From THE CITY OF OXFORD HIGH SCHOOL MAGAZINE VoL. LVIII, ili JULY 1966 No. 186
The bronze statuette of Lawrence of Arabia illustrated in this number of the MAGAZINE was presented to the School in 1956 by Mrs. Lightfoot.
Thirteen inches high, it was sculpted by Kathleen, Lady Scott widow of Captain Robert Falcon Scott, R.N. of Antartic fame who later became Lady Kennet and was a most successful sculptress in her day.
In her Self-Portrait of an Artist (published by John Murray in 1949) there are several references to T.E.L. as a welcome visitor. The most appropriate entries in her diary for 1921 are:
“JANUARY 22ND. Colonel Lawrence is about the house. I am sculpting him.”
“FEBRUARY 9TH. Oh, what a very pleasant day! Colonel Lawrence came to pose and we had fun dressing him up in his Arabian clothes in the drawing-room, praying that my primmest aunt would not be announced. He takes his little bare toes quite for granted. He is going to Arabia with an artist, Kennington, to get pictures for his book, which is all written but which he is not going to publish for quite a long while. The manuscript he is supposed to have lost was quite unimportant notes. He has no money but his All Souls fellowship, and he says he can quite easily live on f250 p.a. He was disliked by the others of his expedition. He hates this film “With Allenby”- says half of it is untrue. He is a very easy responsive little soul, with a ready smile and an acute sense of humour”
“FEBRUARY 20TH. A whole lovely day of Lawrence. We worked and talked and had fun. An Arab proverb-“Everyone’s louse is a gazelle”. He is going out with Winston Churchill [Secretary for the Colonies] to a Conference on the Middle East. He says he is Scotch, Dutch, Italian, and a bit of Spanish and some Norwegian…”
