A new book reveals how the cost of war, death duties and the burden of income tax forced many aristocratic families ot sell their stately homes after the First World War
Wilton House in Wiltshire. Lord Pembroke sold 8,400 acres of the estate during the first world war. Photo: Alamy
The Telegraph - 15 Feb 2015
In May 1918, after thinking long and hard, George Herbert realised he had little choice but to sell much of the furniture at his home in Bretby, Derbyshire.
A few years later Maud Alice Burke took the equally painful, if slightly less desperate measure, of selling her jewels and replacing them with costume pieces.
But George was not an unemployed miner or factory worker facing destitution. And Maud was not an impoverished middle-class widow.
They were in fact Lord Carnarvon and Lady Cunard, members of Britain’s titled aristocracy, which for generations had enjoyed untold wealth thanks to the country’s economic strength and the fruits of the largest empire in history.
But their severely reduced circumstances reflected those of many upper class families in the years that followed World War One.
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