The 1st Viscountess jewels could not have just disappeared, they must have been utilized whether to boast up the finances of the family or redesigned, 'they were just too statement pieces to just go unnoticed.
I wonder if another will was made by the Countess basically dislodging the first, thus allowing certain decisions to be made in her absence. But then I'm sure I read that in those times, a wife's dowry or legacies on her passing became the property of her husband.
Regards,
Dave.
I guess one reason why Mary Curzon’s tiaras did not reappear after her death is that they had become decidedly unfashionable by the time her daughters were grown-up and her husband married his second wife, whereas all four of them – daughters and second wife – were highly fashionable ladies.
The design of the large Boucheron tiara probably qualified for the description "high crown", which was sometimes used in contemporary newspaper reports of jewels worn to a function – a no-go for a head jewel in the 1920’s! Whoever inherited the tiara – if Lord Curzon followed the wishes of his first wife, it would have been one of his daughters, if Anne de Courcy has it right, he gave all of Mary’s tiaras to Grace – had it possibly dismantled and commissioned to use the stones for a new piece. I’m sure this would have been done discreetly. What should be noted is that by all accounts the three daughters were very generously provided for by their late mother’s family, and Grace Elvina Duggan was a wealthy woman when she married George Curzon in 1917. The New York Times reported in 1943 that she had inherited an estate of more than $18,000,000 after her first husband’s death in 1915.
Anne de Courcy writes in her book on George and Mary’s daughters that Grace Curzon had received all three of Mary’s tiaras and thus Alexandra "bought herself the tiara deemed necessary by all married women of her social standing" when she got married to Major Metcalfe in 1925. Her tiara in Beth’s post above looks very fashionable. I wonder if it could have been made of blackened steel with accentuations in diamonds?
Grace Elvina’s first husband Alfred Duggan was appointed to the Argentine Legation in London in 1905. She was presented at court and certainly attended official functions as his wife. We can therefore assume she owned at least one tiara before her second marriage to George Curzon. The shape of the tiara she was wearing in the photo below from 1922 looks though as if this piece might have been acquired or commissioned after she became Curzon’s wife.
It’s a mere speculation, particularly since the only photo I found of Mary Curzon wearing what she called in her will "a diamond tiara made by the Goldsmiths’ Company" shows only five pearls, but the size and shape of these pearls seem to match the ones in Grace’s tiara. But that is, as I said, a mere speculation.
The star tiara mentioned by Mary Curzon in her will might have been inherited by Lord Curzon’s nephew Richard together with the Viscountcy and Barony Scarsdale. The only photo *possibly* showing this piece which I’ve found so far is the one from the wedding of Richard Curzon’s step-son in 1958. *If* this is the star tiara in question, it would have been quite unfashionable in the period between the wars as well, so it was not too surprising that it didn’t reappear earlier.
I think we can relatively safely assume though that the bandeau worn by Grace Curzon in 1924 was a jewel that had belonged to Mary Curzon, although there seems to be no photo of Mary wearing it.
Lord Curzon’s mother Blanche Senhouse died in 1875. Even if the jewel was heavily reworked at a later stage, it seems unlikely to stem from the period before 1875. Curzon’s father didn’t remarry, and the only jewels he might have acquired after 1875 would have been for his daughters and daughters-in-law. He apparently gave Mary a diamond brooch and a pendant as a wedding gift. On the other hand, if the jewel had been a gift to Grace, she certainly would have kept it after her husband’s death in 1925, but Beth found photos proving that the jewel went with the Scarsdale titles and was worn by the 2nd Viscount’s wives.
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