George Cornwallis-West

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George Frederick Myddleton Cornwallis-West (born November 14, 1874 - April 1, 1951 ) was a British officer and writer. He was best known as one of the most prominent bon vivants of the Edwardian era and as the stepfather of the politician Winston Churchill .

George Cornwallis-West

Live and act

Cornwallis-West was born in 1874, the only son of William Cornwallis-West (1835-1917) and his wife Mary, née FitzPatrick (1856-1920). His older sister was the future Princess Daisy von Pless (originally May Theresa Cornwallis-West). As heir to his parents, he later became the owner of Ruthin Castle in Denbighshire Cornwallis-West .

Cornwallis-West began his career in the 1890s as an officer in the Scots Guards . Shortly before the beginning of the Boer War (1899-1903), in which he took part as an officer of the cavalry , he met Jennie Churchill , the widow of Lord Randolph Churchill , who died in 1895 , whom he got to know after a short engagement on July 28, 1900 in St. Paul's got married in Knightsbridge. The marriage was particularly exciting due to the great age difference between the groom and bride - Churchill was almost twenty years older than Cornwallis West - in the "better society" of all of Europe. Churchill called herself Mrs. George Cornwallis-West from then on and also used this name in the title of her autobiography. The relationship between Cornwallis-West and Churchill ultimately failed. In retrospect, Cornwallis-West told his stepson that his relationship with Jennie had reminded him of "Hogarth's Marriage a la Mode".

Through his marriage to Jennie Churchill, Cornwallis-West became the stepfather of the politician Winston Churchill , his exact peer (both born in 1874), with whom he had a lifelong good relationship.

Cornwallis-West met actress Mrs. Patrick Campbell while rehearsing a play written by Jennie . After the relationship with his wife deteriorated and the relationship with Campbell became more and more intense, they separated in 1912 and divorced Jennie in 1914. On April 6, 1914, Cornwallis-West married Campbell, with whom he occasionally appeared on stage as an actor in the following years.

During the years of Edward VII's reign , Cornwallis-West was considered one of the most prominent members of the "better society" of Great Britain and was seen frequently at banquets, receptions, gales, horse races, picnics and similar exclusive social events. His “strikingly good looks” and his gallant manner gave him great popularity, especially with women, and earned him the reputation of “to be the handsomest man in the British Army” (“The best-looking / most handsome man in the British Army”). Others saw him as “an impecunious playboy and something of a parasite” (“A playboy with no financial means and a kind of parasite.”). His fame as a dazzling-looking dandy and heartbreaker continues to the present day. In 2003, Alan Vanneman had a young woman in his Sherlock Holmes novel Sherlock Holmes and the Hapsburg Tiara , set in the Edwardian decade, daydreaming of “To have her hand kissed at Drury Lane by George Cornwallis-West”.

In the 1920s and 1930s, Cornwallis-West produced a number of memory books, mainly about his famous wives and his eventful high society life in the first twenty years of the century. There was also the novel The Woman Who Ended War , which he also - with the help of his friend George Bernard Shaw , who probed the work and wrote some stage instructions and designs - adapted as a stage play.

In 1951 Cornwallis-West, who had suffered from Parkinson's disease for several years, died of suicide .

Adaptations

The actors who played Cornwallis-West after his death include the British Christopher Cazenove , who played him in the 1974 television miniseries Jennie .

Works

Memory books

  • Two wives. 1929.
  • Edwardian Hey Days. Or a little about a lot of things. 1930.
  • Edwardians Go Fishing. Or, Many Days on Many Waters. 1932.
  • Fortune's Favorites. 1933.
  • Us Dogs. Being the Autobiography of Sambo, a Labrador. 1938. (with illustrations by KF Barker)

As editor

  • The Life and Letters of Admiral Cornwallis. 1927.

Works of fiction

  • The Woman who Stopped War. A novel. 1935.

literature

  • Eileen Quelch: Perfect Darling. The Life and Times of George Cornwallis-West . 1972.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Kate Caffrey: The Edwardian Lady. 1979, p. 122.
  2. ^ Geoffrey Best: The Churchill. A Study in Greatness. P. 29.
  3. ↑ Frankfurter Hefte, 1946, p. 145.
  4. ^ Peter de Mendelssohn : Churchill. His way and his world. 1957, p. 141.
  5. ^ Paul Goetsch: English literature between Victorianism and modernity. 1983, p. 83. Similar in Gail MacColl: To Marry an English Lord. The Victorian and Edwardian Experience. 1989, p. 272. There it says: "The handsomest young man in England."
  6. ↑ Magill's Literary Annual, 1986, p. 150.
  7. ↑ Alan Vanneman: Sherlock Holmes and the Hapsburg Tiara. 2003, p. 320.
  8. ↑ Theatrics, p. 199.
personal data
SURNAME Cornwallis-West, George
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Cornwallis-West, George Frederick Myddleton (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British officer and writer
DATE OF BIRTH November 14, 1874
DATE OF DEATH April 1, 1951