Naughty behavior and sordid happenings in the Gilded Age

[George L. Lorton]

Free Love Kept Men and Women plus other naughty behavior and sordid happenings in the Gilded Age and beyond
I always wanted to start a topic like this. This is the place to discuss Free Love and folks living and traveling together who are not Married and have no intentions to marry. Plus scandals or other items that apply to this thread that would be of note to Historians or Enthusiasts.

 

[George L. Lorton]

To start it off were there any couple traveling on Titanic who were not married or any other ship for that matter. Any Gigolos or Concubines anybody knows about?

 

[Luke Owens]

You mean like Guggenheim and his mistress? I've forgotten her name, but she survived Titanic's foundering.

The other major Titanic-related "scandal" I can recall was JJ Astor divorcing his first wife to marry Madeleine...who was, what, seven months pregnant? at the time of the sinking.

Then there was the unknown couple in the stateroom who told the steward to go away when he was trying to roust them out for the lifeboats. No one has ever identified them, to my knowledge.

That's enough from me for now. Anyone else?

Luke

 

[George L. Lorton]

You mean like Guggenheim and his mistress?

In part but I also mean just a man and woman or what have you living together as well. Wasn't there a couple in second class who were not married but traveling together as man and wife.

Of course on the Lusitania there was the supposedly the talented Miss Baker and the man who had paid for her voyage and who's cabin was right across for hers. I think his name was Williamson. Jim Kalafus or Mike Poirier could shed some light on that arrangement.

 

[Michael H. Standart]

>>You mean like Guggenheim and his mistress? I've forgotten her name, but she survived Titanic's foundering.<<

That would be Mme. Léontine Pauline Aubart. (See https://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/titanic-biography/leontine-pauline-aubart.html )

 

[George L. Lorton]

Thanks Michael. I believe there was a Titled Lord on the Persia with his secretary\mistress who was the model for the hood ornament for the Rolls Royce Company if I'm not mistaken.

 

[George L. Lorton]

It was John Douglas-Scott-Montagu, 2nd Baron Montagu of Beaulieu who survived. His secretary (and mistress) Eleanor Thornton, who was the model for the Rolls-Royce "Spirit of Ecstasy" mascot by Charles Robinson Sykes, died.

 

[Jonathan Granato]

In Guggenheim's case (& many others) wasn't it common to have mistress? No great scandal there.

 

[Michael H. Standart]

>>In Guggenheim's case (& many others) wasn't it common to have mistress?<<

I don't know exactly how common it was but I think there was something of an unspoken understanding to the effect.

>>No great scandal there.<<

So long as she didn't attract a lot of undue attention which would make it easy for the lawfully wedded spouses to pretend that they didn't know. (And often as not, they did.)

 

[George L. Lorton]

In Guggenheim's case (& many others) wasn't it common to have mistress? No great scandal there.

Yes, hence the term Love Nest. The term Love Nest came into being during the 20's. Well wide spread usage anyways. It was a house or apartment a married or single man paid the bills on for his Mistress and a place were the mistress lived or were the lovers met.

In F. Scot Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby, Tom Buchanan that dapper man about town (really an arrogant, racist ex athlete ) keeps a apartment for him and Myrtle Wilson (the wife of his own Mechanic George Wilson) to meet in New York. Hence they had a Love Nest.

 

[Lester Mitcham]

I am late to this thread.
George, There were a number of unmarried couples onboard.
George Rosenshine and Miss Maybelle Thorne travelling as Mr & Mrs Thorne
Henry Morley and Kate Phillips travelling as Mr & Mrs Marshall
Denis Lennon and Mary Mullin who travelled as brother & sister under the name of Lennon

Luke, The couple you ask about were most likely the Spencers. - See here: http://www.titanicinquiry.org/USInq/AmInq09Etches01.php

 

[George L. Lorton]

Hi Lester,

I am late to this thread.

That's alright.

Thanks for the interesting information.

Henry Morley and Kate Phillips. Those two I remember. Didn't Kate have a child shortly afterwards?

I also remember Steward Etches trying to get the strangers in that one cabin up on deck.

 

[Lester Mitcham]

Hello George,

Re Kate, so I understand.

Mrs Spencer and her maid survived, but who the other couple with a lifebelt in their hands were I have no idea.

 

[George L. Lorton]

but who the other couple with a lifebelt in their hands were I have no idea.

Who indeed?

 

[Chad Goodwin]

I don't remember where I read it but wasn't there a gentleman in first class who was there with his young male "FRIEND"