DLA166-0018  Transcription

3, PALACE GATE, W. 8.

10th Sept. 1918.

Dear Sir Charles,

I am writing to you what my husband had not the opportunity to tell you about himself today.

He is of Jewish parentage. Since he was quite a youth, he lived mostly away from Hungary in pursuit of his art & mainly amongst Christians. When a student in Munich he lived there with a religious family & ultimately joined the Church of Rome.

On our marriage he promised my mother^[1] that in case of children, they should be brought up as protestants.

When we lived in Vienna, we saw much of the British Embassy Chaplain^[2] there & he decided to join the Protestant church. It was a

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nominal change. In reality my husband is no great believer either in priests or clergymen the outward form of religion matters to him little, but he is a reader of & believer in the Bible & Teachings of Christ.

I don’t suppose you can ever know from him half I know of the splendid son he was to his mother & helper in supporting his family. She, his mother^[3] was a most gifted and noble woman, who had a hard struggle to bring up her children, impoverished as they were by the do-less life & selfishness of his father.^[4]

My husband’s great passion in life has been work. In his brilliant successes he has never forgotten his family.

I need not add more now.

Yours very sincerely,

Lucy M. de László

Editorial Note:

Mrs Philip de László, née Lucy Madeleine Guinness (1870-1950), the artist’s wife; for biographical notes, see [11474].

StdeL

08/09/2023