The Trust's duty
From Mrs Margot K. M. Crosse Sir: I read Yvonne Brock's letter (November 25) with a sense of shock and deep sadness, and was amazed this week to find that the National Trust had not seen fit to make any comment in your columns.
I am a covenanted member of the Trust, and have known Montacute well over the last eleven years. When I first found that I could no longer enter this Stately Home by the logical way, i.e. the front door, but had to go through the Shop, resisting the teatowels and pressurisation, I had deep misgivings. Such a lived-in place as Montacute, with its historical treasures displayed so lovingly in this perfect small setting, should never have been the target for commercialisation. One just cannot understand how faithful and devoted custodians, over a period of thirteen years, could have been so shabbily treated, or how such an imaginative concern (as the National Trust was at its inception) could have sunk so low, and abandoned so Many of its ideals. When the Trust has worked out some sort of an answer to Mrs Brock's article, it will indeed be interesting to read their " explanation. '
Margot K. M. Crosse Steps Hayne, 17 Church Steps, Crewkerne, Somerset
From Mrs Gordon H. McN. Shelford Sir: Yvonne Brock's article in your issue of November 24 must have caused a great deal of anxiety as to what extent the National Trust Still regards itself as having a duty to fulfil the wishes of the original owners of the properties it administers. It is astonishing that it has so far made no move either to refute the charges of commercialisation, or to attempt to Justify them. I know I am not alone in having assumed, up till now, that testators and donors of properties to the Trust did so in the belief that they would be preserved with the same love and care which their original owners had bestowed on them, and maintained (through the gate money) at a higher standard than those owners were able to afford. I Visited Montacute some six years ago and recall that not only was the love and care very apparent, but informed and scholarly conversation about the house and its history, its contents and its grounds was available to any visitor who desired it. Montacute is a sorry sight today. Of course maintenance costs are rising but must the answer be to take from these historic homes th3 very qualities which make them worth preserving? Leave the lions and the circuses to the aristocracy to play with in their own back gardens, and use the beautiful houses and grounds of National Trust property for raising funds in more suitable ways. Son et Lumiere is successful in France.
This would not be the context in Which to make any comments on the sad .history of the Brocks and the National Trust except to express admiration at Mr: 13rock's objective reporting of what must have been a deeply distressing experience. I suspect we have only been allowed to see the tip of the
iceberg. Anne G. McN. Shelf ord
IA Cheltenham Terrace, London SW3
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