The Edith Russell Papers: Third Accrual

The Edith Russell Papers: Third Accrual Sheila Turcon Edith Finch was born in New York City on 5 November 1900. Her parents were Edward Bronson Finch, a physician, and his wife, Delia. She was educated at Bryn Mawr College (ab, 1922), and St. Hilda’s College, Oxford (ba Hons., 1925, ma 1926). Money was not a concern for her; she lectured occasionally at Bryn Mawr and wrote biographies of English poet Wilfrid Scawen Blunt (1938) and Bryn Mawr president Carey Thomas (1947). Her friendship with Lucy Donnelly (also of Bryn Mawr) first drew her into Russell’s orbit in the 1920s. When Russell was in New York in 1950 they reconnected and became romantically involved soon afterwards. She moved to England and married Russell in 1952. In a perfect archivist’s world all of the Edith Russell papers would have arrived at McMaster together. Alas, as we all know, this is a less than perfect world. Thus there have been three accruals so far. The first accrual, which arrived in 1985, was described by me in this journal 30 years ago.1 A concern at that time was the lack of papers related to Edith’s life before she married Russell. The small second accrual, which was shipped in a black tin box and arrived in 2012, does contain materials from Edith’s life before Russell, mainly concerning her time at Bryn Mawr. There were some other tidbits, however, like a signed photograph of jockey James Powell on a horse, “with kind regards from James Powell, Paris, 30/1/29”. Both of these accruals have online finding aids,2 and the correspondence has been entered into bracers. The third accrual (ra3, 1,843) also contains some materials from before 1952 but, as with the first accrual, the majority date from after then. Notwithstanding the size and richness of the new accrual, even more items remain at the Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation (brpf). For example, at the Bertrand Russell Society’s Annual Meeting in June 2022 brpf director Tony [End Page 169] Simpson displayed and described some photographs of Edith taken in the 1920s.3 When Russell died, Edith asked to hold on to the originals of letters he had written to her. Photocopies were sent to McMaster in their place. After she died in 1978 the originals should have been sent, embargoed for five years, and then opened to the public. Alas, they could not be found. They finally arrived with this third accrual. Since envelopes were included, undated letters could finally be dated with certainty. They have been placed in ra2, Box 8.01, where their photocopies have resided for decades. All relevant bracers records have been revised. Click for larger view View full resolution Illustration i. Russell, Edith and “Peanut” on the veranda at Plas Penrhyn, October 1962 (Travel, Photographs and Artwork series). The third accrual has been arranged into the following nine series—many similar to those of the first accrual, but some of them new: Correspondence; Manuscripts; Address and Telephone Books, Lists and Cards, Diaries, Domestic, Medical, Hair Clippings; Travel, Photographs and Artwork; Legal; Financial; Organizations (McMaster University, Bertrand Russell Society, Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation); Estate; Printed and Published. The Legal series includes correspondence with Coward, Chance & Co., Goddard & Co. (Blanche Lucas), Heald, Johnson & Co. and Heald and Nickinson (Jack Black). The Financial series includes correspondence with Felton & Partners, banks, invoices, statements and receipts. The banks are Barclays, Brown & [End Page 170] Shipley, Child & Co., Williams & Glynn’s. The invoices are from stores, hotels and goods suppliers. Both the first and third accruals have Bertrand Russell materials that should have been included with ra2. This new accrual, in addition to the original letters mentioned above, contains other Russell letters in the Correspondence series. There is a card from William Clark of The Observer, arranging for a broadcast at the bbc in June 1955.4 Harrods reminds Russell in 1967 that his library subscription is expiring. There is some 1963 correspondence about Kingston Russell House in West Dorset, owned and then sold by Russell’s forebears (see Auto. 3: 105–6). There is also a photocopy of a letter Russell sent to veteran...

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