"I would wait all night in the rain, to see Consuelo Marlborough get into her carriage." - Sir James Barrie

I can’t apologize for yet another post about Consuelo, Duchess of Marlborough, because I find her fascinating beyond the portrait she’s left us of a poor little American heiress bullied into a loveless ducal marriage. Consuelo’s memoirs are excellent for obtaining a glimpse into the opulent, extravagant and reckless life led by the wealthy and well-born on both sides of the Atlantic (and with trips to Imperial Russia and India under Curzon as well), but after reading Amanda Mackenzie Stuart amazing dual biography, Consuelo and Alva Vanderbilt: The Story of a Daughter and a Mother in the Gilded Age, one quickly gains the impression that Consuelo was not the victim of a pushy mother and a cold-hearted husband at all. Alva certainly did emotionally blackmail her daughter into marrying the Duke of Marlborough, and Sunny was a supercilious and arrogant English peer who may or may not have begun an affair with her friend Gladys Deacon during their marriage; however, Consuelo also indulged in her own peccadilloes.

Her first (alleged) lover was the French artist Paul Helleu. In her memoirs she describes him as a “nervous, sensitive man with a capacity for intense suffering that artistic temperaments are prone to…[h]e thought himself something of a Don Juan, and with his black beard, his mobile lips and sad eyes he had the requisite looks, but he was too sensitive for the role.” Helleu came to Blenheim in the spring of 1900, when Sunny was away in South Africa during Boer War. The artist sketched Consuelo in a number of elegant and intimate poses, the most interesting being a drawing of Consuelo sleeping on the couch with her little dog. Consuelo traveled to Paris in June of that year, where Helleu etched more dry-point pictures of the Duchess. An affair with the artist was possible in Paris, and Consuelo had an easy excuse for being in the city, for her father lived there with his second wife. Sunny returned home in late July, and by the following year, rumors about the trouble between the Marlboroughs began again, exacerbated by Sunny’s disappointment in being passed over for the post of Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, which he blamed on the American press, and therefore, Consuelo. It was in this thick, acidic atmosphere that Gladys Deacon came to stay with them at Blenheim Palace.

Charles, seventh Marquess of Londonderry, by John Singer Sargent, 1910, at Mount Stewart, Co. Down. ©NTPL/John Hammond

Consuelo’s second lover hit a bit closer to home. Charles Stewart Henry Vane-Tempest-Stewart was Viscount Castlereagh and eldest son of the Marquess of Londonderry. He was also a married man and father of two children–and happened to be Sunny’s cousin. In 1906, Consuelo and Castlereagh’s affair was hot and torrid, and shockingly, they hatched a plan to elope to Paris, a move which would have ruined both their lives, and the lives of their families, forever.

No doubt this man stuck in Sunny’s craw, for Castlereagh was everything he was not: tall, attractive, well-liked, and at the beginning of a brilliant political career. The fact that his rival was a close relation couldn’t have been more hurtful of Consuelo, and her plans to elope further inflated Sunny’s immense pride and arrogance. Rumor has it that he wired Consuelo not to return, but Lord Castlereagh’s formidable mother (the infamous Theresa, Lady Londonderry) stepped in and possibly involved the King and Queen into exerting pressure on them to end their affair. Lord Castlereagh returned to his wife, penitent and pitiful (she refused to forgive him for a very long time), but the rift between Sunny and Consuelo was irreparable, and they began to take steps towards separating, or even *gasp* a divorce.

The relations between Sunny and Consuelo were so strained by 1913, he did his best to meddle in her love life, and perhaps this is why Consuelo’s last documented lover before her divorce from Sunny in 1921, was another of his first cousins, Reginald Fellowes. The son of Sunny’s aunt Lady Rosamond and her husband the 2nd Baron de Ramsey of Ramsey Abbey, Reginald was born in 1884, making him a scandalous seven years younger than the thirty-six year old Consuelo. Reginald’s relations with the estranged wife of his ducal cousin was a major source of trouble within the family, both for his parents, who were desperate for him to marry suitable a girl of their choosing, and for Sunny, who stewed and stewed over her personal affairs. The relationship between Consuelo and Fellowes appears to have fizzled naturally, but it surely must have underpinned Consuelo’s intense desire to sever her ties with her bitter and vindictive husband.

Now, this post is not intended to slander or judge Consuelo’s personal affairs, but I’ve always found it very interesting that two of her documented lovers were her husband’s first cousins. Was it a coincidence? Was it true love (or lust)? Or was it revenge? Perhaps a mixture of all choices? Tell me what you think in the comments below!

Picture of Lord Londonderry: Source

In 1885 Karl Pearson was twenty-eight, and an ardent eugenicist who believed that women were the key to national progress. In the club’s inaugural paper, “The Woman’s Question,” he reflected on what changes would occur should women gain access to education, professions and political representation. His treatise was ironically reflected in the make-up of the club, for many of the women felt themselves to be intellectually inferior to the men, who were of Pearson’s background: “radical liberal or socialist in their politics, and employed as lawyers, doctors, or university lecturers. They shared similar public school and Oxbridge backgrounds and were further linked through membership of the same West End men’s clubs: the Saville, the National Liberal Club, the Athenaeum.” Although a number of the female members were economically independent as teachers, writers or journalists, only one had been to university, and all but two were single.

The club’s constitution declared that it would meet monthly, consist of no more than twenty members, and be composed of equal numbers of men and women. They met in each others’ homes, although generally at the house of a male member, with half of the club’s thirty-six meetings taking place at the house of club’s President, Robert Parker, a barrister living in Brunswick Gardens, Kensington, the heart of respectable London. Once at the meetings, the men and women found it difficult to reconcile their gender privileges and marginalization, particularly on the subjects of the role of religion, emotion, and a woman’s individual rights and social obligations.

The club’s most famous female member was Olive Schreiner, a missionary’s daughter whose fictionalized account of her life in South Africa, The Story of an African Farm, made her a celebrity overnight. Schreiner was vocal in her challenge of commonly-held conceptions of female sexuality. Her belief that women experienced sexual pleasure intrigued the male members and horrified the female members. Pearson did propose that sex, even among animals, was never solely for procreation, but was also a “physical pleasure like climbing a mountain, but his support of uninhibited female sexuality fell short: like most “New Men,” who criticized and heralded the end of the patriarchal era but looked with fear towards the new feminist order, and was terrified and disoriented by any signs of female sexual agency in the flesh. Another bone of contention between the men and women was the former’s avoidance of taking responsibility for male sexuality vs the women’s attempt to encourage accountability. Not surprisingly, club members were not sexually adventurous and showed little enthusiasm for free-love doctrines.

The Men and Women’s Club disbanded in 1889, mainly due to the dissatisfaction of the men in the women members. In the eyes of Pearson and his peers, the women proved incapable of the level of scientific work the men demanded, they were serious but did not go very deep, and they were frustrating adversaries. By the end of the club’s existence, club meetings became increasingly deadlocked and stalemated, and neither side found satisfaction in the tone and objective of discussions. While most of the group drifted apart, crossing paths due only to their common social and political circles, Pearson went on to become the premiere voice on the “Woman Question” during the 1890s. His writings were read in Britain and America, and feminists on both sides of the Atlantic viewed him with much respect, using much of his rhetoric to push for legislative reform for women. Despite the short-lived club, its very existence was radical and startling, and very much a product of the late nineteenth century, a time when long-held assumptions and social norms were being challenged by men and women of all walks of life. The topic of female sexuality and gender roles remain today, but for this time, it was extraordinary that a small group of men and women could come together for four years to shatter norms.

Further Reading:
Science, feminism and romance: The Men and Women’s Club 1885-1889 by Judith R. Walkowitz
The real facts of life: feminism and the politics of sexuality, c1850-1940 by Margaret Jackson
City of dreadful delight: narratives of sexual danger in late-Victorian London by Judith R. Walkowitz
Banishing the beast: feminism, sex and morality by Lucy Bland
The facts of life: the creation of sexual knowledge in Britain, 1650-1950 by Roy Porter & Lesley A. Hall
Scandalous Lovers by Robin Schone

The wedding customs of Edwardian England heavily influenced the fashion in America, though there were considerable differences in the former. By the late 1900s, afternoon weddings had become very popular, with 2:30 pm as the most fashionable time, despite the legally recognized time for marriage ceremonies being between 8 am and noon.

To counteract this legality, a special license was obtained (during most of the 19th century, only a few were in position to obtain them) from the Archbishop of Canterbury, after application at the Faculty Office–though a very special reason had to be given to meet with his approval. This license cost on average about £30. Two other options for marriage in England were marriage by “banns” and marriage by license. The “banns,” from an Old English word meaning “to summon”, were the public announcement in church that a marriage was going to take place between two specified persons. They were required to be published in three consecutive weeks prior to the marriage in the parish in which the groom resided and also that in which the bride resided, and both bride and groom were advised to reside at least fifteen days in their respective parishes before the banns were announced.

A marriage by license was a bit quicker, as either the bride or the groom were required to reside in their chosen parish for at least fifteen days prior to the application for the license, either in town or in the country. This £2 license was obtained at either the Faculty Office, the Vicar-General’s Office, the Doctor’s Commons, or at the chosen church where the bride and groom were to be married. On top of these fees,the officiating clergyman needed to be paid (usually according to the position and means of the groom), and the clerk who legalized the marriage required a tip. Interestingly, in Britain, all fees relating to marriage were paid by the groom, and most of the marriage details were left on his shoulders, including the purchase of the bride’s wedding ring and her bouquet, as well as the bouquets and trinkets for the bridesmaids!

In America, the arrangements and the details, if not the financial expense, of the wedding were largely assumed by the bride and her family, leaving the groom with little to do besides show up on the chosen date. The expenses of an American wedding could be heavy: for a church wedding, the services of the clergyman were requested and the church engaged for the date and hour appointed for the wedding. The sexton of the church was enlisted to have the church aired and comfortable for the impending nuptials. To him went the responsibility of making certain an awning and carpet were laid on the church floor, that a man was outside to assist guests from their carriages and maintain order, that another man was at the door to check invitations, and that a policeman was there to keep those uninvited away. To the sexton did much of the planning and preparation of a society wedding fall! Because of the superstitions held by America’s early settlers, weddings were frequently held in June, September, October, and January, though April was a popular month for city brides.

Roman Catholics prohibited marrying on Lent, and though Protestant marriages could be solemnized at any time, the old adage “Marry in Lent, you’ll live to repent” held fast, and that holiday was generally avoided. A nursery rhyme also influenced the day of the week on which a wedding was held–Monday for Wealth, Tuesday for health, Wednesday, best day of all; Thursday for losses, Friday for crosses, Saturday, no luck at all–though Friday was avoided as bearing the mark of Cain and also the stigma of Jesus’s crucifixion. The fashionable hour was high noon, though in imitation of the English, afternoon weddings were popular, and 3 pm was popular for winter weddings, and 4 pm in the spring. At one point in time, evening weddings were much in vogue, but fashionable society gave them up quickly.

The appointment of the wedding gifts were taken very seriously in the United States. The Gilded Age was truly gilded for a bride, with presents growing absurdly gorgeous, displacing the old Dutch custom of giving the young couple household items and a sum of money, and turning into a bold display of wealth and ostentatious generosity. Wedding gifts were displayed at the home of the bride two or three days before the wedding, and the bride and her mother hosted a tea as a way to thank those who sent presents–and also allow everyone to see the lavishness of the gifts sent to the bride. They were customarily placed on tables covered with white damask cloths, which were set around in an empty room to facilitate a tour of the gifts. This was in direct contrast to English custom, where wedding presents were sent to the bride’s residence immediately after the wedding and were supposed to be put in their rightful places and definitely not arranged for the purpose of display. The French did one even better, as the nearest of kin collected a sum of money which was sent to the bride’s mother, who spent it on the trousseau, or jewels or silver, or however the bride so chose.

The most important parts of the wedding were the bride’s gown and trousseau. The traditional attire for a bride was a gown of soft, rich cream-white satin, trimmed simply or elaborately with lace, a wreath of orange-blossoms, and a veil of lace or tulle. The skirt had a train, and except at an evening wedding, waists cut open, or low at the neck, or with short or elbow sleeves (unless the arms were covered with long gloves) were not approved for brides. A wedding gown was supposed to be sumptuous and of the most costly materials, for the bride was privileged to wear her wedding down for six months after her marriage at functions requiring full dress. The train averaged eighty inches in length, though very tall brides wore ninety-five inch trains.

The richest wedding gown was worn, naturally, by Consuelo Vanderbilt on her wedding to the 9th Duke of Marlborough. Of rich white satin, covered with flounces of point d’Angelterre, the court train was fastened to her shoulders and attached to the skirt below the hips, falling in a straight line to lie three and a half yards on the ground. It was edged in its entire length with a borner of rose-leaves tied by true-lovers’ knots (the irony!), wrought with pearls and tiny silver spangles. Accordingly, Consuelo’s trousseau was suitably lavish and just as detailed in the press, with Vogue publishing an illustrated article and the New York Times running nearly two pages to describing her lingerie. In her memoirs, Consuelo details the agony of “[reading in] stupefaction that my garters had gold clasps studded with diamonds, and I wondered how I should live down such vulgarities.” For men wedding attire was much simpler: morning dress was de rigeuer, though an etiquette manual published in the late 1890s detailed the declining fashion for morning wear by American men, who increasingly appeared at weddings in tuxedos.

The actual service was an equally lavish affair: the bride was driven to the church with her father, where relatives and guests awaited. Once the bride alighted from the carriage, the bridesmaids and ushers preceded her, two by two, as her father escorted her down the aisle. As the bridesmaids and ushers reached the lowest altar step, they moved alternately left and right, leaving space for the bridal pair. When the bride reached the lowest step, the groom took her by her right hand and conducted her to the altar where they both kneeled on an elaborate kneeling cushion. Formerly, brides removed the whole glove for the groom to place the ring on her finger, but by the turn of the century, gloves were made with a removable left ring-finger, to facilitate easy access. After the ceremony, the bride and groom marched down the aisle to a choir and strewn rose petals and were immediately driven home. The English fashion for wedding-breakfasts–where prior to the wedding the bride, groom, and their families, sat down to a delicious champagne brunch to toast the impending wedding–did not take off in America, and instead, a reception held after the wedding was popular. Nonetheless, the bride and groom took leave of their families and guests, and in England, were conducted in a four-in-hand to their destination, and in the United States, to the train station.

Widows marrying for a second (or third) time held noticeably simpler weddings. They were advised not to wear bridal veils, a wreath or orange blossoms, nor orange-blossoms on their gown, nor should they be attended by bridesmaids–though she could have pages should the wedding be a smart one. A widow could be given away by her father, uncle or brother, but it was optional after the first wedding, and many a quiet wedding did not feature the widow being “given away.” Formerly, widows married in gray or mauve, though it was later thought permissible for her to wear a cream or white dress, though some wore pale colors, with a matching hat or toque, and a bouquet comprised of mauve, pink, or violet flowers. Interestingly enough, the subject of a widow continuing to wear her first wedding ring was of importance, and etiquette advised the young widow to remove her first band, though she should not cease to wear it until she has arrived at the church. However, it was more usual for a formerly widowed bride to wear both rings for the remainder of her life.

The German custom of celebrating Silver weddings became a vogue in Britain of the late 1910s. The entertainments given to celebrate such an occasion were either an afternoon reception and a dinner party; a dinner party and an evening party; a dinner party and a dance; or a dinner party only, of some twenty or thirty covers. The invitations were issued on “At Home” cards three weeks beforehand, the cards being printed in silver with the name of the husband and wife, and the date and the time on them. Each person invited was expected to send a present in silver, and these were exhibited in the drawing room on the day of the Silver Wedding with a card attached to each bearing the name of the giver. At the afternoon reception, matters were much as at an afternoon wedding, with refreshments and a large wedding cake in which the wife made the first cut much as a bride would do. At the dinner party, the husband and wife went in first, followed by the guests according to precedence, and a wedding cake occupied a prominent place on the table. At the dance, the husband and wife danced the first dance together, and subsequently led the way into the supper room arm-in-arm, where their health was toasted. In the country, some Silver Weddings were celebrated in festivals ranging over three days, and balls, dinners, and treats were given to the neighbors, tenants, villagers and servants. At this celebration, the wife wore white and silver, or gray and silver.

Further Reading:
Manners and Rules of Good Society (1913) by A Member of the Aristocracy
The Book of Weddings (1907) by Mrs. Burton Kingsland
Manners and Social Usages (1897) by Mrs. John Sherwood
The Wedding Day in All Ages and Countries in Two Volumes (1869) by Edward J. Wood
Everyday Etiquette (1905) by Marion Harland and Virginia Van de Water

A native of the Isle of Jersey, that same island from which the equally alluring Lillie Langtry sprung, Elinor and her sister Lucy, who became the first socialite couturier Lucille, also came from humble backgrounds to take London society by storm. Glyn turned to writing after her marriage to landowner Clayton Glyn soured due to his spendthrift ways and their incompatible personalities. She quickly produced a series of light, frothy peeks into high society that proved successful with the public: The Vicissitudes of Evangeline (a series of vignettes detailing a young debutante’s observations of the love affairs of high society, which scandalized the reading public not by its subject, but by a scene where Evangeline is described as becoming in her lingerie!), The Visits of Elizabeth and its sequel Elizabeth Visits America, The Reflections of Ambrosine and The Reason Why.

It wasn’t until she published Three Weeks however, that Elinor Glyn began to rhyme with sin. Three Weeks was the story of a clandestine affair between Englishman Paul Verdayne and a mysterious older woman he meets while on vacation, whom he only knows as “The Lady.” The most sensual and enduring scene which made Elinor immortal took place on a tiger skin, which inspired the doggerel:

Would you like to sin
With Elinor Glyn
On a tiger skin?
Or would you prefer
To err with her
On some other fur?

The resulting scandal “helped to ensure worldwide sales of more than five million in the 25 years after it was first published.” The furor surprised the demure Mrs. Glyn who, in an article with the New York Times, mere said she merely attempted to “show what an educated Slav in love would think and do.” Because of this book, Glyn was considered the leading expert on romance, passion and sex, and was asked around the world to discuss such topics, where she left audiences of both men and women hanging onto her every word as she uttered such pronouncements as “Love is a trinity–body and soul and the desire to reproduce love’s image.” In time, Elinor’s flamboyant persona and flair for words brought her to Hollywood of the 1920s where she promptly coined another enduring word: “It,” that is, the innate sexual appeal some people had and most others didn’t. “It” was the title of her 1927 release and also that of a movie adaptation starring Clara Bow, which helped Glyn parlay her Edwardian success far past that era, where she convinced the cynical post-Great War generation that theirs was not the only period for love and sin.

Further Reading:
The It Girls: Lucy, Lady Duff Gordon and Elinor Glyn by Meredith Etherington-Smith and Jeremy Pilcher
Addicted to Romance: The Life and Adventures of Elinor Glyn by Joan Hardwick
Montacute’s Tigress (BBC)
Books by Elinor Glyn

The daughter of Boston aristocrats Edward Parker Deacon and Florence Baldwin Deacon, Gladys and her three younger sisters, Audrey, Edith and Dorothy gained notoriety at a tender age when their parents became embroiled in a homicide/divorce case that nearly caused an international contretemps between France and the United States.

Though Edward received custody of his three young daughters (Dorothy remained with Florence), the divorce and subsequent custody battle had sapped him of strength and he was committed to a mental health institute in 1897. Gladys, Audrey and Edith trooped dutifully back to their mother, who had reverted to her maiden name of Baldwin. Gladys spent the remainder of her adolescence in Europe, which allowed her to make an easier transition from girl to worldly debutante than most American girls brought over to marry a title. For one thing, Gladys had no incentive to marry. She was wealthy, well-fixed regarding social status despite her parents’ wretched divorce, and her mother was preoccupied with keeping her new lover happy, all of which permitted her an independence from meddling matchmaking many of her contemporaries would envy.

She was also dazzlingly beautiful, charming and erudite. By age twenty-one, Gladys had conquered London and captured the attention of the most sought-after bachelors in society–including the Crown Prince of Germany, whose gift to Gladys of a royal antique nearly caused a diplomatic scandal. Perhaps it was the challenge of the unattainable, the lingering childhood fantasy (on the day of Consuelo’s wedding, her diary notes her lamentation at being too young to catch Sunny), or maybe the friendship began innocently enough, but within months, Gladys had become an integral part of the Marlborough marriage–a shoulder for Consuelo to lean on when Sunny’s beastly behavior became too much, and an attentive, awed listener to Sunny’s overweening pride in Blenheim and his illustrious heritage.

Of this point in her life, Consuelo’s memoirs are frustratingly opaque, noting only “I was soon subjugated by the charm of her companionship and we began a friendship which only ended years later,” calling her “beautiful and alluring.” Judging by the copious accounts of her doings, Gladys was beautiful and alluring, but she was also a vain perfectionist, obsessed with the “kink” in her nose that kept her from possessing a perfect Grecian profile–an obsession that led to the ruination of her beauty before she was yet forty. No proof of a physical relationship between Sunny and Gladys exists, but before long, the combination of their inseparability and the continuing warm relations between Consuelo and Gladys both baffled and fed the gossip mill. This triangle waltzed on for many years until 1906, when Consuelo began to take the necessary steps for divorce.

This was a bold action for the time, as divorce was very difficult to achieve under English law, and it would be socially devastating. Pressure against the divorce was placed on Consuelo and Sunny from all avenues–the King, Consuelo’s father, Winston Churchill and his mother Jennie–but both were adamant: they hated the sight of one another and the thought of being yoked forever was repugnant. Because of their difficulties in obtaining a divorce, the Duke and Duchess of Marlborough decided on a formal separation and joint custody of their sons. Not surprisingly, Gladys’ name was conspicuous by its absence in the press, as well as gossip concerning Consuelo’s aborted elopement with Viscount Castlereagh.

The post-war years witnessed a mellowing reaction to divorce, and a woman could now sue her husband on the grounds of desertion, provided she could also prove he spent a night at a hotel with another woman. To comply with the law regarding the divorce of a separated couple, Sunny and Consuelo went through the farce of moving in together for a few days and he then repudiating her desire for conjugal rights in paper. Consuelo and Sunny officially divorced in 1921, and after obtaining an annulment from the Pope (as Sunny had converted to Catholicism and the Balsan family viewed the marriage between Consuelo and Jacques as unsanctioned due to her divorce), Gladys finally became the (2nd) 9th Duchess of Marlborough at age 40. Ironically, after a clandestine relationship of nearly 20 years, their marriage deteriorated soon after the wedding, and relations between the two were so strained, supper was eaten with a loaded pistol at her plate.

Gladys became increasingly eccentric with the passing years. She bred Blenheim spaniels and allowed them to defecate all over the palace. The injection of wax in the bridge of her nose ruined her beauty as it slid down her face to rest in her chin, which aged her prematurely with discolored jowls, and she refused mirrors in the house. Dissatisfied, angry, and unhappy, Sunny took refuge in the cold cruelty he used as a shield all his life and abandoned Blenheim to Gladys, avenging himself by cutting first her funds, and then the electricity, sparking newspaper cartoons portraying the Duchess of Marlborough cooking over candlelight. Sunny died of cancer in 1934, and Gladys was no longer chatelaine of Blenheim Palace. It was said she left the estate with as much glee as Consuelo during her own departure, but by that time, Gladys had become a true eccentric, living in a haphazard manner until her death in 1977. As for Consuelo, she lived through equally tumultuous, though less tragic times, escaping Nazi-occupied France with her husband and settling in America. She was widowed in 1956, and when she died in 1964, she shocked her family to its toes by requesting to be buried in Bladon, near Blenheim Palace.

Further Reading:
The Glitter and the Gold by Consuelo Vanderbilt Balsan
Consuelo and Alva Vanderbilt: The Story of a Daughter and a Mother in the Gilded Age by Amanda Mackenzie Stuart
The face on the sphinx: A portrait of Gladys Deacon, Duchess of Marlborough by Daphne Fielding
Gladys, Duchess of Marlborough by Hugo Vickers
Gladys, Duchess of Marlborough: the aristocrat with attitude – The Telegraph

The motorcar was here to stay despite protestations from the rural districts, coachmen and other citizens alarmed by the emergence of the horse-powered vehicle over the horse, but many automobile manufacturers and enthusiasts found it prudent to capture the support of lawmakers, preferably the highest in the land–Parliament. Lord Montagu of Beaulieu was a powerful ally. Friend of the King, and founder and editor of The Car Illustrated magazine, his support, among others, of the 1903 Motor Car Bill raised the speed limit to 20 mph and implemented the registration of all motorcars and motorists. Lord Montagu raised the profile of motoring by introducing King Edward to the sport, appearing at many of the first motor rallies and raised the profile of the Rolls Royce when the mascot he commissioned was presented by its sculptor to the company–the Spirit of Ecstasy.

The early motor car featured a radiator cap on its hood/bonnet, but by 1910, the hood ornament/car mascot became fashionable. Responding to customers who felt a firm as prestigious as Rolls Royce should feature its own luxurious mascot, and concerned their customers were affixing inappropriate ornaments to their cars in its absence, Claude Johnson, the managing director of Rolls-Royce, was asked to commission something suitably dignified and graceful. He turned to sculptor Charles Sykes, asking him to produce a mascot which embodied “the spirit of the Rolls-Royce, namely, speed with silence, absence of vibration, the mysterious harnessing of great energy and a beautiful living organism of superb grace…” Years previously, Sykes had been asked to create a mascot for Lord Montagu’s Silver Ghost, and he submitted a modified version of it to Rolls-Royce in February of 1911.

What was listed initially listed as an optional extra, only to become a standard fitting in the early 1920′s, was no ordinary car mascot; the silver sculpture of a flying lady had a past. Lord Montagu of Beaulieu had commissioned this mascot as an emblem not of wealth and luxury, but of love. The subject, Eleanor Velasco Thornton, was a young woman hired as his secretary in 1902, and the two fell quickly in love. But the baron was married and Miss Thornton was barred from being his partner not only because of his matrimonial bonds but also by her much lower social status. The two nonetheless were inseparable for the next decade, Eleanor bearing his child and continuing her work with him on The Car Illustrated. To commemorate their secret love, Eleanor modeled for Montagu’s personal hood ornament, and Sykes crafted a figurine of her in fluttering robes, pressing a finger against her lips – to symbolize the secrets of their love. The figurine was christened The Whisper.

Tragedy struck in 1915 when their voyage aboard the SS Persia, on which they were traveling through the Mediterranean on the way to India, was torpedoed by a German U-boat. There was no time to get to a lifeboat and as they made for the decks on the listing ship, “Montagu had Eleanor in his arms, the next they were hit by a wall of water and she was gone.” He survived and made his way home to read his own obituary in the Times. The baron passed away fourteen years later and with him, the secret story behind Rolls-Royce’s iconic emblem.

Happily, the tale of the star-crossed lovers lives on today, as it has been announced that Batman Begins actor Christian Bale has been tapped to star in The Silver Ghost, which will tell the story of the thirteen year affair between John Montagu, who later became Lord Montagu of Beaulieu, and Eleanor Thornton, his secretary.

Further Reading:
Agony and the Ecstasy: The great Rolls-Royce love story
Wings of Desire: the secret love affair that inspired Rolls-Royce’s flying lady