A dwindling number of American readers recognize the name Jessica Mitford (1917-96). And those who do probably think of her as the author of her most successful book, The American Way of Death. It shot to the top of the New York Times bestseller list on its publication in 1963 and stayed there for six weeks. Its revised edition is still in print today. And, more important, its savage takedown of the funeral industry led to major federal reform. But it was only one of a dozen books she wrote. And writing never defined her. She herself, and most of her many friends on both sides of the Atlantic, saw Mitford as an activist dedicated to social justice. In short, she was a troublemaker. And author Carla Kaplan accurately characterizes her that way in her deeply researched biography, Troublemaker: The Fierce, Unruly Life of Jessica Mitford.
An author who was, above all, an activist
Mitford’s contemporaries, however, knew her as one of the six notorious Mitford sisters. Known as Decca to friends and family throughout her life, she was the “red sheep” of the family. Her parents, Lord and Lady Redesdale, were extreme right-wing Conservatives who admired Adolf Hitler. Her sister Diana married Oswald Mosley, head of the British Fascist Party. Like him and her parents, she was pro-Nazi and antisemitic. Her sister Unity moved to Germany and became Hitler’s companion and possibly his lover. But early in life Decca declared herself a Communist. And at the age of 19 she ran away to live with her cousin, Esmond Romilly. He was a democratic socialist (not a Communist) who had fought in Spain. They first moved to Spain, where Esmond worked as a foreign correspondent. They married there. Then in 1939 the couple emigrated to the United States.
Troublemaker: The Fierce, Unruly Life of Jessica Mitford by Carla Kaplan (2025) 592 pages ★★★★★
A life lived in the public eye
Esmond and Decca traveled throughout the United States, supporting themselves by working odd jobs. But when World War II broke out, he enlisted in the Royal Canadian Air Force. She gave birth to his daughter, Constancia Romilly. (Decca called her “the Donk” or “Dinky.”) They lived then in Washington, DC, with a couple who were prominent Southern civil rights activists. Decca got a job with the federal Office of Price Administration (OPA) working to prevent wartime profiteering. But in 1941 Esmond died in battle. Two years later Decca met and married civil rights attorney Robert (Bob) Treuhaft (1912-2001), an enforcer at the OPA. After a time, she moved to Oakland, California. Bob followed her there and joined a progressive law firm. After a promotion, Decca continued her government work.
The Communist Party and the Civil Rights Movement
Bob and Decca enrolled in the Communist Party in 1943. Soon, the Party became the centerpiece of Decca’s life. She took on one job after another in the Party, working as an organizer both in the Party’s local chapter and in the closely aligned Civil Rights Congress. That work consumed her for the next 15 years, even as Decca gave birth to two sons—and one died when hit by a bus. Despite the growing demands on her, she became nationally prominent in the defense of several Black men unjustly accused and imprisoned for crimes they didn’t commit. These activities, and her growing role in the Party, continued until well after NIkita Khruschchev’s “Secret Speech” in 1956. But Decca and Bob left the Communist Party in 1958, disillusioned by the revelations of Stalin’s monstrous crimes. By that time, Decca felt the party, shrunken in numbers and widely discredited, had become “rather useless.
In the 1960s, Bob forged a high-profile career in the law. He founded his own firm in 1963. The following year he famously represented more than 700 Free Speech Movement students arrested during a sit-in at the University of California in Berkeley. He and his partners (including my friend Mal Burnstein) also represented anti-Vietnam War protesters, the Black Panther Party, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), and the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE).
How we best remember her—for her books
Decca’s first book, the bestselling (and hilarious) memoir of her life in the Mitford family, Hons and Rebels, appeared in 1960. The book sold briskly on both sides of the Atlantic and outraged her sisters. They, especially Diana (Mrs. Oswald Mosley), had long since written her off as having strayed far off the family reservation. But her biting treatment of the fascist views and antisemitism of practically everyone in her family did not go down well. (Only her older sister Pam, a farmer who later came out as a lesbian, and her brother, Tom, escaped the lash of her tongue.)
Decca came reluctantly to her career as a muckraker. But the publication in 1963 of The American Way of Death forever fastened her image in the public mind as a social critic. The book was a sensation. Ten other books followed in the years ahead. Several were successful, as were some of the articles she wrote for The Atlantic and other magazines. But none even came close to the success of Hons and Rebels, much less The American Way of Death. (The Trial of Dr. Spock and Kind and Unusual Punishment: The Prison Business were the standouts.) But for years Decca earned a sizable income as a public speaker about the topics she addressed in her books.
On a personal note
I knew Jessica Mitford slightly. Sometime in the 1970s—my memory is foggy—I spent a half-day with her. I’d invited her to speak to a breakfast group I’d helped organize in San Francisco. She was a huge hit: eloquent, nonstop funny, and insightful. And I was her chauffeur for the day, having picked her up at her home on the border of Berkeley and Oakland and driving her home afterward. She was a delight.
I also met her second husband, Bob Treuhaft, but only once and very briefly. However, I was a close friend of his longtime partner, Mal Burnstein (1934-2023), who worked with him on the Free Speech Movement and other high-profile cases. Mal and I were friends for six decades.
About the author
According to Google Books, “Carla Kaplan is Associate Professor in the English Department at Yale where she also teaches in Women’s Studies, African-American Studies, American Studies. She publishes widely on feminist theory and criticism, women’s writing, African-American literature, American literature, and modernism.” She has written three books.
The author’s own website notes that “Caplan is the Davis Distinguished Professor of American Literature at Northeastern University, where, as the Founding Director of the university’s Humanities Center, she created a conversational hub dedicated to diversity. She has held positions at Yale University, the University of Southern California, Wellesley College, and the University of Illinois, and also teaches writing through arts councils and writers’ centers. . .
“Born in Worcester, Massachusetts, Kaplan grew up in Evanston, Illinois, spending summers in Cape Cod and going to camp at Circle Pines Center, one of the nation’s first interracial cooperatives; she lives in Boston and Eastham, Massachusetts.”
For related reading
Jessica Mitford’s first book was the hilarious memoir, Hons and Rebels (She was the “Red Sheep” of the six notorious Mitford sisters).
I’ve also read two other books about Decca Mitford and her sisters:
- The Mitford Affair by Marie Benedict (Blundering through the 1930s with the notorious Mitford sisters)
- Ha’penny (Farthing Trilogy #2) by Jo Walton (A gripping alternate history of England after World War II) is a novel in which the thinly-disguised Mitford Sisters figure as central characters.
This book joins the list of 12 great biographies.
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