Prince Karim, Aga Khan IV
In 1969 Karim married Sally Croker-Poole, a former British model, who became Begum and took the name Princess Salimah Aga Khan. During a twenty-five-year marriage they had one daughter and two sons. His eldest child from that first marriage is Princess Zahra, but it is Prince Karim’s first son, Prince Rahim, who is expected to succeed his father to the title as leader of the Ismailis. However, the Aga Khan has refused to reveal his intentions in this respect, which – he announced – will be revealed after his death.
Despite the fact that he does not rule over any geographic territory the Aga Khan was in 2015 listed by Forbes magazine as one of the world’s ten richest royals, with an estimated net worth of eight hundred million dollars. This includes hundreds of racehorses, a number of stud farms, an exclusive yacht club and hotel on Sardinia, a private island in the Bahamas, two private jets, a superyacht and several large estates, including his principal home in northern France. His exchequer benefited hugely when the French President Nicolas Sarkozy ruled that the Aga Khan – who is a British subject – would not have to pay any direct taxes, stamp duty and wealth tax to France.
He is founder and chairman of the Aga Khan Development Network, one of the largest private development networks in the world, whose laudable aims are the global improvement of the environment, health, education, architecture, culture, microfinance, rural development, disaster reduction, the promotion of private-sector enterprise and the revitalisation of historic cities.
Source Notes
Full details of the publications cited in the text are provided in the Bibliography.
Abbreviations used in the notes
CHUR – Churchill Papers, Churchill College, Cambridge
CHAR – Chartwell Papers, Churchill College Library, Cambridge
WSC – Sir Winston S. Churchill
CSC – Clementine Spencer Churchill
ME – Maxine Elliott
DFR – Diana Forbes-Robertson
Introduction
1 Daily Mail, 12 October 2013.
PART ONE
In this sketch of Maxine’s early life, I have drawn mainly on the biography My Aunt Maxine: The Story of Maxine Elliott by Diana Forbes-Robertson, Blossom: A Biography of Mrs F.G. Miles by Jean M. Fostekew, the Diana Forbes-Robertson Collection on Maxine Elliott in Special Collections, Raymond H. Fogler Library, University of Maine, the Churchill Archives at Churchill College, Cambridge, and British and American newspaper reports at Colindale Newspaper Library (now at Boston Spa, West Yorkshire) that are too numerous to mention.
Chapter 1
1 Rockland, Maine, Town Birth Register.
2 Comment by Constance Collier, quoted in DFR: My Aunt Maxine, p. 165.
Chapter 2
1 Quoted in DFR: My Aunt Maxine, p. 88.
2 Nat C. Goodwin: Nat Goodwin’s Book, p. 217.
3 Sundry entries in DFR’s research notes, Special Collections. Raymond H. Fogler Library, University of Maine.
4 DFR: My Aunt Maxine, p. 193.
5 ME, undated letter to Constance Collier (c. 1907), noted in DFR’s research notebook, Special Collections, Raymond H. Fogler Library, University of Maine.
6 Unidentified newspaper cutting in DFR research papers, Special Collections. Raymond H. Fogler Library, University of Maine.
Chapter 3
1 CHUR. WSC to CSC, 25 June 1911.
2 See Robert Philip: ‘Matinee idol of tennis who lived and died for adventure’, Daily Telegraph website, 20 June 2005. Also A. Wallis Myers: Captain Anthony Wilding, p. 5.
3 Ibid., pp. 227, 237, 248.
4 ‘People in the Limelight’, Dundee Evening Telegraph, 7 November 1913.
5 A. Wallis Myers: Captain Anthony Wilding, pp. 262-3.
6 Ibid., p. 286.
Chapter 4
1 Martin Gilbert: The Wilderness Years, p. 600.
2 DFR: My Aunt Maxine, p. 259.
3 Ibid., p. 263.
4 Elsa Maxwell on ME, quoted in Sam Stagg: Inventing Elsa Maxwell, p. 70.
5 Diana Vreeland, introduction to Jane S. Smith: Elsie de Wolfe.
6 Elsa Maxwell: R.S.V.P., p. 138.
7 Ibid., pp. 164-5.
8 DFR: My Aunt Maxine, p. 263.
PART TWO
Chapter 5
1 Emrys Williams: Bodyguard, p. 134.
2 Vincent Sheean: Between the Thunder and the Sun, p. 30.
3 Ibid., p. 41.
4 Ibid., p. 68.
5 Daily Express, 3 September 1933, p. 5.
6 Victor Steibel, quoted in Chris Montague, ‘Cara’s VERY naughty aunty!’, Daily Mail, 19 July 2013, pp. 7-8.
7 Leonard Mosley: Castlerosse, p. 80.
8 Ibid., p. 71.
9 Ibid., p. 82.
10 Excerpts from Noël Coward: Private Lives: An Intimate Comedy in Three Acts (Heinemann) 1930.
11 Diana Mosley: A Life of Contrasts, p. 89.
12 DFR: My Aunt Maxine, p. 263.
Chapter 6
1 Churchill College Cambridge, Ref. CSC 2/247. WSC to CSC, 16 August 1934.
2 Author’s interview with Lady Soames, 9 September 2009.
3 Phyllis Moir: I Was Winston Churchill’s Private Secretary, p. 61.
4 WSC addl volume, 17 August 1933, p. 862.
5 Vincent Sheean: Between the Thunder and the Sun, p. 42.
6 Consuelo Vanderbilt Balsan: The Glitter and the Gold, p. 217.
7 Vincent Sheean: Between the Thunder and the Sun, pp. 47-8.
8 Michael Bloch: Wallis and Edward, p. 130.
9 Ibid., p. 131.
10 Private interviews given to the author during research for this book, and also The Churchills: Hugo Vickers interview; the late Diana Mosley interview; anonymous source.
11 Review by A.C. Black of Whites, the First 300 Years by Anthony Lejeune, Spectator, 9 July 1993.
12 Mary Soames: Speaking for Themselves, pp. 37-8.
13 Vincent Sheean: Between the Thunder and the Sun, p. 48.
14 CHAR 1/299/77. Doris Castlerosse to WSC, 9 July 1937.
Chapter 7
1 ‘King’s Holiday in France’, Hull Daily Mail, 25 July 1936.
2 CHAR 1/299/77. Doris Castlerosse to WSC, 9 July 1937.
3 Churchill College Cambridge, CSCT2 (2b). WSC to CSC, 13 September 1936.
4 Churchill Correspondence, December 1936, p. 493.
5 Michael Bloch: Wallis and Edward, p. 253.
6 Michael Bloch: The Secret File of the Duke of Windsor, p. 126.
7 CHAR 1/299.
8 CHUR 1/300. WSC to ME, 4 July 1937
9 Churchill Papers, vol. 12, p. 871.
10 Michael Bloch: The Secret File of the Duke of Windsor, p. 123.
11 Vincent Sheean, Between the Thunder and the Sun, p. 62.
12 Spencer-Churchill Papers, Churchill College Cambridge. WSC to CSC, 18 January 1938.
13 Vincent Sheean: Between the Thunder and the Sun, pp. 65—6.
14 Ibid.
15 DFR: My Aunt Maxine, p. 278.
16 Spencer-Churchill Papers, Churchill College Cambridge. WSC to CSC, 18 January 1938.
17 Forsch Collection, Dartmouth College Library, MS 788-23(2). WSC to ME, 8 February 1938.
18 CHAR 1/323/24-25. Clare Sheridan to WSC, 5 March 1938.
19 Diana Wells Hood: Working for the Windsors, p. 49.
20 Michael Bloch: The Duke of Windsor’s War, pp. 97-100.
21 Debo, Dowager Duchess of Devonshire, to author. The Dowager Duchess had this information from the Windsor’s housekeeper, who later came to work at Chatsworth.
22 Debo, Dowager Duchess of Devonshire, to author.
23 James Lees-Milne: Harold Nicolson, pp. 106-7.
24 Spencer-Churchill Papers, Churchill College, Cambridge, folio 5. WSC to CSC, 10 January 1938.
Chapter 8
1 Harold Nicolson: Diaries and Letters ipßo—ßp, p. 351.
2 Ibid., p. 352.
3 Maxine Block and E. Mary Trow (eds), Current Biography 1P42 (H.W. Wilson) 1942
, p. 155.
4 CHAR 1/324/16.
5 Churchill Correspondence, December 1938, p. 1330.
6 Spencer-Churchill Papers, Churchill College, Cambridge. WSC to CSC, 8 January 1939.
7 Vincent Sheean: Between the Thunder and the Sun, pp. 149-50.
8 Mary S. Lovell, The Mitford Girls, p. 348.
9 CHAR 1/344/14-17. WSC to CSC, 18 January 1939.
10 CHAR 1/343/55-56. Daisy Fellowes to WSC, 12 February 1939.
11 CHAR 1/343. ME to WSC, 27 January 1939.
12 CHAR 1/343/61-62. ME to WSC, 10 February 1939.
13 CHAR 1/343/34-36. ME to WSC, I February 1939.
14 DFR: My Aunt Maxine, p. 282.
15 CHAR 1/343/129-30. ME to WSC, 20 June 1939.
16 CHAR/2/365/4-5. ME to WSC, 6 July 1939.
17 Duchess of Windsor: The Heart Has Its Reasons, p. 319
18 Noël Coward: Future Indefinite, p. 321.
19 Ibid.
Chapter 9
1 CHAR 2/394. ME to WSC, 18 February 1940.
2 Ibid.
3 W. Somerset Maugham: Strictly Personal, p. 11.
4 CHAR 2/394. Brès to WSC, 5 March 1940.
5 CHAR 2/394, WSC to Dr Brès, 15 March 1940.
PART THREE
Chapter 10
1 Quoted in Anne de Courcy: The Viceroy’s Daughters, p. 308.
2 Duchess of Windsor: The Heart Has Its Reasons, p. 332.
3 Andrew Barrow: Gossip, p. 105.
4 Jacques Cygler of Cannes in private conversation with author, May 2013.
Chapter 11
1 CHAR 20/1978/171. Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur Harris to WSC, 22 March 1945.
2 Charles J.V. Murphy: ‘The New Riviera’, Life, 10 November 1947, p. 150.
3 Ibid., p. 146.
4 Ibid., p. 149.
5 Ibid., p. 150.
6 Duff Cooper and John Julius Norwich: Duff Cooper Diaries, p. 402. Entry for 15 February 1945.
7 Hugo Vickers: Cecil Beaton, pp. 325-6.
8 Emrys Williams: Bodyguard, p. 135.
Chapter 12
1 Emrys Williams: Bodyguard p. 134.
2 Ibid., p. 135.
3 Debo Devonshire to her mother, 7 June 1953. Reproduced by kind permission of The Mitford Archive at Chatsworth.
4 The Aga Khan: The Memoirs ofAga Khan, p. 87.
5 Speech given by the Aga Khan III to the All India Conference (in his Presidential Address), Delhi, 1904. For full text see www. ismailignoses.com.
6 India Office Archives, private files: Aga Khan III. A number of letters make it clear that the Aga’s requests to make him a ruling prince were disregarded because his son was ‘not a very desirable person’, 13 February 1934.
7 Lancaster quoted in Leonard Slater: Aly, p. [to come].
8 Charlotte Mosley (ed.): The Letters of Nancy Mitford, p. 263. 29 June 1948.
Chapter 13
1 Elsa Maxwell: I Married the World, p. 240.
2 Emrys Williams: Bodyguard, p. 139.
3 Ibid., pp. 140-1.
4 Ibid., p. 142.
5 Ibid., pp. 150-1.
6 Ibid., p. 152.
7 Ibid., p. 153.
8 Ibid., p. 157.
Chapter 14
1 Mary S. Lovell: The Churchills, p. 500.
2 Author’s conversation with Lord Digby at Minterne, 2009.
Chapter 15
1 The Aga Khan: The Memoirs ofAga Khan, p. 313.
Chapter 16
1 Emrys Williams: Bodyguard, p. 186.
2 Deborah Devonshire: Wait for Me!, p. 165.
3 Ibid., p. 167.
4 Lady Soames in conversation with author, 9 September 2009. See also her biography Clementine Churchill, p. 306.
5 Michael Wardell, Churchill’s Dagger, short memoir of the 1949 holiday. Churchill Centre and online.
6 Anne Sebba: That Woman. Donahue’s story is detailed in this sympathetic biography of Wallis.
7 Anne Sebba, private correspondence with author.
8 Ibid., 3 October 2013.
9 Quoted in Christopher Wilson, ‘The night that Edward confronted Wallis over her gay lover’, Mail on Sunday, 20 September 2014.
Chapter 17
1 Anthony Montague Browne: Long Sunset, p. 224.
2 Statement issued through Rita’s Paris attorney, Maître Suzanne Blum. Quoted in Leonard Slater: Aly, p. 185.
3 Leonard Slater: Aly, p. 186.
4 All quotations from letters written by Debo Devonshire printed by kind permission of The Mitford Archive at Chatsworth.
5 Author’s interviews and private correspondence with ‘Heather Manchester’.
6 Leonard Slater: Aly, p. 191.
7 Justine Picardie: Coco Chanel, p. 165.
8 Anthony Montague Browne: Long Sunset, p. 216.
9 Mary Soames, private correspondence with author.
10 Lord Moran: Churchill, p. 693.
11 Anthony Montague Browne: Long Sunset, p. 220.
12 Mary Soames: Speaking for Themselves, p. 604.
13 Ibid., p. 601.
14 Anthony Montague Browne: Long Sunset, p. 221.
15 Noël Coward: Diaries, p. 323.
16 Ibid., p. 220.
17 Mary Soames: Speaking for Themselves, p. 601.
18 Lord Moran: Churchill, p. 767.
19 Robert Boothby: Recollections of a Rebel, p. 65.
Chapter 18
1 Quoted in Leonard Slater: Aly, p. 225.
2 Ibid., p.226
3 Ibid., p. 218.
4 Author’s conversation with Lady Soames, 9 September 2009.
5 Martin Gilbert: Never Despair, p. 1238.
6 Anthony Montague Brown: Zöwg' Sunset, p. 242.
7 Martin Gilbert (ed.): Winston Churchill and Emery Reves, pp. 385-6.
8 Martin Gilbert: Never Despair, p. 1317
9 See Mary S. Lovell: A Scandalous Life: The Biography of Jane Digby (Richard Cohen Books) 1995.
10 Account of the accident and aftermath provided by Lord Digby in conversation with the author, November 2009.
Chapter 19
1 ‘Playboy to Statesman: Aly Khan’, New York Times, 7 February 1958, p. 4.
2 Joe D. Brown: Aly Khan: Sporting Prince’, Sports Illustrated, 23 March 1959.
3 Bettina: Bettina, p. 240.
Bibliography
All books published in the UK unless otherwise noted.
Aga Khan, The: The Memoirs ofAga Khan: World Enough and Time (Cassell & Co.) 1954
Balsan, Consuelo Vanderbilt: The Glitter and the Gold (Heinemann) 1953
Barrow, Andrew: Gossip, 1920—1970 (Pan) 1978
Beaton, Cecil: The Wandering Years: Diaries, 1922-1939 (Weidenfeld & Nicolson) 1961
Bettina (trans. Marguerite Barnett): Bettina: An Autobiography (Michael Joseph) 1965
Bloch, Michael: The Duke of Windsor’s War: From Europe to the Bahamas, 1939-1949 (Weidenfeld & Nicolson) 1982
— Wallis and Edward: Letters 1931—1937: The Intimate Correspondence of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor (Weidenfeld & Nicolson) 1986
— The Secret File of the Duke of Windsor: The Private Papers 1937— 1972 (Corgi) 1989
Boothby, Robert: Recollections of a Rebel (Hutchinson) 1978
Bose, Mihir: The Aga Khans (Windmill Press) 1984
Cooper, Duff and John Julius Norwich: The Duff Cooper Diaries, 1919-1931 (Weidenfeld & Nicolson) 2005
Coward, Noël: Future Indefinite (Heinemann) 1954
— The Noël Coward Diaries (Weidenfeld & Nicolson) 1982
— Autobiography (Methuen) 1986
— The Letters of Noël Coward (Methuen) 1986
Coudert, Thierry: Café Society: Socialites, Patrons and Artists 1920-1960 (Flammarion, Paris) 2010
de Courcy, Anne: The Viceroy’s Daughters: The Lives of the Curzon Sisters (Weidenfeld & Nicolson) 2000
Devonshire, Deborah, Duchess of: Wait for Me! Memoirs of the Youngest Mitford Sister (John Murray) 2010
Edwards, Anne: Throne of Gold: The Lives of the Aga Khans (H
arperCollins) 1995
Emerson, Maureen: Escape to Provence (Chapter and Verse) 2008 Forbes-Robertson, Diana: My Aunt Maxine: The Story of Maxine Elliott (Viking, New York) 1964
Fostekew, Jean M.: Blossom: A Biography of Mrs F.G. Miles (Cirrus Associates) 1998
Gilbert, Martin: Winston S. Churchill: The Wilderness Years (Macmillan) 1981
— Winston S. Churchill: Never Despair (Macmillan) 1988
Gilbert, Martin (ed.): Winston Churchill and Emery Reves: Correspondence 1937—1964 (University of Texas Press, Austin) 1997
Goodwin, Nat: Nat Goodwin’s Book (Gorham Press, Boston) 1914
Higham, Charles: Mrs Simpson: Secret Lives of the Duchess of Windsor (Pan, New York) 1988
Hood, Diana Wells: Working for the Windsors (Allan Wingate) 1937
Jackson, Stanley: The Aga Khan: Prince, Prophet and Sportsman (Odhams Press) 1952
Learning, Barbara: Lf This was Happiness: A Biography of Rita Hayworth (Ballantyne, New York) 1989
Lees-Milne, James: Harold Nicolson: A Biography (Chatto & Windus) 2 vols 1980-1
Leslie, Anita: Edwardians in Love (Hutchinson) 1972
— Cousin Randolph (Hutchinson) 1985
Lovell, Mary S.: The Mitford Girls: The Biography of an Extraordinary Family (Little, Brown) 2001
— The Churchills: A Family at the Heart of History – from the Duke of Marlborough to Winston Churchill (Little, Brown) 2011
Maugham, W. Somerset: Strictly Personal (Heinemann) 1942
Maxwell, Elsa: R.S.V.P.: Elsa Maxwell’s Own Story (Little, Brown, Boston) 1954
— 1Married the World (Heinemann) 1955
— The Celebrity Circus (W.H. Allen) 1964
Moir, Phyllis: I Was Winston Churchill’s Private Secretary (Angus & Robertson) 1941
Montague Browne, Anthony: Long Sunset: Memoirs of Winston Churchill’s Last Private Secretary (Cassell) 1966
Moran, Lord (Charles McMoran Wilson Moran): Churchill: The Struggle for Survival 1945—60 (Constable) 1966
Mosley, Charlotte (ed.): Love from Nancy: The Letters of Nancy Mitford (Sceptre) 1994
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