Home Was a Grand Hotel: Tales of a Brighton Belle

Growing up in Brighton’s Grand Hotel – a life of luxury beyond many people’s imagination, or an artificial environment where, as a young girl, you had to be on your best behaviour at all times? For Pamela Sydney Wilson, it has truly resulted in a love-hate relationship with the venerable old building. She was the first baby ever to be born in the Grand, and it loomed large in her life, right up until her father retired as the hotel’s general manager after a distinguished 40-year career. Famous for its wealthy and well-known guests, infamous for the disasters that have befallen it over the years, the Grand Hotel has a fascinating and colourful history, and within these pages, there are humorous and tragic tales of what went on and who ‘Miss Pam’ rubbed shoulders with, both in the Grand and during her five wartime years as WAAF Corporal Sydney Smith. The Grand Hotel has held many in its thrall, and such is its appeal that Pamela was drawn back there to celebrate her 80th birthday in the place she called home so many years before.