Tuesday, September 17, 2019

Oh no, another Mrs. Simpson?

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 September 17. 1949

Former Washington, D.C., native,  Romaine Simpson is reported to be engaged to David, the 3rd Marquess of Milford Haven reports the Associated Press.

Lord Milford Haven, a great-great-grandson of Queen Victoria, is a first cousin of the Duke of Edinburgh, and served as Philip's best man at his wedding to Princess Elizabeth, nearly two years ago.

The 30-year-old Marquess has been one of Princess Margaret's "favorite dates," during the last year.  He is an enthusiast of nightclubs in London and in the United States and has also dated women in London and in the United States, Sharman Douglas, the daughter of the American Ambassador Lewis Douglas.

Romaine Simpson, 27, is the daughter of the late Vinton Dahlgren Pierce of Washington, D.C.  Her first marriage to William Simpson of Locust Valley, New York, ended in divorce in 1946 in Reno,  Nevada.

King Edward VIII gave up the throne in 1936 to marry the woman he loved, Mrs. Wallis Warfield Simpson, from Baltimore, Maryland.

The Church of England "frowns" on remarriages of divorced persons.   The Daily Mail contacted Lord Milford Haven "before he pulled the shutter down on the press."  The London newspaper said the marquess would neither decline nor affirm that he and Mrs. Simpson are engaged although he did acknowledge that they had their picture taken together by society photographer Baron Nairum.

Nerium's secretary refused to provide the photographs, stating that the images will be released when the engagement is official.

Mrs. Simpson, a "curvesome and smartly dressed brunette," moved to London from Paris a few days ago.

Her mother, Mrs. Clark McIlwaine, who lives on Connecticut Avenue, NW, told reporters she had "no comments" about the purported engagement.

Mrs. Simpson is staying at the "fashionable" Claridge's Hotel, where it was learned that she is "out" to callers.  A servant at Lord Milford Haven's home at Kensington Palace stated that "his lordship is away."

For the past year, Lord Milford Haven has been "commuting" between England and the United States as a "salesman for a British oil heater firm."

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Lord Milford Haven is the second of two children of the late George, the 2nd Marquess of Milford Haven and Countess Nada Torby.  He succeeded his father in 1938.   His grandmother, Victoria, the Dowager Marchioness of Milford Haven, a granddaughter of Queen Victoria, lives in an apartment at Kensington Palace.


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