Jessica Mitford Jessica Mitford Jessica Lucy 'Decca' Freeman-Mitford (11 September 1917 – 22 July 1996) was an English author, journalist, civil rights activist and political campaigner, and was one of the Mitford sisters. Born at Asthall Manor, Mitford, the sixth of seven children, was the daughter of David Freeman-Mitford, 2nd Baron Redesdale, and his wife Sydney (daughter of politician and publisher Thomas Bowles), and grew up in a series of her father's country houses. She had little formal education, but nevertheless did a great deal of reading. Her sisters Unity and Diana were well-known members of the British Union of Fascists and
Education of the British royal family or heir to the throne had completed a university degree. Novelist Monica Ali described Charles's first wife, Diana, Princess of Wales, as being able to engage with the public on issues such as mental health in spite of her being "uneducated and intellectually insecure". Princess Michael of Kent has said that Diana struggled with praise on account of her difficult upbringing and because she "did not have much education". According to tapes released in 2004, Diana had said that her immediate family members told her she was "the thick one". Diana failed her O-level examinations (equivalent of a high school