January 2023

Grand Ladies Site, Wikimedia Commons

Today marks the 122nd anniversary of the birth of Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother, one of the most important royal figures of the 20th century. To celebrate, we’re devoting the month of August to a survey of her most important private jewelry collection: the Greville Bequest. But first, today we’re looking at the unlikely friendship between Dame Margaret Greville and the royal family, and the way that the jewels made their way from Polesden Lacey to Buckingham Palace.

In 1943, in the midst of the Second World War, a black tin trunk embossed with the initials MHG was dispatched from Polesden Lacey, a grand country house in Surrey, to Buckingham Palace. The Queen had been expecting the delivery. Inside the trunk lay a treasure trove of incredible jewels: more than sixty fabulous pieces made by famous jewelry firms like Cartier and Boucheron.

To this day, we only know details about a fraction of the jewel pieces that arrived inside that trunk. But how the jewels got to the palace—and the interesting royal friendship that led them there—is a crucial part of understanding why the Greville Bequest continues to fascinate royal jewelry lovers to this day.

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Dame Margaret Greville, better known to many in London social circles as Mrs. Ronnie Greville, was one of the leading hostesses of her generation. Kings and queens, statesmen and celebrities, everyone who was anyone was on the guest list for parties at her Mayfair home on Charles Street and weekends away at her country home, Polesden Lacey. But Maggie’s story began somewhere much less posh, and in much more perilous circumstances.

Margaret Helen Anderson was born in Scotland in 1863. The parents listed on her birth record were William Anderson, a porter working for the Fountain Brewery in Edinburgh, and his wife, Helen, who worked as a cook. But it seems that William Anderson wasn’t Margaret’s father at all. Her mother had a longstanding relationship with William McEwan, owner of the brewery where William Anderson was employed. When Anderson died in 1885, William McEwan and Helen were married. After their wedding, Margaret was often referred to as McEwan’s “stepdaughter,” but it seems to have been an open secret that she was his biological daughter.

Grand Ladies Site

William McEwan’s brewing enterprise made him immensely rich. That wealth translated to political power as well. He was elected as Edinburgh Central’s parliamentary representative in 1886, a seat he held until 1900. In 1907, King Edward VII appointed McEwan as a member of the Privy Council. His rise in the social world also allowed him to secure an aristocratic husband for his daughter. In April 1891, Maggie married the Hon. Ronald Greville, eldest son of the 2nd Baron Greville and officer in the Life Guards. The new Mrs. Greville received a haul of glittering wedding presents, including a diamond tiara gifted by her father, described in the Truth as “composed of three diamond rivières of single stones.”

Ronnie Greville would eventually retire from the army as a captain and seek his own political career. He was elected MP for Bradford East in 1896, though he was often laid low with various illnesses. Meanwhile, Maggie focused on shoring up her position in the social whirl of London. She and her mother were frequently invited to gala events, including state occasions attended by the royal family. Just a few months after Maggie’s wedding, for example, she wore her new diamond tiara to a state opera performance given in honor of the visiting Emperor and Empress of Germany.

Grand Ladies Site

Over the years, Maggie found herself drawn closer and closer to London’s most fashionable set. She was presented at court shortly after her wedding, and she began to host small parties at the London home in Charles Street that had been purchased by her father. After Queen Victoria’s death in 1901, Maggie became part of the social circle surrounding King Edward VII. She was a close friend of Alice Keppel, who had a well-documented relationship with the monarch. Maggie’s personality made her just the kind of woman that the king liked to have surrounding him at social events. In 1906, the Westminster Gazette noted, “Young, bright, a capital linguist, a good hand at bridge, and always one of the best-dressed women in Society, Mrs. Greville has speedily become a familiar figure in the little circle specially honoured with King Edward’s friendship.”

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For several years, the Grevilles leased Reigate Priory, a Tudor mansion in Surrey, and King Edward made visits there for several consecutive summers during his reign. In 1907, while documenting one of those royal visits, the Graphic called the Grevilles “très répandus in the best and most amusing social world.” The same year, William McEwan acquired Polesden Lacey, a country estate not far from Reigate, for his daughter and son-in-law. But sadly, Ronnie and Maggie’s partnership ended far too soon. In the spring of 1908, just before their seventeenth wedding anniversary, Ronnie was diagnosed with cancer. He underwent surgery to remove a tumor from his larynx that March, but soon afterward, he contracted pneumonia and died.

Maggie went into mourning for a year, escaping England to travel abroad. Devoted to travel as a pursuit, Maggie would traverse the globe during her long widowhood. But back at home, she was also able to maintain her place in royal society. King Edward VII and friends like Mrs. Keppel continued to visit her for weekends at Polesden Lacey. She was also a close friend of his sister, Princess Beatrice, and of Beatrice’s daughter, Queen Ena of Spain. Maggie maintained her connections to the royals after Edward VII’s death in 1910, developing enduring friendships with King George V and Queen Mary and their children. In January 1922, George V made her a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire.

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Mrs. Greville’s home near Berkeley Square was often crowded with members of the family for late parties and dances after palace functions. Following a state banquet during a visit from the King and Queen of Italy in 1924, the house’s ballroom was crowded with both Italian and British royals. “Mariegold in Society,” a gossip column published in the Sketch, recounted a humorous moment on the crowded staircase that led to the ballroom during that particular party: “The poor Prince of Wales, unnoticed and unrecognised in the crush, tried for about ten minutes to get up the staircase, but was stuck halfway, where he could neither go up nor down! A footman appeared saying, ‘Make way for the Duke and Duchess of York.’ ‘Don’t bother about me,’ said the Prince rather plaintively from his place in the crush.”

The Duke and Duchess of York, later King George VI and Queen Elizabeth, were particular favorites of Maggie’s. Because Bertie was the second son and never expected to inherit the throne, Maggie decided in 1914 that she would bequeath Polesden Lacey to him on her eventual death. (According to Pam Burbidge, the offer was reportedly made as a recognition of her gratitude toward the late Edward VII for his enduring friendship.) She loaned the house to the Yorks for their honeymoon in 1923, and they were frequent weekend visitors there, especially in the years before their unexpected accession in 1936. Maggie often referred to Elizabeth as the daughter she never had.

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Following the outbreak of World War II, Maggie took up residence in the Dorchester Hotel in London. In her waning years, she had flirted with support of the German cause before apparently coming to her senses and throwing her heart and resources behind her home country’s war effort. Her health declined, and she was confined to a wheelchair, but she continued to host parties whenever she could, still dripping in her famous jewels. She died in September 1942, not long after the shocking death of the Duke of Kent. Her visit to Balmoral not long after his death was her final visit with the Queen, who recorded in a letter to a friend that she was “very shocked and sad at the change” in Maggie. A few weeks later, after Maggie’s death, Elizabeth wrote, “I shall miss her very much indeed,” adding that “she was so shrewd, so kind, so amusingly unkind, so sharp, so fun, so naughty.”

In death, Maggie dealt a pair of surprises to the King and Queen. In an unexplained change of heart, she had altered her will and bequeathed Polesden Lacey not to George VI, as originally intended, but to the National Trust. Pam Burbidge notes that Maggie left no explanation behind to clarify her decision, but it seems possible that Bertie’s accession to the throne (and the properties that came with it) was a major factor. I don’t believe Bertie’s reaction to the change in plans has been recorded, but considering the moment in time, he was likely much more preoccupied by other matters. The Trust continues to own and maintain the estate today, and it’s open to visitors. The house is one of the most-visited properties in the Trust’s care.

The second surprise was a more pleasant one. Dame Maggie had bequeathed her famous collection of jewelry to Elizabeth. On September 30, 1942, Elizabeth wrote to Arthur Penn, her treasurer, thanking him for sending along details about the surprise legacy, adding that she “hope[d] to keep it quiet.” But she couldn’t resist sharing the news with the one person who would be most thrilled about the bequest: her mother-in-law, Queen Mary. “I must tell you that Mrs Greville has left me her jewels,” she wrote in October 1942. “She has left them to me ‘with her loving thoughts,’ dear old thing, and I feel very touched, I don’t suppose I shall see what they consist of for a long time, owing to the slowness of lawyers & death duties etc, but it is rather exciting to be left something, and I do admire beautiful stones with all my heart.” (Queen Mary replied a few days later: “I can understand your pleasure about the jewels.” She added, “I never had any such luck—but I am not really jealous.”)

National Archives

Elizabeth’s hopes to keep the bequest quiet in the midst of war were firmly dashed by January 1943, after the estate went through probate. Newspapers across the country revealed that Maggie “left:—’With my loving thoughts’ all jewels and jewellery to HM Queen Elizabeth.” They clarified, “Dame Margaret Greville, better known as Mrs ‘Ronnie’ Greville, had a jewel collection of considerable value, containing some magnificent pieces. These jewels will belong to the Queen as her private property and will be entirely distinct from the State jewels which she wears as Queen.” (They also revealed that Maggie had left lb20,000 to Princess Margaret and lb12,500 to Queen Ena of Spain.) But the royal family has still worked to maintain as much privacy as possible around the jewels, not discussing them extensively in public, especially during the years of war and austerity.

When the jewels were delivered to Queen Elizabeth in 1943, they arrived in the same black tin trunk that Maggie had used to store them at Polesden Lacey. The trunk still bore her initials, MHG. To this day, no full inventory of the jewels in that trunk has been published, likely because they are indeed private property, belonging first to Elizabeth and then to her daughter, the present Queen. This has naturally led to (unconfirmed) speculation, including rumors that jewels owned by Marie Antoinette and Empress Joséphine are among the cache. Over the years, the Royal Collection has shared the confirmed Greville provenance of several prominent royal jewels, and on several days over the course of the rest of the month, we’ll be focusing on each of those pieces individually. Stay tuned: there’s lots of Greville sparkle on the way!

For further reading about Dame Margaret Greville, I’d recommend Queen Bees: Six Brilliant and Extraordinary Society Hostesses Between the Wars by S^ian Evans. The Queen Mother’s excerpted letters, edited by William Shawcross, are found in Counting One’s Blessings. Huge thanks also must be offered to Pam Burbidge, a guide, researcher, and historian who volunteers with the National Trust at Polesden Lacey. She kindly sent me a copy of her new book on Dame Maggie, The Maggie Greville Story, which is clearly a labor of love and offers a wealth of information about the famous hostess. The book is currently available for purchase in the UK, but can be delivered internationally from various outlets.

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Today, the people of Belgium celebrate their National Day, so it seems like the perfect time to marvel at a sparkling survey of the royal family’s tiaras!

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The grandest and most important diadem in the Belgian royal collection is undoubtedly the Nine Provinces Tiara. Made in 1926 by Van Bever, the tiara was given to Queen Astrid as a wedding gift by the Belgian people. The piece can be worn in a variety of configurations and is even wearable as a necklace. Queen Mathilde is the current wearer of the tiara, and she’s pictured here in the full jewel at the 75th birthday celebrations for Queen Margrethe II of Denmark in April 2015.

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Queen Mathilde’s second major tiara, the Brabant Laurel Wreath Tiara, belongs to her personally. The jewel was presented to her as a wedding gift in 1999 by a group of Belgian aristocrats. But it’s much older than that: it’s an antique diamond tiara, made in 1912 by Hennel and Sons. It’s also convertible and can be worn as a necklace (as you’ll see below!). She’s wearing the tiara here at the princely wedding reception in Monaco in July 2011.

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Queen Mathilde is also the present wearer of a fantastic little sparkling jewel, the Wolfers Tiara, that comes from the collection of the late Queen Fabiola. She received the convertible necklace/tiara as a wedding gift on behalf of the diamond industry of Antwerp in 1960. More than 200 diamonds are packed into the petite piece, which Mathilde has worn in both its tiara and necklace configurations. She wears it here during an official visit to Poland in October 2015.

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Queen Paola of Belgium is the owner of another fantastic Belgian royal heirloom, Queen Elisabeth’s Art Deco Bandeau. That geometric sparkler, likely made in the early decades of the 20th century, originally belonged to Queen Elisabeth of Belgium. Queen Paola received the tiara from her father-in-law, King Leopold III, and it’s been her go-to jewel for more than six decades. Above, she wears it during the celebrations of the royal wedding in Luxembourg in October 2012. Today, though, she loans it to other family members. It’s been worn by Queen Mathilde, Princess Astrid, and Princess Elisabetta.

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It’s a little tough to see here, but Queen Paola also sometimes wore one of her diamond necklaces as a small tiara, especially in the 1960s. The piece is a delicate Y-shaped necklace of diamonds, which has a pointed peak when worn in tiara form. Queen Paola wears the tiara setting here at a royal reception in October 1967.

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The future Queen of the Belgians, the Duchess of Brabant, debuted a brand-new tiara at a gala in Norway this June. Princess Elisabeth’s Diamond Tiara is an antique jewel that was purchased for her by her parents, King Philippe and Queen Mathilde, as an 18th birthday present. Some have guessed that it may be a diamond tiara that originally belonged to a British aristocratic family (or an identical piece from the same jewelry firm).

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King Philippe’s sister, Princess Astrid, frequently wears a tiara that her husband, Prince Lorenz, inherited from his family. The Savoy-Aosta Tiara is a diamond floral sparkler that was probably made for Princess Anne, Duchess of Aosta. Lorenz inherited the tiara through his mother, Archduchess Margherita of Austria-Este. Princess Astrid wears the tiara here in Brussels in October 2005.

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Princess Claire, King Philippe’s sister-in-law, has a pair of tiaras in her jewelry collection. This small diamond sparkler is her wedding tiara. The jewel was her wedding gift in 2003 from her new parents-in-law, King Albert II and Queen Paola. Here, she wears the tiara during a banquet in honor of the President of Portugal in October 2005.

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Princess Claire also often wears a diamond and pearl tiara, which has a touch of Art Deco style in its design. You’ll also spot fleur-de-lis elements in the piece. She wears the jewel here at the princely wedding reception in Monaco in July 2011.

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There are also a few tiara mysteries lingering in Belgium. Many are hoping that the Spanish Wedding Gift Tiara, Queen Fabiola’s 1960 wedding present from Francisco and Carmen Franco, is still in the royal vaults today. The convertible jewel can be worn in coronet, wreath, and necklace settings, and various colorful gems can be placed in the center of each leaf element. She wears the tiara here in its coronet form in 1963. It hasn’t been seen in public since Fabiola’s death in 2014.

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And then there’s the mystery of the Stockholm Tiara. The modern diamond and pearl jewel was Queen Astrid’s wedding present from the people of Stockholm in 1926. Above, she wears the tiara at the Vatican in January 1930. Its whereabouts remain unknown.

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When you start a series on the jewels of the Greville Bequest, there’s really nowhere else to begin but this sparkling signature jewel: the Greville Tiara.

Grand Ladies Site, Wikimedia Commons

Earlier this week, we discussed the life of Dame Margaret Greville and her surprise decision in 1942 to bequeath her jewels to Queen Elizabeth (later the Queen Mother). We still don’t know exactly how many jewels were in the black tin trunk that was delivered to Buckingham Palace after Mrs. Greville’s estate went through probate in 1943, but we know that one of the most majestic pieces inside was a grand diamond tiara with a distinctive honeycomb pattern.

The tiara had been designed for Mrs. Greville by Lucien Hirtz of Boucheron in Paris in 1921. It was a complete overhaul of another diamond tiara from her collection, which had been made by the same firm 20 years earlier. (You can see a picture of that original tiara, which had a palmette design, in Sir Hugh Roberts’s The Queen’s Diamonds.) Hirtz used the diamonds from that original tiara to fashion a new, modern diadem with an eye-catching geometric design. Roberts called the resulting tiara, which had a kokoshnik-style silhouette, “one of the most striking and unusual of the jewels inherited from Mrs. Greville by Queen Elizabeth.”

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Queen Elizabeth inherited the grand Greville jewels in the middle of World War II, so naturally she did not wear them in public until after the conflict’s end. Roberts suggests that she first wore the Greville Tiara, as it is known by the royal family, in public for a state ball during the family’s royal tour of South Africa in March 1947. Above, she wears the kokoshnik-style version of the honeycomb tiara for another gala event, held during a state visit by Queen Juliana of the Netherlands to Britain in 1950. On that occasion, she paired the tiara with another fabulous Greville inheritance, the Festoon Necklace. (Behind her, Princess Margaret wears Queen Mary’s Diamond Lozenge Tiara.)

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In 1953, Queen Elizabeth (now the Queen Mother) decided to make her own alterations to the Greville Tiara. She turned to Cartier to add additional height to the tiara by reconfiguring some of the diamonds from the top line of the piece. Four round diamond brilliants and a marquise-cut diamond were added to the tiara as part of the slight redesign. (The newer diamonds can be distinguished from the original ones by their setting; the original diamonds are surrounded by a millegrain setting, while the newer diamonds are not.) Roberts notes that the round diamonds were sourced from a brooch from Elizabeth’s collection that had been dismantled by Cartier four years earlier. The changes somehow made the already-imposing tiara even more impressive.

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As we discussed earlier, the jewels that Elizabeth inherited from Mrs. Greville were her own private property, and she generally kept their provenance quiet. That meant that earlier jewelry historians often made erroneous claims about the source and creation of the jewel, largely because they had access to incomplete information. Both Suzy Menkes and Leslie Field, writing in the 1980s, argued that Elizabeth had had the entire tiara commissioned herself using a cache of South African diamonds given in 1901 to either King Edward VII or Queen Mary. Field wrote (incorrectly) that Elizabeth had chosen the tiara’s design herself. Menkes called the diadem “the last grand tiara made for the English royal family.”

Both Menkes and Field were incorrect in their understanding of the tiara’s provenance, partly because Elizabeth was so tight-lipped about the Greville bequest pieces in general. By the end of her very long life, though, she was more comfortable sharing some information about the tiara’s origins. In 1997, the Queen Mother began loaning some of her personal jewels, including the Strathmore Rose Tiara, to exhibitions curated by Geoffrey Munn, beginning a collaborative relationship with the jewelry historian. In his landmark book, Tiaras: A History of Splendour, Munn clarified some of the details about the Greville Tiara, correcting earlier misinformation. He wrote that the “openwork diamond tiara” did indeed come from the Greville bequest, adding the accurate information that the piece was constructed by Boucheron for Mrs. Greville and later altered by Cartier for the Queen Mother. About a decade later, Hugh Roberts’s book on The Queen’s Diamonds also offered a final, solid Greville provenance for the piece.

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After the tiara was returned from Cartier, the Queen Mother made it one of her most-worn tiaras for the rest of her life. (The only other diadem she wore in public during her long widowhood was Queen Victoria’s Indian Circlet.) Above, the Queen Mother wears the altered Greville Tiara for a Women’s Institute birthday celebration in November 1960. (She’s also wearing the Greville Peardrop Earrings, Queen Alexandra’s Wedding Necklace, and her Silver Anniversary Flower Brooch.)

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The Queen Mother paired the tiara with the Greville Emeralds and Queen Victoria’s Diamond Fringe Brooch for a gala performance during the Belgian state visit in May 1963.

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In April 1972, for another state visit by Queen Juliana of the Netherlands to London, the Queen Mother again paired the tiara with the Greville Emeralds and the Fringe Brooch. (Juliana is resplendent here in sapphire and diamond jewels from the Dutch royal collection, including Queen Emma’s Sapphire Tiara and Necklace.)

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The Queen Mother often wore the tiara (which has a relatively lightweight platinum setting) for concerts and film premieres. Here, she wears the tiara with the Greville Peardrop Earrings, Queen Alexandra’s Wedding Necklace, and Queen Mary’s Diamond Choker Bracelet for the premiere of A Passage to India in March 1985. Beside her, Princess Anne wears pearls, and Diana, Princess of Wales wears emeralds.

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Impressively, the Queen Mum kept wearing the tiara right up until the very end of her incredible life. Here, in December 1998, she wears the tiara with the Greville Peardrop Earrings and three strands of the Greville Festoon Necklace during the German state visit to Britain. She’s pictured here arriving for the state banquet at Windsor Castle with the then-Archbishop of Canterbury, George Carey. Can you believe that she’s 98 years old here?!?

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When Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother passed away in March 2002, the Greville Tiara (and all of her jewels) were left to her daughter, Queen Elizabeth II. It’s perhaps no surprise that the present Queen has never worn her mother’s diamond tiara—the piece must have been so indelibly associated with the Queen Mum for her. But when another new member joined the family three years later, the Queen handed the tiara over to her.

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The Duchess of Cornwall, the Queen’s daughter-in-law, is the present wearer of the Greville Tiara. She doesn’t own the tiara personally—The Queen’s Diamonds revealed that the Queen has offered the piece to Camilla as a long-term loan. One of her earliest public appearances in the tiara came in March 2006 at a state banquet in honor of the President of Brazil. On that occasion, she paired the tiara with the earrings and necklace from her pear-shaped diamond demi-parure.

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There must be something about this tiara, as it is now also the Duchess’s most-worn gala jewel. The piece must be comfortable to wear, and we can see that it coordinates nicely with lots of different ensembles and accessories. Here, Camilla wears the tiara for the Commonwealth Heads of Government Banquet in Uganda in November 2007. She’s also wearing her pear-shaped diamond earrings, plus all five strands of the remarkable Greville Festoon Necklace.

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Here’s another view of Camilla wearing the tiara for another CHOGM Banquet, held in Sri Lanka in November 2013.

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Whenever Camilla attends a tiara event these days, whether it’s a state banquet or the State Opening of Parliament (pictured above, 2019), you can almost bet that she’ll be bringing the Greville Tiara along with her. Of all of the jewels from the Greville Bequest, this one so far is probably the piece with the most lasting royal legacy.

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