BEAUTY'S DEATH

Greymouth Evening Star, 13 September 1923, Page 7

BEAUTY'S DEATH

KE VOL VER CAREER. LONDON, September 2. Did carrying Aladdin’s magic lamp in a pantomime win lor a publican’s daughter the riches of Aladdin’s cave and two princely husbands ? The career of Jessica Harrington suggests that when she rubbed the lamp a genie read her secret wishes. Her face was her fortune, says the acquaintances of Princess Abbas Halim, who died by an accidental revolver shot in Alexandria. She began life as Jessica Harrington, the daughter of a London publican, and was 26 years old., After marrying a scion of one of the oldest noble houses in England, and next a brother of the former Khedive of Egypt, she married Prince Abbas Halim. When she was 16 she became an apprentice to a milliner at the Maison Lewis, in London. Her blonde beauty was so striking that she became a

mannequin. Her next role was that of showgirl in an Aladdin pantomime at

■ a suburban theatre. »’ 'Though her part consisted merely of donning lights and carrying a lantern, ’ and sometimes joining the chorus, she met al the theatre Captain J. T. Ellis, Um young grand-nephew' of the late 1 Lord Howard de Walden. He had just come of age. and inherited £lOO,OOO. t Marriage followed, and the greatest ’ delight of Um captain’s bride was to ■ roll' up at Um Maison Tiewis in a magnificent motor-car, chat to her I former apprentice and mannequin ’ friends, ami buy on a lavish scale, f Alter five years in a Park Lane man- ■ sion, entertaining on a magnificent, i scale, Captain Ellis dissipated his fortune. His wife divorced him, and soon married Prince Djemal-id-Eddin, brother of the former Khedive. They were quickly divorced, aiid Jessica married Prince Abbas Halim. Some of her friends say that she was vivacious and irresistibly gay, as well as beautiful, but that she made jealous enemies among her colleagues of the chorus, while still in her teens, through her grandiose style of driving to the

theater in her own sumptuous motorcar, and wearing wonderful jewels and furs. Jessica’s sister Beatrice married Prince Louis of Bourbon, a cousin of Ki rig Alfonso. The verdict at the inquest was one of accidental death.