A 'Swenglish' journey through family photos, notes and postcards
from the early 20th century.

2022-03-10

Oakhill, Stockholm, 1921 - Sepia Saturday 612

 


Above is one of the rare photos in Gerda's photo album that is marked with both place and date. 

When I first started going through her photos, years ago, I still had difficulties identifying the place though. From the name Oakhill, in English, and knowing that she had lived in America, and had worked as travelling lady's maid, I assumed it must be somewhere in America. It turned out to be from much closer to home, though: This Oakhill is actually situated in Stockholm, Sweden. The English name goes way back to the early 19th century, when there was another building on the hill, serving as summer residence for a British diplomat, Sir Thomas Baker. 

Oakhill, Stockholm, April 2013
Photo by Holger Ellgaard
Wikimedia Commons

See more photos from Oakhill at 
 
https://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oakhill 

The Oakhill we see here was built in 1910 as a palace for the Swedish Prince Wilhelm and his wife, the Russian princess Maria Pavlovna. It was designed by the architect Frederic Boberg and had 40 rooms. However, the royal couple got divorced already in 1914, and moved out of the palace. Since 1926 it has been been home to the Italian Embassy in Stockholm. 

The Swedish Wikipedia article about Oakhill says that between 1914-1926, the palace stood empty for a while and then "in the mid 1920s" was rented out to Ira Nelson Morris. Looking up him, I found that he was "an American author and diplomat appointed the United States Minister to Sweden, serving from 1914 to 1923."  - Which in my opinion makes it more likely that Oakhill was rented by Morris during (part of) that period rather than the "mid" 1920s.

Ira Nelson Morris was married to Constance Lily Rothschild, daughter of the wealthy American businessman Victor Henry Rothschild. The couple had two children, Constance Irene Morris and Ira Victor Morris, born 1903 in Chicago. The son became an author, and has his own Wikipedia article as well, confirming that he was raised abroad in Sweden. 

[Why were people so keen on naming their offspring after themselves? It's so confusing!!]

Under the heading 'Personal Life' in the article about Ira Nelson Morris, there is also this note: "In 1921, while sailing to New York, on the Scandinavian-American liner United States, Morris saved the life of 19-year-old Ellen Neilson, of Brooklyn, in mid-ocean, when she was nearly washed overboard." (In honour of that, he later got a ship named after him - SS Ira Nelson Morris - in 1944, a couple of years after his death.)

Now, where does my great-aunt Gerda come into the picture?
Is she just out on a walk, posing for the camera with this impressive building as background? 

No, the connection goes a bit deeper than that. 

In the list of Gerda's work certificates that I received years ago from a relative (Bengt W, grandson of another of Gerda's sisters), the next one (after Lyon, France, 1919), is dated 20/5 1921, and "written on stationery from Oakhill, Djurgården [Stockholm], by someone with illegible signature, about to return to the United States".  

Adding one thing to another, my conclusion is that after Gerda returned to Sweden in the autumn of 1919, her next employment (until 20 May 1921) was as lady's maid to Mrs Morris (born Constance Lily Rothschild) at Oakhill. 

Wondering how best to connect the content of this post to this week's Sepia Saturday prompt, I extended my searches about Mrs Morris a bit further still, and guess what I found? 

The perfect transition to this week's Sepia prompt:


(click on the logo to get to the website)





Oakhill, Stockholm, 1921 – Sepia Saturday 612 
Sammanfattning på svenska

Fotot på Gerda vid Oakhill 1921 är ett av mycket få foton i hennes album som är märkt med både plats, årtal och namn.

När jag först började gå igenom Gerdas foton så hade jag ändå svårt att identifiera platsen för den här bilden. På grund av det engelska namnet, och med vetskapen att hon både bott i Amerika och arbetat som 'resande' kammarjungfru, så utgick jag först från att det måste vara från någonstans i USA. Jag tror det var först när jag (för ett antal år sedan) fick en lista över hennes anställningar, som min släkting Bengt W sammanställt, som jag upptäckte att detta Oakhill ligger i Stockholm. Sedan 1926 hyser det den italienska ambassaden – men det var ingenting jag kände till. 

Nu har jag äntligen tittat lite närmare på förhistorien, och vem Gerda egentligen arbetade för på Oakhill.

Namnet Oakhill går tillbaka till tidigt 1800-tal, då det låg ett annat hus på kullen, som användes som sommarresidens av en brittisk diplomat, Sir Thomas Baker. Palatset som ses på fotona här i inlägget byggdes 1910 som bröllopsgåva till prins Wilhelm och hans maka, den ryska prinsessan Maria Pavlovna. Det ritades av arkitekten Frederic Boberg och hade 40 rum. Prinsparet skilde sig dock redan 1914 och flyttade då därifrån. Enligt den svenska Wikipedia-artikeln stod huset tomt ett tag men hyrdes sedan, i ”mitten av 1920-talet”, ut till det ”amerikanska sändebudet” Ira Nelson Morris, innan det 1926 såldes till italienska staten för att användas som ambassad.

När jag läser vidare om Ira Nelson Morris finner jag att han var ”United States Minister to Sweden” mellan 1914-1923. Det verkar därför troligt att det var under (del av?) denna period som han hyrde Oakhill (snarare än ”mitten” av 20-talet). 

Ira Nelson Morris var gift med Constance Lily Rothschild, dotter till den förmögne amerikanske affärsmannen Victor Henry Rothschild. Paret hade två barn, Constance Irene Morris och Ira Victor Morris, född 1903 i Chicago. Sonen blev senare författare, och har en egen Wikipedia-artikel (på engelska).

I artikeln om Ira Nelson Morris finns också en notis om att han 1921, på en båtresa till Amerika, räddade livet på en ung flicka som höll på att falla överbord. Till minne av detta fick Morris senare (ett par år efter sin död) en annan atlantångare uppkallad efter sig (SS Ira Nelson Morris).

Hur kommer nu Gerda in i bilden? Jo, i hennes meritlista finns alltså ett anställningsbetyg från 20/5 1921, skrivet på officiellt brevpapper från Oakhill, av (enligt BW) oläsligt namn, ”som skall återvända till USA”.

Lägger jag ihop alla pusselbitar så innebär detta, att efter att Gerda återvände till Sverige (från Frankrike) hösten 1919,  så var hennes nästa anställning som kammarjungfru till  ”Mrs Ira Nelson Morris” (född Constance Irene Rothschild), fram till 20/5 1921. (Även om Ira Nelson Morris var anställd i Sverige ända fram till 1923 så bekräftas ju också en resa till USA 1921 av händelsen ombord på båten.) 

Ytterligare några sökningar resulterade i att jag även hittade ett porträtt av Mrs Ira Nelson Morris med hennes två barn, målat 1911 av en spansk konstnär. (En ganska perfekt matchning till inspirationsbilden från Sepia Saturday 612, av en okänd mor med två barn). 

Länkar till diverse web-sidor där jag hämtat info och bilder finns inbäddade i den engelska texten.


7 comments:

  1. How interesting...so glad you found that Gerda was working in Oakhill! Which just brings it all together!

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    1. Thanks Barbara. It's always satisfying when one manages to find clues that actually lead somewhere :)

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  2. A perfect connection. Isn't it fun when your research leads you right where you need to go! :) I called a friend for the first time, once, asking for him by his given name and the response from whoever answered asked if I wished to speak to the 1st, 2nd, or 3rd? "Uh . . . the 3rd?" I guessed. Luckily, I was right. My son and his wife didn't want a "2nd" so they simply turned his first and middle names around which was perfectly possible to do. I thought that was pretty smart. A really nice photo of Gerda. I hope her story will yet continue for a while? I feel like I'm just getting to know her. :)

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    1. Thanks LaN. Yes, I still have more to follow up about Gerda. I have clues about her next employments as well, even if there is a gap when it comes to written postcards from the 1920s. And then there are a few more postcards from the 1930s (which may in turn inspire me to reexamine things blogged about more randomly in the past). I'll try to proceed chronologically for a while yet (maybe also with a glance to Gustaf, my grandmother and the others at the farm now and then).

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  3. Wow! That's impressive detective work to uncover the true story behind such an innocent photo, Monica. Just solving the mysterious name "Oakhill" must have been especially rewarding. Even before I got to the end of your story as I followed your links I began to speculate on Gerda's connection to Mrs. Morris. Picking up that stationary clue is very clever. now I'm wondering if there might be a connection between Mrs. Morris and Gerda's previous employer during the war. I imagine that high society ladies often traded trusted servants, especially when traveling to foreign places where someone with Gerda's language skills would be valuable.

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    1. Mike, I did make the discovery about the location of Oakhill already back in 2014. It made me change a sentence in a blog post where I'd used the photo in another context (snow theme) - 400 Sepia Saturdays ago! (SS 212). But it's not until now that I managed to dig deeper and find out who it must have been that she worked for there. I've had the same thought as you about recommendations from one employer to another no doubt being important in her 'career' more than once.

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  4. The perfect picture for the theme and congrats on connecting all the dots for Gerda. So satisfying.

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