Loan 96 RLF 4/30

Contains records of the Literary Fund Anniversary Dinners held between 1936 and 1939. Several of these files are a great deal less complete than those for previous years. The records are organised by year. For 1936, there are two folders, the first containing documents relating to that year’s dinner, principally administrative papers and ephemera such as tickets, toast lists and table plans, and the second containing correspondence. For 1937, 1938 and 1939, there are single folders containing the documents present for that year. The 1939 folder also contains copies of a letter on the cessation of dinners during WWII. The contents of the individual folders are summarised below.

1936 (Chairman: Edward Frederick Lindley Wood, Viscount Halifax):

1: Appeals for funds from Edward Frederick Lindley Wood, Viscount Halifax (with draft); notice of dinner; stewards’ invitation; honorary invitation cards; reminder notices; dinner tickets; steward’s tickets; plans of the tables; transcripts of the speeches (speakers: Viscount Halifax, Harry Stuart Goodhart-Rendell, Helen Simpson, St John Greer Ervine).

2: Correspondence, including letters from Hugh John Cole Marshall, Edward Verrall Lucas, David Alexander Edward Lindsay (Earl of Crawford and Balcarres), the Manager of the Hotel Victoria, C J C A Hendriks (for Viscount Halifax), E M Delafield and the Acting Roumanian Charge D’Affaires.

1937 (Chairman: Victor Alexander George Robert Bulwer-Lytton, Earl of Lytton):

1: Plan of tables; alphabetised letters relating the dinner, including correspondence from Hugh John Cole Marshall, Laura Bell, [?] Anley, S A Alexander, George & Allen Unwin Limited, R A Austin Leigh, the Brazilian Ambassador, Hector Bolitho, Ethel Boileau, [?] Bigge, Ethel Lyon Bowley, Edith McKinnell (for Blackwood & Sons), Percy Bates, Cecil Briggs, Lucy R Bentley, Chartres Biron, Walter Bentley, E H Burn, Elsie B Briggs, Sir Edgar R Bowring, the Belgian Ambassador, Samuel Augustine Courtauld, Alice E Cooper, Curtis Brown, Hugh R Dent, Mary Corfield, Mrs Alfred Clark, the Chilean Ambassador, R F Cholmeley, W A R Collins, J F Chance, Phyllis Neale (for Jonathan Cape), Dorothy L Cole, the News Editor of the Daily Telegraph, Louis Downy, Walter John de la Mare, [?] Davies, George Geoffrey Dawson, Mary Fletcher, Stanley Ford, C W Stewart (for Faber & Faber), William Alfred Westropp Foyle, Ada Galsworthy, Lord Gorell, Sir Alexander Gibb, Philip Guedalla, Jocelyn Gibb, E S P Haynes, Elizabeth Hawkins, Margaret Holmes, Hodder & Stoughton Limited, Gertrude Hull (for Alexander L Howard), Maurice Healy, Charles Henry St John Hornby, Susanna S A Howell, C P Hawks, J A Hammerton, C S Evans (for William Heinemann), Alexander L Howard, the Hungarian Minister, Cecil F S Jennings, Lord Ilchester, E V Knox, Galloway Kyle, Sir Clement Kinloch-Cooke, the Countess of Lytton, Edward Verrell Lucas, Lord Augustus Loftus, [?] Lafone, Lady Leconfield, Walter R Lawrence, W Lints Smith, G A Lockett, Lady Emily Lutyens, Lady Leslie, Sir Edward Marsh, Frederick Muller, J G Heath (for Violet Markham), Messrs Methuen & Co, John Murray, Gertrude Simmanel (for Dougal O Malcolm), R H Mottram, Sir Robert Mond, William Babbington Maxwell, Augustus Millard, Roland Heath (for Macmillan & Co), Violet Markham, Lord Macmillan, Rose Macaulay, Sir Frank Newnes, E Phillips Oppenheim, D R Spendlove (for the Press Association), the Polish Ambassador, A D Power, Charles Pendlebury, Sir David Prain, William H Quarrell, Edna Purdie, Mabel A Plender, C Arthur Pearson, Lord Plender, G R Y Radcliffe, Kilham Roberts, Frank Ratcliffe, Juliet Reckitt, H O Serpell, Lord Strickland, Nora K Strange, Rafael Sabatini, F E Storrs, the Times, G A K Thomson, Christopher Turnor, George Titman, G Herbert Thring, Gladys Scott Thomas, W F Turner, Oscar V Viney, H S E Vanderpant, Gabriel Wells, Alec Waugh, John Walter, Lady Walston and Herbert George Wells.

1938: (Chairman: His Royal Highness Prince George, Duke of Kent)

1: Appeals for funds from David Alexander Edward Lindsay (Earl of Crawford and Balcarres); notices of dinner; stewards’ invitation cards; honorary invitation cards; reminder notices; dinner tickets; steward’s tickets; plan of the tables; list for committee meeting; letters from the Lord Mayor’s Private Secretary and Hugh John Cole Marshall (to the Times).

1939: (Chairman: Neville Chamberlain, the Prime Minister)

1: Notices of the dinner; plan of tables; letters on the cessation of dinners during the Second World War.