THE GIRL by MICHELLE MORGAN : MARILYN MONROE, THE SEVEN YEAR ITCH, and the BIRTH OF AN UNLIKELY FEMINIST

As this summer in early August, it will be 60 years since the actress Marilyn Monroe died of an overdose - or perhaps was murdered - a resurgence of film, documentaries, and books has occurred. This book by Michelle Morgan, published in 2018, is one of the first to look at the icon as something other than a victim.  Rather, Morgan points out the attempts to control her career that Monroe had taken in an era when she went against the norms by having a career, and not being the married, stay-at-home wife and mother. In many ways Monroe was born too soon.

Morgan starts out strong with this statement on page 10.

Excerpt: The Girl, titled after her character in the 1955 comedy The Seven Year Itch, tells the story of how that film transformed Marilyn Monroe from another Hollywood star into "The Girl" of modern times - a true icon - and sent her on an unparalleled adventure of self-discovery and reflection.  The years 1954-1956 were Marilyn's most powerful and inspirational, and it was during this time that her most substantial decisions were made. Before Itch, she had been known for her mostly fluffy, dumb-blonde roles, and she was unhappily married to baseball legend Joe DiMaggio.  By the time the film opened Marilyn was the president of her own film company, a student at New York Actor's Studio, and embroiled in a battle with Twentieth Century Fox that would eventually gain independence not only for herself, but others working under the constraints of the studio system too. Shortly after the release, she legally changed her name to Marilyn Monroe, thereby divorcing herself from the troubled past of Norma Jeane once and for all. Her rebellion was remarkable and exceptionally rare during a time when women were expected to strive to be fantastic homemakers and actresses had to accept every kind of behavior imposed upon them by their male bosses.

While Monroe had her detractors, I was surprised to learn that two of the women profiled here, Faith Domergue and Marilyn Maxwell, had nice things to say about Marilyn. 

Excerpt page 127 : Still, Marilyn did have her fair share of powerful female admirers who were always willing to come out in support of her.  One of these women was actress Faith Domergue. She took her complaints about ' clubwomen or jealous movie queens" straight to columnist Erskine Johnson, who published her views. "Nobody can hurt (Marilyn)," she said. "If she stays as she is, holding her ground, being herself, she will be on of the great stars of all time. Women may not approve of an actress, but as long as they're curious, they'll come to see her films and bring their men along too."  (The club she refers to s the Women's Club of Hollywood which apparently thought of themselves as moral arbitrators.)

Excerpt page 128 : One actress shared a name with her. though not by choice.  Marilyn Maxwell had become famous in the 1940's, and when she met the second Marilyn in 1948, she was stunned to hear of her desire to become a successful actress.  Maxwell suggested that she should change her name to something else so that the two of them did not get mistaken for each other. However,  Monroe had no intention of doing so, and for many years Maxwell was bombarded with fans who thought they were the one and the same. In the end, Maxwell gave a standard reply : "No, I'm not the Marilyn with clothes on." though no offense was meant and she actually did greatly admire Monroe. "I think she has done a great deal of good for the movie industry." she said. "She is just what this business needed -- someone to put some glamour and magic back into Hollywood."

If interested in FAITH DOMERGUE:  FAITH DOMERGUE :  HOWARD HUGHES FIFTEEN YEAR OLD MISTRESS : MISTRESS OF THE MONTH  May 2014, which you can find in my archives.  Or click on her name in the labels below.

If interested in MARILYN MAXWELL she is one of the women profiled in my month on comedic actor, Bob Hope.

MARILYN MAXWELL - FOUR YEAR RELATIONSHIP WITH BOB HOPE - CALLED "MRS. BOB HOPE"  August 2015

C 2022 Mistress Manifesto BlogSpot

BEST WAY TO GET INTO A OPEN RELATIONSHIP? HONESTY : OPINION BY MISSY

What is the best way to get into an Open Relationship?  

This is my opinion.  

Just as I think some people one day find themselves in an extramarital relationship or being Kept without having plotted to be, I tend to think some people one day find themselves in an Open Relationship, in other words "organically."  Love might lead you there, or you might just realize you are actually comfortable with how things are in your primary relationship and this is how things are.  

You might not have sought a first experience of including other lovers or love while committed to a primary relationship. Well, maybe you have...  It's just that I'm convinced that the taboos are still in place and if they were not, why would we even call these forms of intimacy an ALTERNATIVE LIFESTYLE? 

Even if everyone involved has formed these relationships honestly, no sneaking or "cheating" or lying or conning, the notion that you 'should' be guilty could be hurled at you by others. So, you're not necessarily "out" about it.

Recently I met a divorced man who told me about the day his daughter called and said "Daddy, I saw mom kissing another man in a car." He said it was true and he was done, and immediately acted to begin a divorce. I had to wonder about his wife. Had they married as two virgins?  Was he giving her enough attention or had his time spent devoted to developing a business thrown her to another man?  It had been years ago and he had not remarried. His ex-wife had. The man cherished hearing that she told the children she sometimes missed their dad. I had to wonder how different his life might be if he had not such a quick and drastic reaction to learning his wife was "cheating" him.  They had not even tried therapy.

He said he was signed up on various dating sites and he was never going to get married again.

I said, "You should make that clear to anyone you start dating so that a woman who is interested in marriage can decide not to date you."

My statement befuddled Mr. Honesty.

What are the ethics of being in a marriage that you want to stay in, if only you can have sex with other people?  It is truly possible to never fall in love with someone else while married?  If you read Mistress Manifesto BlogSpot, then you know the attitude to accept the affairs of a husband or wife is common - supposedly in France anyway!

As we learn from the example of Lady Idina Sackville's life that we're exploring this month, one cannot prevent a person from falling in love with another person anymore than you can 'make' them fall in love with you! She and her Set were sexually adventurous and they changed partners for an experience or for a lifetime.

However, I do believe that there are many ways to love and that we humans can and do love more than one person at a time, in different ways.

If it is your intent to be in an Open Relationship you should discuss this with any potential partner you may have in this inquiry into Alternative relationships before you ever have sex with that person!  Honesty is the best policy. 

Missy

C 2022 Mistress Manifesto BlogSpot

PURPLE EMPEROR

 

THE ABORTION BAN : MOTHER NATURE IS A BITCH

The United States Supreme Court announced the decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, the 1973 law that made abortion legal in the entire United States. I was not aware that many states already had in place laws that basically say, "We follow whatever the Federal laws are, so now abortion is illegal here too."  I expected states to take time to make decisions.

Looking at maps provided by The Wall Street Journal and other media, I see the West Coast states will maintain legal abortion, some on the Eastern seaboard that we call New England, and there is a smattering also of states that will continue to provide services. 

This article from The Guardian is excellent with details and a map: THE GUARDIAN WORLD: ABORTION DESERTS MAP CLINICS

If you are pregnant and especially if you are poor, you will be forced to endure, possibly die, or pull off travel to another state for an abortion and this article above estimates just how many miles that might be; sometimes a 12 hour trip.  (If you're reading this in another country, perhaps think of this is a pregnant woman having to go to another country where she does not have medical insurance to pay for the abortion. She must come up with travel, lodging, and cash for the operation, possibly taking time off from work or caring for her existing children too. She may have to go alone and recover alone as well.)

I know this will be impossible for many women in these states and so they will go back to the dangers of illegal abortion, with some actually facing prison for doing so. This is barbaric and so we have Supreme Court Justices who are barbaric.  It's a fact : They are Republicans.  Recently someone pointed out to me that the honored President Abraham Lincoln was Republican.  Well, the party has changed. They don't make Republicans like they used to.  I frankly think that many of us are suffering the double whamy of a Trump Presidency and Covid-19.

Sometimes I just don't think anti-abortion protesters are facing reality. One pregnancy in five in the United States was terminated in 2020. Nature intended sex and nature intended pregnancy.  Nature does not pay the rent.

ASSOCIATED PRESS  Excerpt : The report from the Guttmacher Institute, a research group that supports abortion rights, counted more than 930,000 abortions in the U.S. in 2020. 

This number was up from the previous year: Covid 19 likely had something to do with this. Women/ families/the nation were facing economic pressures due to lay offs and financial uncertainty.  (And so were the men involved, at least the ones who were responsible.)

Today we see that violence has erupted, that there are absolutely murderous anti-abortion people out there who belong in prison.  Deep irony in that. 

The conflict is between the idealists and the realists. The idealists depend on a mythological past we cannot go back to and probably don't want to go back to if we could. 

I say, end all sex trafficking.  End rape.  End forced marriage.

Make all wages paid out livable income - better yet income that will provide for as many children as nature intends because nature is a bitch and does not care if women die like they used to, worn out from pregnancy and birthing and caring for all those children.

Make sure that all children are born into healthy, stable, and sane partnerships in which one partner does not have to earn income and can stay at home to raise the children, even home-school them. Make sure that no parent dies before all their children are adults who are self-supporting.

While you're at it, make sure there is no sex until marriage and all marriages are made in heaven and last. 

Make sure that everyone who wants to go to college can and that there are appropriate jobs for all those college educated people.

Oh, and by the way, make sure everyone is a Christian, preferably a fundamentalist.

You, my reader either already know what I'm saying or you get it.

This is NOT the world we live in, not our reality.

There are very many issues to address and so much change that is needed but these last few years have been especially challenging and difficult. It's not that abortion is a sacrament, it's that only women -those who have wombs - can become pregnant and have abortions and so very much work and responsibility is on us. We are vulnerable.

Missy

C 2022 Mistress Manifesto BlogSpot All rights reserved including Internet and International Rights

WHAT AUTHOR FRANCES OSBORNE HAS TO SAY ABOUT HER SUBJECT, HER GREAT-GRANDMOTHER IDINA SACKVILLE!

Sorry the video is down but....

I found this article also:

NEW YORK TIMES : Liesl Schillinger -writer : CELEBRATING SCANDAL : ADINA SACKVILLE

Though the posts this month have focused on Lady Idina Sackville's sexuality, which she expressed without regards to the vows of traditional marriage, and her participation in the Happy Valley Set in the Highlands of Kenya in the 1920's - 1940's, perhaps the fact that she was THE LIFE OF THE PARTY has been neglected. This article has as a picture a copy of one of the articles that made the papers, in which her scandalous life was followed, "Love Failures of the Countess." as well as photos of her sons and some of the Happy Valley Set. It also brings us more information about the author who I hope I've honored for her terrifically interesting book, The Bolter, which has been the prime reference for this month's posts.

Missy

THERE IS NO OTHER WAY TO SAY IT : LADY IDINA SACKVILLE'S LAST YEARS WERE TRAGIC

She had been Mrs. Euan Wallace... and Mrs. Josslyn Hay (He'd since become the 22nd Earl of Erroll) ... She had married and married and married.

Idina Sackville had given birth to three children, two sons, and a daughter. True, people of her class were used to sending their children away to boarding school and having relationships with the children then was dependent on letter writing, if that. Idina had been kept from being involved in the raising of her sons though. She'd made an effort to get to know them as they neared adulthood that went not so well. World events affected her personal life as it did so many others.

World War I had affected her life when her first husband Euan Wallace, had joined up and came back uninterested in her or their marriage. He and his next wife, Barbie, had raised those sons as well as three sons of their own.  

Now World War II would further destroy lives.

In a series of tragic events, Euan Wallace and Barbie's three sons would also not live long enough to produce offspring.  

Lady Idna Sackville's daughter by Josslyn Hay would live to adulthood, did marry, have children, and continued on her matriarchal line.  When she married, the Queen and the Princesses Elizabeth (the future Queen Elizabeth II) and her sister attended the wedding. And so, despite all of Idina's scandal, her daughter did not suffer for her mother's reputation. Perhaps that is because relatives had raised the girl.

Idina's sons were killed during service in World War II. As had been the case in World War I, young men of the peerage did not normally avoid military service for their country. This left Euan, who had been so possessive of them without any male heirs.

Then her first two husbands, the fathers of her children died. Josslyn Hay was murdered and her once best friend, Alice De Janze was a suspect.

These deaths put Idina Sackville into a notable depression in which she did not eat or sleep properly and also developed a nerve disease called neuritis, which was said to be made worse because she lived at her house, Clouds, at high altitudes up the mountain. These high altitudes were also said to enhance the effects of alcohol. Idina Sackville was forced to go down the mountain to live in lesser circumstances.

Of great hope to Idina was that her daughter would come to visit her in Africa.  It was not to be. She died before that could happen!

C 2022 Mistress Manifesto BlogSpot

All Rights Reserved Including Internet and International Rights

Excerpts are from The Bolter, a book by Frances Osborne, the main reference for this month's po

My readers, we are not yet done with the Happy Valley Set. Next month we will turn our attention to another book and another woman of that set and learn again how Idina Sackville's life and hers entwined.

A FIFTH AND FINAL HUSBAND

Lady Idina Sackville had one final husband... After her divorce in 1938 from Donald Haldeman, she married William Soltau who was a Royal Airforce Lieutenant.  They divorced in 1946.  I dare say that men never brought Idina happiness but then, it could be argued, she did not bring men happiness either.

As well, her health was starting to wane.

C 2022 Mistress Manifesto BlogSpot

All Rights Reserved Including Internet and International Rights

IDINA LIVED WITH A MAN BUT HE WAS ONE MORE TO GO AWAY

By 1933, Idina Sackville had decided that Chris Langlands would make a good boyfriend.  He had wanted to marry Beryl Purves, now Markham in her second marriage, and was likely already in a ménage of some sort, but Beryl, an pilot, lost interest in him when he crashed a plane trying to show off to her. Chris owned a charter pilot service. As well, Idina and Chris met when he flew a guest over to Idina's house, Clouds.  Now that small planes were providing the transportation in Africa, the isolation of farms and ranches far apart had been breached, and friends didn't necessarily need to drive for hours to go to a weekend house party. Chris and Idina took off on safaris flying from location to location. 

She was living openly with a man without being married to him.

When I think of Idina and her life, I think she married too quickly in every case. For a woman to live openly with a man without being married to him in the 1930's was daring, even for a woman who was already shunned for divorces and deserved the reputation as a seductress.  The pressure to be married is still strong and I'm aware that many couples who decide to live together a while in order to make a decision to marry are often pressured by parents and others to make that decision.  (As well, in many states in the United States living together for seven years is called Common Law Marriage.)

Then, like now, marriage was associated with permanence and having someone to be with in old age.  So, this time Idina was the one to suggest to the man that they get married. But by 1936 Chris was also gone from her life.

What had happened to the Happy Valley Set, with all their entwining friendships and sexual adventures?  Sadly, the scene had diminished as people aged, as people did decide on someone that they stuck with, and drug addiction - especially morphine - and alcohol had consumed some of them.

EXCERPT: " The weekend parties with the old crowd were starting to become, even for Idina, a little unhinged.  The 'sheet game' took a new turn.  A sheet was strung up across the room. One gender would hide behind, a single representative of the other would grope in a sort of blind man's bluff, to work out which of the figures on the other side was who and select a partner.  As cocktails were sunk, the game developed further. Holes were cut into the sheet. Hands, feet, elbows, noses were struck through for identification.  More cocktails were drunk.  A new sheet was pulled across the room.  New holes were cut. The men unbuttoned their trousers..."  (Page 226 of the paperback.)

C 2022 Mistress Manifesto BlogSpot

All Rights Reserved Including Internet and International Rights

Excerpts are from The Bolter, a book by Frances Osborne

RED ADMIRAL

 

A FOURTH HUSBAND WHO BECOMES OBESSED WITH HER : IDINA and THE AMERICAN

If you're the type to get jealous or obsessed, you should never contemplate Open Relationships or find yourself married to a sexual adventurer.  That is the lesson that Idina Sackville's fourth husband, Donald Haldeman, an American who'd been born in England and educated at Eton, and who lead safaris in Africa, was to learn. - Missy

..."Visitors to Kenya started to return to Europe with tales of wild parties, abundant narcotics, and strange ménages of approved infidelities and potentially Sapphic bonds, all occurring within the Wanjohi Valley.  The gossip columnists seized upon the stories, reprinting them, as was the practice then, with clear descriptions but no precise names, and rechristening the place 'Happy Valley.' (Page 173 of the paperback.)

In October 1926 Wall Street crashed and the Roaring Twenties were over.  When her mother died in 1930, Idina learned that her daughter had been provided for, but not so much for her. In November of that year, Idina went for another civil marriage, a honeymoon in the United States, and then back to Kenya the newly married couple went. Unlike previous husbands, this man was not a womanizer. The estate they founded, called Clouds, was not in Happy Valley. While he was off on safaris Idina, true to herself, began having sex with other men. Donald hated that. 

We wonder what his expectations were. Did he not know of her reputation?  Did he think moving them away from Happy Valley would make a lot of difference?  Did he think that she had outgrown or aged past her previous sexual adventures? Had these two even discussed it? In late 1933 he came home to find another man making a run for it.  Donald fired a gun at the man. He was violently angry. Idina had thought of him as protective, but it seems he was also possessive, obsessive, and controlling.  Donald Haldeman would not give up on his wife easily, threatening to shoot anyone she slept with.

Idina had friends be there for support and as witnesses when she told him she wanted out.

Idina told Donald she was taking her daughter, now eight years old, to England to be educated at a boarding school.  Once there, the young girl was lucky to be offered private lessons along with Idina's brother's child and to be raised by him and other relatives.

This time she kept the house, Clouds.

In 1934 she met her older son, now nineteen and who was discontented with the world and his place in it.  They met at the Ritz Hotel in London. This was a three-hour conversation with a young man who she had not been allowed to see since the day she left her first marriage and agreed to leave her sons with their father, David Euan Wallace. Barbie, their step-mother, had taken on raising the boys and had three children with Euan. She was apparently not going to give the boys up to their birth mother. Idina made an attempt to establish a bit of relationship with them but did not succeed. 

Her last years would be full of grief.

C 2022 Mistress Manifesto BlogSpot

All Rights Reserved Including Internet and International Rights

Excerpts are from The Bolter, a book by Frances Osborne, the main reference for this month's post.  

MAY FUNG YEE PANG PREMIERS "THE LOST WEEKEND" FILM ABOUT HER RELATIONSHIP WITH EX-BEATLE JOHN LENNON

MAY FUNG YEE PANG : MISTRESS  OF EX-BEATLE JOHN LENNON was MISTRESS OF THE MONTH in  APRIL 2012 here at Mistress Manifesto BlogSpot.  Here is an update on May's latest, a film called "The Lost Weekend" about her relationship with John.

A year and a half  plus love affair is not a "Lost Weekend" but that's what May Fung Yee Pang's relationship with then ex-Beatle, John Lennon, has been called. May was about a decade younger than John Lennon and 17 years younger than Yoko Ono, who encouraged the relationship, one in which she would not loose control.

VARIETY :Review: May Pang Tells Her Story, and a Piece of John Lennon’s, in a Compelling Documentary  This article linked has an 8 minute recording

Excerpt: In the photos that we saw at the time of her and John, she always had a waifish beauty, and a certain mystery behind those tinted hexagon glasses.  But in "The Lost Weekend," we see that May Pang was a tough ambitious city girl, who spoke with a slight but blunt New York accent, and that after dropping our of college she had the chutzpah to talk her way into a job at the Apple Records offices on Broadway.  She was a schmoozer, and when she began to work for John and Yoko, doing every makeshift task available - avant-garde film production assistant, costume designer - she had an ebullient smile and an easy-to-be-with vivacity.  She was fun but circumspect (she didn't drink or do drugs.)

Excellent review worth your time reading and so, though I haven't seen it yet, apparently a well done and revealing documentary.

This clip is not from the film but a fairly recent interview.  May is about 70 years old now.

MARBLED WHITE

 

HER WELL EARNED REPUTATION AS A SEDUCTRESS : AN OPEN MARRIAGE WITH A MUCH YOUNGER HUSBAND

It seems that Lady Idina Sackville well earned her reputation as a seductress and that she may've even sought out scandal.  If there was inner torment, she hid it well. But while her reputation was trashed, she looked immaculate, having clothing made for her by Molyneux, wearing a bosom-flattening androgynous style that was fashion in that moment, which we are familiar with as that of the Flapper, the liberated woman of the 1920's.  She even had furs she had been given as wedding presents redesigned.

Thirty years old, her wild life well known, Idina did find love again. This time one of Britain's most eligible bachelors was penniless but much younger, only twenty-one to her thirty. Josslyn Hay would one day inherit a Scottish earldom and climb socially by inheritance but until then he was out for fun. Idina called Joss "My Darling Lion." Charles Gordon, her second husband, wanted to marry someone else and easily gave a divorce so that Idina and Joss could marry. The new couple made it on the cover of the society tell-all magazine Tatler.

A small civil marriage again, no one from Joss's family attended. In fact, they were unaware of it for several months and were angry when they found out but Idina won them over. That done, Idina took her third husband to Africa, to Kenya, to that dream of a life there free of all expectations.

Here again she came under criticism. Society forgave affairs, not repeated marriage. She was committing treason to her class. Suspicion was that she was mothering her husband instead of mothering her own sons. Expecting an Open Marriage this time around, Joss began having affairs immediately. Idina claimed she did not mind. He had an affair with an American heiress, Alice de Janze, and the two women shared him. Eventually they became friends both awaiting his return from some other woman's bed.

Idina may have married Joss in an attempt to keep him or control him.  She was soon to learn that he was always on a hunt for sexual adventures with other women.

Not to be outdone by a husband, Idina set the stage for a home to host wild parties. In Nairobi she managed to fill a house she had built with beautiful antiques and carpets brought from England and defied the African heat and soil by planting a green lawn and English flower beds. British settlers attempted to ranch but imported cattle and sheep that did not do well in the sun. These settlers remained as British as they could considering. They protected themselves from the sun with hats. Some of them thought Idina, who shockingly got sunburned and pragmatically wore pants, had "gone native." (Native Kenyans often had several wives.)

But where to find sex party participants?  The Muthaiga Club was where the newly landed gentry went for time off.  Many of these African adventurers were the second sons who had no birthright inheritance. All regarded extramarital sex as normal. The settlers lived miles apart, trying to establish their own working farms and ranches. Their opportunities to meet and socialize with one another and beat the isolation and boredom were limited to livestock auctions and horse races and the club. During Race Week in Nairobi, evening balls gave women the opportunity to look their best, dress in the latest fashions, and show off their expensive jewelry. They had not entirely left their Britishness or their class attitudes behind. While not every party was thrown with the intention to swing, Idina's invitations were sought after. Invitees were willing to drive hours to spend a "weekend" at her home. There they were attended to by servants, took hot baths, put on silk pajamas, and started drinking and entertaining themselves with talk about farming and books, pulling 'stunts' and revving up for Idina's swinger games.

But then Idina got pregnant. Concerned that she'd loose Joss over her pregnancy, she asked  Alice de Janze to move in.  Married for four years and the mother of two, Alice and her husband arrived in December 1925. Alice immediately started an affair with Joss. Asked if she minded, Idina replied that Alice was her best friend.

She gave birth to a daughter who was clearly Joss's.  This was her second chance to be a mother. He had no need for a male heir. 

Her efforts to keep Joss ultimately failed. 

Joss qualified as a man who preferred to be Kept by a woman - at least until he inherited. While out and about he met the second wife of Cyril Ramsey-Hill, Molly, born Mary Maude in London in 1893.  Like Idina, she had also given up a child in another marriage to marry Cyril. Molly was less than a year younger than Idina, so still an older woman for Joss. However, Molly had a private income that outshone Idina's. 

Joss knew Idina and he were drained financially and sexually. As a man after a fortune, he deliberately befriended Molly's husband so that he could be invited to spend time with Molly at their much more impressive house. Then, while Cyril was out of the country taking care of business, Joss moved in on Molly, and despite almost dying of malaria, abandoned Idina.  

Joss' parents became the new Earl and Countess of Errol and Joss and Idina became Lord and Lady Kilmarnock, he got a small but decent amount of money, which gave him independence rather than the opportunity to pay back some of the bills he and Idina had, and all their hard work was for naught.  The bank foreclosed on their property. 

Idina Sackville's third marriage was over and soon she would deposit her daughter with relatives in England. It was the spring of 1928, and she was thirty-five years old. Back in London her designer friend Molyneux let her earn some income by being a showroom model.  Her willingness to work was portrayed as her displaying her body to earn a living by The Express and she sued - and won.  This time around Idina also was the one to ask for and win a divorce.  She got it on the grounds that Joss had cheated on her with Mrs. Ramsey-Hill.

C 2022 Mistress Manfiesto BlogSpot

All Rights Reserved Including Internet and International Rights

Excerpts are from The Bolter, a book by Frances Osborne

REMINDER ABOUT USING COMMENTS ON THIS BLOG - MISTRESS MANIFESTO BLOGSPOT

I read every comment before deciding if I will publish it.  I'm looking for comments that are well spoken and well considered and that are on spot for the post the comment would appear under. I especially like comments that answer the questions I'm asking.

I do not publish SPAM such as people advertising themselves for sex or relationships, or "help" such as psychics and witch spells... I do not publish ranting, swearing, rude commentaries, or comments targeted against anyone as my blog is not the place to play out personal agendas or disagreements. I'm open to different opinions but please, think of how you spoke in class discussions at school and consider your audience! 

Friends, if there is someone you think I should do more research or reading about, please suggest books, articles, or leads to that information. 

THANKS!

Missy

A NEW HUSBAND AND KENYA : IDINA SACKVILLE and CHARLES GORDON

Since Euan had taken lovers, Idina Sackville thought she might also. If this was not revenge or evening the score, then it was because she loved sex and had been sex starved young woman as a wife whose husband was away most of the time. She started an affair with Charles Gordon and the couple were so open about it at one point they moved into a hotel together; Not the discretion required of a Lady who had been presented as a debutant at Court. So, it was thought best if she did not attend her sister's wedding as though she might bring bad luck to that marriage. 

Meanwhile Euan Wallace, though at least as much to blame for the ending of their marriage, remained close with her family, serving as the best man at the wedding, which unlike their own wedding, was a large and expensive and thus publicly acknowledged one. The wedding tweaked him to think a bit about his own marriage and the pending decision he awaited. He had given Idina two weeks to consider making another go of their marriage but in fact he had Barbie waiting for him, even if his intention was to continue to socialize and meet others. Idina held firm. She took the blame. He was granted a divorce based on Idina's infidelity, not his. The agreement included that the children would go to Euan. Weeks after the divorce Idina married Charles Gorden at the Chelsea Register Office, a simple civil ceremony. Weeks after that the couple headed for Kenya, then called British East Africa - Mombasa - the sea front and then Happy Valley - to establish a farm.

First roughing it by living in tents, then building a camp, as the couple walked and road around land purchased and made their plans for the future there in Africa, the excitement of the new adventure gave way to the realization that even though the cost of doing so was small compared to costs in England, it would require hard, hands-on work that they themselves would need to do even with all the inexpensive labor locally available. 

When they traveled on safaris, with porters carrying their belongings, they hunted Big Game, though often killing an elephant or other wild creature in its own habitat was thought of as self-protection. Idina was active on the hunt and shot animals as well as the men. She was comfortable with the lifestyle there in Africa and began a life-long love affair with the country. Back from such adventures, the new couple began to build a single-story house to settle in, a small, efficient house compared to the estates they were used to in England. Their plans would take time.

Then this second marriage began to come undone. Euan had been extremely active in life, getting things done, while Charles seemed lazy in comparison.  From his viewpoint, the problem was that Idina was a 'nymphomaniac.'  She took lovers even when he was around. 

By February of 1920, married only ten months, Idina left hot Africa for the cold of winter in England.  It had been a year since her divorce from Euan Wallace, who was still single.  He had been socializing in America, associating with some of America's richest and most prestigious families.  Was she hoping society would forgive her and allow her back in as a divorced woman?  Did she hope to get back into a relationship with him or miss her children? As it turned out, it was completely over between Idina and Euan. Even Euan had experienced being less than desirable in the marriage market. Euan proposed to Barbie and she accepted, breaking with her fiancée who was not nearly as rich. Barbie and Euan retained their friendship with Idina's sister.

EXCERPT : "It is one thing to close a door behind you. It is quite another to have somebody else lock it shut from the other side,  particularly if the person wielding the key is the woman with whom your husband fell in love when he was married to  you. To aggravate the situation, Idina would be expected to be grateful to Barbie for agreeing to stay in England and bring up her sons, while Idina had adventures abroad.  And now that her boys had a new mother there could be no question of Idina maintaining any contact with them whatsoever.  To do so would be regarded as destabilizing to the children, selfish of Idina, and unfair on Barbie, who had to establish her own relationship wit them." (Page 130 of the paperback.)

Now called British Crown Colony of Kenya, the country was booming. Her absence while in England had not made Charles Gordon's heart grow fonder.  Idina got busy going on safari's inviting other women as guests including famous aristocratic sports women who desired challenges previously unthinkable for women to attempt or achieve.  These were often other women who were also getting divorces. These women were, in my opinion, empowering themselves and making the way easier for other women. Most were rich in their own right.

In November 1921, having technically been married to Charles Gordon near another year, the twenty-eight year old Idina went back to London.  It could be said that she had lost near everything she could have had staying with Euan Wallace, and it was a changed London, not much like the Edwardian Era she had been raised in.

EXCERPT:  'This desire to overturn every previous code of behavior over-flowed into all areas of both the public and the private domain.  In restaurants the young crowd were louder, attempted to drink more champagne than anyone had before, and danced on the tables, the women sometimes wearing nothing under floating skirts.  Nudity was all the rage.  Women appeared in transparent dresses.  A fashion began for receiving guests while still in the bath and then openly and slowly dressing in front of them..."  (Page133 of the paperback.)

This time being divorced was not the shame and ruin it had once been and several of Idina's society women friends had been divorced. But there lingered the problem that a woman was not supposed to be the one to leave a marriage.

EXCERPT: "Society outlawed and branded a wicked woman. Idina clearly decided she might as well be as bad as she could.  She had her hair shingled to razor-thin shortness at the back and painted her fingernails green.  With her new pet, the serval cat*, on a leash, she stayed out all night and slept all day... " (Page 135 of the paperback.)

* a wild cat she took as a pet in Africa  Idina had once made the rounds carrying a black Pekinese dog she named Satan.

C 2022 Mistress Manifesto BlogSpot

All Rights Reserved Including Internet and International Rights

Excerpts are from The Bolter, a book by Frances Osborne

PEACOCK BUTTERFLY

 

SHE NEVER STOLE A HUBAND

"However many lovers she would have in the years that followed, it was said of her that she never stole another woman's husband but might pick them up if they were lying around.  To Idina 'left lying around' would show itself to mean either sanctioned by their wives to sleep with whomever they chose, or abandoned by wives traveling abroad.  it would not mean husbands who were at loose ends while their wives were sick."

From page 105 paperback The Bolter by Frances Osborne

Missy here: I think this is an important distinction. Her first husband had gone off partying when she was sick and still in love with him.

LADY IDINA SACKVILLE : MARRIAGE GONE WRONG

According to author Frances Osborne, who by the way is the great grand-daughter of  Lady Idina Sackville,  the 'Bolter' started out in a first marriage to one of the richest and most eligible bachelors in Britain. David Euan Wallace, with the expectations of the Edwardian era aristocracy.  Despite her family having a bit of a tainted reputation because of the unconventional doings of her mother, Muriel, Countess De La Warr, Idina was presented as a debutant at Court and married.  Soon enough Idina had two sons, fulfilling her womanly role to provide heirs. 

Marriage was for the protection of property and inheritances and, having provided these two sons, by the standards of her peers, a woman could have affairs just like her husband, as long as absolute discretion was kept. Any children conceived with other men would be raised as though they were the sons of her husband. The precedent had been set when the then Prince of Wales and his friends met at the Marlborough House and indulged themselves. They were called The Marlborough Set. What was good for them was good for the aristocracy.

Then World War I broke out and everything changed.

Although men from the upper classes were monied and educated and heading for tremendous careers if they chose to work, or like Euan Wallace, intended to serve in the Calvary which was self-financed, they did not shy away from military service. They wanted to be part of England's role in World War I. Euan went to war and was wounded with shrapnel while serving in Belgium. Perhaps it was being so close to death and violence, but when he came back a couple months after Idina had given birth to their second son, he threw himself into having a good time. There was a man shortage true and he was still one of the richest young men in the country.  He found himself surrounded by women. Euan slept around and his lovers included Idina's women friends.You could say that the young husband had been informed by death and was trying to defy it by throwing himself into entertainments.  However, reading The Bolter, I got the impression that he was uninterested in maintaining a marriage or being a father, that he was immature.

He especially went for Barbie, a younger woman who wanted a rich husband and kept herself for marriage and just out of his intimate reach. Until recently single women could not go out without chaperones and there she was, available, but not too available. She and other friends saw him off as he returned to the war. Idina was left behind.

Idina didn't want to play the possessive and demanding wife but he left her home sick to have a good time. It was clear they were leading separate lives and that he'd moved on. He thought so little of her that six weeks went by when he didn't write of her in his diary. She had been the good wife who had written to her soldier husband every day. Of course, some mutual friends were having a good time with him and were part of this problem, but he no longer even put Idina first in public as a good Edwardian husband was to do.

Idina decided to leave him rather than wait for him to leave her.  Married five years, she was only twenty-five years old in 1918.

On November 11th, Armistice Day, World War I was over, to everyone's' great relief. That day she wrote Euan and asked him for a divorce.

C 2022 Mistress Manifesto BlogSpot

All Rights Reserved including Internet and International Rights

The above book review-report post is the result of reading the book The Bolter from cover to cover.

SWALLOW TAIL

 The images used this month are from the New York Public Library collection

 and are in public domain.  The originals were "cigarette cards"

LADY IDINA SACKVILLE : SCANDALIZED THE ENGLISH ARISTOCRACY WITH HER FIVE DIVORCES : MISTRESS OF THE MONTH

 

I read the paperback, published in 2008, from cover to cover.  

MYRA IDINA SACKVILLE

1893 – 1955

Today it's not unusual to meet someone who has been through a couple divorces or many relationships.  We often meet (or are) the "serial monogamist" who has not legally married and so we can't count the legal divorces. In the Edwardian era, marriage was still the best option for women. Wives of the upper classes were expected to tolerate their husband's affairs and remain in the marriage. They were also expected to marry in the first bloom of youth. The case has been made that Idina Sackville did instigate a divorce from her first husband, thus making her entitled to be called a "bolter," but her other four divorces?  It was complicated. She did not exactly bolt from these. Perhaps she had learned there was no point in having someone in your life who had moved on to someone else. Idina's life was considered scandalous not just because she married and married and married, was a class traitor or unstable but because she deserved the reputation for being a swinger. outrageous sexuality.

Idina birthed two sons and a daughter. She gave up raising the boys as an agreement for divorce from her first husband.  When he remarried, his new wife took over raising them and she was locked out of their lives. Idina was not allowed to contact them and would not even try until they were nearing adulthood. Had she been that easily persuaded that to be childfree meant freedom? Was her hedonistic lifestyle all about masking heartbreak or was she someone who thought one should love the one they were with? Her daughter by a third husband was with her for several years and then raised by her brother and in boarding schools.

Idina's mother, Murial, was the rebel first, also divorcing, getting involved in socialist movements and a mystical religion called Theosophy. This tainted the family's reputation but was considered an interesting eccentricity. Idina got involved in an important aspect of feminism, called suffrage then, the right to vote for women.  It makes sense that she became aware of how unequal women were in marriage, how trapped.

"A man's infidelity counted for nothing since any illegitimate children he produced would stay outside both the marriage and inheritance rights."  (Page 22 of the paperback)

Idina, however, was not alone in having a non-conformist attitude. What made Idina and her "set" unusual was that they were defying all expectations of even the aristocratic and titled in England, who accepted affairs but not divorce, which was considered extreme. They were expected to make examples of themselves for the middle and lower classes. Was Idina less of a hypocrite? Was she just ahead of her times, wanting and needing the "more" that has become an expectation of relationships today? Or was sexual adventure her whole purpose? 

The Happy Valley set as it was called were people who were living in the Highlands of Kenya as ex-pats, many who attempted to tame the land and farm it, some seriously, some just to see if they could.  Many of them had inheritances or trust funds or money coming in from somewhere so that they didn't have to work for a living to start but at some point they had to turn a profit. Idina was one of them by birth though not motivated by money to stay in that first marriage with one of the richest young men in the world.  However, she saw Africa as the opportunity to start anew.

Idina threw sex parties, inventing games so guests would pair off with someone other than the partner they came to the party with. Considered beautiful, with big blue eyes but for an unfortunate chin, she was unafraid to be seen nude and natural though she was also known for having beautiful clothing and wearing clothes well, as she moved with grace in them.

The Happy Valley Set were not the only group of people experimenting with open relationships, spouse swapping, and alternative lifestyles a hundred or so years ago. Many of them did change legal partners, moving towards settling for someone along the way as they aged, if not their original spouse. Perhaps the expats in Kenya were glad to be so far from home, cold and rainy England and all its traditions. Africa meant hot weather, gorgeous rural views, exotic wild animals, houses and rural farms. It could also meant isolation, boredom, and drinking more alcohol.

Let's imagine Idina at eighteen years old in 1911 though. It's a time when girls are shucking their chaperones, staying up late listening to records on the phonograph, driving cars, smoking cigarettes and drinking, all considered evidence of liberation, but most importantly getting involved in politics and the rights of women. Rich girls especially were getting out there in the world, traveling, having adventures. Idina had a good name, even if her parents split up, and had composure and beauty. She wanted to find a husband. She was too young to imagine a life otherwise. Didn't everybody get married? Her mother, Muriel, Countess De La Warr, lodged her with an aunt in London and that year she became a debutant. Such was the prestige of her family that she was presented to the Queen at Court. Then her family gave her a little dance at the Ritz. She was photographed for the society news hanging out with friends as well as actresses and singers.

To stand out she decided to carry a little Pekinese dog with her wherever she went. She named the dog Satan. 

Not engaged by the end of that first season, which was the expectation, Muriel decided it would be too humiliating for her daughter to go another round in England and sent her to America - to New York City - on a steamship. The pressure was on the men to find a wife too, and well, being chaperoned by a railroad heir and a mining heir, staying in the United States for a whole year, gave the impression there was competition for her. Imagine being 19 and already having that pressure, that worry.

In 1913 she was back in London and engaged, while she continued to work for a group that backed Votes for Women. Her fiancée was one of the most eligible bachelors in Europe, a 21 year old rich enough to be in the Calvary, where the men financed their participation, David Euan Wallace, called Euan. He was an heir to an industrial fortune made in iron and probably just as immature as she was. Euan's family's company had 30,000 to 40,000 employees and were perhaps the richest family in Scotland. They also owned land. They indulged in philanthropy.  They had money to spare. Once married To Euan, Idina would never have to worry about money again providing she remained married.  All that was required of her then would be to do her duty of producing an heir. 

In October 1913, the engagement of Idina and Euan was announced in the Times (of London) and he set up a 100,000 pound marriage trust *** for Idina.  Her financial future was secure.

He called Idina, who was small, "Little One" and he called her "Brownie." Then they married very quietly in a small church and went off on an Egyptian honeymoon.  The intentions seemed right. What could go wrong?

To learn more about Idina Sackville and her life, continue to read this month's posts, as I explain and try to understand what she did with her life.

Missy

***A marriage trust is in place in case a spouse dies.  Its like an insurance policy.  This amount does not reflect upon the amount of money a wife has to live on or spend while married to an alive husband. 

C 2022 Mistress Manifesto BlogSpot All Rights Reserved including Internet and International Rights