The Jersey Lily pub in Whiteladies Road is a tribute to the society beauty, actress, and sometime royal mistress Lillie Langtry, whose fame began when she was sketched by artist Frank Miles, grandson of Bristol’s first millionaire, the banker and MP Philip John Miles of Leigh Court.
Born Emilie Charlotte Le Breton in 1853 in St Helier, Jersey, Lillie’s father was the Rector of St Saviour’s and Dean of Jersey. The family claimed descent from Richard Le Breton, one of the assassins of Thomas Becket.
Rev William Corbet Le Breton had a reputation as a philanderer, so as well as Lillie and her six brothers, he fathered several children by his parishioners as well. Lillie’s mother left her husband in 1880.
Lillie’s attractions were noticed at an early age when she received her first marriage proposal aged 14. Her admirer was 23-year-old Lieutenant Charles Spencer Longley, son of the Archbishop of Canterbury.
In 1874, aged 20, she married Irish landowner Edward Langtry, who was six years her senior. The couple moved to London and set up home in fashionable Park Lane.
At a reception in Knightsbridge in 1877, Lillie was sketched by artist Frank Miles, friend and probably the first male lover of Oscar Wilde, with whom he shared a house for two years.
Lillie wore black, as she was in mourning for her brother Reggie who had been killed in a riding accident aged 22. The black dress and understated jewellery were to become her trademark.
Miles later painted her portrait several times and Lillie also sat for Burne-Jones, William Frith, Sir John Everett Millais and photographer Rupert Potter, father of author Beatrix Potter.
In her 1925 autobiography, Lillie recalled she was given a stuffed peacock, a bird of ill omen; she gave it to Oscar Wilde but it was appropriated by Frank Miles. Soon after Oscar and Frank’s friendship ended, Frank’s father died, there was a broken engagement and Frank was committed to Brislington House Asylum where he died aged 39 in 1891.
Lillie’s beauty and charm were soon much sought after in London society. Prince Leopold, Queen Victoria’s youngest son, hung a drawing of Lillie over his bed until it was taken down by his unamused mother. At a dinner party, Leopold’s brother Edward (“Bertie”) , Prince of Wales met Lillie and was soon infatuated.
Lillie would be Bertie’s mistress for three years and he continued to support her stage career after the affair ended.
She was twice presented to Queen Victoria whose reaction was, unsurprisingly, “rather frosty”.
Other Royal admirers included Crown Prince Rudolf of Austria and Leopold, King of the Belgians. As her relationship with the Prince of Wales declined, Lillie began an affair with his cousin Prince Louis of Battenberg, father of Lord Louis Mountbatten.
Lillie became pregnant and let Prince Louis believe he was the father but it is more likely the baby’s father was Arthur Jones, brother of Lillie’s sister-in-law. Lord Mountbatten always maintained his father was the father of Lillie’s only child, Jeanne Marie, born in 1881.
In need of money, she started an acting career in 1881, helped by Oscar Wilde. Critical reviews were mixed but she was adored by the public and toured the UK and the USA with her own company for 35 years.
She first appeared in Bristol at the Prince’s Theatre, Park Row in November 1884 for six nights in Peril, adapted from the French playwright Sardou, playing a the romantically tempted Lady Ormond, and Lady Teazle in Sheridan’s The School for Scandal.
The Western Daily Press’s review was a bit sniffy about her performance, but praised her dresses as “simply superb”, while the Bristol Mercury’s correspondent said “her acting may not be absolutely great”.
Whatever the critics thought, Lillie returned in September 1885 playing for three nights again in Peril as well as Bulwer-Lytton’s, The Lady of Lyons, and Goldsmith’s She Stoops To Conquer.
Lillie received several curtain calls and the Bristol Times and Mirror declared her dresses to be “in excellent taste … they fitted her fine figure to perfection”.
Her figure was certainly displayed to advantage in the comedy A Young Tramp by W.G. Wills, which premiered at the Prince’s on September 12 before a “large and fashionable audience”.
Lillie played the role written for her of a “Yorkshire yokel” in “smock frock and breeches”, and looked “very charming dressed as a boy”, her performance being “natural and unaffected”. Her father watched from a private box . Lillie’s next appearance at the Prince’s was in Mrs Dering’s Divorce in February 1905 for one matinee performance.
Lillie Langtry was the first socialite to appear on stage and so attracted widespread public gossip and media interest. In 1882 she became the first celebrity to endorse a commercial product, becoming the poster girl for Pear’s soap. She is also believed to have begun the theatrical tradition of the “red carpet” in 1906.
For ten years from 1881 she had an affair with wealthy American sportsman and race horse owner Frederick Gebhard, which started her own passion for horse racing. In 1889 she met eccentric and immensely wealthy young bachelor George Alexander Scott, the most successful gentleman jockey of his day. Scott was reputed to have been involved in prize fighting scandals, and was twice a co-respondent in divorce cases. He died aged 33 in New Orleans in 1893.
Lillie continued her interest in horse racing and breeding (her advisor was jockey Lester Pigott’s great grandfather) until she sold her assets in 1919. Since 2004 the Lillie Langtry Stakes race has been run at Goodwood.
She finally divorced in 1897, and Edward Langtry died the same year aged 50 in Chester Asylum and Lillie became a U.S. citizen.
In 1888 she had established a wine farm in California – Langtry Farm is still in business today. After an affair with Hungarian Prince Paul Esterhazy, Lillie, aged 45, married 28- year-old Hugo Gerald de Bathe in 1899. On the same day her horse Merman won the Goodwood Cup.
In 1907 Hugo became the 7th Baronet de Bathe and Lillie became Lady de Bathe. The same year she became the first woman to break the bank at Monte Carlo. She spent her last years in Monaco as she drifted apart from Hugo, who she only saw at social events and occasional private meetings.
She made her final appearance in Bristol at the Hippodrome in December 1917 in Overtones by American playwright, Alice Gestenberg, the first play to dramatise the subconscious.
Jeanne Marie grew up believing that Lillie was her aunt, and only discovered the truth when she married aged 18. She cut Lillie off and never spoke to her again. Jeanne Marie’s daughter Mary Malcolm, would become one of the first female TV announcers in 1948.
Lillie died in Monaco aged 75 in 1929 and was buried with her parents in St Saviour’s churchyard, St Helier, within sight of her childhood bedroom. Hugo did not attend her funeral. Frank Miles who effectively created “The Jersey Lily” lies in the churchyard of St Mary’s, Almondsbury.
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