Editing Eleanor Alice Burford (section)

==Personal life==
[[File:Canning Town and Royal Victoria Dock 1908.jpg|left|thumb|Map 1908, showing Eleanor Hibbert's birthplace [[Canning Town]] to the north of [[Royal Victoria Dock]].]]
{{Quote box|width=17.5em|bgcolor=#c6dbf7 |quote="I consider myself extremely lucky to have been born and raised in London, and to have had on my doorstep this most fascinating of cities with so many relics of 2000 years of history still to be found in its streets. One of my greatest pleasures was, and still is, exploring London."<br/> —Eleanor Hibbert<ref name="hibbert_dalby">{{cite news | title= All About Jean Plaidy | url= http://jeanplaidy.tripod.com/id17.htm | first= Richard |last=Dalby |publisher= Book and Magazine Collector #109 |date=  April 1993 |access-date=18 April 2014 }}</ref>}}
{{Quote box|width=17.5em|bgcolor=#c6dbf7|align=left|quote="I found that married life gave me the necessary freedom to follow an ambition which had been with me since childhood; and so I started to write in earnest."<br/> —Eleanor Hibbert<ref name="hibbert_dalby"/>}}
[[File:hatton.garden.london.ringshop.arp.jpg|right|thumb|A shop in [[Hatton Garden]], London's [[jewellery]] quarter and centre of the UK [[diamond]] trade. In the 1920s, Eleanor Hibbert worked for a jeweller in Hatton Garden, where she weighed gems and typed. ]] 
[[File:Strand Street, King's Lodging - geograph.org.uk - 703683.jpg|left|thumb|In the early 1970s, Eleanor Hibbert bought a historic house in [[Sandwich, Kent]], and named it ''King's Lodging''.]]
[[File:Albert court before Royal Albert Hall, London in spring 2013 (2).JPG|right|thumb|Eleanor Hibbert lived in a two-storey penthouse at Albert Court, [[Kensington Gore]], close to the [[Royal Albert Hall]], London.]]
{{Quote box|width=17.5em|bgcolor=#E8FFEE|align=left|quote="We spent the first night of our honeymoon in a country hotel, with Tudor architecture oak beams, and floors which sloped, of the Queen-Elizabeth-Slept-Here variety. There were old tennis-courts – the Tudor kind where Henry VIII was said to have played; and gardens filled with winter heather, jasmine and yellow chrysanthemums. [...] So that first night together was spent in the ancient bedroom with the tiny leaded paned windows, through which shafts of moonlight touched the room with a dreamlike radiance [...] "<br/> —Eleanor Hibbert writing as Victoria Holt in ''The House of a Thousand Lanterns'', 1974<ref name="hibbert_lanterns">{{cite book | url = http://www.epubbud.com/read.php?g=TK59A9H6&tocp=8 | last= Holt |first= Victoria |date= 1974 |title= The House of a Thousand Lanterns |location= London |publisher= Collins |page= 74 |isbn= 9780006143499 |access-date= 2 September 2014}}</ref>}}
[[File:St Peter's Church, Notting Hill - geograph.org.uk - 837135.jpg|thumb|right|A memorial service was held for Eleanor Hibbert in March 1993 at [[St Peter's, Notting Hill]] Anglican church in [[Kensington Park Road]], [[London]].]]
[[File:Sea Princess Venice 1986.jpg|thumb|left|Eleanor Hibbert died aboard the cruise ship ''[[MS Veronica|Sea Princess]]'' in 1993. (The ship is seen here in 1986 at Venice).]]
Hibbert was born Eleanor Alice Burford on 1 September 1906 at 20 Burke Street, [[Canning Town]], now part of the [[London]] borough of [[Newham]].<ref name="hibbert_oup">{{Cite ODNB| title= Reference Entry for Hibbert Eleanor Alice | first= Moira |last=Burgess | chapter= The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography | url = http://oxfordindex.oup.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/53144 |date=  September 2004  | pages= ref:odnb/53144 | doi= 10.1093/ref:odnb/53144 |access-date=18 April 2014 }}</ref> She inherited a love of reading from her father, Joseph Burford, a dock labourer. Her mother was Alice Louise Burford, née Tate.

When she was quite young, ailing health forced her to be privately educated at home. At the age of 16 she went to a business college, where she studied [[shorthand]], [[typewriting]], and languages. She then worked for a jeweller in [[Hatton Garden]] where she weighed gems and typed. She also worked as a language interpreter in a café for French and German-speaking tourists.<ref name="hibbert_dalby"/>

In her early twenties, she married George Percival Hibbert (''c.'' 1886–1966),<ref name=nyt/><ref name="hibbert_smh-1978-03-02">{{cite news | title= Just Like A Character From the Past | url= https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1301&dat=19780302&id=TPtjAAAAIBAJ&pg=3854,281122 |first=Margaret |last=O'Sullivan|newspaper=The Sydney Morning Herald  | date=2 March 1978|access-date=18 April 2014}}</ref> a wholesale leather merchant about twenty years older than herself, who shared her love of books and reading.<ref name="hibbert_oup"/> She was his second wife.<ref name="hibbert_ind">{{cite news | title= Obituary: Jean Plaidy | url= https://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/obituary-jean-plaidy-1479699.html | first= Elizabeth |last=Walter |newspaper= The Independent |date= 20 January 1993 |access-date=18 April 2014 }}</ref> During [[World War II]], the Hibberts lived in a cottage in [[Cornwall]] that looked out over a bay called [[Plaidy, Cornwall|Plaidy Beach]].

Between 1974 and 1978, Eleanor Hibbert bought a 13th-century [[manor house]] in [[Sandwich, Kent]], that she named ''King's Lodging'' because she believed that it had served previously as lodging for English monarchs [[Henry VIII]] and [[Elizabeth I of England|Elizabeth I]].<ref name="hibbert_smh-1978-03-02"/> The house had carved fireplaces and a staircase from the [[Tudor architecture|Tudor period]].<ref name="hibbert_rt_1981">{{cite news | title= Hail Victoria! Long May She Reign | url= http://www.rtbookreviews.com/rt-daily-blog/magazine-extras-victoria-holt-feature-second-issue-romantic-times | first= Marion |last=Harris | work= Romantic Times | date= 1981 | access-date= 26 August 2014 | archive-date= 6 December 2018 | archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20181206222813/http://www.rtbookreviews.com/rt-daily-blog/magazine-extras-victoria-holt-feature-second-issue-romantic-times | url-status= dead }}</ref> Hibbert restored the house and furnished it opulently but soon found it too big for her taste and too far from London.<ref name="hibbert_oup"/>

She then moved to a two-storey penthouse apartment at Albert Court, [[Kensington Gore]], London, that overlooked the [[Royal Albert Hall]] and [[Hyde Park, London|Hyde Park]].<ref name="hibbert_dalby"/> She shared her apartment with Mrs. Molly Pascoe, a companion who also travelled with her.<ref name="hibbert_smh_1972-02-04">{{cite news | title= Would The Real Mrs Hibbert Please Stand? | url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1301&dat=19720204&id=WgpiAAAAIBAJ&pg=7039,614241 | first=Marie|last= Knuckey | newspaper=The Sydney Morning Herald | date=4 February 1972|access-date=18 April 2014}}</ref>

In 1985, Hibbert sold ''King's Lodging''.<ref name="hibbert_rt_1981"/><ref name="hibbert_harfleet">{{cite web | title= History of Harfleet House in the Medieval town of Sandwich Kent | url= http://www.harfleethouse.co.uk/harfleet_history.htm | access-date= 6 September 2014 | archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20150308004701/http://www.harfleethouse.co.uk/harfleet_history.htm | archive-date= 8 March 2015 | url-status= dead | df= dmy-all }}</ref>

Hibbert spent her summers in her cottage near [[Plaidy, Cornwall|Plaidy Beach]] in [[Cornwall]].<ref name="hibbert_smh_1972-02-04"/> To get away from the cold English winter, Hibbert would sail around the world on board a [[cruise ship]] three months a year from January to April. The cruise would take her to exotic destinations like [[Egypt]] and Australia, locations that she later incorporated into her novels.<ref name="hibbert_smh_1972-02-04"/><ref name="hibbert_smh-1970-03-01">{{cite news | title= It Feels Like 'Coming Home': Mrs Eleanor Hibbert. English Author Would Like To Live Amongst Us| url= https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1301&dat=19700301&id=hPljAAAAIBAJ&pg=1332,698397 |newspaper= The Sydney Morning Herald| date=1 March 1970|access-date=18 April 2014}}</ref> She sailed to [[Sydney]] aboard the cruise ship ''[[SS Oronsay (1950)|Oronsay]]'' in 1970, and the ''[[SS Canberra|Canberra]]'' in 1978.<ref name="hibbert_smh-1978-03-02"/>

Towards the end of her life, her eyesight started failing.<ref name="hibbert_ind"/>

Eleanor Hibbert died on 18 January 1993 on the cruise ship ''[[MS Veronica|Sea Princess]]'' somewhere between [[Athens]], [[Greece]] and [[Port Said]], [[Egypt]] and was buried at sea. A memorial service was later held on 6 March 1993, at [[St Peter's, Notting Hill|St Peter's Anglican Church]], [[Kensington Park Road]], London.<ref name="hibbert_oup"/>