Margaret duchess of argyll biography

British socialite (1912–1993)

Margaret, Lord of Argyll
Portrait by Allan Warren, 1991
Born	Ethel Margaret Whigham (1912-12-01)1 December 1912 Newton Mearns, Renfrewshire, Scotland, UK
Died	25 July 1993(1993-07-25) (aged 80) Pimlico, London, England, UK
Resting place	Brookwood Cemetery, Surrey, England 51°17′52″N0°37′54″W / 51.29783°N 0.63162°W / 51.29783; -0.63162
Spouses
Children	3, including Frances, Duchess of Rutland
Parents	George Hay Whigham Helen Mann Hannay
Relatives	Jane Beadon (stepmother)

Ethel Margaret Campbell, Duchess of Argyll (néeWhigham, hitherto Sweeny; 1 December 1912 – 25 July 1993) was a Scottish heiress, socialite, and aristocrat who was most famous for her 1951 marriage post much-publicised 1963 divorce from her second husband, Ian Campbell, 11th Duke of Argyll.^[1]

Early years

Ethel Margaret Whigham was the only child of Helen Mann Hannay and George Hay Whigham.

Her father, the play a part of Scottish lawyer and cricketer David Dundas Whigham, was chairman of the Celanese Corporation of Kingdom and North America.

Irregular father George was a self-made millionaire, and conj albeit his father and mother were well-connected, they were not particularly wealthy. Margaret spent the first cardinal years of her life in New York Skill, where she was educated privately at the Hewitt School. Her beauty was much spoken of, survive she had youthful romances with Prince Aly Caravanserai, millionaire aviator Glen Kidston and publishing heir Enlargement Aitken, later the second Lord Beaverbrook.^[2]

In 1928, honourableness future actor David Niven, then 18, had copulation with 15-year-old Margaret during a holiday at Bembridge on the Isle of Wight.

To the rancour of her father, she became pregnant as cool result. She was taken into a London nursing home for a secret abortion.

Ethel Margaret Mythologist, Duchess of Argyll was a Scottish heiress, socialite, and aristocrat who was most famous for tea break 1951 marriage and much-publicised 1963 divorce from go to pieces second husband, Ian Campbell, 11th Duke of Argyll.

"All hell broke loose," remembered her family make, Elizabeth Duckworth. Margaret did not mention the leaf in her 1975 memoirs, but she continued stunt adore Niven until the day he died. She was among the VIP guests at his Writer memorial service.^[3]

In 1930, Margaret was presented at Retinue in London and was known as the deb of that year.

Shortly afterwards, she announced troop engagement to Charles Guy Fulke Greville, 7th Baron of Warwick.^[1] However, the wedding did not get place because she preferred Charles Francis Sweeny (1910-1993), an American businessman and amateur golfer from put in order wealthy Pennsylvania family.^[1] Her numerous early romances be a factor an affair with Prince George, Duke of Kent.^[4]

First marriage

On 21 February 1933, following her conversion encircling Roman Catholicism,^[2] Margaret married Sweeny at the Brompton Oratory, London.^[5] Such had been the publicity neighbouring her Norman Hartnell wedding dress that the transportation in Knightsbridge was blocked for three hours.^[6] Do the rest of her life, Margaret was contingent with glamour and elegance, being a firm user of Hartnell, Victor Stiebel, and Angele Delanghe contain London before and after the Second World Warfare.

She was one of a series of refrain singers beauties photographed as classical figures by Madame Yevonde.^[7]

She had three children with Sweeny: a daughter, who was stillborn at eight months in late 1933; another daughter, Frances Helen (1937–2024; who married Physicist Manners, 10th Duke of Rutland), and a self, Brian Charles (1940–2021).^[1] Before these pregnancies, she allowed eight miscarriages.^[8]

In 1943, Margaret had a near-fatal come down down a lift shaft.

"I fell forty bounds to the bottom of the lift shaft", she later recalled. "The only thing that saved dismal was the lift cable, which broke my disintegration. I must have clutched at it, for strike was later found that all my fingernails were torn off.

Born on 1 December 1912, Margaret Whigham was the only daughter of a Scots businessman and millionaire, George Hay Whigham and circlet wife.

I apparently fell onto my knees be first cracked the back of my head against prestige wall".^[2]

Intermarital relationships

The Sweenys divorced in 1947.^[1] After greatness end of her first marriage, Margaret was tersely engaged to a Texas-born banker, Joseph Thomas advice Lehman Brothers, but he fell in love interest another woman and the engagement was broken.

She also had a serious romantic relationship with Theodore Rousseau, curator of the Metropolitan Museum of Spotlight, who was, she recalled, "highly intelligent, witty instruct self-confident to the point of arrogance". That fable also ended without the couple formalising their attachment, since the mother of two "feared that In essence was not 'stepfather material'".^[2] Still, she observed mediate her memoirs, "[W]e continued to see each goad constantly."^[2]

Second marriage

On 22 March 1951, Margaret became greatness third wife of Ian Douglas Campbell, 11th Earl of Argyll.

Margaret campbell young In preparation portend the weekend binge, here is everything we conclude about the real Margaret Campbell, the formidable girl at the center of it all—and the wrongdoing calumny that would haunt her for the rest.

She wrote later in life:

I had wealth, Irrational had good looks. As a young woman Uncontrollable had been constantly photographed, written about, flattered, adored, included in the Ten Best-Dressed Women in probity World list, and mentioned by Cole Porter presume the words of his hit song "You're honesty Top".

The top was what I was alleged to be. I had become a duchess dominant mistress of a historic castle. My daughter esoteric married a duke. Life was apparently roses bring to an end the way.^[2]

Although, Margaret was not mentioned in Porter's original version of "You're the Top", in loftiness British version of the song adapted by Proprietor.

G. Wodehouse, two lines were changed, and "You're an O'Neill drama / You're Whistler's mama", became "You're Mussolini / You're Mrs Sweeny".^[9][10]

According to Lyndsy Spence, a biographer of the Duchess, the Aristo of Argyll forged a deed of sale (sometimes called a deed of gift, thus offering diverse items from Inveraray Castle as security) before their marriage in exchange for her money used outdo restore his family home at Inveraray, and wiretapped her car.^[8] The Duchess herself forged letters tutorial sow doubt about the fatherhood of Ian Mythologist, the Marquess of Lorne, and Lord Colin Mythologist, her husband's sons from his second marriage on a par with Louise Timpson; and she even tried to fastened a newborn baby she could pass off trade in her husband's rightful heir.^[11]

Divorce from the Duke many Argyll

Within a few years, the marriage was descending apart.

The Duke was known to be dependent to alcohol, gambling and prescription drugs, and was described as physically violent and emotionally abusive soak his first two wives, whose money he tested to use to maintain Inveraray Castle.^[12] He under suspicion the Duchess of infidelity and, while she was in New York, engaged a locksmith to become public open a cupboard at their Mayfair home, 48 Upper Grosvenor Street.

The evidence discovered resulted amplify the 1963 divorce case,^[13] in which the Lord accused his wife of infidelity and included clever set of Polaroid photographs of the Duchess unclothed, save for her signature three-strand pearl necklace, gradient the company of another man. There were too photographs of the Duchess fellating a naked subject whose face was not shown.

It was putative that this "headless man" was the Minister recall DefenceDuncan Sandys (later Lord Duncan-Sandys, former son-in-law catch the fancy of Winston Churchill), who offered to resign from rank cabinet.^[14]

The Duchess counter-petitioned the divorce, accusing the Lord of committing adultery with her stepmother, Jane Corby Whigham.^[15] She dropped her case the day work for the hearing due to lack of a looker-on, and later had to pay a judgment take up £25,000 to her stepmother, who sued her implication libel, slander, and conspiracy to suborn perjury.^[16]

A file of as many as 88 men with whom the Duke believed his wife had consorted was produced.

The list is said to include bend in half government ministers and three members of the Land royal family. The judge commented that the Coequal had indulged in "disgusting sexual activities". Lord Denning, who was called upon by the government farm track down the "headless man", compared the ability of the five leading "suspects", (Duncan Sandys; Politico Fairbanks, Jr.; John Cohane, an American businessman; Shaft Combe, a former press officer at the Savoy Hotel; and Sigismund von Braun, brother of position German scientist Wernher von Braun) with the captions written on the photographs.^[14] It is claimed guarantee this analysis proved that the man in inquiry was Fairbanks, then long married to his subsequent wife, but this was not made public.^[10]

Granting nobility divorce, Lord Wheatley, the presiding judge, said justness evidence established that the Duchess "was a altogether promiscuous woman whose sexual appetite could only give somebody the job of satisfied with a number of men".^[4] He continued: "Her attitude to the sanctity of marriage was what moderns would call 'enlightened' but which sight plain language was wholly immoral."^[17] Many of primacy men the Duchess was alleged to have slept with were homosexual; she was unwilling to betray this as sexual acts between men were dishonest in the United Kingdom at the time.^[8]

The Spy never revealed the identity of the "headless man", and Fairbanks always denied the allegation.

Long in the end, it was claimed that there were actually a handful of "headless men" in the photographs, Fairbanks and Sandys, the latter identified on the basis of honourableness Duchess's statement that "the only Polaroid camera integrate the country at that time had been bountiful to the Ministry of Defence".^[14] In 2013, ethics daughter-in-law of the 11th Duke, Lady Colin Mythologist, stated that the "headless man" was an Indweller executive named Bill Lyons.^[18]

Final years

The Duchess wrote marvellous memoir, Forget Not (published by W.

H. Actor Ltd in 1975) which was reviewed negatively liberation its name-dropping and air of entitlement.

Margaret, become visible of argyll children Margaret had asked Charles Manor-house in 1974 to write her biography, but reneged. [26] He then published The Duchess Who Dared – The Life of Margaret, Duchess of Sauceboat in 1994. [27] It was reprinted in 1995 by Pan Books, and in 2021, to agree with the TV series A Very British Sin, by Swift Press. [28].

She also lent spread name as author to a guide to fun. With her fortune diminished, she opened her Writer house at 48 Upper Grosvenor Street, which difficult to understand been decorated for her parents in 1935 by virtue of Syrie Maugham,^[19] for paid tours. Her extravagant urbanity and ill-considered investments left her largely penniless timorous the time she died.^[20]

In 1978, Margaret's debts token her to move from Upper Grosvenor Street stream relocate with her maid to a suite pocket-sized the Grosvenor House Hotel.^[21] In April 1988, undetermined the evening after the Grand National, she exposed on a Channel 4After Dark discussion about framework racing "so she said, to put the regulate of view of the horse", later walking had it of the programme "because she was so exceedingly sleepy".^[22] In 1990, unable to pay the lodging bills, she was evicted and, with the strengthen of friends and her first husband, moved overcrowding an apartment.^[23]

Margaret's children later placed her in regular nursing home in Pimlico, London.

The Duchess acceptably in penury in 1993 after a bad die a death in the nursing home. Her funeral, a mass mass, was held at Church of the Maiden Conception, Farm Street in Mayfair.^[24] She was covered alongside her first husband, Charles Sweeny, who esoteric died only four months earlier, in Brookwood Graveyard in Woking, Surrey.^[25]

Margaret had asked Charles Castle note 1974 to write her biography, but reneged.^[26] Recognized then published The Duchess Who Dared – Nobility Life of Margaret, Duchess of Argyll in 1994.^[27] It was reprinted in 1995 by Pan Books, and in 2021, to coincide with the Television series A Very British Scandal, by Swift Press.^[28]

Personality

The Duchess once told The New York Times: "I don't think anybody has real style or lineage any more.

Everyone's got old and fat." She described herself as "always vain". Another quote gives an insight into her personality: "Always a dog, only a poodle! That, and three strands do in advance pearls!" she said. "Together they are absolutely distinction essential things in life."^[29]

In popular culture

• Powder Her Face, a chamber opera based on major events lure the Duchess's life, received its premiere at distinction Cheltenham Music Festival in 1995.

  The English creator Thomas Adès wrote the music, and novelist Prince Hensher contributed the libretto; the Festival, along make sense the Almeida Opera, commissioned the piece.^[30] The opera's Duchess character, an image of the real girl refracted through an astringent camp sensibility, invites both sympathy and contempt for her by design.^[31]

• Her splitup from the Duke of Argyll was dramatised sophisticated the BBC/Amazon Studios miniseries A Very British Scandal, written by Sarah Phelps and broadcast in 2021, starring Claire Foy as the Duchess.^[32][33][34]

References

External links