Mission accomplished
Lord Montagu of Beaulieu
Recently, seven weary but exhilarated members of the British Bicentennial Heritage Mission arrived back from a three weeks' coast-to-coast tour of the United States. The Purposes of this Mission were straightforward: first, to wish the United States many happy returns, and to bring a much welcomed British presence to US bicentennial celebrations. Specifically, we aimed not only to emphasise our common history and culture but also to study at first hand how the United States was managing and presenting Its historic sites, both in urban and in rural areas.
The tour was planned and superbly organised by the British Tourist Authority, who appreciated our potential for publicising at the same time our own historic buildings, 19 he of Great Britain's most important tourist attractions. The team, who represented between them 1,500 places of historic interest open to the public, was carefully chosen. First, there was Vivian Lipman, Director of Ancient Monuments and Historic Buildings at the Department of the Environment, representing approximately 800 historic buildlogs and sites. Observing Mr Lipman's obvious enthusiasm on his first visit to the United States,! am sure it will not be his last and I have no doubt that many of the ideas which he so acutely observed may be applied to I-30E properties in the future. The National Trusts for England and Wales, and for Scotland were represented by Lawrence Rich and the Earl of Dunmore resPectively. The private sector included the buke of Marlborough, whose Churchill and US connections made him an ideal member 0. f the team, as was the Duke of Argyll who !s himself not only half-American but also head of the Campbell clan and whose ancestor, General Lewis, was one of Washington's generals. The Marquess of Tavistock coura
geously embarked on his first US promotion tour, creating new surfaces on paths worn thin by his skilful publicist father. Finally, there was Sir Hugo Boothby, Chairman of the Historic Houses Association in Wales, also on his first visit, but there is no doubt that Americans are now much more aware of Wales, particularly of the facts that Thomas Jefferson was one of the seventeen Welsh signatories to the Declaration of Independence and that Welsh blood has flowed through the veins of no fewer than eight Presidents.
Everywhere we went, the delegation was magnificently received but no more so than at Williamsburg, where the ninth Earl of Dunmore's presence provided a unique and romantic highlight, as his ancestor, the fourth Earl, was the last Royal and inevitably unpopular Governor of Virginia. His old seat of government, once a derelict historic site, is now, as Colonial Williamsburg (thanks largely to Rockefeller generosity), a mecca for those interested in authentically recreated history. Thus, almost 200 years to the day after the last Governor retreated so ignominiously, the present-day Williamsburg Trustees hosted an eighteenth-century candle-lit dinner in the rebuilt Governor's Mansion, complete with servants with powdered wigs and breeches. The courteous attempt by the President, Carl Hummelsine, to whitewash Lord Dunmore's ancestor was masterful but clearly embarrassed the honoured guest, who was addressed throughout the dinner as 'Governor'. The eighteenthcentury concert which followed was an inspiration in nostalgia.
The night before we dined in an eighteenth-century house, occupied by General Gage in 1775, which was moved from Boston to Washington and lovingly refurbished to eighteenth-century perfection by Mrs Miriam Morris, herself a legend in restoration circles in the United States. We visited the Adams family home near Boston and George Washington's home at Mount Vernon; indeed, wherever we went, American heritage centres were our main targets. We inspected historical houses and town centres in New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Washington, Richmond, Charleston, Houston, Dallas, San Francisco and Los Angeles, and of course saw the many bicentennial exhibitions which abounded, but, without seeming chauvinistic, none matched up to the 1776 British Exhibition at Greenwich in invention or content.
So what did we accomplish ? Apart from the inevitable publicity we achieved for our common heritage and our historic buildings in Britain, there were many serious discussions with bodies such as the National Parks Service, the US National Trust, and the local heritage societies and foundations respon sible for administering American heritage sites. Interesting differences soon became apparent.
Often in America, the high-class presentation and interpretation were a revelation
to British eyes, as was their attention to detail and authenticity. Alternatively, the
tradition of British private house owners, who sacrifice their privacy in continuing to live in their homes and act as unpaid custodians, provoked amazement and admiration in our US counterparts. The lived-in atmosphere in American house museums was ininvariably missing and in some cases very generous endowments diminished the necessity to attract large public attendances. However, we left convinced that we each have much to learn from the other and an important technical report is being prepared for interested bodies on both sides of the Atlan
tic. The time e is ripe.
Strangely, however, there is no Federal policy towards historic buildings. Consequently, the undoubted highlight of the visit in terms of the future was our official visit to Capitol Hill in Washington. It was a unique and moving moment when four members of the House of Lords were formally presented on the floor of the Senate by Senator Brooke of Massachusetts. The House then adjourned for ten minutes in our honour, when nearly a hundred Senators queued up to shake our hands. Later, for over an hour at an exclusive sit-down meeting in the VicePresident's Room, our delegation was quizzed on how Britain preserves its architectural heritage by leading Senators and Congressmen, led by Clayburne Pell and including Senators Hubert Humphrey, Scott, Percy, Brooke, Symington and Mathias and Congresswoman Boggs, this year's Democratic Convention chairman. The debate was fascinating and led to a request for a full report on -our organisation and methods. In the event that a Federal policy is eventually evolved, I think we can claim to have sown seeds that afternoon which will do more than anything to repay our American hosts for thelitrwgeansesrpoecusiawlieylcsoigmneifi.
cant that this mem
orable and moving day was crowned by the news from the House of Commons that the Government had agreed to exempt from Capital Transfer Tax maintenance funds for historic houses which are open to the public. The Senators and Congressmen called this an enlightened piece of legislation and those of us who had fought so hard to achieve it could only proudly agree, for although the United States has very generous and constructive tax reliefs for charitable contributions to preserve cultural objects, there are no Federal tax reliefs to encourage those who wish to continue living in historic buildings. We were indeed flattered to have been asked so many searching questions by such a distinguished group of legislators. Thus, in 1977 the Historic Houses Association, in conjunction, it is hoped, with the Department of the Environment and the National Trusts, hopes to mount an Anglo-US Heritage Conference as a major event in our own Heritage Education Year. So much of our history and culture is common to both nations; is it too much to hope that a joint policy might eventually be evolved on how it could best be preserved and presented for the benefit of future generations of the English-speaking world ?
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