DUCHESS OF ORLEANS

Evening Post, Volume CXII, Issue 141, 11 December 1926, Page 22

DUCHESS OF ORLEANS

DISINHEEITED BY HEB

HUSBAND.

The will of the Duke of Orleans proved an interesting human document (writes the London correspondent of the Melbourne "Argus" on 23rd September). The tragedy of the Duke's life was an unhappy marriage. The Duke's English estate was valued at £150,000, though there are even larger estates in Hungary, Belgium, and Italy, the value of which has yet to be revealed. The will expressly ordered that the Duchess of Orleans should not benefit in any way. A life annuity of £6000 was left to Mrs. Violette Jarrott, wife of Mr. Charles Jarrott, the chairman of thd Automobile Association. During a part of his last illness, much of which was passed in a violent delirium, the Duke of Orleans stayed with Mr. and Mrs. Jarrott at Wimbledon, and the generous bequest to Mrs. Jarrott may be regarded as an expression of, the Duke's thanks. Mrs. Jarrott is a daughter of the. late Mr. Bobert Vyner, a breeder of racehorses. Her son, Lord Loughborough, is heir to the earldom of 'Eosslyn. Before her present marriage Mrs. Jarrott was Countess of Eosslyn. The disinherited Duchess was a ' member of the Austrian Boyal House. It is said that the Duke looked for a dowry of £250,000 when he married, and that he was keenly disappointed when the bride's father mergly remitted the interest upon this amount annually, instead of handing over the capital. Later the annuities ceased completely when the bride's mother, the Archduchess Clothilde, got into financial difficulties'. But for the persuasion of his Boyalist supporters, the Duke of Orleans would have, left his wife very soon after marriage. In 1904 he made an effort to obtain a divorce, but three years later there was a temporary reconciliation. In 1913 there were further quarrels, and the Duko was forced to make his wife an allowance, by order of a "Tribunal of Honour," which met in Brussels. To-day the Duch ess is living in Austria, where' her beauty, kindly nature, and high principles are generally recognised.