Flora Curzon, Lady Howe
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
27 January 1870
The Countess Howe | |
|---|---|
.jpg) Photo by Nadar, Paris, 1894 | |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Florence Hamilton Davis 27 January 1870 New York City, U.S. |
| Died | 15 April 1925 (aged 55) |
| Spouse(s) |
|
| Children | 3 |
| Parent(s) | John Hagy Davis Florence Chapman Davis |
| Known for | Lady Terence Blackwood Marchioness of Dufferin and Ava |
Flora Curzon, Lady Howe (born Florence Hamilton Davis; January 27, 1870 – April 15, 1925), was an American heiress and singer who twice married into the British aristocracy.[1]
Florence Hamilton Davis was born in New York City around 1865.[2] Flora, as she was known, was the daughter of Bellevue, Ohio-born Florence (née Chapman) Davis and John Hagy Davis, a Wall Street banker with John H. Davis & Co., located at 10 Wall Street.[3] She grew up at 24 Washington Square North in New York.[4] Her half-brother, John Ethelbert Davis (1900–1966),[5] was married to Maude Reppelin Bouvier, a daughter of John Vernou Bouvier Jr. and sister of Edith Ewing Bouvier Beale (of Grey Gardens infamy) and John Vernou Bouvier III (father of First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and Princess Lee Radziwill).[6]
In 1898, her father, who was as "conspicuous in society as he [wa]s in Wall Street," married for the third time, out of four overall, to South African born Mary Ethel Jackson, a friend of Flora's who was about thirty-three years his junior.[7]
Singing career
In December 1910, Lady Dufferin, a singer, made her public debut at Bechstein Hall in London.[8] She appeared in a concert arranged by Mme. d'Onalda, but did not accept a fee. Lady Dufferin possessed a "charming soprano voice, and has had training in Paris and elsewhere. When her husband, then Lord Terence Blackwood, was Secretary to the British Embassy at Paris, she frequently sang in private salons in the cause of charity."[8]
