Gaston de Fontenilliat

Charles Gaston de Fontenilliat, Count of Fontenilliat[lower-alpha 1] (27 August 1858 – 30 May 1925) was a French nobleman, soldier, and businessman who married two American heiresses.

Early life

Gaston was born on 28 August 1858 at Épinay-sur-Seine, a commune in the northern suburbs of Paris. He was a son of Baroness Anne Hélène Amélie Marie von Krüdener (1830–1859) and Arthur Jules Philippe, Count of Fontenilliat (1822–1900).[1] His elder brother, Philippe de Fontenilliat, married Adrienne Espinasse, and his elder sister, Helene de Fontenilliat, married Constantin Linder, the wealthy Finnish Lord of Kytäjä.[2] His father, a Knight of the Order of the Holy Sepulchre, served as Secretary to the French Legation in Sweden in 1853.[3]

His paternal grandparents were Jules Philippe de Fontenilliat and Élisabeth Aimée Doyen (daughter of Baron Charles-François Doyen, Receiver-General of Finances of the Loire and Manche, and granddaughter of Jean Doyen, Garde du Corps of Charles IV, Duke of Lorraine).[lower-alpha 2][4] His maternal grandparents were Amélie von Lerchenfeld and Baron Paul Alexander von Krüdener, a nobleman of German Baltic descent who was the Russian Ambassador at the Court of the King of Sweden and Norway, who died of infarction in Stockholm in 1852. After his grandfather's death, Amélie married Count Nikolay Adlerberg in 1855 with whom she lived in Helsinki from 1866 to 1881 during Adlerberg's service as Governor-General of Finland.[lower-alpha 3] His grandmother, a celebrated beauty, was herself the illegitimate daughter of Bavarian diplomat Maximilian-Emmanuel, Graf von und zu Lerchenfeld auf Köfering und Schönberg and Duchess Therese of Mecklenburg-Strelitz.[lower-alpha 4][lower-alpha 5]

Career

Fontenilliat served as a Second-Lieutenant in the 12th Chasseurs (also known as the Chasseurs de Champagne). Shortly after their marriage, he was forced to resign because "of a scandal created by a girl named Odette, who accused him of having borrowed money of her. She declared that he owed her $8,000" which his wife had to pay part of.[7]

In New York, he served as director and secretary of the Journal of Useful Inventions Publishing Company, located at 744 Broadway. The president was Edgar de Valcourt-Vermont, Comte C. de Saint-Germain.[8] In 1901, he was involved with his brother-in-law, William George Tiffany (a first cousin of Charles Lewis Tiffany),[9] in the formation of the Phoenix and Eastern Railroad, a company that intended to build a railroad from Benson, Arizona to Phoenix, Arizona.[10]

In 1902, while in Carbet, a suburb of Saint-Pierre, Martinique, Fontenilliat witnessed the 1902 eruption of Mount Pelée which killed 28,000 people. Along with Henri Marie, Comte de Fitz-James of Paris (second son of the 8th Duke of Fitz-James), he left the West Indies aboard the SS Caracas for New York City.[11]

By 1914, Fontenilliat was on a mission for the French government during which he traveled to Texas after passing through New York City.[12]

Personal life

Fontenilliat was twice married. His first marriage was to Julia Florence Smith (1860–1905) in Paris on 22 December 1887. Julia was the youngest daughter of American merchant Murray Forbes Smith and Pheobe Ann (née Desha) Smith (eldest daughter of U.S. Representative Robert Desha).[13][14] Among her siblings were Alva Erskine Smith, the first wife of William Kissam Vanderbilt (parents of Consuelo Spencer-Churchill, Duchess of Marlborough), and Mary Virginia Smith, the first wife of banker Fernando Yznaga (brother of Consuelo Montagu, Duchess of Manchester).[15] After their marriage, they went to Brussels and then to London.[7] Before their divorce in 1901, they were the parents of:[16]

  • Rene Gaston de Fontenilliat (1893–1946), who inherited half of the estate of his unmarried maternal aunt, Armide Vogel Smith;[17][18] he married Emma Elesa Tourot in 1923.[19]

After their bitter divorce Julia lived "in a magnificent villa at Maisons-Laffitte, near Paris" but died at the Bois-Colombes hospital in Paris on 4 August 1905,[20] and was buried at Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx.[21] Fontenilliat was in Russia when she died.[20] He married, secondly, Mary Josephine (née Livingston) Blanc de Lanautte d'Hauterive (1854–1937) in Paris on 23 July 1913.[22] Mary, a daughter of Mary Josephine (née Kernochan) Livingston of Eastnor Castle and Edward Louis Livingston (a direct descendant of Judge Robert Livingston),[23][24] was the widow of Campbell Boyd,[lower-alpha 6] and Charles-Joseph Blanc, Vicomte de Lanautte d'Hauterive.[26][lower-alpha 7]

He died in Paris in 1925.[28] His widow died on 30 October 1937 in Monte Carlo.[22]

References
Notes
  1. He is sometimes referred to as the Baron of Fontenilliat but more often as the Count of Fontenilliat.
  2. His great-great grandfather, Baron Jean Doyen, was ennobled on 14 October 1628 by Charles IV, Duke of Lorraine for military services. His great-grandfather, Baron Charles-François Doyen, had the title confirmed and added a knighthood, by Polish King Stanisław Leszczyński, who became Duke of Lorraine.[4]
  3. From his grandparents marriage, he had an uncle, Baron Nikolai Arthur von Krüdener. While still married to his grandfather, his grandmother had a child with Count Nikolay Adlerberg, his uncle Count Nikolai Adlerberg (b. 1848). After his grandfather's death in 1852, his grandmother married Count Nikolay Adlerberg.[5]
  4. When Gaston's grandmother Amélie von Lerchenfeld (1808–1888) was born, her mother Duchess Therese of Mecklenburg-Strelitz (a daughter of Charles II, Grand Duke of Mecklenburg and his first wife Princess Friederike of Hesse-Darmstadt.) was married to Karl Alexander, 5th Prince of Thurn and Taxis. After her birth, she carried the von Sternfeld surname, however, on 1 August 1823, the Grand Duke of Hesse gave the fifteen-year-old Amélie permission to carry the surname "von Lerchenfeld", but without rights to use the coat of arms or be listed in the family tree, which was the price for her extramarital birth.[6]
  5. Among his grandmother Amélie von Lerchenfeld's many first cousins were Prince Frederick of Prussia, Frederick William IV, King of Prussia, William I, German Emperor, Prince Charles of Prussia Alexandrine, Grand Duchess of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, Princess Louise of Prussia, Prince Albert of Prussia, Empress Alexandra Feodorovna (wife of Tsar Nicholas I), Charlotte, Princess of Württemberg, Joseph, Duke of Saxe-Altenburg, Therese, Queen of Bavaria, Louise, Duchess of Nassau, Georg, Duke of Saxe-Altenburg, Prince Eduard of Saxe-Altenburg, Frederica, Duchess of Anhalt-Dessau, Prince Carl of Solms-Braunfels and George V of Hanover.
  6. Campbell Boyd (1842–1894) was the son of John Christian Curwen Boyd and a nephew of Benjamin Boyd and Mark Boyd.[25]
  7. Mary Josephine's second husband, the Vicomte de Lanautte d'Hauterive, was a son of Auguste Maurice Blanc de Lanautte d'Hauterive (nephew of Alexandre Maurice Blanc de Lanautte, Comte d'Hauterive), and was previously married to heiress Nora Davis (d. 1874), daughter of Thomas E. Davis, in 1873.[27]
Sources
  1. Carpelan, Tor Harald (1903). Finsk biografisk handbok (in Swedish). G.W. Edlunds förlag. p. 2575. Retrieved 27 July 2022.
  2. Aminoff, Torsten Gregori (1925). Finlands ridderskaps och adels kalender (in Swedish). Frenckellska Tryckeri. p. 285. Retrieved 27 July 2022.
  3. Annuaire de la noblesse de France et des maisons souveraines de l'Europe (in French). Bureau de la publication. 1889. p. 245. Retrieved 12 July 2022.
  4. Georgel, J. Alcide (1882). Armorial historique et généalogique des familles de Lorraine titrées ou confirmées dans leurs titres au XIXe siècle renfermant les titres impériaux et royaux, les pairs héréditaires, les majorats ainsi que les généraux, les préfets et les évêques qui commandèrent ou administrèrent cette province (in French). Chez l'auteur. p. 229. Retrieved 28 July 2022.
  5. Jahrbuch für Genealogie, Heraldik und Sphragistik (in German). Kurländische Gesellschaft für Literatur und Kunst. 1913. p. 18. Retrieved 27 July 2022.
  6. Stubhaug, Arild (3 August 2010). Gösta Mittag-Leffler: A Man of Conviction. Springer Science & Business Media. p. 227. ISBN 978-3-642-11672-8. Retrieved 27 July 2022.
  7. "DUPES OF A TITLE. An Epidemic of Ruin Wrought by Foreign Adventurers. American Girls Dazzled by Barons Sucrow and De Fontenilliat". The Evening World. 13 May 1889. p. 1. Retrieved 27 July 2022.
  8. The Trow City Directory Co.'s, Formerly Wilson's, Copartnership and Corporation Directory of New York City. Trow. 1890. p. 152. Retrieved 27 July 2022.
  9. "Married Very Quietly; Mr. W.G. Tiffany and Mrs. Fernando Yznaga Become One". The New York Times. 22 July 1888. Retrieved 6 April 2020.
  10. "A Railroad from Benson to Phoenix". The Copper Era And Morenci Leader. 11 July 1901. p. 1. Retrieved 27 July 2022.
  11. "FLED INTO SEA FOR SAFETY FROM PELEE; Baron de Fontenilliat, Here, Re- counts His Experiences. DREAD SCENES AT ST. PIERRE Foliage and Grass Spared Where Great Loss of Life Occurred -- New Yorker Also Describes Sights Seen From Shipboard". The New York Times. 27 May 1902. Retrieved 27 July 2022.
  12. "MISSED FATHER BY AN HOUR Son Was In Same Hotel, but Did Not Know It". The New York Times. 9 October 1914. Retrieved 27 July 2022.
  13. Depew, Chauncey M. (20 October 2013). Titled Americans, 1890: A list of American ladies who have married foreigners of rank. Bloomsbury Publishing. p. 110. ISBN 978-1-78366-005-6. Retrieved 27 July 2022.
  14. Cisco, Jay Guy (1909). Historic Sumner County, Tennessee: With Genealogies of the Bledsoe, Gage and Douglass Families, and Genealogical Notes of Other Sumner County Families. Higginson Book Company. p. 139. ISBN 978-0-8328-3500-1. Retrieved 27 July 2022.
  15. Fowler, Therese Anne (16 October 2018). A Well-Behaved Woman: A Novel of the Vanderbilts. St. Martin's Publishing Group. ISBN 978-1-250-09549-7. Retrieved 12 July 2022.
  16. Armstrong, Zella (1922). Notable Southern Families. Lookout Publishing Company. p. 324. Retrieved 27 July 2022.
  17. Times, Special to The New York (19 May 1907). "MANY BEQUESTS TO CHARITY. Will of Armide Vogel Smith is Filed for Probate". The New York Times. Retrieved 27 July 2022.
  18. New York Supreme Court. New York Supreme Court. 1919. p. 91. Retrieved 13 July 2022.
  19. "RENE DE FONTENILLIAT WEDS MISS TOUROT; Bridegroom Is Nephew of Mrs. O. H. P. Belmont--Marriage Is in Municipal Chapel". The New York Times. 15 March 1923. Retrieved 27 July 2022.
  20. "MUST NOT SPEAK TO HIS FATHER. Disinherited by His Mother if He Disobeys. Quarreled With Her Husband Four Years Ago and Dies Still Hating Him". The Washington Times. 28 August 1905. p. 4. Retrieved 27 July 2022.
  21. "FORMER AMERICAN DEAD Sister of Mrs. Oliver H. P. Belmont Leaves Singular Will. BARONESS DE FONTENILLIAT PASSES AWAY IN FRANCE". Detroit Free Press. 27 August 1905. p. 2. Retrieved 27 July 2022.
  22. Mosley, Charles, editor. Burke's Peerage, Baronetage & Knightage, 107th edition, 3 volumes. Wilmington, Delaware, U.S.A.: Burke's Peerage (Genealogical Books) Ltd, 2003, volume 1, page 470.
  23. Surepeme Court Appellate Division- First Department Papers On Appeal From Order. 41 West St. New York: E. J. Hall Press. p. 154. Retrieved 27 July 2022.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location (link)
  24. "Mrs. Mary Josephine Livingston". The New York Times. 16 July 1908. p. 7. Retrieved 27 July 2022.
  25. Walford, Edward (1893). The County Families of the United Kingdom Or Royal Manual of the Titled and Untitled Aristocracy of Great Britain and Ireland. p. 111. Retrieved 27 July 2022.
  26. "$745,046 TO 26 HEIRS.; Widow of W.S. Kernochan Leaves Estate to His Relatives". The New York Times. 9 December 1915. Retrieved 27 July 2022.
  27. Annuaire de la noblesse de France et des maisons souveraines de l'Europe (in French). Bureau de la publication. 1887. p. 159. Retrieved 27 July 2022.
  28. Paris, France, Births, Marriages, and Deaths, 1555-1929
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