Diana Helena Lewthwaite (1943-2023)
Written by Tim Cockerill
Occupation: Olympic Skier
Family Background
Diana Helena Tomkinson ( known as 'Di') and her twin of Virginia Susan, were born on the 23 April 1943 to William Robert Tomkinson TD (1909-1970 ) and his wife Helen Mary Blane MBE (1913-2000). They had married in 1940 and Helen Mary, also an Olympic skier, was the only daughter of Commander Sir Charles Rodney Blane RN (1879-1916), 4th and last baronet, who was drowned when his ship HMS Queen Mary sank at the battle of Jutland in 1916. Both Sir Charles's brothers had died before him in World War I, hence the baronetcy ended. It was created in 1812 for Sir Gilbert Blane (1749-1834), MD, a Scottish physician who instituted health reforms in the Royal Navy, such as the obligatory use of lemon juice to prevent scurvy. Sir Gilbert was Physician to the Fleet from 1779-1783 and Physician Extraordinary to the Prince of Wales, later the Prince Regent (George IV) and his brother, William IV. Di's paternal ancestors, the Tomkinson family, had been settled in Cheshire since the 18th century. Her father William was a Captain in the Middlesex Regiment and later became the senior partner in a firm of London accountants, but lived at Kingswood, Surrey. Di and her twin sister had an elder brother Robert and a younger brother David. Their grandfather Robert Edward Tomkinson (1847-1928), a fourth son, was a stock- broker in London, whose elder brother was James Tomkinson (1840-1910) PC MP, who succeeded to the family estate at Willington Hall, near Chester which the family had purchased in 1828. The latter's great great granddaughter was Tara Palmer-Tomkinson (1971-2017 ), socialite and television personality, whose father Charles, was an international skier and whose grandfather was killed in a skiing accident at Klosters in Switzerland in 1952.
Education
Di was educated at Roedean, where she excelled at all sports. Annually, on Boxing Day, Di's mother Helen took all four children skiing to Villars, south of Lake Geneva, where for many years her grandmother Lady Blane and Ethel Leverson held sway. By the age of ten, Di was deemed to be outstanding on the slopes.
Sporting career
Having completed her A Levels, Di left school in 1960 to train with the British team in races around the Alps, on the volcanic slopes of Mont Etna and at Zakopane in Poland. She travelled to each event in her red Mini, a car bought with money earned as a pisteur, preparing the pistes, which was hard physical work. She was one of the few women to do it. Her training lasted five years and at 5ft 9in and weighing under ten stone, she was considered the bravest and toughest British skier of her time by the team manager Elspeth Crossley Cooke. By 1964 she had won a place as a reserve on the Olympic team at Innsbruck in Austria. In1966, she competed in the first and only Alpine World Ski Championships in the southern hemisphere in Portillo, Chile, finishing 8th in the downhill.
Over the next two years Di competed in the newly inaugurated World Cup, taking part in some thirty events and establishing herself as one of the best British skiers of her era. Her apotheosis came in 1968 when, at the age of 24, she was selected for the British Olympic team at Grenoble, France. This was acknowledged at the time to be the best ever ladies’ team. However, during a training run she was knocked sideways by a trainer of another team walking in front of her on the slopes a collision which broke her arm. Nothing daunted and having to miss the downhill race, she insisted in competing in the slalom with her arm in a cast. She thus finished a creditable 23rd out of 40, but by this sheer bad luck she had been deprived of her potential and never had another chance to display it.
Having retired from competitive skiing, Di continued her skiing links in another way between 1969 until the early 1990s. This came about when she met David Lewthwaite whilst helping to organise the 1968 Ski Ball. In 1964 David had founded Supertravel, the first ski travel business to offer catered chalets. His remarkable price of a £49 break in the Alps was necessitated by the then imposed limit of £50 to cover accommodation and meals on foreign holidays. This was a stringent economic measure designed to control the movement of capital. His business soon proved a great success and even members of the Royal Family participated, though Di always refused to divulge any names. She married David in 1969 and soon became a high profile and knowledgeable asset in the business, a role she continued to hold until retirement aged 60.
In 1975 Di became president of the Ladies Ski Club for three years, following in the footsteps of her mother Helen Tomkinson and her grandmother Lady Blane. Her mother also took a prominent part on Olympic and World Championship juries. The club is the oldest Women's Alpine Ski Club in the world and was founded in 1923 by leading lady ski racers, led by Mabel Lunn (1885-1959), wife of Arnold Lunn (1888-1974), the alpine skiing pioneer and businessman.
Di was always a keen horsewoman and in 1994, along with her daughter Emma, she bought the Irish-bred Supreme Rock with a view to Emma having a bit of fun eventing. No-one could have foreseen how Supreme Rock would become one of the most successful horses ever seen in that sphere. Emma had weekly lessons with Pippa Funnell, a leading three day eventer, and competed for a couple of years. In 1996 Pippa took on the ride full time and enjoyed huge success, winning a silver medal at the Sydney Olympics 2000. She also won the Badminton Horse Trials back to back in 2002 and 2003, as well as successfully defending the European Championship titles of 1999 and 2001 and winning the Rolex Grand Slam of Eventing in 2003. The wider family were there to watch, even in Sydney, and earned themselves the nickname of ‘the barmy army’. At the Lewthwaite’s ancestral home in Cumbria, a representation of Supreme Rock was given pride of place amongst the family portraits. Di adored the ‘Rocky years’, travelling to support him at competitions and watching his training; it gave her something to dream about whilst at her office desk during the week.
Marriage and Family Life
On 11 October 1969 Diana Helena Tomkinson married David Rainald Lewthwaite (1940-2004), later Sir David Lewthwaite, 5th and last baronet, elder son of Brigadier Rainald Gilfrid Lewthwaite (1913-2003; DCB), 4th baronet, by his wife Margaret Elizabeth Lewthwaite ( 1907-1990; DCB). David had a distinguished time at Rugby between 1953-1958 when he was head of house, head of school and a Cadet Officer in the CCF. He then went on to Trinity College, Cambridge, being the fifth generation of his family to attend the college. He was awarded a Dewar travelling scholarship and began his business career by working for the Morgan Guaranty Trust Co. of New York from 1962-1964. He then founded Supertravel Ltd in 1964, becoming chairman and managing director of Supertravel Holdings Ltd and its subsidiaries. There were two daughters of the marriage, Emma Victoria (b. 1971) and Mary-Claire (b.1972 ), who are both married with children.
The later years
Di's husband David died in 2004, having only outlived his father by a few months. His mother had died in 1990 and his brother Valentine and two sisters predeceased him. For many years previously they had lived in London but also used Whicham Mill, Whicham, near Millom, as their Cumbrian home. David's father Rainald died in his ninetieth year in 2003 but before that David had renovated Broadgate, the family's Regency house, built in 1819. As a skilled interior decorator, he supervised the interior decoration, in keeping with its period.
After her husband's death Di remained living at Broadgate, supervising the estate of some 550 acres and single-handedly running an elegant bed and breakfast establishment. In 2022 she was diagnosed with motor neurone disease from which she died on 30 January 2023 aged 79. She was buried at St Anne's, Thwaites with her husband and nearby five generations of other Lewthwaites. She had led a very active life and continued to ski until three years before her death.
Sources
- Ancestry.com
- Burke’s Peerage, 1916 (for Blane)
- Burke’s Peerage, 2003 (for Lewthwaite)
- Burke’s Landed Gentry, 1972 (for Tomkinson)
- Cairns, Tasmin, The Ladies Ski Club website, accessed 2019
- Inglis, J., Rugby School Who's Who, 3rd edition, Rugby, 2002
- Obituary of Di Lewthwaite in the Daily Telegraph, 20 April 2023
- Obituary of Di Lewthwaite in Horse and Hound magazine, 25 February 2023
- Pike, WT, Contemporary Biographies, Cheshire, Brighton, 1904
- Family information