Marguerite de Beaumont

Marguerite de Beaumont (b. Liverpool, 13 May 1899, d. Marlborough, 30 July 1989) was a Girl Guide leader, horse breeder, author and poet. She published biographies of Lord and Lady Baden-Powell, and was a recipient of the Silver Fish Award, Girl Guiding’s highest adult honour. Family and personal life Born Marguerite Julia Caroline de Beaumont-Klein, she was the middle child of mother Kathleen Mary O’Hagan and father Louis Charles Leopold Martial de Beaumont-Klein. She was baptised in 1905 at St George's, Bloomsbury. She spent her childhood in Norfolk, moving to Cambridge, where her father was a lecturer at the university, in 1915. The family dropped Klein from their name during the First World War. In 1934 she bought Shalbourne Manor in Marlborough, Wiltshire with her partner Doris Mason (1904 –1964). Mason ran the farm, while de Beaumont ran Shalbourne Stud. During the Second World War they welcomed a dozen evacuees from East London’s docks. The dining room at the manor was converted into an emergency surgery, equipped at their own expense, to treat wartime casualties. In January 1945 the couple donated land to provide recreation facilities for returning World War II service personnel. de Beaumont was buried at St Michael and All Angels Church in Shalbourne, Berkshire. Mason having pre-deceased her, de Beaumont left her entire fortune of £3 million, plus Shalbourne Manor, to her equine vet.