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Lot Essay
The complexity of this Rothschild Chinoiserie Necessaire, its numerous and elaborate fittings, its exceptionally lavish jewelled floral ornament and its exotic pagoda form place it at the zenith of English eighteenth century gold work. The rarity of the present example also lies in the use of solid gold in the construction of the frame, base and canopy, in contrast to the more usual practice employed by James Cox, whose work is discussed below, of overlaying gold sheets onto a base metal frame and lining drawers and other components with gilt-brass. The workmanship is much finer than most documented Cox products. Moreover, the use of real precious stones, as opposed to paste gemstones, eclipses similar items that were made in London during this period.
Comparable rare necessaires set with watches are found in major institutions around the world including the British Royal Collection, the Imperial Palace Museum, Beijing, the Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg, the Metropolitan Museum, New York and the Victoria and Albert Museum, London. They epitomise the wondrous objects that were known in the eighteenth century as toys, the sort of item which Samuel Johnson described as “a thing of more show than use, a petty commodity, a trifle”. They would have been made either for export to the Chinese market or sold in a toyshop, which were amongst the most fashionable - if not the most fashionable - shops in London and Bath in the second half of the eighteenth century, see Vanessa Brett, Bertrand's Toyshop in Bath. Luxury Retailing, 1685-1765, Wetherby, 2014. Those wealthy enough to afford such items appreciated the workmanship, technical advances, and new and exotic materials that went into their making. The purveyors of these toyshops, a toy-man or toy-woman did not themselves make anything - he or she was purely a retailer, the equivalent of a French marchand mercier.
The Parisian Corporation des Marchands-Merciers was originally founded in the twelfth century as purveyors of fine fabrics. By the eighteenth century the corporation had grown to become a large body representing purveyors of luxury goods of all kinds, including furniture, bronzes, paintings, gold snuff-boxes and porcelain as well as silk and fabrics. In London several of these toy-men described themselves as “jewelers” and many who described themselves as “goldsmith and jeweler” also sold toys such as necessaires and étuis. Some might have employed a craftsman to work in the shop and carry out repairs and alterations, but most would have sent out such work to a craftsman nearby and bought or commissioned stock from specialists. The most famous of these toy-men, James Cox (circa 1723-1800), claimed in 1773 that for “about seven years past [he had] employed from eight hundred to one thousand workmen”. James Cox was a creative genius, he was an inventor, a designer and an entrepreneur. He first made his name as a goldsmith and jeweller but became best known for his incredibly complicated musical automaton clocks and necessaires that incorporated watches, the majority of which were exported abroad to adorn the palaces of the Chinese Emperor and Indian Maharajas as well as the Tsar of Russia and the Ottoman Kings.
The making and marketing of luxury goods involved a complex network of inter-related designers, craftsmen, merchants and retailers. A necessaire such as the present example required the skills of many different trades. The names of several hundred watchmakers, jewellers, goldsmiths, toy-men, lapidaries, and snuff-box makers working in London in the middle decades of the eighteenth century are known, but usually the only visible signature on mounted wares are on those that incorporate a watch. The watch on the present example is signed on the movement by Robert Allam, who was apprenticed in London in 1730 to Thomas Smith, and was a member of the Clockmaker’s Company 1742-1765. He is listed in Baillie's Clock Makers of the World as an eminent clock and a watch maker. A craftsman of considerable skill, a number of his watches are mounted in gold and hardstone cases. It is sometimes difficult to decide whether such a signature is the name of a watchmaker, the workshop who assembled the piece, or a retailer. John Barbot (1702-1766) described himself as a tweezer or étui case maker and is also recorded as a silver and goldsmith. His name is on the watch of a pair of gold-mounted agate necessaires set with rubies and diamonds in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. It also appears on a necessaire in the Imperial Palace Museum, Beijing. The Metropolitan Museum collection also includes a jewel cabinet with enamel plaques, surmounted by a watch with the name of James Cox; a watch in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, is engraved with the name of the London toy-man P. D. Chenevix. None of these men is recognised as a watchmaker. They engraved their names on the watches to advertise the shop from which the piece was bought. These necessaires incorporated the work of many other specialists: James Giles, for example, is associated with many of the small bottles that are found in them. In London there were numerous other toyshops and snuff-box makers, and those who advertised that they 'make and sell' étuis or équipages.
The leisured classes were fascinated by the virtuosity and elegance of these luxurious mechanical wonders. Cox staged an exhibition at the Great Room in Spring Gardens in the 1770s where “thousands of Londoners [marveled] at sumptuous gilded musical cabinets and clocks with elaborate chiming mechanisms… Three times a day, the musical automata sprang into brilliant sound, a mechanical gala concert…” (G. D’Arcy Wood, Romanticism and Music Culture in Britain, 1770-1840: Virtue and Virtuosity, Cambridge, 2010).
The Chinese Export Market.
The present necessaire is a sublime example amongst the exceptional works of art created by English craftsmen in the eighteenth century for export to China. These highly elaborate objects were presented to Chinese officials – including the Emperors, who developed strong fascinations for Western clocks – to facilitate Britain’s trade with China. The insatiable Chinese demand for similar objects, coupled with the immensely lucrative trade which they helped to enable for Britain, led to a burgeoning market for such works in England, and saw the collaboration between highly skilled craftsmen in the realisation of some of the most extraordinary and unusual objects of the eighteenth century.
In the sixteenth century, Matteo Ricci – the first Jesuit missionary given entry to China – presented Western clocks and works of art as tribute to the Chinese Imperial Court. Ricci and his Jesuit confrère, Michele Ruggieri, quickly realized the potential these clocks held in unlocking the Middle Kingdom to the West, and subsequently encouraged a Chinese fascination with European timepieces and objects. This established a precedent of presenting gifts of Western manufacture to gain favour with the Imperial Court, which was appropriated by other Europeans who sought to open trade relations with China from the mid-sixteenth century.
The British East India Company was a major supplier – often via intermediaries – of Western clocks and elaborate works of art to the Chinese Imperial Court. As Britain ever sought to expand its influence in and trade with China, clocks became one of its most important exports to the Far East from the late seventeenth century. The accession of the Emperor Qianlong, who reigned from 1735 to 1795 – during which period the present necessaire was created – marked a zenith in Imperial fascination for such curiosities. This burgeoning interest also encouraged the establishment of private merchants in China including John Henry Cox, son of the aforementioned jeweller and toymaker, James Cox, who established a firm at Canton in the 1780s. Interest in Western clocks and works of art continued in the 19th century, albeit at a considerably more modest scale following the death of Emperor Qianlong.
Alfred de Rothschild (1842-1918)
Alfred de Rothschild, the son of Lionel and Charlotte de Rothschild, was not only one of the wealthiest men of his generation but also a formidable connoisseur and collector of art. His father was head of the Rothschild bank in England, a grandson of the banking dynasty's founder Mayer Amschel de Rothschild and the son of Nathan Mayer de Rothschild, who had settled in England in 1798. The second of Lionel de Rothschild's three sons, Alfred studied at Cambridge, where he was a contemporary of Edward, Prince of Wales (later King Edward VII), who was to remain a lifelong friend. He joined the family bank soon after university at the age of 21, where he was a partner alongside his brothers until his death. He was made a director of the Bank of England at only 26.
The scale of the family's financial success was reflected in an expanding array of houses in both London and the country. Alfred de Rothschild's grandfather, Nathan Mayer, had acquired Gunnersbury Park in the 1830s, the first of a series of country houses that members of the family purchased in the following years. Nathan Mayer's four sons each acquired extensive estates close to each other in Buckinghamshire in the Vale of Aylesbury, within easy reach from the bank in the City of London. In the country they could escape from the daily pressures of their business, hunt and entertain in a manner that would help secure access to the inner sanctums of British society.
Within close proximity, the various branches of the family built houses that vied in magnificence with each other and with those built by their cousins on the continent. Mayer Amschel (1818-1874) constructed perhaps the most remarkable at Mentmore, on the estate that had been acquired from the Harcourt family in the 1850s, whilst his elder brothers Lionel and Anthony built sumptuous mansions at Aston Clinton and Tring. This set a pattern that continued into the next generation with Alfred de Rothschild at Halton, his brother Leopold at Ascott, and his sister Evelina's husband Ferdinand de Rothschild (their cousin from the Austrian branch of the family), and his sister Alice at Waddesdon Manor and Eyethrope.
A passionate collector, Alfred de Rothschild's taste was in many ways similar to that of other members of his family. He acquired the finest French furniture and clocks, porcelain and tapestries, French and English objets-de-vertu, such as the present necessaire, and also German Renaissance silver. In the field of Italian and Spanish art he stood alone buying works with a religious subject. His pictures and works of art were displayed both at his London house in Seamore Place and later at Halton, where his decision to build a new house seems to have been partly conditioned by a desire to provide a suitable setting for his expanding collection. Lady Dorothy Nevill thought him the “finest amateur judge in England of Eighteenth- Century French Art”. He was also more widely involved in the art world in England as a Trustee of the National Gallery and a founder Trustee of the Wallace Collection, to both of which he was also an important benefactor.
The estate and original house at Halton had been acquired by Alfred's father Lionel from the Dashwood family in 1853. Alfred demolished the existing building, and between 1880 and 1883 built a palatial new house on the site in the French style. Many of his finest 18th century portraits by artists such as Gainsborough and Reynolds were hung prominently in the North or Lady's Drawing Room. Glazed cabinets contained pieces from his silver collection. He commissioned Charles Davis to write a two volume catalogue of his collection. Published in 1884, the Inventory of Alfred de Rothschild's Collection included numerous finely executed photographs of the works of art. The chinoiserie necessaire is not listed, suggesting it was acquired after the catalogue’s publication.
Although his fondness for female company was well-known, Alfred de Rothschild never married, and following his death the pictures and many of the works of art, together with much of his estate, were bequeathed to his natural daughter, Almina, Countess of Carnarvon, wife of Herbert, 5th Earl of Carnarvon, the celebrated Egyptologist.
Almina Victoria Marie Alexandra, Countess of Carnarvon (1876-1969)
Almina, Countess of Carnarvon was born Alice Wombwell, the daughter of French born Marie Wombwell, née Boyer (d.1913), whose father was a Parisian banker. Marie Boyer married Captain Frederick Charles Wombwell (1845-1889), the fourth son of Sir George Wombwell 3rd Bt. (1792-1855) in 1868 but the marriage was an unhappy one. Wombwell was an untrustworthy drunkard. Although they had a son Frederick in 1869, Marie became estranged from her husband and whilst separated from him was introduced to Alfred de Rothschild. The couple shared a love of the theatre and opera. Alfred lavished gifts on Marie and their friendship blossomed. Their daughter was born in 1876. Her mother was called ‘Mina’ by friends and family and the addition of the first two initials of her true father’s first name resulted in the unusual Almina. Alfred remained very close to the family and was godfather to Almina. She grew to become a much admired and charming young woman.
She was presented at court in 1893 when she met the young Earl of Carnarvon. He was struck by her and also by the prospect of the sizable dowry and income Alfred had made known would be paid on his daughter’s marriage. The elevation of Almina into the highest levels of the aristocracy would alleviate much of the embarrassment associated with the circumstances of her birth. The couple were married at a service in a lavishly decorated St. Margaret’s Westminster in June 1895. Following a reception at Lansdowne House the couple travelled to Highclere Castle, the principal seat of the Earls of Carnarvon. Lord Carnarvon was somewhat reserved in large gatherings of people but had a passion for travel and was a lover of the new motor cars of the day, driving at speed, resulting in a number of accidents. One in 1901 severely affected his health. His doctor’s recommendation that he should spend time in a warm climate led to Almina and her husband staying for extended periods in Egypt.
Carnarvon became fascinated by the many excavations of ancient sites. In 1907 he met the young archaeologist Howard Carter. The earl funded his work until the outbreak of war in 1914. Almina spent the war years running Highclere as a highly regarded hospital for injured officers at great cost to her husband and Alfred. It outgrew the confines of the castle and in late 1915 Almina moved the hospital to a leased house in Bryanston Square. It was visited by General Kitchener the month it opened and by the King and Queen the next year.
Following the armistice Lord Carnarvon resumed his sponsorship of Carter’s work, with disappointing results until 1922. In November of that year the pair made the greatest archaeological discovery of the 20th century, the almost untouched tomb of the young 18th dynasty pharaoh Tutankhamun. Tragically the earl died in April the next year from an infected mosquito bite and pneumonia. Alfred de Rothschild had died in 1918 leaving Almina his London house, 1 Seamore Place, and its fabulous art collection. Post war taxation and Almina’s lavish entertaining could not be funded by the sale of Carnarvon land and chattels alone. Therefore, following the death of the earl, Almina sold a large proportion of her father’s collection at Christie’s in May 1925. The saleroom correspondent of The Times gave an enthusiastic report of the pre-sale viewing, “Christie’s rooms resembled a private view at the Royal Academy, in that it was difficult to examine the treasures because of the great concourse of visitors”. The Duke of Connaught and other notable figures attended the viewing. The first day of the sale, led by the necessaire, totalled over £10,000. This and the other auctions of Alfred’s treasures alleviated Almina’s financial worries for a time, however, she was never able to adjust to her reduced circumstances, remaining faultlessly generous to friends and extravagant in her tastes. She found happiness once more with her second husband Lt. Col. Ian Onslow Dennistoun but he died in 1938. Almina lived until 1969.
Emile Wertheimer (1874-1953)
This magnificent necessaire was acquired by Emile Wertheimer at the land mark sale of the Carnarvon Art Treasures at Christie’s in 1925. The Times report of the sale records the lot opening at 100 guineas. A bidding battle ensued with the dealer Blairman. It culminated with Mr. Wertheimer paying the top price of the day, 820 guineas (£861) for the spectacular necessaire. When it was next sold in 1953, following the death of Mr. Wertheimer, it was the day’s highlight once more reaching £3,000. The late owner was described in The Times report of the 1953 sale as an American born cinema owner. Wertheimer had been born in New York in 1874, the son of New Yorker Max Wertheimer. He was indeed a pioneer of film in the United Kingdom and was the owner of numerous cinemas. A Punch article from 1953, (‘Mr. Wertheimer Didn’t Care’, Punch, vol. 224, 27 May 1953, p. 639), describes how in 1919 he had “sown the first big cinemas in the West End”. He prospered and “the crop increased a hundred fold from year to year”. He also had a highly successful film distribution business, World’s Master Productions, based in the heart of London’s Theatreland at 35 Little Newport Street. The company was at the forefront of early moving pictures. Wertheimer worked with the ground breaking but controversial American film director and writer D. W. Griffith (1875-1948) buying and distributing his films in the United Kingdom. This was celebrated on the company’s letter head which proudly recorded Griffith’s international successes such as Birth of a Nation made in 1915, Intolerance from the following year and Orphans of the Storm from 1921. Griffith was one of the earliest proponents of the feature film and pioneered the use of close-up shots in his productions. He was a founding member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Science and was awarded a special Oscar later in his career.
Wertheimer had come to London in the early years of the 20th century. The 1901 census records him staying the Hotel Cecil on the Strand. He married fellow American (Callie) Gerome Edwardy (d.1944) in London in 1903. She had been born in Savannah, Georgia in 1880, however, this was not always accurately recorded in her passport applications and in the ships’ passenger records for the numerous trips she took to New York. She often shaved a few years off her age, in one instance reducing it by a full decade. It is evident from the Punch article cited above that Emile was devoted to his wife. They never had children and although Emile was highly successful in the world of motion pictures, he and his wife shared a passion for beautiful works of art and paintings, which they collected together for display in their neo-Georgian north London house. Gerome’s death in 1944 marked the end of Emile’s collecting, being unable to share the joy with his wife. On his death their art collections were dispersed. The funds from the sales, and Emile’s £200,000 estate, endowed a personal charity which was to be administered by trustees for 21 years. Any residue after this time was given to the King Edward Hospital Fund for London.
Comparable rare necessaires set with watches are found in major institutions around the world including the British Royal Collection, the Imperial Palace Museum, Beijing, the Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg, the Metropolitan Museum, New York and the Victoria and Albert Museum, London. They epitomise the wondrous objects that were known in the eighteenth century as toys, the sort of item which Samuel Johnson described as “a thing of more show than use, a petty commodity, a trifle”. They would have been made either for export to the Chinese market or sold in a toyshop, which were amongst the most fashionable - if not the most fashionable - shops in London and Bath in the second half of the eighteenth century, see Vanessa Brett, Bertrand's Toyshop in Bath. Luxury Retailing, 1685-1765, Wetherby, 2014. Those wealthy enough to afford such items appreciated the workmanship, technical advances, and new and exotic materials that went into their making. The purveyors of these toyshops, a toy-man or toy-woman did not themselves make anything - he or she was purely a retailer, the equivalent of a French marchand mercier.
The Parisian Corporation des Marchands-Merciers was originally founded in the twelfth century as purveyors of fine fabrics. By the eighteenth century the corporation had grown to become a large body representing purveyors of luxury goods of all kinds, including furniture, bronzes, paintings, gold snuff-boxes and porcelain as well as silk and fabrics. In London several of these toy-men described themselves as “jewelers” and many who described themselves as “goldsmith and jeweler” also sold toys such as necessaires and étuis. Some might have employed a craftsman to work in the shop and carry out repairs and alterations, but most would have sent out such work to a craftsman nearby and bought or commissioned stock from specialists. The most famous of these toy-men, James Cox (circa 1723-1800), claimed in 1773 that for “about seven years past [he had] employed from eight hundred to one thousand workmen”. James Cox was a creative genius, he was an inventor, a designer and an entrepreneur. He first made his name as a goldsmith and jeweller but became best known for his incredibly complicated musical automaton clocks and necessaires that incorporated watches, the majority of which were exported abroad to adorn the palaces of the Chinese Emperor and Indian Maharajas as well as the Tsar of Russia and the Ottoman Kings.
The making and marketing of luxury goods involved a complex network of inter-related designers, craftsmen, merchants and retailers. A necessaire such as the present example required the skills of many different trades. The names of several hundred watchmakers, jewellers, goldsmiths, toy-men, lapidaries, and snuff-box makers working in London in the middle decades of the eighteenth century are known, but usually the only visible signature on mounted wares are on those that incorporate a watch. The watch on the present example is signed on the movement by Robert Allam, who was apprenticed in London in 1730 to Thomas Smith, and was a member of the Clockmaker’s Company 1742-1765. He is listed in Baillie's Clock Makers of the World as an eminent clock and a watch maker. A craftsman of considerable skill, a number of his watches are mounted in gold and hardstone cases. It is sometimes difficult to decide whether such a signature is the name of a watchmaker, the workshop who assembled the piece, or a retailer. John Barbot (1702-1766) described himself as a tweezer or étui case maker and is also recorded as a silver and goldsmith. His name is on the watch of a pair of gold-mounted agate necessaires set with rubies and diamonds in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. It also appears on a necessaire in the Imperial Palace Museum, Beijing. The Metropolitan Museum collection also includes a jewel cabinet with enamel plaques, surmounted by a watch with the name of James Cox; a watch in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, is engraved with the name of the London toy-man P. D. Chenevix. None of these men is recognised as a watchmaker. They engraved their names on the watches to advertise the shop from which the piece was bought. These necessaires incorporated the work of many other specialists: James Giles, for example, is associated with many of the small bottles that are found in them. In London there were numerous other toyshops and snuff-box makers, and those who advertised that they 'make and sell' étuis or équipages.
The leisured classes were fascinated by the virtuosity and elegance of these luxurious mechanical wonders. Cox staged an exhibition at the Great Room in Spring Gardens in the 1770s where “thousands of Londoners [marveled] at sumptuous gilded musical cabinets and clocks with elaborate chiming mechanisms… Three times a day, the musical automata sprang into brilliant sound, a mechanical gala concert…” (G. D’Arcy Wood, Romanticism and Music Culture in Britain, 1770-1840: Virtue and Virtuosity, Cambridge, 2010).
The Chinese Export Market.
The present necessaire is a sublime example amongst the exceptional works of art created by English craftsmen in the eighteenth century for export to China. These highly elaborate objects were presented to Chinese officials – including the Emperors, who developed strong fascinations for Western clocks – to facilitate Britain’s trade with China. The insatiable Chinese demand for similar objects, coupled with the immensely lucrative trade which they helped to enable for Britain, led to a burgeoning market for such works in England, and saw the collaboration between highly skilled craftsmen in the realisation of some of the most extraordinary and unusual objects of the eighteenth century.
In the sixteenth century, Matteo Ricci – the first Jesuit missionary given entry to China – presented Western clocks and works of art as tribute to the Chinese Imperial Court. Ricci and his Jesuit confrère, Michele Ruggieri, quickly realized the potential these clocks held in unlocking the Middle Kingdom to the West, and subsequently encouraged a Chinese fascination with European timepieces and objects. This established a precedent of presenting gifts of Western manufacture to gain favour with the Imperial Court, which was appropriated by other Europeans who sought to open trade relations with China from the mid-sixteenth century.
The British East India Company was a major supplier – often via intermediaries – of Western clocks and elaborate works of art to the Chinese Imperial Court. As Britain ever sought to expand its influence in and trade with China, clocks became one of its most important exports to the Far East from the late seventeenth century. The accession of the Emperor Qianlong, who reigned from 1735 to 1795 – during which period the present necessaire was created – marked a zenith in Imperial fascination for such curiosities. This burgeoning interest also encouraged the establishment of private merchants in China including John Henry Cox, son of the aforementioned jeweller and toymaker, James Cox, who established a firm at Canton in the 1780s. Interest in Western clocks and works of art continued in the 19th century, albeit at a considerably more modest scale following the death of Emperor Qianlong.
Alfred de Rothschild (1842-1918)
Alfred de Rothschild, the son of Lionel and Charlotte de Rothschild, was not only one of the wealthiest men of his generation but also a formidable connoisseur and collector of art. His father was head of the Rothschild bank in England, a grandson of the banking dynasty's founder Mayer Amschel de Rothschild and the son of Nathan Mayer de Rothschild, who had settled in England in 1798. The second of Lionel de Rothschild's three sons, Alfred studied at Cambridge, where he was a contemporary of Edward, Prince of Wales (later King Edward VII), who was to remain a lifelong friend. He joined the family bank soon after university at the age of 21, where he was a partner alongside his brothers until his death. He was made a director of the Bank of England at only 26.
The scale of the family's financial success was reflected in an expanding array of houses in both London and the country. Alfred de Rothschild's grandfather, Nathan Mayer, had acquired Gunnersbury Park in the 1830s, the first of a series of country houses that members of the family purchased in the following years. Nathan Mayer's four sons each acquired extensive estates close to each other in Buckinghamshire in the Vale of Aylesbury, within easy reach from the bank in the City of London. In the country they could escape from the daily pressures of their business, hunt and entertain in a manner that would help secure access to the inner sanctums of British society.
Within close proximity, the various branches of the family built houses that vied in magnificence with each other and with those built by their cousins on the continent. Mayer Amschel (1818-1874) constructed perhaps the most remarkable at Mentmore, on the estate that had been acquired from the Harcourt family in the 1850s, whilst his elder brothers Lionel and Anthony built sumptuous mansions at Aston Clinton and Tring. This set a pattern that continued into the next generation with Alfred de Rothschild at Halton, his brother Leopold at Ascott, and his sister Evelina's husband Ferdinand de Rothschild (their cousin from the Austrian branch of the family), and his sister Alice at Waddesdon Manor and Eyethrope.
A passionate collector, Alfred de Rothschild's taste was in many ways similar to that of other members of his family. He acquired the finest French furniture and clocks, porcelain and tapestries, French and English objets-de-vertu, such as the present necessaire, and also German Renaissance silver. In the field of Italian and Spanish art he stood alone buying works with a religious subject. His pictures and works of art were displayed both at his London house in Seamore Place and later at Halton, where his decision to build a new house seems to have been partly conditioned by a desire to provide a suitable setting for his expanding collection. Lady Dorothy Nevill thought him the “finest amateur judge in England of Eighteenth- Century French Art”. He was also more widely involved in the art world in England as a Trustee of the National Gallery and a founder Trustee of the Wallace Collection, to both of which he was also an important benefactor.
The estate and original house at Halton had been acquired by Alfred's father Lionel from the Dashwood family in 1853. Alfred demolished the existing building, and between 1880 and 1883 built a palatial new house on the site in the French style. Many of his finest 18th century portraits by artists such as Gainsborough and Reynolds were hung prominently in the North or Lady's Drawing Room. Glazed cabinets contained pieces from his silver collection. He commissioned Charles Davis to write a two volume catalogue of his collection. Published in 1884, the Inventory of Alfred de Rothschild's Collection included numerous finely executed photographs of the works of art. The chinoiserie necessaire is not listed, suggesting it was acquired after the catalogue’s publication.
Although his fondness for female company was well-known, Alfred de Rothschild never married, and following his death the pictures and many of the works of art, together with much of his estate, were bequeathed to his natural daughter, Almina, Countess of Carnarvon, wife of Herbert, 5th Earl of Carnarvon, the celebrated Egyptologist.
Almina Victoria Marie Alexandra, Countess of Carnarvon (1876-1969)
Almina, Countess of Carnarvon was born Alice Wombwell, the daughter of French born Marie Wombwell, née Boyer (d.1913), whose father was a Parisian banker. Marie Boyer married Captain Frederick Charles Wombwell (1845-1889), the fourth son of Sir George Wombwell 3rd Bt. (1792-1855) in 1868 but the marriage was an unhappy one. Wombwell was an untrustworthy drunkard. Although they had a son Frederick in 1869, Marie became estranged from her husband and whilst separated from him was introduced to Alfred de Rothschild. The couple shared a love of the theatre and opera. Alfred lavished gifts on Marie and their friendship blossomed. Their daughter was born in 1876. Her mother was called ‘Mina’ by friends and family and the addition of the first two initials of her true father’s first name resulted in the unusual Almina. Alfred remained very close to the family and was godfather to Almina. She grew to become a much admired and charming young woman.
She was presented at court in 1893 when she met the young Earl of Carnarvon. He was struck by her and also by the prospect of the sizable dowry and income Alfred had made known would be paid on his daughter’s marriage. The elevation of Almina into the highest levels of the aristocracy would alleviate much of the embarrassment associated with the circumstances of her birth. The couple were married at a service in a lavishly decorated St. Margaret’s Westminster in June 1895. Following a reception at Lansdowne House the couple travelled to Highclere Castle, the principal seat of the Earls of Carnarvon. Lord Carnarvon was somewhat reserved in large gatherings of people but had a passion for travel and was a lover of the new motor cars of the day, driving at speed, resulting in a number of accidents. One in 1901 severely affected his health. His doctor’s recommendation that he should spend time in a warm climate led to Almina and her husband staying for extended periods in Egypt.
Carnarvon became fascinated by the many excavations of ancient sites. In 1907 he met the young archaeologist Howard Carter. The earl funded his work until the outbreak of war in 1914. Almina spent the war years running Highclere as a highly regarded hospital for injured officers at great cost to her husband and Alfred. It outgrew the confines of the castle and in late 1915 Almina moved the hospital to a leased house in Bryanston Square. It was visited by General Kitchener the month it opened and by the King and Queen the next year.
Following the armistice Lord Carnarvon resumed his sponsorship of Carter’s work, with disappointing results until 1922. In November of that year the pair made the greatest archaeological discovery of the 20th century, the almost untouched tomb of the young 18th dynasty pharaoh Tutankhamun. Tragically the earl died in April the next year from an infected mosquito bite and pneumonia. Alfred de Rothschild had died in 1918 leaving Almina his London house, 1 Seamore Place, and its fabulous art collection. Post war taxation and Almina’s lavish entertaining could not be funded by the sale of Carnarvon land and chattels alone. Therefore, following the death of the earl, Almina sold a large proportion of her father’s collection at Christie’s in May 1925. The saleroom correspondent of The Times gave an enthusiastic report of the pre-sale viewing, “Christie’s rooms resembled a private view at the Royal Academy, in that it was difficult to examine the treasures because of the great concourse of visitors”. The Duke of Connaught and other notable figures attended the viewing. The first day of the sale, led by the necessaire, totalled over £10,000. This and the other auctions of Alfred’s treasures alleviated Almina’s financial worries for a time, however, she was never able to adjust to her reduced circumstances, remaining faultlessly generous to friends and extravagant in her tastes. She found happiness once more with her second husband Lt. Col. Ian Onslow Dennistoun but he died in 1938. Almina lived until 1969.
Emile Wertheimer (1874-1953)
This magnificent necessaire was acquired by Emile Wertheimer at the land mark sale of the Carnarvon Art Treasures at Christie’s in 1925. The Times report of the sale records the lot opening at 100 guineas. A bidding battle ensued with the dealer Blairman. It culminated with Mr. Wertheimer paying the top price of the day, 820 guineas (£861) for the spectacular necessaire. When it was next sold in 1953, following the death of Mr. Wertheimer, it was the day’s highlight once more reaching £3,000. The late owner was described in The Times report of the 1953 sale as an American born cinema owner. Wertheimer had been born in New York in 1874, the son of New Yorker Max Wertheimer. He was indeed a pioneer of film in the United Kingdom and was the owner of numerous cinemas. A Punch article from 1953, (‘Mr. Wertheimer Didn’t Care’, Punch, vol. 224, 27 May 1953, p. 639), describes how in 1919 he had “sown the first big cinemas in the West End”. He prospered and “the crop increased a hundred fold from year to year”. He also had a highly successful film distribution business, World’s Master Productions, based in the heart of London’s Theatreland at 35 Little Newport Street. The company was at the forefront of early moving pictures. Wertheimer worked with the ground breaking but controversial American film director and writer D. W. Griffith (1875-1948) buying and distributing his films in the United Kingdom. This was celebrated on the company’s letter head which proudly recorded Griffith’s international successes such as Birth of a Nation made in 1915, Intolerance from the following year and Orphans of the Storm from 1921. Griffith was one of the earliest proponents of the feature film and pioneered the use of close-up shots in his productions. He was a founding member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Science and was awarded a special Oscar later in his career.
Wertheimer had come to London in the early years of the 20th century. The 1901 census records him staying the Hotel Cecil on the Strand. He married fellow American (Callie) Gerome Edwardy (d.1944) in London in 1903. She had been born in Savannah, Georgia in 1880, however, this was not always accurately recorded in her passport applications and in the ships’ passenger records for the numerous trips she took to New York. She often shaved a few years off her age, in one instance reducing it by a full decade. It is evident from the Punch article cited above that Emile was devoted to his wife. They never had children and although Emile was highly successful in the world of motion pictures, he and his wife shared a passion for beautiful works of art and paintings, which they collected together for display in their neo-Georgian north London house. Gerome’s death in 1944 marked the end of Emile’s collecting, being unable to share the joy with his wife. On his death their art collections were dispersed. The funds from the sales, and Emile’s £200,000 estate, endowed a personal charity which was to be administered by trustees for 21 years. Any residue after this time was given to the King Edward Hospital Fund for London.