Born in London on August 4, 1920, Lady Anne was the eldest child and only daughter of Albert Spencer, 7th Earl Spencer, and his wife, Cynthia Hamilton. Lady Anne’s younger brother, John Spencer, Viscount Althorp, inherited their father’s title and the family seat of Althorp House, upon his death in 1975.
Lady Anne grew up between Spencer House in London and at the family seat of Althorp House, in Northamptonshire. The Spencers have a relationship with the House of Windsor dating back generations, and Lady Anne enjoyed a close relationship with the royal family, thanks to her four aunts being Ladies-in-Waiting to the Queen Mother and her own mother serving as a Lady-to-the-Bedchamber.
Like many young women of her generation, Lady Anne was educated at home by a governess and reportedly excelled at music and languages. Indeed, the young British society swan was living in Austria to perfect her German when Adolf Hitler and his entourage drove past her apartment in Vienna, marking the start of the Anschluss, or annexation of Austria, in March 1938.
A swift evacuation was required. Fortunately Lady Anne was able to call on the help of her companion, whose father, William Ormsby-Gore, 4th Baron Harlech, was a highly-regarded politician. “Notwithstanding the experience of the Anschluss, my mother maintained the fondest memories of Vienna, and later in life loved returning to the city,” her son Richard later recalled in the East Anglian Daily Times.
Back in Britain, Lady Anne was ready to do her part for the war effort. The aristocratic beauty swapped her debutante gowns for a nurse’s uniform and served at Middleton Hospital, a converted country house in Oxfordshire. She later joined the Women’s Royal Naval Service, also known as the WRENs.
