Elizabeth Astor Winthrop Chanler Chapman (February 23, 1866 – June 5, 1937) was an American heiress and socialite during the

Gilded Age In United States history, the Gilded Age was an era extending roughly from 1877 to 1900, which was sandwiched between the Reconstruction era and the Progressive Era. It was a time of rapid economic growth, especially in the Northern and Wes ...

Early life and family

Elizabeth, or "Bessie", was the eldest surviving daughter born to

U.S. Representative The United States House of Representatives, often referred to as the House of Representatives, the U.S. House, or simply the House, is the lower chamber of the United States Congress, with the Senate being the upper chamber. Together they c ...

John Winthrop Chanler John Winthrop Chanler (September 14, 1826 – October 19, 1877) was a prominent New York lawyer and a U.S. Representative from New York. He was a member of the Dudley–Winthrop family and married Margaret Astor Ward, a member of the Astor famil ...

(1826–1877) and Margaret Astor ( née Ward) Chanler (1838–1875) of the wealthy

Astor family The Astor family achieved prominence in business, society, and politics in the United States and the United Kingdom during the 19th and 20th centuries. With ancestral roots in the Italian Alps region of Italy by way of Germany, the Astors settled ...

. Through her father, she was a descendant of Peter Stuyvesant, the last Dutch

Director-General of New Amsterdam This is a list of Directors, appointed by the Dutch West India Company, of the 17th century Dutch province of New Netherland (''Nieuw-Nederland'' in Dutch) in North America. Only the last, Peter Stuyvesant, held the title of Director General. As t ...

Wait Winthrop Waitstill Winthrop (27 February 1642 – 7 November 1717) was a colonial magistrate, military officer, and politician of New England. Early life Winthrop was born on 27 February 1642 in Boston, the capital of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. He wa ...

and

Joseph Dudley Joseph Dudley (September 23, 1647 – April 2, 1720) was a colonial administrator, a native of Roxbury in Massachusetts Bay Colony, and the son of one of its founders. He had a leading role in the administration of the Dominion of New England ...

. Through her mother, she was a grand-niece of

Julia Ward Howe Julia Ward Howe (; May 27, 1819 – October 17, 1910) was an American author and poet, known for writing the " Battle Hymn of the Republic" and the original 1870 pacifist Mother's Day Proclamation. She was also an advocate for abolitionism ...

John Jacob Astor III John Jacob Astor III (June 10, 1822 – February 22, 1890) was an American financier, philanthropist and a soldier during the American Civil War. He was a prominent member of the Astor family, becoming the wealthiest member in his generation and ...

, and William Backhouse Astor, Jr. (husband of

Caroline Schermerhorn Astor Caroline Webster "Lina" Schermerhorn Astor (September 22, 1830 – October 30, 1908) was a prominent American socialite of the second half of the 19th century who led the Four Hundred. Famous for being referred to later in life as "the Mrs. Asto ...

, who was Elizabeth's godmother). Chanler and her siblings became orphans after the death of their mother in December 1875 and their father in October 1877, both to pneumonia. The children were raised at Rokeby, their parents' 43 room estate in Barrytown. Elizabeth, a "beautiful and tough-minded woman who even in the nursery was known as 'Queen Bess' by her siblings," had nine brothers and sisters, including John Armstrong Chanler (who married novelist Amélie Louise Rives); politicians William Astor Chanler,

Lewis Stuyvesant Chanler Lewis Stuyvesant Chanler (September 24, 1869 in Newport, Rhode Island – February 28, 1942 in New York City) was an American lawyer and politician who served as Lieutenant Governor of New York from 1907 to 1908. Early life He was the fifth ...

, and the artist

Robert Winthrop Chanler Robert Winthrop Chanler (February 22, 1872 – October 24, 1930) was an American artist and member of the Astor and Dudley–Winthrop families. A designer and muralist, Chanler received much of his art training in France at the École des Beaux- ...

. Her sister Margaret Livingston Chanler, served as a nurse with the American Red Cross during the

Spanish–American War , partof = the Philippine Revolution, the decolonization of the Americas, and the Cuban War of Independence , image = Collage infobox for Spanish-American War.jpg , image_size = 300px , caption = (cloc ...

(and wife of Richard Aldrich), Winthrop Astor Chanler, served in the

Rough Riders The Rough Riders was a nickname given to the 1st United States Volunteer Cavalry, one of three such regiments raised in 1898 for the Spanish–American War and the only one to see combat. The United States Army was small, understaffed, and di ...

in Cuba and was wounded at the Battle of Tayacoba.

Society life

At her father's death in 1871, his estate was valued between $1,500,000 (equivalent to $) and $2,000,000 (equivalent to $ in dollars). John Winthrop Chanler's will provided $20,000 a year for each child for life, enough to live comfortably by the standards of the time.Thomas, Lately. ''The Astor Orphans: A Pride of Lions'', W. Morrow, 1971. In 1892, Elizabeth, her sisters, Margaret and Alida, and her brother Winthrop and his wife Margaret, were all included in

Ward McAllister Samuel Ward McAllister (December 28, 1827 – January 31, 1895) was a popular arbiter of social taste in the Gilded Age of late 19th-century America. He was widely accepted as the authority as to which families could be classified as the cream o ...

's "

Four Hundred 400 (four hundred) is the natural number following 399 and preceding 401. Mathematical properties 400 is the square of 20. 400 is the sum of the powers of 7 from 0 to 3, thus making it a repdigit in base 7 (1111). A circle is divided into ...

," purported to be an index of New York's best families, published in ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

''. Conveniently, 400 was the number of people that could fit into Mrs. Astor's ballroom. Elizabeth was a member of the Cosmopolitan Club of New York. In 1893, while she was in London for a brother's wedding, John Singer Sargent, the most famous and sought after portrait artist of the day, painted a portrait of the then twenty-six year old Elizabeth. According to Sargent, she had "the face of the Madonna and the eyes of a child." Her son donated the portrait to the Smithsonian American Art Museum in 1980.

Personal life

On April 23, 1899, Chanler married author

John Jay Chapman John Jay Chapman (March 2, 1862 – November 4, 1933) was an American author. Early life Chapman was born in New York City on March 2, 1862. He was a son of Henry Grafton Chapman Jr. (1833–1883), a broker who became president of the New York S ...

(1862–1933), the son of Henry Grafton Chapman, a president of the

New York Stock Exchange The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE, nicknamed "The Big Board") is an American stock exchange in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan in New York City. It is by far the world's largest stock exchange by market capitalization of its listed ...

, and Eleanor Kingsland (née Jay) Chapman, a great-granddaughter of

John Jay John Jay (December 12, 1745 – May 17, 1829) was an American statesman, patriot, diplomat, abolitionist, signatory of the Treaty of Paris, and a Founding Father of the United States. He served as the second governor of New York and the f ...

, the first Supreme Court Chief Justice. Chapman was previously married to Minna Timmins, who died in 1897. Elizabeth and her husband had one child together: * Chanler Armstrong Chapman (1901–1982), who married Olivia James, a niece of

Henry James Henry James ( – ) was an American-British author. He is regarded as a key transitional figure between literary realism and literary modernism, and is considered by many to be among the greatest novelists in the English language. He was the ...

. They divorced and he married the former Helen Riesenfeld, a writer, in 1948. After her death in 1970, he married Dr. Ida R. Holzbert Wagman in 1972. Reportedly, Chapman served as the model for

Saul Bellow Saul Bellow (born Solomon Bellows; 10 July 1915 – 5 April 2005) was a Canadian-born American writer. For his literary work, Bellow was awarded the Pulitzer Prize, the Nobel Prize for Literature, and the National Medal of Arts. He is the only w ...

's 1959 novel ''

Henderson the Rain King ''Henderson the Rain King'' is a 1959 novel by Saul Bellow. The book's blend of philosophical discourse and comic adventure has helped make it one of his more popular works. The novel is said to be Bellow's favorite among his books. It was ranke ...

''. Her husband died at her home, "Good Hap", on November 4, 1933 near

Barrytown, New York Barrytown is a hamlet (and census-designated place) within the town of Red Hook in Dutchess County, New York, United States. It is within the Hudson River Historic District, a National Historic Landmark, and contains four notable Hudson River V ...

. After his death, Elizabeth spent several years working on a volume of his collected letters, which she completed just before her own death. Elizabeth died on June 5, 1937 and was buried at Saint Matthew's Episcopal Churchyard in Bedford, New York.

Residences

In 1902, Elizabeth bought the former Livingston mansion, known as Edgewater, and located next to her childhood home, Rokeby, in

for $20,000 from the estate of the second owner, Robert Donaldson Jr. In 1905, she and her husband moved into a new house, known as Sylvania, that was designed by architect Charles A. Platt, and built on the hill above Edgewater. Thereafter, her mother-in-law lived at Edgewater from 1910 until at least 1914. In 1917, Elizabeth sold Edgewater to her stepson, Conrad Chapman, for $1.00. Conrad lived abroad most of his life and eventually sold the house in 1947.Conrad Chapman's address in his 1921 NY

Social Register The ''Social Register'' is a semi-annual publication in the United States that indexes the members of American high society. First published in the 1880s by newspaper columnist Louis Keller, it was later acquired by Malcolm Forbes. Since 2014, ...

entry was

Oxford, England Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the Un ...

, and in the 1931 edition,

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...

. The house was later owned by writer

Gore Vidal Eugene Luther Gore Vidal (; born Eugene Louis Vidal, October 3, 1925 – July 31, 2012) was an American writer and public intellectual known for his epigrammatic wit, erudition, and patrician manner. Vidal was bisexual, and in his novels and e ...

and financier

Richard Jenrette Richard Hampton Jenrette (April 5, 1929 – April 22, 2018) was an American businessman who co-founded the investment bank Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette (DLJ). Early life Jenrette was born on April 5, 1929, in Raleigh, North Carolina, the son of ...

. Shortly before her husband's death, they moved into a cottage built on the grounds of Sylvania they named "Good Hap" and turned Sylvania over to her son, Chanler Chapman.

References

;Notes ;Sources

External links

*
Video "Director's Choice - Elizabeth Winthrop Chanler by John Singer Sargent"
{{DEFAULTSORT:Chanler, Elizabeth Winthrop 1866 births 1937 deaths Elizabeth Astor Winthrop Astor Orphans Elizabeth Astor Winthrop People from Dutchess County, New York Elizabeth Astor Winthrop Chanler family Winthrop family