First marriage , 1905. , dressed as the
French Ambassador to the Court of Catherine the Great. Marlborough was married twice. His first wife was the American railroad heiress
Consuelo Vanderbilt, whom he married at
Saint Thomas Church in New York City on 6 November 1895. The marriage was a mercenary one. Inheriting his near-bankrupt dukedom in 1892, he was forced to find a quick and drastic solution to the financial problems of his family. Prevented by the strict social dictates of late 19th-century society from earning money, he was left with one solution; to marry money. The marriage was celebrated following lengthy negotiations with his bride's divorced parents: her mother,
Alva Vanderbilt, was desperate to see her daughter a duchess, and the bride's father,
William Vanderbilt, paid for the privilege. The value of the initial marriage settlement was $5,000,000, although the Duke and his descendants continued to benefit from millions of dollars of gifts and inheritances from members of Consuelo's family throughout the 20th century. The bride later claimed she had been locked in her room until she agreed to the marriage. The contract was actually signed in the vestry of St. Thomas Episcopal Church, immediately after the wedding vows had been made. While they honeymooned in Europe, Marlborough told Consuelo that he actually loved another woman but had married her to "save
Blenheim". They had two sons,
John Spencer-Churchill, Marquess of Blandford, eventually the 10th Duke of Marlborough, and
Lord Ivor Spencer-Churchill. Their mother famously referred to them as "the heir and the spare". The Vanderbilt dowry was used to restore Blenheim Palace and replenish its furnishings and library, for many of the original contents had been sold over the course of the 19th century. Many of the jewels worn by subsequent Duchesses of Marlborough also date from this period. The 9th Duke employed noted landscape gardener
Achille Duchêne to create the
water garden on the terrace at Blenheim. In 1934 he owned 19,685 acres of land. After the Duke's death the income would be paid to Consuelo for her lifetime, and thereafter to the holder of the Dukedom (provided that they were also a descendant of Consuelo and the Ninth Duke). Although the couple separated in 1906, further transfers of wealth to the Duke's descendants from the Vanderbilt family included: • The income from a $5,000,000 trust fund created by William K. Vanderbilt in 1912, which would be payable to Consuelo for life and then to her sons by the Duke; • The income from a further $450,000 trust settled on Consuelo, and then her sons by Vanderbilt in 1919;
Separation and divorce Throughout their marriage Consuelo was far from happy; she recorded many of her problems in her autobiography
The Glitter and the Gold. Consuelo was also unfaithful; her liaisons included her first love,
Winthrop Rutherfurd (who was alleged to be the father of her second son,
Lord Ivor, since he allegedly bore no resemblance to either the Duke or his brother), and three of her husband's cousins:
Hon. Freddie Guest (son of
Ivor Guest, 1st Baron Wimborne, and Lady Cornelia Spencer-Churchill), Hon. Reginald Fellowes (son of
William Fellowes, 2nd Baron de Ramsey, and Lady Rosamund Spencer-Churchill) and
Charles, Viscount Castlereagh. The couple shocked society by separating in 1906. In order to facilitate the divorce, Alva Vanderbilt testified that she had coerced her daughter into marrying the Duke. The couple were divorced in 1921; their marriage obtained a
declaration of nullity by the
Catholic Church on 19 August 1926, no doubt facilitated by the
Anglican Duke's wish to become a
Roman Catholic. Consuelo subsequently married a Frenchman,
Jacques Balsan. She died in 1964, having lived to see her son become Duke of Marlborough; she frequently returned to Blenheim, the house she had found uncomfortable and inconvenient when living there.
Second marriage In the late 1890s, the Duke invited to Blenheim Palace
Gladys Deacon, another American, who became friends with Consuelo. Deacon, the daughter of
Edward Parker Deacon, became the Duke's mistress soon after moving into the palace. She and Marlborough were married on 25 June 1921 in Paris, shortly after his divorce from Consuelo. He moved out of the palace, and two years later evicted her. The couple separated but never divorced. ==Death==