BALANCE

PAMELA DIGBY CHURCHILL HARRIMAN - DUMPY DEBUTANTE TO AMBASSADOR TO FRANCE

PAMELA DIGBY CHURCHILL HARRIMAN 

DUMPY DEBUTANTE TO AMERICAN AMBASSADOR TO FRANCE

First published March 4th, 2019

Go to March 2019 in the Archives to read more about Pamela!

Pamela Beryl Digby Churchill Harriman 

20 March 1920 – 5 February 1997

Pamela Digby was born into the aristocracy of Great Britain - the lowest rung of five, she was Honorable. Though her family lacked the money that some of her peers displayed when they were introduced to society formally, and though as a debutante she was considered not successful, and her early and first marriage to Winston Churchill's son Randolph was a disaster, she became known as The Courtesan of the 20th Century. She was the mistress of several important and wealthy men, and managed to marry three times. She seemed to work hard - study - these men to please them - and it could be argued that she actually wanted to marry more than one of them but lost at love. She was known for her femininity and her nurturance of them as well as her ability to help them make the contacts they wanted for business. She had few women friends but counted The Duchess of Windsor, the ex Wallis Simpson, as a close one. She might be thought of as a reinvention-of-self artist. A chameleon. A risk taker. She was ambitious for the good life. She had one, but crisis compelled her to move on, and on. The title of Sally Bedell Smith's book REFLECTED GLORY says a lot; Pamela reflected the glory of the men she enchanted. These men could have so very many women but for a time they chose her. Being her keeper was even a way for them to claim status.

Not one to write her memoirs or even keep a diary, perhaps no one really knew what she was thinking - or plotting - at any point in her life. Often she kept a game face and did not reveal her true emotions. She liked to keep the men guessing about their status in her life. So one has to know the person by the evidence of their actions.  Was she really just after other women's husbands or had the wives of those men not cared enough for them?  Perhaps she learned the lessons of her birth status: women were not heirs. If they wanted to live in style it was though marriage - or men - that one could. Had she not been introduced to society specifically to become engaged and married within a debutante season or two?  Had she not done her duty to produce a male heir - the grandchild of Winston Churchill the World War II era statesman - by marrying his son Randolph; he proposed she marry him on their first date specifically because he feared not leaving an heir as he went off to war himself.  

For those of you who have to coax your beauty, Pamela was considered dumpy in her teens and from mid-life on. She really had to work at it. She was not considered to be all that attractive - just average - and in her early years her clothes were barely fashionable. She was even ridiculed for her looks. Yet she lived through years in which her taste in clothing and upkeep of her hair and skin allowed her to be considered a great beauty. Her personality was cheerful and flirtatious but perhaps not spontaneous. Yet she was not known for her sense of humor and tended not to air her own opinions - not until she was widowed from her third husband and began to become a fundraiser for the Democratic party in the United States. It's said she was important to the election of President William Jefferson Clinton.  She became the Ambassador to France!  She lived into her 80's.

These next two months will be devoted to Pamela Digby Churchill Harriman.  Her life included many whose names have appeared here at MISTRESS MANIFESTO BLOGSPOT in the past. 

You'll be enthralled with her story.  And you'll learn why she is thought to have achieved what no other woman of the 20th century did; being kept by a "golden string of lovers" who had wealth and power.

Missy

C 2019 Mistress Manifesto BlogSpot

All Rights Reserved including Internet and International Rights.

MARY BOLEYN : MISTRESS OF KING HENRY VIII

First published in January of 2012, a month dedicated to Mary Boleyn as Mistress of the Month.

Go to January 2012 using archives on the side bar of the start page to read all the posts about Mary Bolyn (aka Mary Boleyn).

HENRY VIII had so many mistresses, including Elizabeth Blount before her, and Mary's sister Anne Bolyn was one of them too. Mary is the one who had a happy ending to her life - marriage to a man she loved who loved her without so very many complications - and who SURVIVED. Anne's the one who married the King and got beheaded.

Henry married Anne after he finally gave up on his wife of many years, Katherine of Aragon, try as the poor woman did, to give him a legitimate MALE heir. (We know so many men still dwell on having a son!)

Then, unhappy with a mistress as wife, it was Anne Bolyn that he sent to the block - beheading!

Mary seemed to have survived all this and have his child, a daughter named Katherine Carey, while she was married to William Carey. Henry sent William Carey off somewhere so he wouldn't interfere in their affair. She was devastated when the King dumped her for her sister.

Because of their daughter, Katherine Carey, there are a few people alive today who are blood related to Henry. If the book author Alison Weir is right, today's decedents of Mary Bolyn include Camilla Parker Bowles and Princess Diana!

Alison Weir's latest book called "MARY BOLEYN - Mistress of Kings" is fascinating. She has to tease out the details but is good at pointing out where other authors of the subject have run on assumptions. The term Kings is used because Mary may have been the mistress of the French King Francois I when she was a young teenager at his court. (The subtitle "The Great and Infamous Whore" turns out to be wrong)!

Mary, for all the details and historical research Weir did, remains a bit of a mystery. Was she simply compliant? Yet twice she married for love! Was she boring and without opinion or is it that she knew how to survive?

The book came out 2011 published by Ballantine Books and should be on your mistress bookshelf!

C 2012-2014  Mistress Manifesto BlogSpot

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ROYAL BABYLON by KARL SHAW : MISTRESS MANIFESTO BOOK REVIEW

First published here at Mistress Manifesto on January 17, 2010

If you want to read about Royal Personages who had Mistresses, usually several, at once or over time, ROYAL BABYLON is a book to read. (You'll be glad we no longer live without contraception! But some mistresses today still see pregnancy as a way to be supported for life or force the issue of marriage!) And when I say that there was lots and lots of craziness, I mean lots! This book is an argument against intermarriage!

on page 68 we read...

"The British royal family, through Queen Victoria and her nine children, was related to the German Emperor, the Czar of Russian, and the kings of Spain, Portugal, Belgium, Bulgaria, and Romania; and via Edward VII's wife, Alexandra, they were linked to the royal families of Greece, Denmark, and Norway... the biggest danger comes from marrying cousins, because their children can inherit a double dose of recessive genes... The blue bloods may have lived hundreds, even thousands, of miles apart, but they were still in effect marrying the girl next door...


DID INTERBREEDING MAKE PEOPLE CRAZY OR MAYBE HYPERSEXUAL?

on page 89 we read...

"When King Augustus II of Poland lay on his deathbed in 1733, his last words were "My whole life has been an unceasing sin --- God have mercy on me!" ... (He was known for) his exceptional physical size and strength, his gluttony, his drinking prowess and his lechery, but most of all for his astonishing virility. Over a period of half a century he fathered 365 bastards, give or take a dozen. It is probably only fair to record that there was also one legitimate heir.... Augustus presided over an enormous warren of concubines. Some enjoyed official status; other he preferred to keep quiet about --- his own daughter, the Countess Orzelska, for example. One of his favor trysts was the Swedish Countess Aurora of Konigsmark; another was Fatima, a captured Turkish slave girl. Some of his more ambitious mistresses negotiated legal contracts and annual salaries for themselves; one earned herself a large palace in Dresden...

on page 90 we read...

"August the Strong's progeny went on to populate most of Europe and some of them because famous in their own right, including Maurice de Saxe and his daughter George Sand.

C 2010 Mistress Manifesto - BlogSpot

Book Review-Report- Recommendation

A MERRY OLDE ENGLAND CHRISTMAS

It happens.... 

Hello My Dear Readers...

In the Mediterranean climate of Southern California this season, palm trees swaying in the breeze and beach days still possible, I imagine instead the snowy Continental Climate of Europe or the Temperate Maritime Climate of the British Isles. I listen to classical music and I make pots of tea and bake some scones - or at least purchase some from Trader Joes market. Though I no longer put up a Christmas tree, I do like to have a few branches of fresh pine in the house to scent the air. I arrange ornaments in bowls as centerpieces for the table. I pull out old photographs and a few toys that were mine as a child and leave them out to look at. Sometimes I just want to be alone with a good book. Sometimes I indulge myself socially. I don't have a fireplace but if you're from the snow belt, well, you might be amazed at how many people here do. There's a smell of wood fire in the air on the colder nights. (Few of us actually run our heaters unless we have a cold streak. Instead we actually get under quilts.) If ever there's a time to wear flannel here, this is the time.  

In order to celebrate Merry Olde England, I've mined past posts to bring you a variety of Great British mistresses. You can use the side bar where past posts are archived to bring up the entire year and month and read through... Some interesting reading awaits you as you nosh on crackers and cheese and a glass of wine.

So cozy up and enjoy the season with me!

Missy

PS:  I do have the names of some British Isle's Mistresses I haven't covered yet. If you have suggestions please leave me a comment. If you want your comment to remain unpublished, just start out your message with the words Do Not Publish!