A Churchill tiara?

[LouisFerdinand]

Winston Churchill was Winston Spencer-Churchill     
His paternal grandfather was John Winston Spencer-Churchill, 7th Duke of Marlborough. John's wife was Frances Anne Emily, Duchess of Marlborough.   
Was there a Churchill tiara? Was there a Spencer-Churchill tiara?

[Curryong]

The direct Spencer Churchill line are the Dukes of Marlborough. Like most of the higher aristocracy the family would still possess a tiara or two. The most famous was Consuelo Vanderbilt Spencer Churchill's huge Boucheron diamond tiara. Consuelo, an American, was unhappily married to Winston Churchill's cousin, the Duke who was nicknamed Sunny. She sold it just before her divorce in 1919.

By Churchill I presume you mean Winston Spencer Churchill's family. I don't think so, though one of his daughters who married into the upper classes may have purchased one after marriage.

Clementine, Winston's wife, borrowed a tiara to wear during the Coronation festivities in 1953. It was quite common for ladies who had no tiara of their own to borrow one for special occasions from aristocratic relatives and friends and that's what she did.

That's what will happen at Charles's Coronation though there might well be too few to go round. Smart Court jewellers in London still have a few that they hire out however, as do firms like Cartier.

[LouisFerdinand]

@Curryong, You mentioned Consuelo.   

Consuelo Vanderbilt was given the Boucheron Diamond Tiara by her father William K. Vanderbilt as a wedding gift.     
Marlborough Boucheron Tiara | Royal Jewels and Other Sparklers | Pinterest | The o'jays, Jewelry and Tiaras

[Curryong]

Thanks, LouisFerdinand, for the information on the Boucheron tiara. It was certainly a magnificent piece of jewellery. However, Consuelo had such a piquant little face and slender neck that I'm not sure that it was shown off to its full advantage. Perhaps such a tiara really needs a Maxima, Camilla or Sylvia to really rock it!

[LouisFerdinand]

@Curryong, When the Boucheron Tiara was referred to as the Marlborough Tiara, it gives the impression that it is a tiara that was owned by the Spencer-Churchill family through the male lineage.

[Curryong]

^ No, no, Consuelo brought it into the Spencer-Churchill family as a wedding gift to her from her father and she sold it in 1919 after an unhappy marriage to the Duke and many years of separation.

However, she was photographed in it often when she was Duchess of Marlborough. She wore it to many grand Edwardian occasions, and it was regarded at the time (though it always remained hers) as a Spencer-Churchill piece.

The Marlboroughs weren't wealthy, but they did have tiaras, bandeaus and other jewellery of their own, probably ugly Victorian pieces that had come down through the family. I don't think Consuelo liked wearing any tiaras. Like many other women she complained they gave her headaches.

[LouisFerdinand]

How often was the Boucheron Tiara referred to as the Marlborough Tiara?

[Curryong]

^ In the early Edwardian period when Consuelo was Duchess and wore this particular tiara the only people who would have taken note of it, let alone what it was called, would have been upperclass people who read THe Morning Post or Society magazines like Lady or the Illustrated London News. These carried reports of balls and dinners and house parties among the eliite. Sometimes the reports of materials and designs of the ladies' gowns were very detailed but I don't think they always went into the provenance of the jewellery worn.

About the only anecdote of the Boucheron that I can remember is that Consuelo didn't have time to get it out of the bank prior to one Society function and so she wore a diamond bandeau instead, annoying King Edward VII, for whom such things were important.

Of course Consuelo was separated from the Duke for years and years before their divorce. I don't think she would be wearing Spencer Churchill jewels in those circumstances. However, she had plenty of her own including the Boucheron, (if she ever had occasion to wear it. She spent much of her time with the lover who became her second husband on the Continent particularly France, and also spent time in the US, neither of them tiara-wearing countries. She was rather disgraced in Britain because she had left her husband.)

The only times I've seen this tiara mentioned it's been referred to as the Boucheron. Whether this was so in the late Victorian/Edwardian period, I don't know.

[amabel]

Curry why do you say about Winston's daughters htat if they married into the upper clases they might have had tiaras?  They were upper class and as far as I know they married upper class as well, except for Sarah marrying some actor or comedian but later she and he were divorced.

[Curryong]

^ I know that Winston Churchill's daughters were upperclass. However, with that remark I meant that only with marriage to upperclass men with whom they would have attended Society and Royal events would a tiara have been necessary.

They also cost money. Lady Randolph Churchill probably had a tiara. However, her financial circumstances were strained later in life and she could have sold it. Clementine Churchill, who had an unusual background, also faced financial constraints (with Winston) in the 1920s and '30s. I can't believe that with that and a large family there were huge amounts of money to spend on jewellery, especially tiaras. The Spencer Churchills weren't particularly wealthy aristocrats and I don't think Lord Randolph (a younger son)  would have inherited a tiara.

Clementine and Winston's eldest daughter, Diana, might have had a tiara as she married a Conservative politician, Duncan Sandys, later Duncan Sandys, as her second husband. They were divorced in 1960 and she suicided in 1963.

Sarah Churchill, actress and dancer, married three times, the first to comedian Vic Oliver. No tiara needed there, I fancy. Her second husband Anthony Beauchamp was either American or lived a lot of the time in the US, not a tiara wearing country. Her third marriage, to Baron Audley, might have necessitated a tiara but he died after only a year or so of marriage.

Mary Churchill may well have had a tiara. She married Christopher Soames MP, later Baron Soames. After she died aged 91 in 2014 many items of art memorabilia were auctioned but no mention of tiaras.

As I said in my previous post, Winston's daughters may have had tiaras. I don't know. However, if there were lots of tiaras in the possession of Clementine and her daughters, then it's very odd that Lady Churchill had to borrow one from an aristocratic friend in 1953, the usual custom among minor aristos and upperclass women who didn't possess such items.

In any case LF asked originally if there was a tiara specific to the Churchills. I replied that I didn't believe so, and if there had been then surely Clementine would have worn it when at Society events when royals were present.

[amabel]

Winston himself was not well off, but he was upper class and I'd assume that his daughters would marry "tiara" owning men...

[Curryong]

^ Yes, but they wouldn't be specifically Churchill tiaras, which was the question asked by Louis Ferdinand and the point of the thread.

[LouisFerdinand]

The title of Duke of Marlborough was created by Queen Anne in 1702 for John Churchill, 1st Earl of Marlborough.   
Did his wife Sarah have a tiara?   
Did Henrietta Churchill Godolphin, 2nd Duchess of Marlborough have a tiara?

[Curryong]

Both these ladies lived in the early 18th century. Henrietta may have had a tiara but that item of jewellery didn't really become fashionable until the turn of the 19th century, when Napoleon bought several for his wife Josephine. Most aristo Englishwomen of that time didn't wear much jewellery at all in portraits, as it was considered vulgar. Also diamonds weren't so easy to aquire for non royals before the Brazilian and then the South African fields were opened up in the 19th century. Henrietta may have had a diadem of some sort for the hair. I don't know. However, very very few tiaras of today, even those worn by royalty, predate the Napoleonic period.

[LouisFerdinand]

The 8th Duchess of Marlborough was Lily Spencer-Churchill.   
Here she is with a diamond and pearl tiara. The description does not describe where the tiara came from.   
Prior to Consuelo, the 8th Duchess of Marlborough was Lily Warren Price, her second husband was George Spencer-Churchill, married in May 1888. No i? |

[Curryong]

^ Thank you, LF. No, there are no details of this tiara's provenance. It could be a Spencer Churchill piece or, considering Lily's very wealthy first husband it might be the Duchess's own. She went on to marry not so wealthy men, but American Society ladies did start wearing tiaras for some events late in the 19th century. I'm not sure that would have been prior to 1883 when Lily's millionare husband died, though. So it may, just may, be a Malborough tiara. Good detective work, LF!

[LouisFerdinand]

@Curryong, I did not know that Lily Spencer-Churchill had a previous spouse. Who was he?

[Curryong]

^ Lily was married first to a Louis Hamersley, who was American as she was and the heir to a large property development fortune. He was a millionaire.  I think she married him in the late 1870's but he died young in 1883. After the marriage to the Duke ended, Lily married for a third time, to Lord William Beresford, a younger son of an Irish peer, the Marquis of Waterford. There were no children from any of these marriages.

Neither Lily's second husband nor her third had any real money and later on in her life she sued her stepson the 10th Duke of Marlborough for a return of the monies she had spent renovating and repairing Blenheim Palace when his father was alive.

[LouisFerdinand]

The Russian Pearl Pendant Kokoshnik became a Marlborough Tiara for Gladys Spencer-Churchill, the spouse of the 9th Duke of Marlborough.     
The Russian Pearl Pendant Kokoshnik The Duchess of Marlborough Christie's sold the original pearl pedant tiara at auction in 1927 and it was bough? |

[Curryong]

I love Kokoshnik tiaras, very elegant. The history of the Marlboroughs in the late 19th and early 20th centuries is one of of pecunious Dukes marrying Dollar Princesses from across the Atlantic, having not particularly successful marriages and of the jewellery worn being later sold off!

Nevertheless, earlier Marlboroughs, the Duke and Duchess who were Winston's grandparents for example, (regarded as churchy and ultra respectable) would have had a tiara or diadem or two tucked away in the family vaults. That Duke acted as Viceroy in Ireland for a short time, primarily because Randolph (Winston's father) had got himself into the Prince of Wales's bad books. Randolph therefore left London with his family for a while and acted as his father's Private Secretary..