Mary Goelet, Duchess of Roxburghe, and her Happily Ever After

Mary, Duchess of Roxburghe as Scheherazade. Image from National Portrait Gallery

Mary Goelet was born on October 6, 1878 in New York City, U.S.A., the daughter and first of two children of Ogden Goelet and Mary Rita Wilson. Her father was a yachtsman, landlord, businessman, and a prominent heir from New York City. He was the grandson of Peter Goelet, heir to one of the largest fortunes during the Gilded Age. Her mother, on the one hand, was one of the renowned “marrying Wilsons” who married into the wealthiest and most prominent families of the day.

The Goelets descended from the French Huguenots who fled France and sought for religious freedom in the Americas, amassing large fortunes as traders and merchants. The family went on to purchase huge Manhattan estates, earning money through building and renting out houses.

Marriage

In 1897, Mary was rumored to be engaged to the 20-year-old William Montagu, 9th Duke of Manchester, who eventually married another American heiress, Helena Zimmerman. One story reveals that William only said he was engaged to Mary in order to fend off his creditors. Mary, instead, married Henry Innes-Ker, 8th Duke of Roxburghe, on November 10, 1903.

 On the way to the church, Miss Goelet's carriage was mobbed by thousands of "inordinately curious woman," reports The New York Times. "So great was the congestion of carriages at the entrance to the church that the Goelet carriage was obliged to pull up at the corner of Fifty-Third street." Recognizing the carriage contained the wealthy bride, well-dressed women eager to catch glimpse of her flocked towards the vehicle, which "plainly frightened" her, causing her brother to call the police to hold back the women.

Several uninvited persons also managed to sneak in the galleries of the church and a police was also called to expel the uninvited guests.

The Duchess of Roxburghe wore a grown of "purplish heliotrope velvet, trimmed with banks of silk of the same shade in length-wise applications. The bodice was tight fitting," topped and matched by a "boat-shaped toque of velvet," and "trimmed with one wide ostrich plume, shading from black to white, placed flat on its top." A house reception was attended by around 200 guests , including the couple's relatives and intimate friends. The couple proceeded to Ochre Court, the Goelet's Newport residence, where they spent the first part of their honeymoon.

The couple went on to have on only son, George, to whom Mary gave birth ten years after the marriage.

Mary, Duchess of Roxburghe. Image from Wikimedia Commons

A Very Wealthy Woman


Dubbed as the wealthiest New York heiress at the time of her wedding, the Duchess of Roxburghe is one of the two children of the late Ogden Goelet, whose real-estate fortune was valued at $25 million. She herself possessed a fortune of $5 million. The Duke of Roxburghe, meanwhile, possessed the ancient and beautiful Floors Castle in Roxburgshire.

The couple took up residence at the Floors Castle in Scotland. Mary decorated the fortress with her own art collection including a precious series of 17th century tapestries from the Gobelins Manufactory, a historic tapestry factory in Paris, France.

As Duchess of Roxburghe, Mary hobnobbed with the British and European aristocracy, and, more interestingly, the Royal Family. She visited Windsor Castle in 1913 and became a guest of Queen Mary and King George. Mary and her husband were also guests of King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra.

In 1929 following her mother’s death, Mary inherited $3,000,000 from her mother's estate, as well as the Goelet art collection.

Married for nearly 30 years, Mary and Henry’s union was considered to be one of the happiest transatlantic marriages. Mary Innes-Ker, Duchess of Roxburghe, died on April 26, 1937 in London, England. She was 58 years old.

Floors Castle. Image from Wikimedia Commons