NICOLE COSTE : PRINCE ALBERT II IS RUMORED TO HAVE BEEN BANNED FROM MARRYING HER BY HIS FATHER : HER LOVE CHILD WITH THE PRINCE IS ACCEPTED AND REACHES ADULTHOOD

Back in September 2010, I elected NICOLE COSTE as Mistress of the Month. It's time to update ourselves on this beautiful African woman who, as Mistress of Prince Albert II of Monaco, is rumored to have wanted to marry back in the day before he did marry his forever wife, Princess Charlene. The son of Nicole and Albert, Alexandre, has been featured in more recent magazine and news stories as reaching adulthood as an accepted member of Prince Albert's family. It's not easy to sort through media and know for sure what's true and what is not about these relationships. For instance, I'm skeptical of the stories that Princess Charlene, Prince Albert II's wife, tried to flee her wedding and I dislike the misinterpretation of her emotional tears at the wedding as negative. But Charlene did go to Africa in recent years and stay there for a suspiciously long time, and then after a return to Monaco, entered a Swiss clinic. People do wonder at the status of Charlene's marriage to Albert and if Albert persists in faithfulness and loyalty to Charlene.

Let's start with the posts from 2010 and I'll add the updates.

- Missy

Here's what I posted in September 2010:

Nicole Valérie Tossoukpé, now called NICOLE COSTE, was a flight attendant from the African country of Togo when worldly Prince Albert of Monaco met her, and things were so good between them that Albert, who some say has outdone Mick Jagger when it comes to the numbers of women he has had, decided to set her up in Paris as his mistress. A few years into it, the couple had a son, Alexandre. Albert wanted to marry Nicole but his father said no...***

Now, I looked around the net for information and picture on NICOLE COSTE, and I'm linking to this one (click on the title above); it has some great pictures of the couple together and Albert with his son as well as strong suggestions that Monaco look no further for it's heir. Yes, there are some who want little Alexandre to become the heir to the throne and I know - Albert is marrying Charlene  - sometime in July 2011 - but this is MISTRESS MANIFESTO BLOGSPOT!

Just a few months ago Nicole emerged at Cannes...

C 2010-2015 Mistress Manifesto First published September 1, 2010

 

NICOLE COSTE BRINGS FORTH HER CHARITY 2010!

Miss Afrique 2010, first beauty contest of its kind on African soil ... NICOLE CONTE is busy, looking terrific, and doing something important with her life! The contest was partially sponsored by Nicole's charity...

*** In 2025 I still hear and read this.

NICOLE VALERIE COSTE

Nicole Valérie Tossoukpé

1971- present

She legally changed her surname to Coste in November 2004.

She has two sons from a previous marriage.

She and Albert II met on an Air France flight where she served as a 1st Class flight attendant.

This month I will go further with the Nicole Coste story than I did years ago. Although there may once have been talk of marriage, and Nicole has in interviews promoted the idea that the people of Monaco love her and that she could well as a Princess, it is also true that she is accused of having a rivalry with Princess Charlene and possibly the cause of Charlene's distress. She may or may not have had men in her life since Albert but if so, this seems to be a secret. Paris and London figure in her story too, not just Monaco.

If you would like to read past coverage about Monaco, you may want to visit my archives!

January  2015  

The GRIMALDI CURSE and the MISTRESSES OF THE PRINCES OF MONACO

C2010 Mistress Manifesto - BlogSpot  First published September 9, 2010

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JOSSYLN HAY IS FOUND MURDERED and THE SUICIDE OF ALICE DE JANZE

Well, my readers, if you've come this far into my retelling the story of American heiress and expatriate Alice de Janze, you may realize that the murder of Jossyln Hay is the dramatic conclusion of the story and the book The Temptress. In fact, there have been several books written about the Happy Valley Set that include or are focused on this murder because it remains an unsolved mystery. Author Paul Spicer believes Alice e Janze did murder Jossyln Hay, quite deliberately, and believes that with her suicide she left a letter that admitted it, which was confiscated by the police and never seen or spoken of.  As well, Spicer visited a woman who was the daughter of the doctor who attended Alice when her servants heard the shot she inflicted upon herself, and rallied to save her life. He says this daughter was only eleven years old at the time, but her mother did tell her about Alice's confessional letter.

What if Alice Silverhorne, who married Frederick de Janze, and then Raymond de Trafford, had been born today?  Certainly, there would have been much more psychological and psychiatric help for her. If you recognize yourself in Alice, perhaps you have a mood disorder or you fight depression, or maybe the one you love is an unhealthy obsession.  Know that this is true. Reach out for help!

Josslyn Hay, had created enemies, even if he was a likeable character who, despite his reputation ,had been welcomed into the homes of many of the Happy Valley settlers.  He was likely a sex addict and he had gotten himself involved with many women.  Any number of jilted lovers or husbands could have been to blame. 

In 1941, when he was about 40, he was found in a fetal position on the floor of his car which was slightly off road. The author comes up with a credible scenario on how this murder could have happened, as he was shot at close range.  He proposes that Alice is the one who knew when he would be on the road mid-morning and where and drove to that point. Then, seeing that he knew her, Josslyn might have stopped to talk to her.

But who in Kenya was accused?  Despite the notion that the people who came to Kenya and indulged in sex parties, swinging, changing partners, Open marriages, and so on, did so to escape the restrictions in their lives and experience the freedom to do as they like, many of them suffered from too much drama and chaos that was unlivable without the use of alcohol and other drugs. Many of them, when it comes right down to it, sought the perfect partner.

Someone had decided to repress the evidence and let a likely innocent man go to trial.

A man named Jock Delves Broughton was blamed and went on trial. Jock had reason to believe his wife, Diana, was cheating on him. After the murder Alice visited this man as he awaited his fate in prison, assuring him she knew he was innocent, but  thought she was a suspect, she was never suspected enough to be arrested or brought to trial herself. Jock was an older man and becoming a social outcast  because of this accusation was more than he could deal with. Though he was not convicted, he took a fatal dose of morphine in 1942. Then Diana went on to marry one of the wealthiest men in Kenya, Gilbert Coville, in 1943, a month after her husband's suicide. (Diana went on to marry again in 1955. Despite this, Gilbert still left her his entire estate when he died!)

On Page 195 of Paul Spicer's The Temptress we find an accounting of Alice's very intentional suicide:

Alice killed her dog with sleeping pills, she visited Josslyn's grave, and amended her will,

On September 27, 1941, Alice told her African staff not to disturb her, which wasn't unusual since she normally slept in until 11:00. Then she collected flowers from her garden and decorated her bedroom with the blooms. She put notes on her furniture, friend's names, to alert the staff as to who was to get what.  She wrote letters to her children, to her then boyfriend, Dickie, who was in Egypt, to the police, and then a suicide note.  It was clear she had planned her actions.  She locked her bedroom door, wrapped her chest with a large bandage, which must have been in order to keep the bloody mess she would make to a minimum.  Then she took a huge dose of a sleep medication and before it hit took a revolver and aimed at her heart. The attempt to kill herself didn't work automatically.  Servants forced the door open and found her near death.  A doctor was called and raced to the house but it was still a long trip and by then she had died. 

Her grave was left unmarked so it wouldn't be dug up by fortune hunters.

Dickie Pembroke, the new boyfriend, was devastated as he might have married Aice after the war. (World War II)

Raymond de Trafford survived being a prisoner and the war but because of his notoriety was turned down to rejoin the Coldstream Guards. Eventually he was accepted with the Pioneer Corps posted in Morocco, was discharged at the rank of Captain in 1945 and awarded two medals.  True to form, he went back to gambling, womanizing, and hunting.

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ALICE SILVERHORNE - DE JANZE FALLS FOR THE BAD BOY RAYMOND DE TRAFFORD

The people who came to Kenya's Happy Valley in the early 20th century, were people who wanted an escape from the restrictions of their lives, who were searching for something else or more.  

Invited by the pregnant Idina Sackville and her then-husband Josslyn Hay, to visit them at their house called Slains, the de Janzes were introduced to the Happy Valley life.

Idina thought of Alice as her best friend. Now the mother of two small daughters, Alice was not especially enjoying her husband as a lover. During this time Alice and Joss became lovers, just as Idina had planned. I wonder if the two women friends had talked about it and came to an agreement or if it happened naturally.

Perhaps it was the bright African sun, for Kenya was right on the equator, but Alice did feel cured of her depression. However, Alice still must have felt something like "is that all there is?"  She was not besotted with her husband and the affair with Joss made her realize it more so. She did not have designs on Joss as her next husband, but Alice dreaded going home to Europe or America.  So, she and Frederick bought a 600-acre farm and started to build a house on it. (Implied is that it was her money.) After Idina gave birth, her third child and a daughter, in 1926, Alice and Frederick went back to France, to visit their children, which were being raised by his mother. Then they returned to Africa. 

When Alice was introduced to Raymond de Trafford there was an instant attraction. He was 26 and raised Catholic but he had left a trail of broken hearts.  A British aristocrat who was part of Cold Stream Guards, Raymond had escaped having to serve in World War I.  He had recently been to South America where he played polo and went to cattle runs.  Importantly, Raymond was not an heir unlike so many of the Happy Valley Set and had to find a way to make his own money. Not penniless, he bought a small farm which would have to turn a profit. Then he decided that he would trap live African animals and sell them to zoos to earn income.

Now Alice had three men in various stages of relationship with her. Her husband, Frederick, didn't like Raymond but they didn't fight over her either. She also managed to conduct an affair with Raymond without her husband or Joss finding out. The situation didn't please Adina.  Alice knew that her affair with Joss was not the way out her marriage. Joss was on his way out of his marriage with Idina. 

Something I felt aware of as I read the book, The Temptress, was that when it came to money, there were just as many men seeking to marry women with money as there were women seeing to marry men with money.  Idina had married one of the richest men in Great Britain, her first husband David Euan Wallace, but all the money in the world would not have kept her in that marriage. By leaving him, however, she had taken a daring risk - for a woman of those Edwardian times - that was difficult to recover from.

Joss was moving on from Idina, as he had met Mary "Molly" Ramsey-Hill, who was married to Cyril. They lived lavishly.  She had wealth of mysterious origin but perhaps it came from a first husband that she'd married at 16. From that point on, Joss befriended her husband so he could be invited to their impressive home and see Mary. Confident of himself as a seducer, the man certainly seems to have been premeditated in his pursuit, for he would succeed with her.

Frederick came back from a safari with malaria and almost died.  Alice was there for him as he fought the disease. the dutiful wife. In order to overcome the disease, he had to go back to France - alone.  He was medically advised that he should never come back to Africa because another bout of Malaria would kill him.  Alice insisted that their children be in his custody. The heartbroken man left the country and did not argue.  They were Catholic - no divorce.

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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!

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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.

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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.)

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Excerpts are from The Bolter, a book by Frances Osborne

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.

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

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.

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Excerpts are from The Bolter, a book by Frances Osborne

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.

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

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. 

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WIKIMEDIA COMMONS on GENITAL MUTILATION

This image is a work of an employee of the Government Accountability Office or a predecessor organization, taken or made as part of that person's official duties. As a work of the U.S. federal government, the image is in the public domain in the United States.

COMMONS WIKIMEDIA on GENITAL MUTILATION OF WOMEN IN AFRICA

PEACE IN SUDAN?

PEACE DIRECT : SUDAN

Kola Boof's story of violence in her personal life from the time she was a child is painful.  She is of Egyptian and Sudanese heritage.  I found this organization which intends to create peace in the Sudan.

EXCERPT:  Sudan's 21 year civil war left two million people dead and split the country in two. Weapons are everywhere in the countryside and inter-communal battles occur with frightening regularity.

Simple disputes over water rights, farmland or cattle theft can leave scores dead and breed local hostilities with wider implications.

The continued bombing by the Sudanese Air Force of villages under the control of the Sudan People's Liberation Army - North results in the deaths of many civilians.

The UN (United Nations) estimates that 100,000 people have fled into neighboring South Sudan.  The growth of weapons in the region along with existing armed groups destabilizes communities and entrenches cycles of revenge.

PENTAS - NATIONAL FLOWER OF SUDAN

 

VISUTEZ L'AFRIQUE

SACRIFICE TO THE NILE

Picturesque Egypt Vol 2

The Sacrifice to the Nile