- Diana [Broughton], Lady Delamere (becomes Lady Delamere by marrying Lord Tom Delamere after Broughten dies)
- Sir Henry John Delves ("Jock") Broughton, 11th Baronet, 1883 - 1942, age 58 in 1941;
- Josslyn Hay, Earl of Erroll, a hereditary Scottish title, 1901 - 1941;
- June Carberry: Diana's "best friend"; was with Diana on the night Erroll murdered
- Miss Wilks: Broughton's housekeeper; seems loyal to the core
- Juanita Carberry: daughter of June Carberry; 15 years old at time of murder; very close to old man Broughton
- Superintendent Arthur Poppy: think Inspector John Williams in Alfred Hitchcock's "Dial M For Murder."
- Hugh Delamere, arrives, 1901
- Norfolk Hotel, Nairobi, founded 1904
- Club Muthaiga, Nairobi, founded 1913
- Idina: moves to Kenya with second husband, 1919; divorced 1923
- Josslyn and Idina, to Kenya, 1924
- Idina moves back to Kenya with third husband, Josslyn 1924
- Josslyn's first time to Kenya, with new wife, Idina, 1924
- Broughton, returns to Kenya, newlywed, wife Diana: 1940;
- June Carberry, with husband, daughter, arrives Kenya on same flight as Broughton/Diana: 1940
- Josslyn murdered January 24, 1941
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Diana, Lady Delamere, wife of Broughton during trial (become a Delamere only much, much later):
- Delamere: De La Mere, from the sea?
- she is clearly the center of the story -- up until the last chapter
- I did not realize that -- that she was the center of the story until near the end of the book -- before reading the last chapter
- up until then, it centered around Broughton, of course
- wife of Broughton; she did not testify at her husband's murder trial
- last husband: Lord Tom Delamere; link here;
- chapter six: many friends, including Hugh Dickinson, Major Richard (Dickie) Pembroke)
- so, Diana:
- short first marriage
- then Broughton
- then Colvile
- then Tom Delamere late in life; his third marriage (Diana Caldwell, better known as Diana Delves-Broughton before the marriage);
- Earl of Erroll
- Lord Erroll: the hereditary High Constable of Scotland
- by precedence, the first subject in Scotland after the Royal Family
- 39 years old: leading figure in Kenya's colonial community
- recently appointed Military Secretary
- Eton graduate
- notorious for his exploits with married women
- only in the last five years, had become serious about life; projected to be the future leader of hte white settlers;
- first wife:
- second wife: Lady Idina Sackville, see below
- 1928, p. 27
- the year before the crash which drastically thinned out the settler population
- the year Josslyn Hay's father died; Josslyn becomes the Earl of Erroll and High Constable of Scotland
- he had already lived in Kenya for four years; in the heart of Happy Valley
- first Slaines, on the slopes of the Aberdares; then Clouds
- after he divorces Idina, moves into lodging at the Club Muthaiga
- more on Joss on page 35; author says really not a lot know about Joss, considering
- when I read David Begg's description of Josslyn, beginning on page 35, I immediately thought of Gatby's nemesis and Daisy's husband: Tom Buchanan.
- first wife, Vera
- "war dodger" in 1914; heat stroke in England (LOL)
- 1923: buys coffee farm in Kenya
- 1940: returns to Kenya, age 57 with new wife. about 58 years old when Joss murdered;
- 1897 - 1943
- 1928 - 1931, married to Hugh Delamere (b. 1883, so about 14 years younger than her husband)
- 1940: mayor of Nairobi, despised by most
- see chapter 4
Lord Francis Scott, p. 21
- a leading "soldier-settler"
- second son of the Duke of Buccleuch (primogeniture victim)
- would succeed Lord Delamere as the settlers' leader after Delamere died, 1931
- wife Eileen, daughter of the Earl of Minto, see below
- established a polo club
- house at Rongai, built in 1922
- new arrival; arrived at age 32; arrived in 1920;
- a "veranda farmer" -- typical of the settlers that arrived after the war
- an old Etonian
- many thousands of acres at Burgeret, near Nanyuk, at the foothills of the Aberdares;
- money to spare; new arrivals; early settlers did not like these "veranda farmerss"
- an old Etonian;
- pink gin for guests
- wife, p. 36, the very young Nina Drury, born in 1901;
- becomes a very dangerous, scary, voyeur; strange; even his wife Nina Drury warns folks to stay away from her husband; chapter 6;
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Minor Characters
Lady Idina Sackville: 1893 - 1955
- wiki link here;
- Lady Myra Idina Sackville, known by her middle name, Idina
- cousin: the writer Vita Sackville-West;
- married, divorced five times;
- moved to Kenya with her second husband in 1919; divorced in 1923
- third husband: Josslyn Hay, Lord Kilmarnock
- they moved to Kenya in 1924
- lived on her money
- bungalow called Slaines
- father-in-law dies; husband become 22nd Earl of Erroll; she, the Countess of Erroll;
- one child
- divorced in 1929, the year of the crash; Happy Valley drastically reduced in numbers as settlers moved out;
Diana Caldwell, comes on the scene in1935; age 22 -- p. 59, first mention
Edith Maude ("Molly") Ramsay-Hill, 1893 - 1939;
- Joss' wife after divorcing Idina; married 1930
- died 1939
- 1940: Joss has affair with Diana, Lady Broughton, wife of Sir Jock Delves Broughton, Bt (baronet).
- Joss found murdered 1941
- Jock commits suicide not long after that
- Alice de Janzé, American heiress, spent years in Happy Valley;
- Armour family
- one of the most prominent American socialites of her time; multi-millionaire heiress;
- 1927: shot her lover Raymond and herself at a Paris railway station; both survived; went ton to marry and later divorced Raymond;
- divorced from Raymond in 1938
- lover of Pembroke, after Lezard (need to confirm as I re-read the book)
- before Diana arrived in Kenya, Alice had hoped to become Erroll's lover again; but Erroll involved with Mrs Wirewater;
- Nancy Wirewater: most likely Phyllis Filmer, wife of the managing director of Shell in Kenya Royal Dutch
- Shell established the first depot on the island of Shimanzi, in Mombasa in the early 1900s.
- one of the major suspects in Erroll's murder;
- from a grand Irish family
- one of the worst of the playboys
- 28 April 1870 – 13 November 1931
- styled The Honourable from birth until 1887, was a British peer
- one of the first and most influential British settlers in Kenya
- the son of Hugh Cholmondeley, 2nd Baron Delamere
- moved to Kenya in 1901 and acquired vast land holdings from the British Crown
- became the unofficial 'leader' of the colony's European community
- famous for his tireless labours to establish a working agricultural economy in East Africa as he was for childish antics among his European friends when he was at his leisure.
- succeeded Lord Delamere as the settlers' leader after Delamere's death in 1931
- wife, Eileen, daughter of the Earl of Minto
- kept a great diary
- Lord Francis set up a polo club; Somali ponies
Denys Finch Hatton, p. 22 -- first mentioned
- among the first to guide, attract safaris
- author mentions Vera, Lady Broughton at this point
- wife of Lord Francis Scott;
- daughter of the Earl of Minto
- a very illuminating diary
- mentioned briefly
- "community of English squires established on the Equator"
- Tich Miles, p. 26
- Derek Fisher, p. 26
- Syd Ziegler, p. 27
- Sonny Bompas, p 27
- Edward, Prince of Wales, p. 27, visited Kenya in 1928
- Sir Derek Erskine, later Kenyatta's lone supporter among the Europeans before independence, p. 27
- Comte Frédéric de Janzé (26 years old) and his young American bride, Alice.
- read about Janzé -- page 32
- wrote Vertical Land: anonymous pen portraits of some of the Happy Valley residents; describes Idina, p 32
- one of the first marriages to be threatened by Josslyn: the de Janzés -- p. 38
- closest friends about time she falls in love with Joss: Patricia Bowles, p. 39.
- Fabian Wallace, p. 33
- homosexual and a close friend of Josslyn's
- Michael Lafone, p. 33
- a fierce womaniser with an eyeglass
- Raymond de Trafford, p. 33
- the epitome of the remittance man
- Alice de Janzé becomes Patricia's closest friend
Dr Joseph Gregory: GP to the Muthaiga Club; pronounced Molly dead, 1939;
Julian "Lizzie" Lezard
- chapter 4
- playboy in London society
- new friend for Alice (Gare du Nord fame)
- an inspired buffoon
- a gifted tennis player; came from South Africa with the Davis Cup team
- the privileged outsider, the victim of merciless teasing
- first moneyed woman: Hilda Wardell, Leicestershire
- rode with Quorn and Pytchley (bottom of page 51)
- after several years, Hilda could take no more; divorced amicably;
- she sent Lezard to Kenya without a penny
- he was told that Alice de Trafford, now divorced from Raymond an living in Happy Valley, would look after him
- Alice brought him back to the Wanjhi Valley in her box-body car
- Erroll and Lezard were perfectly matched: the comedian and the Earl, both broke, both mad about women
- Lezard was fascinated by Erroll; and the obvious place to stay was at the center of activity, Erroll's house at Muthaiga
John Carberry, first mention, chapter 5, on plane with Broughton and Diana when they first arrived in Kenya, flying from Mombasa to Nairobi; sadistic and satanic
- wife June Carberry
- met Diana Broughton on that flight
- June Carberry and Diana Broughton immediately become best friends
Hugh Dickinson: in love with Diana Caldwell-Broughton
Major Richard (Dickie Pembroke): a constant companion, along with Hugh Dickinson, of Diana's
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