Louis Charles Richard Duncombe-Jewell, a.k.a. Ludovic Cameron

Born: 10 September 1866.

Died: 1947.

Louis Charles Richard Duncombe-Jewell, born Louis Charles Richard Jewell, was a soldier, special war correspondent of The Times and The Morning Post, sportsman and sometimes poet. He was the eldest son of Richard and Mary Jewell of 112 Barras Street, Liskeard, Cornwall. His father was a bank manager, but later become an accountant and moved his family first to 25 Granville Road, London, then to Beech Villa on Barrow Road, Streatham, just a few blocks from the Crowley and Bishop families. As Duncombe-Jewell recalled, “I have known Edward Alexander Crowley—which is his correct name, though he has gone under many aliases—since he was a boy of 14: his mother and uncle having been friends of my father and mother.” The friendship was natural, since the Jewell family were Plymouth Brethren; like Crowley, he was taught by private tutors.

He was a champion of the Cornish language, having been born at Liskeard in Cornwall. Jewell tried his father’s line of work but soon abandoned banking for writing, publishing in 1881 “a jejune railway novel.” In 1893 he began to write on foreign politics and military subjects (being a lieutenant in the 3rd Volunteer Battalion of the Royal Fusiliers), contributing successively to the St. Jame’s Budget, the Sketch, the Globe, Black and White, and the Pall Mall Gazette. In November 1895 he assumed the surname Duncombe in accordance with his grandmother’s will, and married Mary Amy Slaughter (1870–1904).

Around the time of his marriage he edited The Royalist, a journal dealing with Irish and Welsh Jacobitism and Cornish identity. It was subsidized by Celtic-Cornish scholar and activist Henry Jenner (1848–1934). Both the magazine and Jenner were part of a larger Legitimist movement that sought dynasty change by restoring to the throne Don Carlos VII of Spain and Charles XI of France, among others. Jenner and Duncombe-Jewell had a long acquaintance, and both were actively involved in Legitimism. Ironically, Duncombe-Jewell was also Spanish correspondent to The Times (1898–1899), covering the Carlist uprising at the same time he was participating in it. Crowley too was involved around 1899.

Alas, misfortune soon surrounded Duncombe-Jewell. His “disastrous personal financial situation led to his dismissal in the summer of 1902” from a projected Victoria History of Cornwall.

A few months later, on 28 April 1903, his son Anthony Michael Duncombe-Jewell was born at 11 St. James Terrace, Plymouth; however, this child was not with him at Boleskine, nor is he mentioned in Duncombe-Jewell’s biographies. A year and a day later, on 29 April 1904, his wife Mary, aged thirty-four, died of shock from on operation for double salpingitis (inflammation of both fallopian tubes); her sister Frances H. Slaughter was present at the time of death. It is unclear whether Duncombe-Jewell was present at either of these events; he is not the informant for the certified record of either the birth or the death. At this time, he changed his name by deed poll to Ludovic Cameron; Lowenna suggests this may have been a tactic to dodge creditors. Whether the subject of his divination was financial, paternal, matrimonial, or other, his old friend’s house Boleskine provided the perfect opportunity for Ludovic Cameron to lay low.

Military service:

Formerly a Lieutenant in the 3rd Volunteer Battalion of the Royal Fusiliers, he represented The Times in Spain during the rumours of an impending Carlist rising in 1898-99, and served as a Special War Correspondent for the Morning Post newspaper in South Africa, the same paper that also employed Winston Churchill, with the 3rd Division South African Field Force.

Writing career:

Duncombe-Jewell was a noted historian, novelist and verse-writer, and made numerous contributions to the Pall Mall Gazette, and many other publications of the period. He was editor of Armorial Cornwall, founder and Hon. Sec. Celtic-Cornish Society, and leader of the Cornish Language Movement. He was also an expert in the works of occultist, Aleister Crowley, who spent some time in Cornwall.

Interest in Cornish Nationalism:

During the 1890s, Duncombe-Jewell flirted with the Neo-Jacobite Revival. He wrote a piece on the movement for The Albermarle, which was critical of the more political Legitimist Jacobite League of Great Britain and Ireland, but favourable towards the more artistic Order of White Rose.

In 1901 he founded the Cornish Celtic Society (Cornish: Cowethas Kelto-Kernuak), and at the Pan Celtic Congress of 1901 made a spirited plea for recognition of Cornwall as a Celtic nation.

He was a flamboyant individual who appeared at the 1902 Bangor Eisteddfod as the Cornish delegate sporting a traditional Cornish costume of his own design. He was made a bard by the Welsh Gorsedd in 1904 and took the bardic name of Bardd Glas (the Blue Bard) because he was clad from his tights to his cap in this colour. Also involved with Cowethas Kelto Kernuak was Henry Jenner who later retired to Cornwall following a distinguished career as librarian at the British Museum. Together with Jenner, he was jointly responsible for Cornwall gaining its acceptance as a Celtic nation by the Pan Celtic Congress of 1904. Later Jenner helped found the Cornish Gorseth.

The Cowethas Kelto Kernuak organisation petered out, when in 1903, Duncombe Jewell left Cornwall to live at Boleskine near Loch Ness and the colourful and enigmatic Bardd Glas progressively turned his attention away from Cornish Celtic culture to Welsh.