Elizabeth Bellamy

Elizabeth Wallace (Formerly Kirkbridge née Bellamy) is a fictional character in the ITV period drama Upstairs, Downstairs, that was originally broadcast for five series from 1971 to 1975. She was portrayed by Nicola Pagett.^[1]

Elizabeth is the daughter of Richard and Lady Marjorie, and was a main character for the first two series, appearing in 13 episodes. The spoiled, self-absorbed younger sister of James, Elizabeth takes a somewhat fleeting interest in various social causes, including socialism and the Suffragette movement. The impulsive Elizabeth defies her parents and marries a poet, Lawrence Kirbridge, but he turns out to have no interest in sex and arranges for his publisher to make love to Elizabeth, and a child is conceived. Soon after Lawrence is sent abroad, and Elizabeth has a relationship with an Armenian. Elizabeth is close to the maid Rose, who frequently calls her "Miss Lizzie", even after marriage.

Elizabeth leaves Upstairs, Downstairs between the second and third series when she moves to New York. The reason for the departure was Nicola Pagett's refusal to appear again, after she was not selected to appear in an Upstairs, Downstairs film. The film was never made.^[1]

Early life

Elizabeth is born in 1886 to Richard, a Conservative MP, and Lady Marjorie Bellamy, the daughter of the 12th Earl of Southwold, a prominent Conservative politician. She finishes her education at Frau Beck's Finishing School, in Dresden, Germany in 1905, and has her coming out ball in May that year at Londonderry House. She was due to be presented to the King and Queen by her Aunt Kate (Lady Castleton), but runs away from the Ball. Inverting the situation with James, she is close to her father, while having a somewhat strained relationship with her mother (with whom she shares her haughty behavior, though Elizabeth lacks her mother's kindness or maternal feeling).

In December 1905, she falls in love with Baron Klaus von Rimmer, a German who turns out to be a homosexual. He flees Eaton Place with the footman Alfred (when their affair is discovered by Rose), before the police arrive to arrest him. Not wishing Elizabeth to know the real reason for his departure, she is told that he is a spy.

Elizabeth is a member of the Young Women's Christian Fellowship, and while working with them she finds the former housemaid Sarah, and saves her from poverty by employing her as the Bellamy's scullery maid.

Marriage

Elizabeth and her future husband Lawrence Kirbridge

In Winter 1908, she becomes involved with a group of socialist poets, and upsets her parents by inviting them to tea. She also, under the influence of one member, Evelyn Larkin (Georgia Brown), accrues a bill of over £4 on shoes for street children, then refuses to pay for them. Her father intervenes, and pays for the shoes. After one argument with her parents, she runs away from home to stay with her friend Henrietta Winchmore, and is only discovered after Rose is forced to tell Hudson where Elizabeth is staying. Her father visits, and shortly after, Elizabeth and fellow poet Lawrence Kirbridge have tea at Eaton Place.

While Elizabeth is reluctant to marry, the head housemaid and friend Rose, persuades her it is the right thing to do. She and Lawrence Kirbridge, the Cambridge-educated maternal grandson of a Dorset baronet, marry in June 1909.^[2] They take their honeymoon in Vienna, and set up home in Greenwich.

The marriage is an unhappy affair from the start, and Lawrence does not wish to consummate the relationship. He later angrily asks his valet Thomas if he thinks he is homosexual. Lawrence 'arranges' for his publisher, the much older Sir Edwin Partridge, to make love to Elizabeth at a soiree the couple hosts. During Christmas 1909, Elizabeth informs her parents that her marriage has failed. The family solicitor, Sir Geoffrey Dillon, prepares for an annulment of the marriage on the grounds it has not been consummated. However, after an examination by a physician, it is discovered that Elizabeth is 3–4 months pregnant and she is forced by her father to divulge the identity of the father. In order to avoid a scandal, Lawrence is sent abroad with an allowance, and the Greenwich house is sold.

Later, Elizabeth Kirbridge gives birth to a daughter, Lucy Elizabeth, in a London nursing home. To avoid scandal and since Lawrence is the legal father, he is asked to attend the baby's christening. Following the ceremony, he is never heard from again. Elizabeth, lacking maternal feelings, is indifferent to the baby and content to have Lucy be brought up in the nursery by Sarah and the servants.

Suffragettes

Elizabeth, on her wedding day, with Rose, June 1909

Elizabeth Bellamy becomes involved in the Suffragette movement, and participating in an attack on an MP's house, is arrested, along with her innocent housemaid Rose. An Armenian Julius Karekin, who exiting the MP's house, finds Elizabeth's card, and at Court gets her off with a 40 shilling fine, which he then pays. All the others, including Rose, are sent to prison. This makes Elizabeth feel incredibly guilty, and with the help of Karekin she gets Rose freed after the discovery they are being force fed.

She soon starts an affair with Karekin, and he gives her a hat shop, which she names Madame Yvonne. He also buys 165, Eaton Place when the £5600 lease is up for sale following the death of Lady Marjorie's father, and gives the house to Richard and Lady Marjorie. Her relationship with Julius Karekin fizzles out when after a few months he starts a relationship with someone else. He always made it clear that he was a philanderer. Elizabeth is last seen celebrating Lady Marjorie's birthday, months before Lady Marjorie dies on the Titanic.

Move to America, New York City, 1911-1929

Although Elizabeth is last seen on the series in 1910, it is mentioned very briefly that she has moved to New York, and has married an attorney named Dana J. Wallace. No other information is given why she moved, and how she met Dana.

In 1914, when talking to Georgina, Rose refers to Elizabeth and "her husband and children", meaning that she and Dana have at least one child. The phrase "children" refers to the child of Elizabeth and Dana, and Elizabeth's child with Sir Edwin. Lady Marjorie is on her way to see Elizabeth in New York City when the Titanic sinks and Lady Marjorie drowns. Elizabeth becomes 'The Honourable' when her father is raised to the Peerage in 1917.

While James is in America in 1928-1929, he visits Elizabeth in New York. While James is there in 1929, he and Dana invest in the American Stock Market. The 29 October 1929 crash occurs and Dana loses money, but Dana has managed to pull out some in time. James, back in London, does not hear about the stock crash for many hours, and by then, it is too late - he has lost all of his money and more.

References

Bibliography

• John Hawkesworth, In My Lady's Chamber, Sphere Books Limited, 1973