat, writer, and editor.
38 Facts About Diana Mosley
1. 2.
Diana Mosley was one of the Mitford sisters and the wife of Oswald Mosley, leader of the British Union of Fascists.
3.
Diana Mosley was initially married to Bryan Guinness, heir to the barony of Moyne, and both were part of the Bright Young Things, a social group of young Bohemian socialites in 1920s London.
4.
Diana Mosley's marriage ended in divorce as she was pursuing a relationship with Oswald Mosley.
5.
Diana Mosley later moved to Paris and enjoyed some success as a writer.
6.
Diana Mosley was a regular book reviewer for Books and Bookmen and later at The Evening Standard in the 1990s.
7.
Diana Mosley was described by obituary writers such as the historian Andrew Roberts as "unrepentant" about her previous political associations.
8.
Diana Mosley Mitford was the fourth child and third daughter of David Freeman-Mitford, 2nd Baron Redesdale, and his wife Sydney.
9.
Diana Mosley was a first cousin once removed of Clementine Churchill, second cousin of Sir Angus Ogilvy, and first cousin, twice removed, of Bertrand Russell.
10.
Diana Mosley was raised in the country estate of Batsford Park, Gloucestershire, then from the age of 10 at the family home, Asthall Manor in Oxfordshire, and later at Swinbrook House, a home her father had built in the nearby village of Swinbrook.
11.
Diana Mosley was educated at home by a series of governesses, except for a six-month period in 1926, when she was sent to a day school in Paris.
12.
Diana Mosley's parents were opposed to the engagement but in time were persuaded; Sydney was particularly uneasy at the thought of two such young people having possession of such a large fortune, but she was eventually convinced Bryan was a suitable husband.
13.
Diana Mosley was one of a series of society beauties photographed as classical figures by Madame Yevonde.
14.
In February 1932, Diana met Sir Oswald Mosley at a garden party at the home of the society hostess Emerald Cunard.
15.
Diana Mosley soon became leader of the newly formed British Union of Fascists and Diana became his lover; Mosley was then married to Lady Cynthia Mosley, a daughter of Lord Curzon, a former Viceroy of India, and his first wife, the American mercantile heiress Mary Victoria Leiter.
16.
Diana Mosley was devastated by the death of his wife, but later started an affair with her younger sister, Lady Alexandra Metcalfe.
17.
Deborah eventually came to know Diana Mosley and ended up liking him very much.
18.
The couple rented Wootton Lodge, a country house in Staffordshire that Diana Mosley had intended to buy.
19.
Diana Mosley furnished much of her new home with much of the Swinbrook furniture that her father was selling.
20.
In 1934, Diana Mosley visited Germany with her then 19-year-old sister Unity.
21.
Diana Mosley became well acquainted with Winifred Wagner and Magda Goebbels.
22.
Mosley and Diana had two sons: Alexander Mosley was born on 1938 and and Max Rufus Mosley.
23.
Diana Mosley told Lawley that she had not believed the extermination of Jews by Nazi Germany until "years" after the war, and that she thought the official death figure of six million Jewish victims was too high.
24.
Diana Mosley convalesced at Chatsworth House, the residence of her sister Deborah.
25.
Diana Mosley attended the funeral of Rene de Chambrun, the son-in-law of Vichy France Prime Minister Pierre Laval, in 2002.
26.
Diana Mosley was shunned in the British media for a period after the war, and the couple established their own publishing company, Euphorion Books, named after a character in Goethe's Faust.
27.
Diana Mosley provided articles, book reviews, and regular diary entries.
28.
Diana Mosley reviewed autobiographical and biographical accounts as well as the occasional novel.
29.
Diana Mosley wrote the foreword and introduction of Nancy Mitford: A Memoir by Harold Acton.
30.
Diana Mosley produced her own two books of memoirs: A Life of Contrasts, and Loved Ones.
31.
Diana Mosley was buried at St Mary's Churchyard, Swinbrook, Oxfordshire, alongside her sisters.
32.
Diana Mosley was survived by her four sons: Jonathan and Desmond Guinness, and Alexander and Max Mosley.
33.
Diana Mosley's stepson Nicholas Mosley was a novelist who wrote a critical memoir of his father for which Mosley reportedly never forgave him, despite their previously close relationship.
34.
Diana Mosley was to blame for everything, and I say that as someone who approved of him.
35.
Wilson wrote for the same newspaper and said that her public loyalty for Oswald and Hitler were disastrous mistakes, claiming that privately Diana Mosley had admitted that the Nazis were "really rather awful".
36.
Diana Mosley described Mosley's unwavering allegiance to Hitler and fascism as that of "a silly kid".
37.
Diana Mosley inspired the protagonist of the 2018 novel After the Party by Cressida Connolly.
38.
Diana Mosley is portrayed extensively in the sixth and final season of Peaky Blinders by Amber Anderson.