Dear Dame
Here's a rather nice recollection of Charles Cadogan....
In the middle 1950's my aunt was living in a Cadogan Place flat.
Her husband was a bomber pilot shot down and killed in Libya. Money was tight. One day she received a visit from the estate's agent(in those days the London estate was run as if it were the country estate )
The purpose of the visit was to inform my aunt that Lord Cadogan was 'worried about his war widows' and wanted her to renew her lease for a nominal sum.
With kind regards,
'redacted'
What a star.
ReplyDeleteAnd he set up Cadogan Hall when he could have made much more dosh redeveloping it
Cadogan Hall is an amazing place. Ticket prices are not too bad.
DeleteThe old fashioned paternalism recounted by the Dame's correspondent has had its day - more's the pity. Paternalism used to be a significant aspect of Conservatism and Fabianism.
ReplyDeleteThatcherism put paid to paternalism for the Tories- greed, profit maximisation and self interest became the order of the day.
The hard left is wedded to dogma and theory and thinks all that the problems of the proles will be over with collective ownership and control of the means of production.
While we should all be grateful for the excellent development of Cadogan Hall lets not get dewey eyed about the paternalism of the great london property estates . It is entirely due to them that the UK still has our completely unjust and stultifying Freehold/ Leasehold system . As gracious as the great estates try to appear- any time meaningful reform is proposed in this area they fight like cats in a sack
DeleteI imagine most of the very rich residents of Cadogan have either ganged together to buy freeholds or extended their leases. If Cadogan were forced by legislation to abandon leases you can be certain they would sell up and we would welcome a Middle Easter owner with the horrors that would unleash. Be very careful what you wish for.
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