My original issue is not whether QM gave items to QEQM but rather if, and what, she left to her at the time of her death.
Cheers! Bryce
--Previous Message-- : I think Queen Mary was extremely generous with : her gifts of jewels to QEQM. The initial : gift on her marriage of a sapphire demi : parure might not have been too lavish (there : was also the tiara and suite from George VI) : but later the gifts increased... the diamond : crescents tiara and circles necklace that : had belonged to her own mother the Duchess : of Teck said a great deal and of course she : her great sense of history she handed over : the immense Delhi Durbar diadem.. : : --Previous Message-- : I agree with Nellie’s assessment of the : situation, as I think has often been the : case, in that “just Royal ladies sharing : some jewels in a practical way.” But there : is method to their madness. : : I think the QM was very cognoscente and : deliberate in the distribution of her : jewels. She would have been aware that the : Princess Royal (Mary) and the later sons : (Gloucester and Kent) would require jewels : as they would not be in the same position as : George VI (QEQM) and, in fact by then, QEII : to have available to them the jewels : associated with their loftier positions. : The proverbial ‘second son’ would not : inherit and the daughters were expected to : be furnished by their husbands. QM : delivered her jewels where she felt they : would be needed most – QEQM was probably not : high on her list of those in need of some : extra jewels : : We can pretty much list QM’s jewellery : inherited by the Harewoods, Gloucesters and : Kents but (back to my original question) not : QEQM. I am not saying she did not get : anything, I just do not recall reading what, : if anything, she received. (now I see : Arthur’s reference from Field re the : sapphire – could this be Princess Anne’s : copy? I cannot remember when it was : acquired) : : QEII, sensitive to her mother’s position, : let her keep for her personal use many of : the heirloom jewels that should have passed : to her on her ascension. However, QEII : already had quite a trove of jewellery and : no doubt felt that her mother would (and : should) need to retain some majestic jewels : as befitting her status as Dowager Queen. : QEQM was still a very active member of the : BRF and would require such jewellery. QEII, : like most daughters, no doubt let her mother : keep the pieces she liked famously saying : “Mummy will give them back some day” (no : doubt a euphemism). : : I think I am correct in saying that Queen : Alexandra kept some “heirloom jewellery” as : well during her tenure as Dowager – but : correct me if I am wrong. : : I do not recall that QM “kept back” and : heirloom pieces – she still had significant : personal jewels to fulfill her role a : Dowager. : : As I mentioned initially, QM seems to have : provided early for QEII by providing her : with some major pieces at her wedding (at : which point she, for all intends and : purposes, was heir apparent) perhaps with : the (ultimately incorrect) thought that it : would be some time before Princess Elizabeth : would succeed her father and have access to : the full “vault”. : : Ultimately, I do not think that we can say, : even with the advantage of hindsight, that : any of the Dowager Queens (QA, QM or QEQM) : were left in the lurches, as it were, in : respect to the volume and importance of the : jewels they used in their dower years. : : I do not think that the exact timing of the : transfer of these jewels ultimately : mattered. I do not believe that any pieces : ultimately left the “Queen to Queen” stream : – some pieces were just held a little longer : by some. Probably this was a good thing : because it allowed us to see various jewels : more often as there were more people who : were available to wear them. : : Cheers! : Bryce : : --Previous Message-- : I have no photographic (or portraitural) : evidence that QEQM wore the Fringe Necklace : during her husband's reign. The earliest : picture I have of QEQM with this necklace is : this (already seen) photoshoot by Dorothy : Wilding, which is dated 1954 by the National : Portrait Gallery: : : : : http://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portraitLarge/mw14089/Queen-Elizabeth-the-Queen-Mother : : : : : I simply suggested that we have neither a : photographic evidence of Queen Elizabeth the : Queen Mother wearing Queen Adelaide's Fringe : Necklace/Tiara before 1953-1954, nor of : Queen Mary wearing it after 1936 (and even : after the 1920s). So there is a gap in the : 1930s and 1940s during which this : necklace/tiara could have been in Queen : Mary's as well as in Queen Elizabeth's : hands. As Queen Mary seemed to be very : respectful about the rules regarding the : Crown jewels, I suspect that she probably : handed over this jewel to Queen Elizabeth in : 1936, but we need further documentation from : the Royal Collection to be sure. : : Here worn (as a tiara) by Queen Mary in : 1911: : : : http://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portraitLarge/mw54403/Queen-Mary?sort=dateDesc&search=sp&sText=queen+mary&displayNo=60&wPage=3&rNo=218 : : : : : : --Previous Message-- : : Exactly, I meant to write in my previous : that the reason QEII waived her inheritance : of the fringe necklace was because her own : London fringe was so similar. : But I was in a hurry to go out and I spelt : waived without a i. : And to Arthur I will be very interested if : someone can produce evidence of Queen : Elizabeth wearing the fringe necklace as : consort. : It would an irony that she only started : wearing a necklace she had been entitled to : at the moment she was no longer Queen. : : : --Previous Message-- : : I have it! : : QEII had her own London fringe necklace. So : similar to the heirloom one. : So QEII lent the heirloom one to QEQM. : : But all theories require Queen Mary to have : hung on to an heirloom fringe and I don't : think that was like her. : : Edit: perhaps on QEQM becoming Queen, Queen : Mary had offered the heirloom one but QEQM : could not wear it as a tiara - effectively. : None of them could, so Queen Mary offered : her own fringe tiara to Queen Elizabeth (QM) : instead. : : --Previous Message-- : Merlin, : : your suggestion that the Fringe Necklace was : bequeathed by Queen Mary to Queen-Mother : Elizabeth relies on the fact that the : Queen-Mother never wore this necklace before : 1953 and wore it quite frequently after this : date. That makes it a plausible argument. : : Nevertheless, we can also notice that Queen : Mary was never seen wearing Queen Adelaide's : Fringe (whether as a tiara or as a necklace) : after the 1920s. As Queen Adelaide's Fringe : was a Crown heirloom, it makes sense that : Queen Mary handed this necklace/tiara to : Queen Elizabeth in 1936. After, for whatever : reason, Queen Elizabeth never wore it during : her husband's reign, but we can not exclude : that the necklace was already at her : disposal from the late 1930s on. : : : --Previous Message-- : : Arthur might well be right I don't see much : evidence of a third fringe. : What I do still think is that there is no : visual evidence I have ever seen of QEQM : wearing a fringe necklace as Queen. : All those evening events in Canada and South : Africa along with a host at home. : I could well accept that on Queen Mary's : death in 1953 the present Queen waved her : bequest of the Diamond Fringe Necklace and : let her Mother have a life time loan of it. : I come back to my original point that it is : 1953 of all years that QEQM starts to wear : the fringe necklace. : And from then it comes out often. : : : : : : --Previous Message-- : : Arthur - your paras - : : First - I completely agree, and think there : was also that gorgeous pearl brooch of QV : : Second - strongly support you there. I have : never seen it, as far as I can possibly : know. : : Third - not really convinced - not the same : need. : : Don't know about the sapphires. : : Final - I strongly support that the Durbar : never belonged to QEQM. Years ago the Royal : Insight Q&As supported my belief. : : : --Previous Message-- : Apparently, for whatever reason, Queen : Elizabeth the Queen Mother retained with : her, after her husband's death and her : daughter's accession, several of the jewels : considered as Crown heirlooms, which she had : received from Queen Mary in 1936 and which : she should normally have handed over to : Queen Elizabeth II in 1952. The most famous : examples are Queen Victoria's Oriental : Diadem and Ruby Parure and Queen Victoria's : Household Diamond Jubilee Brooch, but it is : also the case with Queen Adelaide's Fringe : Necklace (Hugh Roberts' The Queen's : Diamonds explicitely confirms that it was : retained by the Queen Mother until her death : in 2002). The Queen (Elizabeth II) would : have been entitled to claim these jewels : back as soon as 1952, but she probably did : not want to enter an argument with her : mother (considering probably she had enough : jewels for herself on her own). : : Therefore, I am getting more and more : suspicious about the very existence of a : fringe necklace from Princess Victoria. As : far as I know, we have never seen pictures : or portraits of Princess Victoria with a : fringe necklace (or a fringe tiara), this : necklace is never mentioned in any of the : autoritative documentation about the British : royal jewels (Field's or Roberts' books, : Royal Collection's website...), and we have : the confirmation by Roberts that the fringe : necklace worn by the Queen Mother is from : Queen Adelaide, and not from Princess : Victoria... : : I agree with Merlin that, as Queen Mary : bequeathed some jewels to her younger : daughters-in-law, the Duchesses of : Gloucester and of Kent, there would be no : reason to treat Queen-Mother Elizabeth : differently and to deny her any bequest : (both Queens were known to be in good terms, : and the fact that QEQM's husband was already : dead when Queen Mary died in 1953 could not : have been a reason, as it was the case for : the Duchess of Kent too). : : Regarding the jewels which could have been : bequeathed by Queen Mary to Queen Elizabeth : the Queen Mother, Leslie Field mentions a : sapphire and diamond brooch "almost : identical [to the Prince Albert Brooch] , : which had been bought in 1937 by Queen Mary : from the London jeweller S. J. Phillips. It : was one of a set of three that had been part : of the French Crown Jewels. Queen Mary : bequeathed it to Queen Elizabeth in : 1953" . Actually, I am puzzled by this : assertion, as I can not identify which : brooch this could be (all the sapphire : brooches I have seen in the British Royal : Family are different-looking from The French : Crown Jewels sapphire brooches). The three : brooches are, on the pictures below, linked : to the top of the earrings and as the clasp : of the necklace on our left: : : : : There is also the example of another : sapphire and diamond brooch, from Russian : origin, thought to have been purchased in : 1934 by Queen Mary from the daughters of the : late Russian Empress Maria Feodorovna. Queen : Elizabeth the Queen Mother wore this brooch : regularly (though not frequently) throughout : her life, so we can guess it was a bequest : from Queen Mary. Queen Elizabeth II wore : this brooch for the first (and until now : only) time on 3rd April 2014 when she paid : an official visit to Italian President : Giorgio Napolitano and to Pope Francis in : Rome. : : : : : And finally, there is the unclear situation : of the Delhi Durbar diamond tiara. It was a : private belonging of Queen Mary (made in : 1911 with the diamonds from a Boucheron loop : tiara made in 1902 with diamonds presented : in 1901 to Queen Mary, then Duchess of York, : by the directors of the De Beers Mine, Cape : Town). Hugh Roberts mentions it was : "loaned" to Queen(-Mother) : Elizabeth for the South African Tour in 1947 : (which implies it was still considered as : Queen Mary's private property) and since : then retained by the Queen-Mother until her : death in 2002. Maybe Queen Mary bequeathed : the tiara to Queen Elizabeth the Queen : Mother (though the latter already had the : use of it). : : Queen Mary probably bequeathed to Queen : Elizabeth the Queen Mother some smaller : jewels (bracelets, rings...), but I have not : tried to hunt for that. : : Best wishes, : : Arthur : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : :
on September 1, 2014, 3:05 pm, in reply to "