Pamela, Lady Youde, OBE (; born 6 December 1926) is a native of Kent, England, and the wife of Sir Edward Youde, the 26th Governor of Hong Kong. She served as Governor's wife from 1982 to 1986 by virtue of her husband's position.
Lady Youde developed a love for Chinese culture from an early age, and before becoming the Governor's wife she had lived in China on four separate occasions for a combined total of eleven years. She first came to China in 1948 after joining the Foreign Office, serving in clerical roles in Shanghai, Nanjing, and Beijing. Following her marriage in 1951, she returned to England and became a full-time homemaker, but subsequently lived in China three more times through her diplomat husband's postings, including residing in Beijing from 1974 to 1978 as wife of the British Ambassador to China. Her many years in China, combined with studies in Chinese at the SOAS University of London, enabled Lady Youde to speak fluent Mandarin.
During her four years as the Governor's wife, Lady Youde was actively involved in charitable work, serving as President of The Community Chest Hong Kong and President of the Hong Kong Girl Guides Association, among other roles. She also participated in various social and official occasions, including the reception for in October 1986. Her husband was the only Governor of Hong Kong to die in office. In recognition of his contributions to the development of higher education in Hong Kong, the Hong Kong Government, with Lady Youde's support, established the in April 1987 to provide scholarships for Hong Kong students to pursue further studies both locally and overseas. Since the Fund's establishment, Lady Youde has continuously served as a member of its Board of Trustees and its Council.
Beyond her work with the Sir Edward Youde Memorial Fund, Lady Youde has devoted herself after her husband's death to promoting educational and academic exchange between Britain and China, including serving as Chairman of the Needham Research Institute Trust from 2002 to 2008, and as a trustee of the Great Britain–China Centre Great Britain-China Educational Trust from 2000 to 2016. Lady Youde also authored an English-language travel book about China and translated traditional Chinese stories into English. Pamela Youde Nethersole Eastern Hospital is among the places in Hong Kong named after her.
Biography Family background Lady Youde was born Pamela Fitt (née Fitt) on 6 December 1926 in Kent, England, from the Fitt family, a modestly distinguished family in the local area of Herne Bay and Whitstable. Her father, Arthur Baden Fitt (1900–1982), served in the Royal Air Force during World War I. At the time of Lady Youde's birth, Arthur was working as the hotel manager at the Marine Hotel in Whitstable, which was owned by his father (Lady Youde's grandfather), George John Fitt. Arthur later operated the smaller Richmond Inn in Herne Bay, and after World War II became involved in the yacht and motor vehicle trade in Kent, particularly in recreational vehicles, with considerable success. His company, Arthur Fitt Caravans, was one of the approved dealers of the National Caravan Council.
Lady Youde's father married Margery Wooff (1903–1979) on 6 December 1924, meaning Lady Youde was born on her parents' second wedding anniversary. Lady Youde was the eldest among her siblings; she had a brother and a sister, named Arthur John Fitt (born 1930) and Julia Margaret Fitt (born 1937), with her brother John later taking over their father's caravan business. Lady Youde and her family lived in Herne Bay; they also had a holiday house in the coastal town of Salcombe in Devon, where they would fish and go out to sea during holidays.
Experiences in China During her school years, Lady Youde was active in music, singing, and performing in plays. She graduated from secondary school during World War II and in 1943, at only seventeen years of age, took a secretarial course. She subsequently worked at an engineering firm. However, Lady Youde did not aspire to lead the ordinary life of a typical working woman. Rather, she had been fascinated by China since learning about it in primary school at around the age of ten, and from that time had longed to experience Chinese life and culture. As a child, none of her family had any connection to China, so her knowledge came entirely from reading, and she formed early on a desire to go to China one day. To realise this ambition, she spent evenings after work learning Mandarin from a missionary who had served in China, whose accounts of life there deepened her understanding of the country.
Several years later, using her command of Mandarin as an advantage, Lady Youde was hired by the Foreign Office as a typist, and was subsequently posted in 1948 to Shanghai, China, where she worked in the Exhibition and Film Section of the Press Department of the British Embassy in China. Her duties included general shorthand, typing, and secretarial work, as well as participating in organising educational and medical exhibitions locally, and screening newsreels about Europe and Great Britain at universities and schools. However, Lady Youde's arrival in China coincided with the turbulent period of the Chinese Civil War. In March 1949 she was transferred to Nanjing, then the capital of the Republic of China, to work at the main British Embassy, and a month later, in April of that year, the Chinese Communist Party forces captured Nanjing. During her postings in Shanghai and Nanjing, Lady Youde took the opportunity to travel extensively, using not only her own feet but also bicycles, buses, and boats. She lived in single-staff quarters in both Shanghai and Nanjing; after moving to Nanjing, although she was temporarily unable to venture out due to the fighting between Nationalist and Communist forces and the suspension of water and electricity, she was free to move about after the Communist liberation of Nanjing.
In October 1949, the People's Republic of China was proclaimed in Beijing, and mainland China changed sovereignty as the Nationalist Party retreated to Taiwan. In January 1950, Britain recognised the People's Republic of China, and the two countries established diplomatic relations at the level of provisional chargé d'affaires, later upgraded to chargé d'affaires level in June 1954. Accordingly, Lady Youde was transferred to Beijing in 1950 to help establish the provisional chargé d'affaires office at the former . In June of that year, she passed her probationary period and was issued a Civil Service Certificate as a Grade I Executive Officer, with her substantive appointment backdated to August 1949. In Beijing, Lady Youde's freedom of movement was restricted; although she was initially permitted to travel by train to visit temples in the suburbs, these temples were subsequently ordered closed by the authorities and she was no longer able to visit them. In 1951, she married Edward Youde (later Sir Edward; 1924–1986), then a Third Secretary and Vice-Consul, in Beijing, formally becoming Lady Youde, whereupon she resigned from her post and became a full-time homemaker.
After their marriage, the Youdes returned to England, with Edward posted to the Foreign Office in London while Lady Youde enrolled at SOAS, University of London, from which she graduated with an undergraduate degree. There she met D. C. Lau and other sinologists from Hong Kong, with whom she formed lifelong friendships. As an alumna of SOAS, she was later appointed to the SOAS governing body. In 1953, Youde was posted to Beijing as Second Secretary at the British chargé d'affaires office, and Lady Youde accompanied him; their elder daughter Jennifer was born there in January 1955. In January 1956, Youde was transferred to the British Embassy in Washington, D.C., United States, and was promoted to First Secretary in January the following year; their younger daughter Deborah was subsequently born in August 1959.
From 1960 to 1962, Youde, accompanied by Lady Youde, was again posted to Beijing at the chargé d'affaires office, serving as First Secretary. Thereafter, Youde was successively posted to New York in the United States and back to London, England, in various roles, and Lady Youde spent some time without visiting China again, devoting herself to raising their two daughters. It was not until August 1974, when Youde was appointed to succeed Sir John Addis as British Ambassador to China, that Lady Youde went to live in China for the fourth time. By this period Sino-British relations had improved considerably, and the two countries had established full ambassador-level diplomatic relations in 1972. During his tenure as Ambassador, Youde was awarded the KCMG in 1977, becoming a knight, and Lady Youde accordingly became styled Lady Youde. Although her husband left his post and returned to Britain in June 1978, as China began to open up following the end of the Cultural Revolution, Lady Youde also had opportunities to visit China in a private capacity on organised tours. Her many years of experience in China prompted the London publisher Batsford Books to invite her to write the China volume for their travel book series, which also included volumes on California, Florida, India, Greek Macedonia, Malaysia and Singapore, South Africa, and West Germany. After eighteen months of writing, her work China: Through the Eyes of Pamela Youde was published in early 1982, with a Chinese-language edition subsequently published by Ming Pao Publications in 1983.
As Governor's wife In December 1981, the British Government announced that Sir Edward Youde would succeed Sir Murray MacLehose (later Lord MacLehose) as the 26th Governor of Hong Kong, and he arrived in Hong Kong on 20 May the following year to take up his post, accompanied by Lady Youde. Before her husband assumed the governorship, Lady Youde had also visited Hong Kong on a private visit in February 1982 at the invitation of Lady MacLehose (later Lady MacLehose of Beoch), staying at Government House and calling on the Hong Kong Executive and Legislative Councils Members' Office, where she lunched with the female members of the councils. Additionally, Youde had previously used the romanisation "Yau Tak" as a transliteration of his name while in China, but changed it to "Youde" before assuming the governorship. After he assumed the governorship, the Hong Kong Government's Chinese Language Division finalised the official Chinese transliteration of Lady Youde's name as "彭雯麗" in September 1982.
As the Governor's wife, Lady Youde frequently represented her husband at various cultural and charitable activities, as well as social and official occasions, including welcoming Queen Elizabeth II and her husband Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh during in October 1986. Lady Youde enjoyed mingling with ordinary citizens and often went among the people to understand their circumstances. For instance, shortly after arriving in Hong Kong, the territory experienced the , with Kwun Tong in Kowloon among the worst-affected areas. After the disaster, Lady Youde accompanied her husband to visit victims in the affected areas, and, being fluent in Mandarin, engaged with them in depth to offer comfort and sympathy. In 1983, Lady Youde succeeded Michael Sandberg (later Lord Sandberg), Chairman of the Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation, as President of Community Chest Hong Kong. During her tenure she was particularly devoted to fundraising efforts, regularly participating with her husband in Community Chest events and never missing Board of Directors meetings. Community Chest under her leadership continued to organise various fundraising activities including the , with the inaugural walk along the Island Eastern Corridor on 3 June 1984 attracting over 98,000 participants, breaking the record since the Walk for Millions first began in 1971.