Gilded Age Newport Etiquette

Consuelo Spencer-Churchill, Duchess of Marlborough, was a member of the prominent American Vanderbilt family. Her marriage to Charles Spencer-Churchill, 9th Duke of Marlborough became an international symbol of the socially advantageous, but loveless, “Dollar Princess” marriages, which were so common during the Gilded Age.

Newport Etiquette

One must be very circumspect at Newport. Etiquette requires of men that they marry the daughter of a host or hostess, whenever an invitation is accepted to dine at a house where there is a marriageable heiress. At the Eastern watering places, it is claimed that the Duke of Marlborough would not have dared to become the guest of Mrs. William K. Vanderbilt had he not been seized with matrimonial designs upon Consuelo Vanderbilt.— Chicago News, 1895

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