Enid On Holiday

[Aunt Fanny]

I hope this has not been asked before--I could not see any previous question on this subject.
I would love to know a bit more about where Enid travelled.
I think she went to Scotland or the Lake District for her honeymoon, and of course ,Dorset for many holidays.
However, when did she go to Jersey and the USA? Was the latter for work, and how did this tie in with her writing please?
Also, I heard she may have gone to Ramsgate?
Anyway, it would, I think help to know a little more about her visits and fit them into the whole picture of her life. Thank you, Aunt Fanny.

[Anita Bensoussane]

However, when did she go to Jersey and the USA? Was the latter for work, and how did this tie in with her writing please?

Enid and Hugh Pollock went to Jersey for their honeymoon in 1924. During the early years of their marriage, "Most Easters were spent by the sea in Sussex and their two weeks in the summer a little further afield - though never outside the British Isles." They went to the Isle of Wight several times, with Dorothy Richards accompanying them at least once. It was while on holiday with Dorothy (and Dorothy's sister Betty) at Budleigh Salterton, Devon, in the spring of 1941, that Enid became attracted to Kenneth Darrell Waters (Barbara Stoney's Biography). Stoney also mentions holidays in Seaford and Felpham in Sussex with Mabel Attenborough (in 1924, prior to Hugh and Enid's marriage).

Barbara Stoney tells us that Kenneth and Enid only went abroad together once, "and that was in the late autumn of 1948, when they joined friends for a three-week semi-business holiday in New York, sailing out on the Queen Elizabeth and back on the Queen Mary." Mystery Island (the American title for The Island of Adventure) had won an award "and her New York publishers used the occasion of her visit to introduce her to booksellers, librarians and reviewers at a large cocktail party given in her honour." Apparently, "The American Press, generally, was not as tactful or as kind to Enid as their British counterparts had been up to then and the holiday was not altogether a success." Enid Blyton dispensed with her New York agent on the spot. She was impressed by American business efficiency but was "deeply shocked" by "the pace and toughness of the American scene generally".

Stoney also mentions Enid's visit to Annecy in France in 1913, to stay with her French teacher Mlle. Louise Bertraine.

[Aunt Fanny]

Thank you Anita--that was quick! Fantastic mine of information as always

[Anita Bensoussane]

Don't know whether you saw, but I edited my post to include some holidays with Dorothy Richards and Mabel Attenborough. I also meant to say that The Queen Elizabeth Family (1951) was obviously inspired by Enid's New York trip.

[Katharine]

Don't forget her time at Seckford Hall in Woodbridge and the fact that she trained in Ipswich as a teacher. She also apparently cycled from Woodbridge to Felixstowe according to the biography.

Woodbridge and Felixstowe are pleasant enough to have inspired some of her writing although I can't say I've ever noticed any particular influence. Can't say there's much to write about in Ipswich, although of course it was a lot different nearly 100 years ago.

[Tony Summerfield]

I think that you will find that before Dorset became a favourite destination Enid spent a number of holidays in the Isle of Wight.

[Aunt Fanny]

Thank you, I did not know. I feel a "challenge Anita" coming on!
It would be lovely to see an article about Enid's holiday destinations from childhood, through when she was teaching to her marriages.
It would really add to , dare I say, the Big Picture"?

[Anita Bensoussane]

I feel a "challenge Anita" coming on! It would be lovely to see an article about Enid's holiday destinations from childhood, through when she was teaching to her marriages.

It might be nice to bring all that information together into one article, Liz, but to be honest I wouldn't have anything to add to what can already be read in books like Barbara Stoney's Biography, Imogen Smallwood's A Childhood at Green Hedges and the books by Viv Endecott and Andrew Norman about Enid Blyton in Dorset. Such an article would best be written by someone who has access to Blyton letters and photos (if any previously unpublished ones exist), and who is familiar with at least some of the places Enid visited.

[Aunt Fanny]

Your post was really helpful, so no worries--please do you know whereabouts in Sussex they stayed, likewise Jersey and the Isle of Wight? Will leave it now and thanks again.

[Anita Bensoussane]

Barbara Stoney says that Enid spent the Easter of 1924 with Mabel Attenborough and Hugh Pollock at Seaford on the Sussex coast. In July of the same year, Enid joined Mabel at Felpham and Hugh stayed with them over the weekend.

In the early years of their marriage, Hugh and Enid spent Easter holidays by the sea in Sussex but Barbara doesn't say where.

About Jersey, Barbara writes, "Her [Enid's] honeymoon appears to have been spent in Jersey, for shortly afterwards she wrote two articles for Teachers World - 'La Corbiere' and 'Dawn at Sea' - which described incidents on holiday." That's interesting, as Enid said in a letter to Trevor Bolton that Kirrin Island, castle and village had been inspired by somewhere she had visited in Jersey.

In 1933, Hugh was sick and he and Enid took a few weeks' holiday in Scotland, sending baby Gillian and her nurse to a residential nursery in London.

In 1934 Enid and her family rented a furnished house for the summer, at Seaview on the Isle of Wight. The following year they again "took a house on the Isle of Wight for a month's holiday in the summer. This time there was added excitement as it coincided with the Jubilee Review of the Fleet at Spithead, which gave her yet another topic for her page." And in 1936 they went to the Isle of Wight again, this time accompanied by Dorothy Richards. On that holiday, Enid recorded going on a picnic to Alum Bay.

By the way, I don't think we've mentioned Enid and Hugh's cruise in October 1930 to France, Portugal, Madeira, Morocco, the Canary Islands and Spain on the Stella Polaris - a voyage which Enid drew upon when writing The Pole Star Family and The Ship of Adventure (both 1950).

[Moonraker]

Barbara Stoney says that Enid spent the Easter of 1924 with Mabel Attenborough and Hugh Pollock at Seaford on the Sussex coast...

I wonder if they bumped into Eddie....?

[Aunt Fanny]

Great, thanks, job done, Anita!
It is especially interesting to see how the trips influenced her stories

[Tony Summerfield]

Barbara Stoney says that Enid spent the Easter of 1924 with Mabel Attenborough and Hugh Pollock at Seaford on the Sussex coast. In July of the same year, Enid joined Mabel at Felpham and Hugh stayed with them over the weekend.

This thread has inspired me to look out a 'From My Window' from May 1924 - 'Sussex Downs' - possibly written over the visit to Seaford period. I hope to squeeze it into the next Journal, space allowing.

[Aunt Fanny]

bOh yes please Tony! Wonderful! Had not realised this was written in /about Sussex.

[Anita Bensoussane]

This thread has inspired me to look out a 'From My Window' from May 1924 - 'Sussex Downs' - possibly written over the visit to Seaford period. I hope to squeeze it into the next Journal, space allowing.

Sounds good to me! Thanks, Tony. The Jersey articles for Teachers World might also be of interest sometime if you've got them - 'La Corbiere' and 'Dawn at Sea'. I wonder whether it's possible to glean any clues from them about the inspiration for Kirrin Island?