Nancie and Jack at St Jean de Luz 1938 and Huntingford Family 1986 at Fairford

A House called "Fairford", and a New Chapter in Nancie's Life

Nancie accompanied Mimi and her Mother to London, where they stayed in Claridges Hotel. They had afternoon tea with Josephine Grove who had been Jean's companion and was the lady who originally interviewed Nancie for the job as Governess to Mimi. She lived at Branstone Lodge, 232 Kew Road, Richmond. This building has been supplanted by a block of flats.
That evening Nancie dined with her ex-employer and life-long friend, Eleonore, Marquise de Chabannes la Palice at an Indian restaurant in Swallow Street.
The following day Nancie had lunch with her Aunt Min who had come up to London for the day from Hampshire.
Nancie and Mimi left for Paris the day afterwards, the 8th July 1939 and had tea there with Mr Smith and 'Aunt Dolly'  .The latter sent a telegram when Nancie and Jack got married on September 23rd 1939 in Lytham St Annes, Lancashire but I'm not sure who she was exactly.
Nancie and her charge, Mimi, travelled to St Jean de Luz by train but there is no mention of Mimi's Mother Jean being with them.
Nancie found her good friend Maureen already on the beach and brought her up to speed with all the recent events in her life. Maureen returned the favour by telling Nancie all the latest St Jean de Luz gossip. Unfortunately Nancie does not go into any details in her diary, other than writing, "Lousy people!" Maureen also remained a close friend and correspondent until her death.
You may wonder why Nancie married Jack in Lytham. We can blame Mr Hitler again for that.
He invaded Poland, causing war to be declared on September 3rd 1939 and Jack's school in Widnes was evacuated to Blackpool.Lytham is nearby.
Nancie used to tell us children the story of the bike ride. She and Jack rode their bikes from Hough Green all the way to Fleetwood to see my grandparents. They stopped at a farm and a man at the gate told them that war had been declared. They came home fairly rapidly on the train!
Soon after they married Jack and Nancie bought a house in Lancaster Avenue, Hough Green, Widnes, opposite where they were lodging with Don and Eva Wedlake. The war intervened and they didn't move in until a few years later. The house had a name but they changed it to something with a special significance for them both, to "Fairford." That was our happy family home until their deaths. (Jack died in 2001 aged 90 and Nancie in 2004 aged 92.)
The last brief  entry in her diary, on July 23rd 1939, reads, "Jack arrives".
Marriage was a new adventure for Nancie. One chapter closed but another opened for her. My brother David and I owe a great debt to Herr Hitler. Nancie had seen such a lot of very rich and very unhappy people that she had sworn never to marry, herself.   Thank goodness she changed her mind!
Fairford has a special place in all our hearts.

Nancie returns to Paris and visits Fairford in Gloucestershire

Nancie continued to take Mimi to her dancing and riding lessons. She visited friends, wrote letters and read books in her spare time. She went to the Scots Kirk in Paris where the Reverend Donald Caskie was Minister and hoped that perhaps, one day, he would be able to marry them there. Unfortunately Hitler scuppered that idea, as you will see.
One of my favourite stories of this time was how she was walking along one day in Paris and noticed a very elegant couple walking in front. They suddenly turned into their residence and Nancie realised that the legs she had been admiring belonged to the Duchess of Windsor who had been on the arm of her husband, the Duke of Windsor.
It was about this time that Nancie's Uncle, Jim Holmes, who lived at Ibert, in Killearn, died. He had been like a Father to her sister, Nell and his death hit the family hard. He was buried in Killearn on February 1st 1939.
 The Easter school holidays in England started in April and Jack came over to Paris to see his fiancee. Mr Smith and Mrs Bond took them both out to dinner and then to the Folies Bergeres! They may even have seen Josephine Baker on this occasion but Nancie does not put it in her diary. She just wrote, "Wonderful show!" They had a biography of Josephine Baker, later in their bookcase with some very risque photograph of Josephine dressed in banana skins and little else.
In June 1939 Nancie and Mimi again visited Fairford in Gloucestershire to see Jean's Aunt Henrietta Ferris, now aged eighty-four. Jack came down from Widnes to meet Nancie at Fairford. He left just before Mimi's Mother, Jean Ferris, arrived. A few days later Jean, Mimi and Nancie went to London.

!939 : Nancie Thomson receives a marriage proposal from Jack Huntingford

On 21st December 1938 Nancie left Paris travelled back to England. Jack met her off the train at Preston Station. They continued by train to Fleetwood where Jack introduced her to his parents, David and Alice Huntingford. We only ever knew them as our grandparents, Gran and Pop. Presumably Nancie called them Mr and Mrs Huntingford on this occasion. They lived at 'Lemnos', 68 Agnew Road, Fleetwood.( See picture below.)
Jack's brother, Alan Huntingford came round with his girlfriend, Marjorie Bussey to play cards. (Newmarket, apparently!)
Nancie still smoked at this time so I don't think Gran and Pop would have approved but there is nothing in her diary to suggest any outward disapproval. Jack's Uncle Arthur and Aunt Ethel were invited for tea on Christmas Day and returned the invitation on Boxing Day. They lived in a house called 'Sylmar' on Poulton Road. Everyone seemed to get on really well.
On 28th December Jack and Nancie went to Scotland on the train. Alan and Marjorie came to see them off at the station.
Nancie and Jack spent Christmas 1938 at Rosemount, Kilmacolm, Renfrewshire with her family. Her brother Bill also brought his girlfriend, Anne. They all saw the New Year in together.
It was on the 2nd January 1939 that Jack plucked up the courage to pop the question and, thank goodness, Nancie said ,"Yes!" Two days later they bought the ring and carried on visiting all the relatives to give them the good news.
Jack had to leave on 7th January as the new school term was starting at the Wade Deacon GS for Boys in Widnes

. A couple of days later Nancie returned to Paris to carry on looking after Mimi.

Paris in the winter of 1938/39 and more on Mrs Bond

After their return to Paris Nancie was left to do the unpacking and Mimi and her Mother  'went off somewhere'. Later Mimi went to the manege to ride. Presumably the new pony had come north with them but I'm not sure. The day after their arrival Mimi went to Fontainebleau with her parents so Nancie went to the cinema.
Mr Smith was there and also Mrs Bond, hovering in the background. Edward Smith stayed at the American Artists' Centre, at 261 Boulevard Raspail, in Paris and Mrs Bond at 104 Rue Cambronne, the road leading up to the Eiffel Tower. These addresses were in Nancie's address book so I don't know what date they apply to.
Mrs Bond would appear to have been born Katherine Kramer, daughter of Elizabeth Meihle Kramer and was born in New York on Christmas Day, 1899. She died in Spain on 21st March, 1987, aged 87. She was, as far as I can ascertain, the daughter of Henry and Elizabeth Kramer (nee Meihle) who lived in Manhattan. After her Father died her Mother worked in a club in Manhattan. I think she may have become a companion or a housekeeper to Jean Ferris. Her death is recorded in the US Social Security Index and she is buried in Mount Olivet Cemetery , Queen's County, New York.
 It is amazing just what one can find out about people with very little to go on. Passenger lists are invaluable and censuses are very useful.

A New Romance for Nancie and another new car for the d'Espinays: a 1938 Rosengarten

One of my favourite stories, when I was a little girl, was how Jack had seen Nancie on the beach at St Jean de Luz in the summer of 1937. She had small children with her and he presumed she was a) French and b) married. Being a shy chap he hadn't approached her. Happily, in the summer of 1938 he summoned up the courage to speak to her and discovered that she was a) Scottish and b) unmarried. By this time she had seen enough of others'  marriages to put her off for life!
Luckily Jack got on really well with four year old Mimi, as well as Nancie, her Governess, and they spent as much time as they could together before Jack had to return to England, where he was teaching.This was at the beginning of September.
On the 25th September Mimi celebrated her 5th birthday. Her presents included a pony,a pedal car and a kitten (a minou, as Nancie called it in her diary.) Many years late, we had a kitten whose name was 'Minou'. Now I know why!
Mimi was showered with expensive gifts. She lacked for nothing, except perhaps a well-balanced Mother! Nancie related that in the evening there was a 'big shindy' (sic) but gives no details. The Marquis and Marquise left at 10pm.
Nancie stayed up late talking with Mr Smith and Mrs Bond, the Housekeeper. I'm not sure of her title but she seemed to run the household. The next day they all left St Jean de Luz for Paris.
A new car arrived not long after Mimi's birthday. It was called a Rosengarten. Carlos, the chauffeur took Mimi and Nancie for a ride to Le Bourget in it.

Ferdinand Pinner Earle, Film Producer

As I mentioned in a previous post, Jean Harris, now the Marquise d'Espinay, was very friendly with the artist and film producer, Ferdinand Pinner Earle. He caused a great scandal in the early 1900s when he dumped his first wife in order to marry another woman.
He later divorced her and married for a third time. In 1914 a French court found him guilty of kidnapping his son, in a case reminiscent of Jean Harris's situation with her husband, Irving Drought Harris.
His last wife was a Belgian girl called Denise who was only sixteen when she married him. Earle died in 1951, leaving four sons and four daughters.

The 1937 Buick 80 series Roadmaster towncar and its history

One day in 2014, while I was googling, I came across this car being advertised for sale in the USA. It was a 1937 Buick 80 series Roadmaster Towncar, custom-bodied by Franay, of Paris.The chassis and cowl had been exported to France and the bodywork completed by Franay. The advert gave the history of the car. It had been bought by one Charles d'Espinay, of the Chateau de Doumy, stored throughout the Second World War in Norway, driven regularly from 1945 to 1952 and then stored in Houvier, Normandy from 1952 to 1979. It was sold to a Mr Mike S. James of England, by the original owner's daughter, Mrs Chantal Morancon. Mr James restored the exterior and mechanical parts but not the interior. The latter was lined with brazilian rosewood and there was a decanter with cut glass goblets. The windows between the driver and passenger compartment rolled down. Talk about 'the height of luxury' ! Nancie talks about the chauffeur driving her and Mimi to various places, in this car.

In 1984 the car was sold to Coys of Kensington, the well known auction house for classic cars, racing cars and other exotic cars. Bought by Tom Crook Classic Cars of Tacoma, Washington, it was shipped to the US where it was bought by Dr Neal W. Gapoff of Albany, California. He sold it a year later to Ed Curry, of Hanna, Utah and it was inherited by Michael Curry in 2013. He was selling it in 2014 when I found the ad. How amazing to find such a detailed record of a particular vehicle that my Mother rode in over eighty years earlier! The internet is a real Treasure Trove.

Jean has a daughter, Chantal d'Espinay and more court cases make the lawyers rich

Jean  d'Espinay (nee Ferris, late Harris) gave birth to a daughter, Chantal, in October 1939. Mimi and John now had a half-sister. John was living with his Father, Irving Harris, in the USA.
Amongst Nancie's correspondence I came across a letter written in 1945 by Marie d'Espinay, Charles' Mother. Charles himself adds a little note to Nancie at the bottom of the page. They are still living at the Chateau de Doumy, near Pau. Chantal, then aged about six, adds her 'Bons Baisers' to Nancie.
Irving had flown to the USA with Mimi just after the death of her Mother, in October 1941. Jean died on September 19th and Mimi went back with Irving on 21st October. I presume she stayed there as she is not mentioned in the letter from Marie in 1945. Ten years later Mimi returns to France as a student, for a year.

Because Jean's divorce from Irving Harris was granted in France the US authorities refused to recognise it and they claimed that her subsequent marriage to Charles d'Espinay was therefore illegal. Irving Harris fought for Jean's money to be divided between John and Mimi only. In her will Jean had left an annual allowance to Charles, various bequests to family and friends and the rest to be divided between her three children.

The ensuing court cases made some lawyers very rich and the complexity of the financial and legal situation were hard to untangle. Jean's money was mainly in New York but she also had some in England and property such as the Chateau de Doumy, in France.

I'm not sure if Nancie followed all the repercussions after Jean's early death. The was was in full swing by then and she had other things on her mind, namely the birth of her own baby, David Ian Huntingford, who was born on 11th May 1942 in Maryport, Cumberland.

The French Authorities pursued Charles d'Espinay for assuming a false title to which he was not entitled. Somehow he managed to convince the French courts that it was genuine but not until 1943, when Jean had been dead for two years.

Jean Harris marries Charles d'Espinay in 1938

Nancie was looking after little Mimi when her Mother, Jean Harris, nee Ferris married Charles Louis d'Espinay-Durtal on 20th April 1938 At Champeaux. The happy couple honeymooned at Rennes whilst Nancie and the other members of the household celebrated with champagne at home.  On her marriage Jean became the Marquise d'Espinay-Durtal, Princesse de Broons.
According to Cheryl Beck who has researched his background, Charles was the son of a Paris shoemaker, one Charles Vrigoneaux and his wife, Marie Rochard. In 1937 he had his birth record altered and again, in 1938, after he had married Jean. It would seem that she had no idea about his true origins and we will never know for sure if she suspected anything. Sadly she died on 19th September 1941, after an operation in Pau, at the early age of thirty-one.
There are some very strange entries in Nancie's diary around the time of the wedding. Just before she married Charles, Jean apparently tried to kill herself. Whether she had doubts about marrying him or whether someone was trying to prevent the marriage, no one knows. She may even have been trying to escape other influences by marrying Charles.
She seems to have had a very unstable personality, looking at her on-off relationship with her first husband, Irving Drought Harris. Being parted from her firstborn, her son John, can't have helped.
Nancie rarely refers to Charles so we can only surmise about their relationship.
The newlyweds went off to the Mediterranean on their honeymoon, however, and all seemed well. There was a lot of commotion about buying a yacht but Nancie doesn't give details. Reading between the lines Jean seemed to be a lady who liked her own way, whether it be in the choice of a yacht or a husband and woe betide anyone who crossed her! All that money did not bring her a lot of happiness and it certainly made Nancie appreciate that fact.

John Wakefield Ferris marries Emma Watson, nee Spreckels

John Wakefield Ferris is aged 56 when he marries Emma Claudine Watson nee Spreckels, widow of Tom Watson. The wedding took place in 1906, two years after Tom's death, in the Church of the Transfiguration, in New York, as reported in The Los Angeles Times.They had planned to have it at her Father Claus Spreckel's house in San Francisco but the house was wrecked in the terrible earthquake that occurred in 1906.The Reverend John Olyphant conducted the ceremony and then left town, causing some confusion and a denial by the Rector of the church that the marriage had actually taken place there, according to The Washington Post. Controversy seems to be the order of the day for this family!

The Ferris Family of Fairford in Gloucestershire emigrate to the USA

Nancie was working as Governess to four year old Mimi, daughter of wealthy heiress Jean Harris (nee Ferris) during the winter of 1937. She managed to see her old employer and lifelong friend Eleonore de Chabannes, Ebles de Chabannes and various other old friends. I think she met Brenda Johnston around this time who was to be another faithful friend. Brenda never married but had a longstanding relationship with a married man. Nancie was her confidante and they were still close in their eighties when Brenda lived in Elgin, Scotland with her sister, Jean.

In February of 1938 Jean took Mimi and Nancie to Fairford in Gloucestershire, where her Father's sister Henrietta lived. The house was called Mount Pleasant House. Henrietta had never married and was to die six years after this aged 89 in 1944. She had lived in the USA but eventually came back to the village she'd grown up in.

Her parents were John Naish Ferris and Henrietta nee Wakefield from nearby Cricklade. They married in1849. In the 1861 census John Naish Ferris is a Stage Coach Proprietor living at 99 High Street, Fairford, owning 28 acres of land and employing two men. He and his wife have three children : John Wakefield Ferris, 11, Colleen Ferris, 9 and Henrietta Ferris,7.

By 1871 they are living on a farm with 406 acres and employing eleven men and two boys. Far Hill Farm is today part of the Ernest Cook Trust (endowed 1952)and the present occupant of the farm, now 900 acres, was awarded the 2014 Cotswold Grey Partridge Trophy for conservation!

John Wakefield Ferris seems to have left Britain for the USA in about 1876. Certainly by 1880 the whole family appears in the US census for Novato, Marin, California. John is now 65 and a Farmer, his wife, Henrietta 61, 'keeps house' and daughter Henrietta is 25 and 'at home'. Daughter Mary 26 is 'visiting'.

In 1900 we find John Wakefield Ferris, aged 51, living in Novato with his two sisters, Mary C. (Colleen) and Henrietta. He is unmarried at this time.

The Strange Marriage of Jean Ferris and Irving Drought Harris

By 1935 the marriage between Jean Ferris and her husband Irving Drought Harris was finally over and they had separated. In May of that year Irving filed for divorce from Jean and a few months later she filed a counter claim.
Amazingly they had previously battled in the Supreme Court in January 1932 when, in an earlier separation, Jean had taken their baby son, John, to live with her at her Uncle Rudolph Spreckels'  New York apartment. Irving Harris took out a writ of Habeas Corpus to force her to produce the child in court. Jean tried to prevent him seeing the boy whose full name was John Wakefield Harris.
After their marriage at The Church of the Heavenly Rest in New York, Jean and Irving had lived together in New York. In November 1931 Jean left him and went to live with her Uncle Rudolph at the Ritz Carlton. Irving tried to see his son on numerous occasions but eventually had been told to settle the case in court.
This 'spat' was clearly over by October 1932 when Jean and Irving bought the Chateau de Doumy near Pau, in the Basses Pyrenees, France. In September of the following year 1933, Elizabeth Marshall Harris 'Mimi' was born but by April 1935 the marriage had finally crumbled. 'Volatile' seems too mild a word to describe this relationship!
Nancie arrived to look after Mimi in October 1937. By this time her older brother John was living with his Father in the USA. Irving Harris had managed to get custody of John, and flown back to the states with the five year old boy.
I don't know if Mimi had any contact with her brother John after that or even if Jean saw her son. The volatile marriage had become a war!
Mimi was four when Nancie arrived in Paris to take up her post. She wasn't an easy child to cope with, which wasn't surprising, given her family circumstances. Nancie would take her to the manege for her riding lessons and sometimes to the Scots Kirk where the Reverend Donald Caskie was Minister. He took the young Scots woman under his wing and introduced her to lots of other Scots. Later he would become famous as The Tartan Pimpernel, helping British airmen escape from France.

Nancie used to write and receive letters every day

Nancie corresponded with many of her friends and families for whom she had worked. She wrote and received many letters throughout her life, from all over the world. As I was writing this a couple of years ago I received a letter from Patience Holt, widow of James Holt, one of Nancie's babies. It contained a letter that Nancie had written to her in 1964. It wasn't dated but I was able to date it from the contents. It gave me a shock when I opened the envelope and saw her writing. I used to joke that my Mother wrote to me wherever I was and whatever I was doing. I remember being in the labour ward, having my first baby. She wasn't allowed to come in, despite having given birth to me in the same nursing home in 1946, so, to ease her frustration, she wrote me a letter, much to the amusement of the nursing staff! The arrival of this letter of hers from Patience convinces me that she approves of my writing up her memoirs. Thank you, Patience for your thoughtful gesture.

When Nancie went to work for Jean Ferris she was still getting over the end of her romance with 'Mac': Denzil Ian McCleod. I don't know much about their meeting but I think it must have been in Haft Kel. Unfortunately there is a gap in her diaries for this period. I do know that he later married in 1940 and had three children but apart from a passenger list showing him going out to Venezuela at the age of eighteen he is quite an elusive character. I wish I'd asked her more when she was still alive.
She did always tell us that she was engaged several times before she met Jack, including the stalwart Bill Park from back home.
She was certainly deterred from marriage by the unhappy marriages she observed and was not in a hurry to settle down. 

A romantic trip to St Jean de Luz for Nancie and Jack in 1974

In 1974 Nancie and Jack celebrated their 35th wedding anniversary by returning to the place they met: St Jean de Luz. As ever, she kept a detailed diary. It was very wet and stormy for most of their time there but on their actual anniversary, 23rd September, they were able to go for a swim in the sea.
They had arrived at their hotel on September 15th, in torrential rain, having driven all the way from their home in Widnes, Lancashire. As they drove into the car park they caught the wing of the car on a gate post and damaged both the bodywork and some of the electrical system. Undaunted, they managed to get it repaired in Bayonne but it meant they were without a car for several days.
Once it was repaired they then drove into Spain (still in awful weather) to visit an old university friend  of Jack's (from his time at Poitiers University, presumably) , who was amazed when they turned up, out of the blue, at his factory. They hadn't seen each other for over forty years.

Nancie and Jack had first met on the beach at St Jean de Luz in 1937.  He thought she was French and married as she had children with her. It wasn't until he saw her again the following year that he plucked up the courage to actually speak to her. He then discovered she was an unmarried Scots lass from Kilmacolm who was working as a Governess and came to St Jean de Luz

each summer from their home in Paris. The rest is history!

Nancie kept in touch with many of the families she worked for but sadly not Mimi. I have been trying to find out what happened to her in later life but so far, unsuccessfully.

To return to the mysterious Mr Smith of my previous post. He seems to have been involved in Jean Ferris' financial affairs but I'm not sure in what capacity. He could have been a New York trustee. At one point he gave Nancie, then aged 26, the money to pay all the staff at the Villa Korsar, so he certainly had control of the purse strings. Nancie also mentions a Mrs Bond in her diary but I'm not sure of her role. She was possibly the housekeeper at the Villa Korsar.
  

The mysterious 'Mr.Smith' at the Villa Korsar in 1938

In her diary for 1938 Nancie refers to a 'Mr Smith' who seems to play an important part in her employer, the wealthy Jean Ferris's  life. I thought the chances of finding out any more about him were very slight but thanks to Ancestry.com I discovered quite a lot and even found a photograph.
Ernest Stanley Smith was an American citizen, born in New Jersey, who had originally come to France on business from New York.
He spent time in Spain, Switzerland and England and in 1917 was Acting American Consular Agent in Bayonne, near St Jean de Luz. He travelled back to the US most years, remaining a US citizen. He also had to visit England for 'medical reasons' he claimed, in 1920, by which time he had retired. His company was called 'The Rare Stick and Handle Company of New York City'. Apparently trade in walking sticks and canes was very lucrative. No fashionable gentleman wanted to be seen out and about  without the very latest style of walking stick. Tiffany made them with china handles, Meissen with porcelain and Remington Rifles made them with weapons inside.
The handles were made of gold, silver, ivory, ebony and many other varieties of wood. You could get them with eagles' heads, dogs' heads, ducks' heads and so on. Some contained razor blades to be used as weapons and others writing material or bows to play a violin. Sir Harry Lauder and Salvador Dali both had large collections of walking sticks. The Great Gatsby always sported a walking cane.

Isadore Nobel and Henry Ford of car fame

Uncertain of how to proceed, Grisha Goluboff's parents asked a lawyer, Mr Isadore Nobel, for advice. He became Grisha's guardian and companion. When Henry Ford heard the little boy playing he gave him a Stradivarius violin plus a limousine to get about in. He sounds like a well adjusted boy, with varied interests such as soccer, photography and astronomy! If you are interested you can see and hear him play the violin on 'you tube'. He was nine at the time! British Movietone put this on in July 2015. Google on 'Boy Violinist Wins Fame'.
Grisha's Father is with him and Isadore Nobel in 1932 on the SS 'Bremen', sailing from Cherbourg to New York. All three give their address as 416 Kearney Street, San Francisco. Mischa Elman boarded at Bremerhaven and his US address is 262 Central Park West, New York City.
These Ancestry.com passenger lists are wonderful for the background information that they provide, particularly when it concerns naturalised US citizens and those who have changed their original surnames. On this occasion Grisha Goluboff has become Garson Holcombe aged nine!
All this is not really part of Nancie's story but I included it to show the fun of research and of googling, in particular. I call it 'going off at a tangent'! It helps me hone my research skills.
Maybe there is a connection with Nancie's friend Vladim de Gouloubeff who appears in her address book but I have yet to find it.

Mischa Elman and Grisha Goluboff - a musical interlude.

Sometimes, when researching, I find myself going off at a tangent and following some obscure 'twiglet' that I have come across on Google.There are some amazing websites on the internet, if only one had the time to explore them. One such site is called, 'Discovering Chaplin' and is all about Charlie Chaplin, the famous film star. There is a photograph of Charlie Chaplin with Feodor Chaliapin and his daughter, in Biarritz. The two men, whilst staying in the Hotel Miramar, in Biarritz, were invited to a party at the home of Mischa Elman, the virtuoso violinist, who owned 'an estate in St Jean de Luz'. This was in 1931. At this party they joined in the entertainment, reversing their normal roles. Charlie sang some old Russian songs and Chaliapin did a comedy routine!
Mischa Elman was born in Russia in 1891 and he died in 1967.He became a US citizen in 1923 but made many of his recordings in Paris. During the summer months he taught the violin in his St Jean de Luz estate, on the bay. Suzuki, the Japanese man who started the method named after him, of teaching very young children to play the violin, is said to have done so after hearing recordings of Elman playing the violin.
There is a photograph of Mischa Elman on another website which concerns historical clothing (histclo.com).He is sitting on board the ship SS Bremen, going from New York to Europe, with his arm round a young boy called Grisha Goluboff. I have found them returning to New York, again on the SS Bremen, in 1934. Having been a child prodigy himself, Mischa Elman took a great interest in Grisha Goluboff.
Grisha was the son of another Russian emigre who changed his name to Holcombe. He had been a wealthy jeweller in Russia but escaped, after being shot in the arm. He managed to reach America where he married and had a family. In the 1930 census he is a Watchmaker. The story goes that his three year old son picked up his Father's violin one day and showed such promise that his Father paid for him to have lessons. After a couple of years he was good enough to perform with the Philadelphia Symphony Orchestra.

Feodor Chaliapin and the Villa Korsar

Irving Drought Harris and his wife Jean, nee Ferris, had travelled together from Southampton to New York, in May 1934. Among the passengers on the 'Bremen' was a young widow called Gloria Vanderbilt, aged 28, from New York. She was the mother of Gloria Vanderbilt, the American heiress.
Gloria, the mother, lost custody of her daughter, Gloria junior, in yet another famous court case. The mother lived in Paris for six years after the death of her husband, the fabulously wealthy Reginald Claypole Vanderbilt. She, not unlike Jean Ferris, had married whilst only a teenager. She had an identical twin sister, called Thelma, who was reputed to be the mistress of the Prince of Wales at one time. No doubt the Vanderbilts knew the Spreckels family in New York and the Harris family in Paris.
When in Paris Jean Harris lived at One, Avenue de Marechal Maunoury, opposite the Bois de Boulogne but when she was in St Jean de Luz, in the south of France, for the summer months, she lived at the Villa Korsar.
The villa actually belonged to a friend of hers, namely Feodor Chaliapin, a famous Russian opera singer. He had a large, deep, expressive bass voice, apparently. Born in Kazan, in Russia, he met and became a friend of Sergei Rachmaninoff who took him under his wing. Chaliapin's most famous role was that of Boris Godunov. He appeared regularly at the Bolshoi Theatre and the Zimin Private Opera in Moscow. Touring the west he played the Devil in Mefistofele at La Scala with the conductor Toscanini. He sang in New York and in 1907 and again in 1921 at the Metropolitan Opera House.
The famous entrepreneur Sergei Diaghilev brought him to Paris and London and in 1926  he toured Australia.
He is reputed to have popularised the Song of the Volga Boatmen. After the Russian Revolution Chaliapin moved to Finland and then, finally, settled in Paris.He still toured widely and even went as far as Japan in 1936. Apparently, whilst there he suffered from toothache and the chef cooked his steak in a certain way so that he could eat it. Chaliapin Steak is still a Japanese dish today!

Jean Ferris and Irving Drought Harris

Jean attended a finishing school in Paris and the following year, aged nineteen,, being a ward of court, asked for permission to visit her Spreckels relatives in the USA. This was granted and she travelled to America with Josephine Grove (nee Raiman) as her chaperone. She stayed with Claus Spreckels junior for a few months and then went to stay with Rudolph Spreckels at the Ritz Carlton Hotel in New York. While she was there she met Irving Drought Harris, a young architect, who had been married before, according to the US census for 1920 for San Antonio, Bexar County, Texas. Whether he told Jean this we do not know but by the time she came home to England, not long afterwards, she was engaged to him. She was still only nineteen so it must have caused her stepfather and guardian, Arthur Hutton, some concern. History seemed to be repeating itself as she followed in her Mother's shoes. Being an heiress made her very attractive, no doubt!
A marriage settlement was prepared, under the jurisdiction of the Court of Chancery in England and the couple were married on October 19th 1929 at The Church of The Heavenly Rest, in New York City. They made their home in New York and their first child, a son, John Wakefield Harris, was born there on 21st September 1930.
The marriage appears to have been a 'stormy' one. The couple would separate and then get back together again. In 1932 they bought a French chateau near Pau, called Le Chateau de Doumy.
Eleven months later their second child, Elizabeth Marshall Harris (known as Mimi) was born. Clearly some form of 'rapprochement' had taken place.

Jean Ferris inherits a fortune from her Mother, Emma Hutton, nee Spreckels

After the death of Tom Watson, in 1904, his widow Emma Claudine (nee Spreckels), married, in 1906, John Wakefield Ferris, of whom more later. Their daughter Jean Ferris was born on the 29th June 1910, two years after the death of her wealthy grandfather, Claus Spreckels. In his will, dated May 11th 1907, Claus appointed Jean's uncles, Claus junior and Rudolph, as executors to his estate. The will went through probate in San Francisco on July 9th 1909. Claus left his estate to his wife for life and thereafter to his daughter, Emma Claudine Ferris. His sons were deemed to have already received their share but remained as trustees to administer the estate.
On 18th January 1912, John and Emma Ferris took Jean, aged 1 year 6 months, to New York, presumably to visit the Spreckels Family. They travelled on the 'Olympic', sister ship to the 'Titanic' and amongst the passengers was the ship's owner, Joseph Ismay, who survived the sinking of the 'Titanic'  in April of the same year.
On January 19th 1919 John, now 69, Emma, 49 and Jean, 8 crossed the Atlantic again on the 'Baltic' to visit Emma's family. The Ferris family lived at Kingswood Manor, Reigate, Surrey. John Wakefield Ferris died on 25th November 1920, aged 71, at 29 Wimpole Street, which eventually became part of the London Eye Hospital.
Emma Ferris married Arthur Hutton in the spring of 1922 so when John Wakefield Ferris' probate was granted on 23rd September 1922 she was already Mrs Hutton. Sadly she was to die only two years later, herself, leaving the nine year old Jean with her stepfather, Arthur Hutton, as her Guardian.
Jean's stepfather sounds like a very sympathetic person and, under the aegis of the Chancery Division of the High Court of Justice, he administered her fortune. Arthur Hutton died in 1943 at Nutfield Lodge, Hampden Park, Eastbourne, aged 86. He left £18,950 14s 3d. Ironically he survived his stepdaughter, Jean, by two years.

Back to the blog, after a break of 12 months. I haven't quite finished with the Spreckels Family as Emma Spreckels also had a brother called John Dietrich Spreckels. He left San Francisco and went to Germany to study chemistry and mechanical engineering. On his return he worked for his Father, Claus Spreckels, in the sugar business. Having established a shipping company to get the sugar from Hawaii to the USA he visited San Diego and decided to invest in the city. He bought land and acquired businesses, such as the railway system, newspapers and hotels. In 1906, after the San Francisco Earthquake, he and his family relocated there. John Dietrich Spreckels had married Lillie Siebein and they had four children. He must take the credit for the development of the city of San Diego from its modest beginnings to the wealthy city that it became.