Constance Crowninshield Coolidge

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Constance Coolidge
Charcoal drawing of Constance by John Singer Sargent, 1915
Born
Constance Crowninshield Coolidge

(1892-01-04)January 4, 1892
Boston, Massachusetts
DiedApril 30, 1973(1973-04-30) (aged 81)
Neuilly-sur-Seine, France
Resting placePère Lachaise Cemetery
Spouses
​
​
(m. 1910; div. 1924)​
Pierre de Jumilhac
​
​
(m. 1924; div. 1929)​
Eliot Rogers
​
​
(m. 1930; div. 1932)​
André Magnus
​
​
(date missing)​
RelativesCaspar Crowninshield (grandfather)

Constance Crowninshield Coolidge (January 4, 1892 – April 30, 1973), was a Boston Brahmin (a member of Boston's upper society), socialite, heiress and a long-term American expatriate living in Paris.[1] She had the pedigree of the most elite Boston Brahmin: she was a descendant of the Adams, Amory, Coolidge, Copley, Crowninshield, and Peabody families, all of them well-known in Boston's high society. She was a distant relative of Calvin Coolidge.

A trust child and in adulthood a self proclaimed socialist, Constance rejected her Brahmin background early in life, replacing it with a Parisian life from 1923 onwards. Her friendships included the literati such as Harry Crosby, Hart Crane, Robert Herrick, Somerset Maugham and H. G. Wells.[2]

Early life[edit]

Constance was born in Boston, Massachusetts on January 4, 1892. She was a daughter of landscape architect, David Hill Coolidge and Harriet Sears (née Crowninshield) Coolidge (1869–1905).[3]

She was the granddaughter of Caspar Crowninshield, Commander of the 2nd Massachusetts Cavalry during the U.S. Civil War, and the niece of the music patron Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge and Frank Crowninshield, editor of Vanity Fair. Among her many first cousins was Ben Bradlee. She was also a distant relative of former U.S. President Calvin Coolidge.[4] Her great-aunt, Fanny Crowninshield, was the wife of John Quincy Adams II, and the mother of George Caspar Adams and Charles Francis Adams III, who were like uncles to her.

Interests[edit]

Constance was known for her love of anything risky; she was addicted to horse racing, gambling and extramarital affairs.[5] While married to the Count, she became prominent in the arts, as well as one of the most prominent racehorse owners in France.[6] With her third husband, she attended the "Concours Hippique", the Paris Horse Show of 1932 and was described as an outstanding figure on the French turf.[7]

Passionate about horse racing, she owned a very large stable of horses and she would go to the racetrack every day. In 1933, her horse "Yarlas" came in fourth at Auteuil Track.[8] In 1934 her horse "Jean-Victor", won the Prix du Président de la République at the Auteuil Hippodrome.

Personal life[edit]

While in Paris studying languages, eighteen year-old Constance met fellow Bostonian Ray Atherton who was studying architecture at the Beaux-Arts de Paris. Atherton asked her father for permission to marry, but Coolidge insisted they wait a year. Nevertheless, Atherton persisted and while the Coolidges were touring Germany, he obtained a marriage license and when they returned to Paris, Constance and Ray were married.[9]

The couple resided initially in Chicago, Illinois before moving to London returning a second time in 1917, when her husband entered the U.S foreign service. During their marriage, she accompanied her husband to China on a diplomatic posting, where she, a determined gambler, behaved wildly enough to earn herself the nickname "The Queen of Peking". Living there during American Prohibition in the early 1920s proved tantalizing for her. Constance wore dresses that were flamboyant and she spared little thought of what others might say about her. She engaged in extramarital liaisons, which placed a great deal of a strain on their marriage.[5]: 214  Among her affairs were those with British diplomat Eric Brenan and American expat, Felix Doubleday, the adoptive son of publisher Frank Nelson Doubleday.[10][11] Love letters from both Brenan and Doubleday have been preserved at the Massachusetts Historical Society.[1] It was also during this time that she became friends with Wallis Simpson and Katherine and Herman Rogers.[10] She had multiple admirers and received regular relationship advice from her relative and financial guardian, Charles Francis Adams III, written on his "Secretary of the US Navy" stationery.[12]

When Atherton was recalled to the State Department, she remained in China on the plea that her horses needed attention.[13] Later, Atherton was assigned to head up the U.S. Embassy in Athens and Constance moved to Paris. In Paris, she became intimately involved for a time with fellow Boston Brahmin, hedonistic poet and publisher Harry Crosby, whose wife Caresse Crosby was the first recipient of a patent for the modern bra.[14][15] In 1924, Constance obtained a divorce, reportedly in China, from Atherton who later married Maude Hunnewell, with whom he had two children before his death in 1960.[16]

Second marriage[edit]

Following her divorce from Atherton, she became engaged to the former polo player, Antoine Clément Marie Pierre Chapelle de Jumilhac, also known as Count Pierre de Jumilhac, a member of one of the oldest noble families of Brittany.[17][18] They married on October 11, 1924, and she became Comtesse de Jumilhac.[19] The marriage to the Count did not last,[20] and they divorced in Paris in May 1929.[21] D. H. Lawrence, the English writer, wrote to Harry Crosby and mentioned Constance:[22]

Good that Constance – la Comtesse – has her divorce – but tell her to spend a year in contemplation before she starts marrying again. Marriage is a treacherous stimulant.

Constance remarried twelve months later and Count de Jumilhac died two years later on October 18, 1932, following a long illness.[23]

Third marriage[edit]

After her second divorce, Constance visited her parents who had relocated to Santa Barbara. Shortly after, she met Eliot Rogers and their marriage was announced by The New York Times on February 26, 1930, with the headline "Countess Wed on Coast".[24] Eliot was the brother of author Cameron Rogers and a nephew of Chicago banker Charles Fernald and Reginald Fernald, the owner of the Santa Barbara Morning Press. She returned to France with Eliot, however, by November 1933, the papers referred to Constance by her maiden name, since her marriage to newspaper owner Eliot had ended in divorce.[25]

In 1934, she met the writer H.G. Wells, twenty-five years her senior, with whom she conducted a passionate affair in the last decade of his life. By the time she was forty years of age, she was juggling multiple relationships with H.G. Wells, Philippe Barrès, the editor of Paris Match and Paris Soir, and the recently widowed William Lygon, 7th Earl Beauchamp who asked her hand in marriage in 1936.

During the abdication of Edward VIII in 1936, she invited Wallis Simpson to stay with her in Paris, and was a guest at their wedding. Constance remained at the center of social events and was friends with Ernest Hemingway and Wallis Simpson.[26] In 1938, her father was terminally ill, she returned to California and was with him at the time of his death.[3] She returned to France spending Christmas in the company of the Windsor’s and accompanied them to Monte Carlo.

Fourth marriage[edit]

In the 1950s she married André William Magnus (March 13, 1908 – April 21, 2001), a public relations manager in the French Film Industry and spent most of the rest of her life in Paris.[27]

Constance died at the American Hospital in Paris on April 30, 1973, and her husband, André scattered her ashes in a vault situated on the top of a hill in the Père Lachaise Cemetery.[28] Although she was a distant relative of Calvin Coolidge, a range of U.S. regional newspapers from Alabama to Meriden, Connecticut published her obituary erroneously describing her as one of his daughters.[4]

Collection of photography[edit]

The Southern Illinois University, Carbondale holds a series of photographs of her life as part of the Caresse Crosby Collection.[29][30][31][32][33]

Ancestry[edit]

Further reading[edit]

  • The Letters of D. H. Lawrence, Volume VII, November 1928 – February 1930, ed. Keith Sagar and James T. Boulton, Cambridge University Press, 1993, page 48. ISBN 0-521-00699-6.
  • W.H. Downes, John S. Sargent, his life and work, London, 1926, page 291, as 'Mrs Ray Atherton'.
  • D. McKibbin, Sargent's Boston, with an Essay and a Biographical Summary; plus a complete Check List of Sargent's portraits, Boston, 1956, page 82, as 'Mrs Ray Atherton'.

References[edit]

  1. ^ a b Massachusetts Historical Society. "The World of Constance Coolidge and her infamous charms".
  2. ^ Atherton, Constance; Jumilhac, Countess de; Rogers, Constance; Magnus, Constance, "Star Begotten: HG and Constance Coolidge, 1935–1937", Shadow Lovers UK Edition, doi:10.4324/9780429305917-4, retrieved February 7, 2023
  3. ^ a b TIMES, Special to THE NEW YORK (May 4, 1938). "DAVID H. COOLIDGE; Former New York Landscape Architect Dies in California". The New York Times. Retrieved July 15, 2022.
  4. ^ a b "Constance C Coolidge Obituary".
  5. ^ a b Geoffrey Wolff (2003). Black Sun: The Brief Transit and Violent Eclipse of Harry Crosby. New York Review of Books. ISBN 1-59017-066-0.
  6. ^ "Paris sees America of Colonial Days Exhibition". The New York Times.
  7. ^ Birkhead, May (March 27, 1932). "HORSE SHOWS DRAW PARIS SOCIAL WORLD; Aateuil Obstacle Races Attract Many, Although Largest Crowds Wait Until After Easter". The New York Times. Retrieved July 15, 2022.
  8. ^ "MILLIONAIRE WINS CHASE.; Fribourg Entry Takes 500,000 Franc Classic at Auteuil Track". The New York Times. June 19, 1933. Retrieved July 15, 2022.
  9. ^ "Ray Atherton and Constance Coolidge marry at short notice in Paris". Washington Post. February 1, 1910.
  10. ^ a b Andrew Morton (February 13, 2018). Wallis in Love: The Untold Life of the Duchess of Windsor, the Woman Who Changed the Monarchy. ISBN 9781455566969.
  11. ^ "Constance Atherton's lover Felix Doubleday in 1923" (PDF).
  12. ^ Andrea Lynn (December 6, 2019). Shadow Lovers UK Edition: The last affairs of H.G. Wells. ISBN 9781000311341.
  13. ^ TIMES, Special Cable to THE NEW YORK (May 16, 1929). "GETS DIVORCE IN PARIS.; Former Constance Coolidge Obtains Decree Against Count de Jumhilac". The New York Times. Retrieved July 15, 2022.
  14. ^ "The Crosby's: Literatures most scandalous couple".
  15. ^ "Constance with friends - Description Handwritten on verso, "L to R., C.C.C. Lawrence Vail, Kay Boyle, Harry crossed out Hart, Caresse, Le Moulin on the Sun Tower 1928". Note: "Le Moulin du Soleil" was the home of Caresse and Harry Crosby in Ermenonville, France - 1928".
  16. ^ Times, Special to The New York (March 17, 1960). "RAY ATHERTON, 76, DIPLOMAT, IS DEAD; First U.S. Envoy to Canada! Had Served in London---Associate of Cordell Hull". The New York Times. Retrieved July 15, 2022.
  17. ^ "New York Times reports on the engagement between Constance Atherton and former polo player Count Pierre Jumilhac in 1924". 1924.
  18. ^ "COUNT TO MARRY DIVORCEE.; Mrs. Constance Atherton to Become Bride of Pierre Jumilhae". The New York Times. September 21, 1924. Retrieved July 15, 2022.
  19. ^ "New York Times reports on Count to marry divorcee Mrs Constance Atherton". The New York Times.
  20. ^ "Former Constance Coolidge Starts Suit Against Count in Paris". The New York Times.
  21. ^ "Constance Coolidge Obtains Decree Against Count de Jumhilac, May 16". The New York Times. 1929.
  22. ^ "Crosby, Harry, (1898-1929)".
  23. ^ "COUNT P. DE JUMILHAC.; Former Husband of Miss Constance Coolidge of Boston". The New York Times. October 19, 1932. Retrieved July 15, 2022.
  24. ^ Times, Special to The New York (February 26, 1930). "COUNTESS WED ON COAST.; Constance de Jumilhac and Eliot Rogers Marry". The New York Times. Retrieved July 15, 2022.
  25. ^ "Many Americans see the Prix du Conseil". The New York Times.
  26. ^ de Courcy, Anne (June 13, 2019). Chanel's Riviera: Life, Love and the Struggle for Survival on the Côte d'Azur. ISBN 9781474608220.
  27. ^ Rasponi, Lanfranco (1966). "The International Nomads". p. 243.
  28. ^ Andrea Lynn - includes extensive research on “CCC” - Constance C. Coolidge (December 6, 2019). Shadow Lovers UK Edition: The last affairs of H.G. Wells. ISBN 9781000311341.
  29. ^ "Constance with Irish author James Joyce and his wife at Lake of Constance in 1932".
  30. ^ "Constance with Irish author James Joyce and his family at Lake of Constance in 1932".
  31. ^ "Constance and Caresse Crosby in Ischia, Italy in 1933".
  32. ^ "Constance Magnus in Antibes, France 1950".
  33. ^ "Constance in Arosa, Switzerland 1962".

External links[edit]

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