2006

Where Wexford Unwinds

George Baker, 75, is one of Britain’s best-loved television actors.  Having started his career in the theatre at the age of 15, he went on to star in films such as Goodbye Mr Chips, The Spy Who Loved Me and The 39 Steps.  In 1987 he was cast as Chief Inspector Wexford in ITV’s The Ruth Rendell Mysteries. A father of five daughters, Baker is married for the third time, to Louie Ramsay who plays on screen wife Dora Wexford. They live in the village of West Lavington in Wiltshire, six miles from Devizes.

George Baker talks to Rosanna Greenstreet…

In the Eighties, my late wife Sally and I were looking for somewhere to buy in Warwickshire.  We were living in London and had rented cottages in Warwickshire for years and years.  We never thought to buy, which was extremely stupid because by the time we wanted to move to the country it was too expensive.

Then Sally got ill with cancer and an old friend said, ‘Why don’t you come to my neck of the woods in Wiltshire and have a look?’ When Sally was in remission she went house hunting. It was 1989 and we’d been looking for four years by then.

I was living in a cottage in Romsey while I was filming the Wexfords and Sally came to see me and said, ‘I’ve seen it! I’ve seen the house!’ She was worried it would go, so I said, ‘OK, let’s look at it now.’We rang the owners and drove back to West Lavington.  We had a look around - the church was nice, the pubs were nice, the shop looked nice. Then we came to the house, which is gorgeous.

The original property, built in about 1880, has been built onto very cleverly.  It is a bit of a Tardis. From the outside it looks like an old cottage but inside it has five bedrooms and two bathrooms - I have an awful lot of children and therefore grandchildren.  The kitchen is enormous and to die for - it has an Aga and a central chopping area. I have always done all the cooking, so that was of great importance. 

There is an office above the garage. All the studies I’d had before were the smallest room in the house and suddenly there was this wonderful space.

After Sally died in 1992, I never considered leaving. Sally chose the house, it proved to be a lovely home and I had integrated into the village.  Twelve years ago, I founded the youth club and now I am chairman of many charities round about.

When Louie and I married in 1993, she came to live here. She loves the house. She’s not a country person - she was brought up in Hampstead - but she bought some green wellies and is now the most marvellous gardener. West Lavington is a small village - I think we’re 1,700 souls. The church is called All Saints and we have three pubs, The Churchill Arms, The Stage Post and The Bridge Inn. The Bridge has a wonderful restaurant run by a French chef, an Anglophile who has married a beautiful English woman.

In West Lavington, we have a Costcutter.  We go into Devizes for Sainsbury’s, the lovely High Street shops and wonderful market on a Thursday which sells very good clothes, fish, meat and marvellous local produce. I also shop in Market Lavington, a bigger village, two minutes away by car.  There is a wonderful butcher, a Co-op and a chemist.

Lavington School in Market Lavington is one of the best comprehensives in England.  In West Lavington we have Dauntsey’s independent school, where the standard of drama is amazing.  They did Sweeney Todd; Louie and I had seen it with Julia McKenzie and Denis Quilley and, I have to tell you, Dauntsey’s School did a better production than the National Theatre.

© The Mail on Sunday 2006

My First Home

George Baker tells Paula Kerr about His Memories of His First Home, in Dublin.

The first home I remember well was a small house in St Helen’s Road, Booterstown, Dublin, with a peat oven in the kitchen, a piano in the back room - and plenty of happy memories.

Before that, I’d been living in Bulgaria, where my father was a British consul. But my mother was Irish, and my father insisted the family move there when World War II broke out. He went to fight in Cairo, and was killed in 1942.

I moved to Dublin with my mum, my older brother Frank, younger brother Patrick and our nanny, in 1940. We went to stay with my uncle Jack and aunt Eva. They were kind people who were happy to take us in.

The house had a back room with a piano in it. Jack used to play for us and my mother would tease him because every song he attempted was in the key of C. The house had three bedrooms: one for my aunt and uncle, another for us boys and our cousins and one for my mother. I shared a bed with my brothers.

All the kids helped my uncle build an air raid shelter in the small back garden. I don’t know how much use we were but when you’re ten, you think you do all the work, don’t you? My aunt was a splendid cook - she taught me to make soda bread and I still use her recipe.

Though I was only ten, I’d been through quite a lot and felt quite unsettled. I knew my father was in danger and there had always been talk of moving on, so nowhere felt like home. I used to swim to forget my worries.  At 11, I entered a three-mile swimming race. The club sent an escort boat in case I sank to the bottom but I won. I was so happy.

My last Irish relative died in Waterford 15 years ago, but until then I would visit regularly. My late wife, Sally Home, and I would go across whenever we had the opportunity. We loved the slow pace of life there. We moved to Yorkshire, but I missed Ireland.  It will always have a special place in my heart.

© The Daily Mail 2006