The opening of parliament by the king and queen, with all the pomp of olden days that had been discontinued during the war, brought a good many people to town who otherwise would have remained in the country, and for a week or so the big hotels and restaurants were full of well-known faces, pretty women, and lovely clothes.

Fashionable wedding have also attracted the attention of the public, and, of course, gave rise to the gossip which, as a rule, attends events of that kind. The most important among them was that of the youthful Marquess of Blandford [1] with the Hon. Mary Cadogan [2], about which a great deal was said and a great deal more left unsaid, but whispered from ear to ear.

John Singer Sargent’s portrait of the Marlboroughs [source]

Every one of the innumerable people invited to attend it was more or less keen to see the meeting of the Duke and Duchess of Marlborough [3], and, of course, rumors had arisen that this auspicious occasion of the marriage of their son and heir would bring about a reconciliation. But once more gossips had to retire into the background, because no such result followed the ceremony at St. Margaret’s Church, Westminster.

The wedding was unusually brilliant. Not only the king and queen but also Queen Alexandra were present. The two royal ladies were attired in purple velvet, with the difference that the dowager wore over her dress a gorgeous cloak of black jet which was a pronounced wonder, whilst her daughter-in-law had over her shoulders a wrap of most magnificent ermine that reached nearly to her ankles.

The bride was pronounced lovely and her dress a perfect wonder of good taste and simplicity, but to the general surprise the wedding presents were quite insignificant, with the exception of those of the royal family and the row of pearls given by the Duchess of Marlborough to her new daughter-in-law. Mr. Vanderbilt [4] gave a house in London to his grandson, but this could not be laid upon a table, as were the other gifts showered upon the young pair, and was consequently overlooked by the guests, who commented upon the simplicity of the things spread before them.

The wedding reception was held in the town house of Lord Farquhar [5], who lent it for the occasion, as everybody agreed as to the unseemliness of holding it at Sunderland House [6], where it would have been rather difficult for the Duchess of Marlborough to welcome as a guest her own husband, and as Sir Hedworth and Lady Meux’s London residence [7] was not considered large enough to accommodate the many people bidden to such an important social event as the nuptials of the heir to the titles and honors of the illustrious house of Churchill.

NOTES
1. In 1920 the Marquess of Blandford was Lt. Col. John Spencer-Churchill. He was the 10th Duke from 1934 until his death in 1972.
2. The Hon. Alexandra Mary Cadogan was the daughter of Viscount Chelsea, eldest son and heir of the 5th Earl of Cadogan. He died in 1908, and the earldom was inherited by his brother. The bride’s mother was the Hon. Mildred Cecilia Sturt, who remarried to Sir Hedworth (Lambton) Meux after the her first husband’s death. Mary, the new Marchioness of Blandford, became a duchess in 1934; she gave birth to five children, including the 11th Duke, and died in 1961.
3. Charles Spencer-Churchill, the 9th Duke of Marlborough, and his first wife, Consuelo Vanderbilt. The couple finally divorced in 1921 after a fifteen-year separation.
4. The groom’s grandfather was William Kissam Vanderbilt, a millionaire railroad tycoon and a grandson of Cornelius “the Commodore” Vanderbilt. He died only a few months after the wedding.
5. Viscount Farquhar (later the 1st Earl Farquhar) was a Tory politician who served as the Lord Steward of the Household at the time of the Blandford wedding. His London house, where the reception was held, was at 7 Grosvenor Square.
6. Sunderland House, on Curzon Street in Mayfair, was the London residence of the groom’s mother. The Marlboroughs had built it together, financed by Consuelo’s father, before their separation.
7. The home of the bride’s mother and stepfather.

LONDON, Mar. 26 — At the two courts held this spring, rubies were the favorite gems, and some of the finest of these stones in England were to be seen. At the first court, Queen Alexandra wore the Cullinan diamond [1], and at the second she wore on her corsage the famous Agincourt stone, a pigeon’s blood ruby which belongs to the crown of England [2; pictured below in the Imperial State Crown].

Another wonderful ruby, which makes rare appearances in public and was visible at the second court, was Lady Carew’s [3] uncut stone of 133 carats, which is over an inch long. It was obtained in Persia by Lady Carew’s great-uncle [4] some 50 years ago. On its four sides it carries the names and titles of the four great emperors to whom it belonged.

Julia, Lady Carew (not wearing the “ruby”) [source]

It has been bored from end to end, and has evidently been worn as a necklace or armlet threaded on a cord. Lady Carew has had it mounted with a diamond for suspension from a neck chain, and it is as a pendant that she wears it. Her jewelers were anxious it should be mounted in a tiara, but that would not show the inscriptions, which form its most remarkable feature. The fact that four Eastern emperors had their names incised upon it proves that it must have been regarded as a treasured heirloom and a powerful talisman [5].

Other wonderful rubies seen at the courts were the Duchess of Norfolk’s [6] cluster, the Duchess of Bedford’s [7; pictured above] pendants, and the necklaces of Mrs. Harry Higgins, Mrs. Burns, and Mrs. Ogden Mills, three American hostesses in London [8].

NOTES
1. Read my extensive post on the Cullinan Diamond here.
2. The “Agincourt stone” referenced here is the Black Prince’s Ruby, which is actually a spinel. Weighing more than 130 carats, the spinel is today mounted in the Imperial State Crown. Tradition states that Henry V wore the stone at the Battle of Agincourt in 1415.
3. Julia, Lady Carew (ca. 1864-1922) was born Julia Lethbridge in Ontario. She married Robert Carew, 3rd Baron Carew in 1888.
4. Lady Carew’s great-uncle was Charles Alison, a diplomat who served as Queen Victoria’s Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to the Shah of Persia (present-day Iran) from 1860 to 1872. Alison’s sister, Julia Alison Hill, was Lady Carew’s maternal grandmother. Sources say that Lady Carew spent several years in Persia during her great-uncle’s tenure there.
5. The “ruby” mentioned here is actually the Carew Spinel (making this article two-for-two on rubies that aren’t rubies). After her death, Julia Carew bequeathed the stone to the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, where it is on display today in the South Asia gallery. The museum’s records date the spinel to the Mughal court of the 17th century. Charles Alison is said to have acquired the stone in Tehran around 1870.
6. Gwendolen Constable-Maxwell (1877-1945), wife of the 15th Duke of Norfolk.
7. Mary Tribe (1865-1937), aviator, suffragette, ornithologist, and wife of the 11th Duke of Bedford.
8. These three American hostesses were Marie Louise (Parsons) Higgins, wife of Henry Vincent Higgins, Covent Garden Opera manager and chairman of the Ritz Hotels in London and Paris; Mary Lyman (Morgan) Burns, sister of J.P. Morgan and mother of Viscountess Harcourt; and Ruth (Livingston) Mills, wife of banker and horse breeder Ogden Mills and sister-in-law of Whitelaw Reid, the American ambassador to Britain.