The hunt for the Duke of Westminster’s ice cream

The question had always been hypothetical, like how many times a Tory leader can alienate their base during a six-week election window or what is the square root of nothing (the answer might be Ed Davey’s approach to campaigning). But last Friday, I discovered the answer to a very different riddle.

How far would a person travel on the promise of a free ice cream? 

I can tell you the answer. It’s at least 21 miles and I know that because that’s how far I went for a tub of soft scoop paid for by the Duke of Westminster.

Now, you might know the Duke as the UK’s most eligible bachelor, as well as one of the UK’s richest men (I suspect the two things might be linked) but I only knew him because he’d promised free ice cream to anybody in the city of Chester on the day of his wedding. What’s not to like? Or indeed to lick? So, I woke up early on Friday morning, skipping breakfast, so I’d have room for double portions, assuming they wouldn’t have some anti-fraud safeguard involving indelible ink like in Indian elections. Except, no sooner had I left the house than I discovered some guy on LBC telling the world about this offer. Judging from some of the calls, people were now planning on flying in for their free tubs. I’d be lucky if there was any left by the time I got there.

The train into the city took half an hour and was running half empty. Chester, as you might know, is one of those cities that earns the title because of a cathedral rather than a metropolitan footprint. It’s a former Roman garrison and one of the most notorious tourist traps in the north of England. It was also the former safe Tory seat occupied by Giles Brandreth, whose appeal perfectly suited the city famous for its defensive walls but could just as easily be wrapped in a comfortable cardigan. An expensive one at that. None of your Primark rubbish. I’m talking Debenhams. Or Marks and Spencer. Brandreth went the way of the Romans (and indeed Debenhams) in 1997, and except for Stephen Mosley who briefly regained the seat in 2010, it has remained in Labour’s hands ever since.

By the time I arrived, the queue outside the ice cream concession beneath the famous East Gate was approaching fifty deep so I sidled my way around to the cathedral, expecting to find a shorter line elsewhere. I certainly expected smaller crowds and not the multitudes who I was later told had been there for hours. Clearly, I was far too late to get a good spot, so I paused at the cathedral’s side entrance to photograph the small steps people were standing on – just the kind of detail right for a photo essay, I thought. That’s when a blacked-out van drew up in front of me and Prince William climbed out.

Here, I realised, was a man not about to upstage a close friend on his wedding day. He’d arrived at the entrance well out of view of the press pool. The crowds whooped with delight. I took a picture of the back of his head as people jostled into the back of me, at the side of me, and even above me as a woman scaled a pillar like Polynesians scale palm trees. I realised that this meant I now had “a spot” which I would have to guard with my life. I was trapped and would remain trapped for the next three hours.

Not a lot happened at first, which gave me time to reflect on how I’ve never been a royal watcher, mainly because I grew up in a family of royal watchers. I prefer to watch people, which was the real reason I’d travelled to the city. And crowds of monarchists are worth experiencing at least once. They are polite to a fault and deeply patriotic, but exhibit a little venom if crossed. They are a strange quasi-ritualistic blend of Middle England manners and an actual sense of predatory malice. They reminded me of the stories you’d hear about East End gangsters who loved their mothers, believed in civilised behaviour on their manor, but also could cut you in half with a chainsaw if you didn’t respect the code. 

Amid the laughter and polite banter, sharp elbows established the boundaries. Beneath the sea of nodding heads, a different drama was played out with kicked shins and stepped-on toes. Listen carefully and there’s also a secret language going on; people addressing their complaints in roundabout ways.

“We should have brought a backpack,” they’ll say behind you, meaning that they think you shouldn’t have brought a backpack. “Some of these look like professional photographers” means you shouldn’t own a camera when others have only a mobile phone. “Some people are too tall…” I thought it best not to explain my complicated views on monarchy. 

An old Land Rover arrived, deeply symbolic perhaps of pragmatisms, utility, or simply the landowner. It contained the Duke. It endeared me to him immediately. I spent all my early years in the family’s old army Land Rover which predated by decades the Cybertruck as a vehicle containing nothing but hard corners and lethal metal edges. The cubic block of metal also did me another favour and blocked off the view of the press as the Duke turned and waved in my direction.

Buses continued to arrive, bringing in people from a world I’ll never know. Princess Eugenie was in the mix, wearing what would later be described as a “gentle olive green wedding guest dress featuring a V-neckline and close-fitting cut by Joseph” and “a handbag by Anya Hindmarch.” I didn’t have the words. It seemed to me that she’d dressed to match the same shade of green as the Land Rover but what do I know? 

Then came the bride in a car that was itself special. The Bentley 1930 8 litre GK 706 had, according to the Bentley PR team, been W.O. Bentley’s “personal ‘company car’, in which he enjoyed many fast, non-stop runs down to the South of France with his wife.” As Oliva Grace Harson (soon to be Olivia Grosvenor) emerged, the wind whipped up and caught her veil, which flailed wildly like Penny Mordaunt raving about Labour’s tax proposals. She too waved at me. Rarely have I clicked this well with people in my life.

With the principles all in place, it became a matter of waiting. The crowd thinned for a little while as the ceremony went on. Half an hour was the rumour. It ran closer to an hour. I can’t say I saw the appeal of doing this regularly. I think it’s uncontentious to say that Aristotle’s thoughts about the rules of law embodied by a few who were “morally and intellectually” superior no longer apply. I prefer Wodehouse’s judgement. “Say what you will, there is something fine about our old aristocracy. I’ll bet Trotsky couldn’t hit a moving secretary with an egg on a dark night.”

For most of my adult life, I’ve had an almost paradoxical fascination with the British aristocracy; being an instinctive aversion, natural from my working-class background, but begrudging acceptance that not all of it is bad and (say it quietly) they’re often a good deal better than the alternative world of celebrity ego.

Royalty – and by extension the concept (increasingly a conceit) of nobility – is also moving inextricably into a new phase. I often wondered if Queen Elizabeth, in her later years, realised the same. The James Bond skit and appearance with Paddington the Bear seemed like an acceptance that some traditions are unsustainable. Younger royals seem – quite rightly – to cherish their freedom in the face of the modern creature created in part by Prince Phillip, who helped turn the family into objects of media fascination. Prince William’s caution seems wise and closer to an older notion of the English aristocracy, offering the paternalistic care of something endearing through generations. 

It’s the custodian of land but also people, through the medium of tradition. It was impossible to live in the North West and not feel the influence of the sixth Duke of Westminster, Gerald Grosvenor. New wealth rarely gets invested back into society or culture, with billionaires preferring to leave their fortunes locked up in offshore accounts. Old money represented patronage and the support of projects that required no more justification than the whim of the patron. Unlike central government, the patron didn’t need to justify the cost. And whisper it… Some had more taste than local councillors who blow an entire arts budget on a concrete sculpture of a squashed head.

I might well have broad republican sympathies but what those gathered in Chester invest in people they barely know seems no more or less ridiculous than investing in former Page 3 models turned disk jockeys, children’s TV presenters turned sex pests, or snooker players turned literary critics… Nor do I have an answer to the old question about wealth disparity, a class system, or wider poverty. To borrow a Trumpism, I do know there are good people on both sides. But also deeply annoying people too.

Such as the guy who had been whistling behind me for half an hour. Incessantly. Uncompromisingly. I’ve glared at him a few times and he glared back. I think he wanted my spot. It was now psychological warfare if it wasn’t already. I find myself staring at the nails of the young woman who has climbed the pillar. They are decorated with stars and a rainbow. 

The newlyweds emerge from the church and more photos are taken. Later I discovered that a Just Stop Oil protestor had attempted to spray something orange on the bride and groom, and on Prince William too, which again felt self-defeating given his environmental work, as well as the abjugation of some notional decency. Protest is fine – vital to a properly free democracy, I think –  but… Well, not on a person’s wedding day.

The couple managed to get away and drove right past me, offering me (and just me) a final wave. Then it was Prince William’s time to depart. He again looked embarrassed to be getting all the attention and pauses outside the blacked-out van and Wills – first name terms, now – also waved in my direction.

By the time I walk back down to the East Gate, the queue for free ice cream is twice as long as earlier. Another queue, even longer, snakes its way towards a second ice cream concession. Based on ice cream consumption on that one Friday, a British Revolution won’t be coming any time soon, even if I didn’t get my free ice cream from the Duke of Westminster. And maybe that was only right.

@DavidWaywell

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