Born
Penelope Loader Maffey, she was the daughter of
Sir John Maffey, later 1st
Baron Rugby, who was to become Governor-General of the
Anglo-Egyptian Sudan,
Permanent Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies and wartime United Kingdom Representative to
Dublin. Earlier, he had been the private secretary to the
Viceroy of India and Governor of the
North-West Frontier Province, thus Penelope was born in
Peshawar and spent her early years in India, where three of her siblings died in childhood. When she was seven years old, she returned to England for
prep school, then went on to
Sherborne School for Girls. Her parents had a house,
Anmer Hall, on the King's
Sandringham estate, which led to her socialising with the royal family. Indeed, she became the King's favourite. Maffey was presented at Court and named
Debutante of the Year. She was romantically linked with several men, including
Prince Bernhard of Lippe-Biesterfeld,
Esmond Harmsworth and society artist
Simon Elwes (1902–1975), which caused a minor scandal as he was married and a
Roman Catholic. Maintaining a friendship, she accompanied Prince Bernhard on his honeymoon in 1937 and became good friends with his new wife,
Princess Juliana of the Netherlands. In 1938 she met
Canadian William Aitken, a nephew of media magnate
Lord Beaverbrook, and a journalist at the
Evening Standard. They were married later that year at St Peter's,
Eaton Square. Their son
Jonathan was born in Dublin in 1942. In December 2008, Dutch historian Cees Fasseur claimed that Jonathan Aitken was actually the result of a wartime affair between Penelope and
Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands. The prince's wife
Queen Juliana of the Netherlands stood sponsor for Jonathan Aitken's christening. William Aitken had joined the
RAF and Penelope joined the
WRVS, helping to evacuate German children to Ireland. In 1944, her husband was badly hurt in a
Spitfire crash. She spent two years nursing him back to health, at a time when her baby son was ill with
tuberculosis and the family home in London was bombed. She and William had a daughter
Maria in 1945. William was elected as
Conservative Member of Parliament for
Bury St Edmunds in 1950, and he was knighted in 1963, giving her the style of
Lady Aitken. She devoted herself to community work in support of her husband's political career, becoming a
magistrate and running the Clothing Exchange, which played a major role in helping the victims of the
East Coast floods in 1953. Eventually she was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire (
MBE). She lived with the children in
Halesworth to be near her father, who died in 1969 aged 91. The family fortune was wiped out by
death duties and a stock market crash. She restarted her affair with Simon Elwes, and then had a long relationship with
Sir John Davis, chairman of
Rank Xerox.
Gardening was another passion. She created a garden at
Playford, her moated Tudor house near
Ipswich. Later she created an English garden at her house near
Santa Eulalia on the Spanish island of
Ibiza, smuggling sacks of soil and rare plants through customs. Lady Aitken continued to be seen at many parties and with many men. Satirist and broadcaster
Noel Picarda instantly fell in love with her, and eventually became her live-in companion until his death in 2003. Her house and her parties were often the scene of political machinations in Conservative circles and she was often seen holding court among politicians or her family, whether in London, her local pub or the
Gironde. Aitken died of cancer, aged 94. She had two children –
Jonathan Aitken and
Maria Aitken. She was the grandmother of the actor
Jack Davenport, Petrina Khashoggi (biological daughter of Jonathan Aitken and Soraya Khashoggi (
née Sandra Daly), conceived while she was married to
Adnan Khashoggi), Victoria Aitken, Alexandra Aitken and William Aitken. She is buried in the churchyard of St. Mary's,
Playford, Suffolk. ==References==