Speaker 1: Welcome to Noble Blood, a production of iHeartRadio and Grimm
Speaker 1: and Mild from Aaron Manky listener discretion advised. In nineteen
Speaker 1: thirty one, a socialite named Ethel Margaret Wigham held her
Speaker 1: nineteenth birthday party at the Embassy Club, one of London's
Speaker 1: most exclusive supper clubs at the time. It was the
Speaker 1: kind of place where film stars and royalty commingled, and
Speaker 1: Margaret was the center of it all. She was the beautiful,
Speaker 1: wealthy daughter of a Scottish businessman, and after her coming
Speaker 1: out as Debutante of the Year in nineteen thirty she
Speaker 1: soon became a darling of London society thanks to her
Speaker 1: glamorous fashion and her aura of confidence. According to legend,
Speaker 1: the night of the birthday party, Margaret had an astrologer
Speaker 1: predict her future. I see happiness, laughter, much love, but
Speaker 1: beware there is danger. Danger from what Margaret asked, treachery.
Speaker 1: The astrologer replied, you will be betrayed by the people
Speaker 1: you trust. Flash forward thirty years and Margaret, then fifty
Speaker 1: years old and the Duchess of Argyle, arrived at court
Speaker 1: wearing a tailored peacoat, mink wrap and pearl earrings. She
Speaker 1: was there to begin the divorce proceedings from her second husband,
Speaker 1: the Duke of Argyle, which would end up being the
Speaker 1: longest and costliest divorce proceedings British history had ever seen.
Speaker 1: The couple had met after Margaret's divorce from her first husband,
Speaker 1: American businessman Charles Sweeney, but it soon became clear that
Speaker 1: Margaret had found another doomed match. The Duke was filing
Speaker 1: for divorce from his wife on the grounds of adultery,
Speaker 1: alleging that Margaret had taken eighty eight lovers in their
Speaker 1: time together, a list of lovers that included cabinet ministers,
Speaker 1: Hollywood actors, and royals. It was a tabloid frenzy, not
Speaker 1: only thanks to the couple's titles and the breadth of
Speaker 1: the accusation, but because of the voyeuristic intimate details that
Speaker 1: were being made public. Margaret later described her second husband
Speaker 1: as quote in every essence a Gemini Gemini. People are
Speaker 1: usually two faced, aren't they? You should never trust them?
Speaker 1: Charming and treacherous. The story of the Argyle divorce and
Speaker 1: the story of Margaret's life are both complicated ones to tell.
Speaker 1: It's hard to separate the truth from the tabloid narrative,
Speaker 1: and it's hard to discern what the truth even is
Speaker 1: at all. Margaret's recountenances are filled with contradictions, misrememberings, and,
Speaker 1: according to some outright lies. In more recent years, there
Speaker 1: have been attempts to reframe Britain's view of Margaret with
Speaker 1: our modern understanding of issues at play, like slutshaming and
Speaker 1: ideas about revenge porn. Last year, the BBC aired the
Speaker 1: drama A Very British Scandal, which sought to paint a
Speaker 1: more nuanced, insightful portrait of the inner lives of the
Speaker 1: subjects at the heart of the scandal. But as you
Speaker 1: might imagine, television is meant to entertain, and the show
Speaker 1: still provides all of the sensationalized scandal that you might
Speaker 1: hope for from its title. Perhaps in the end, that's
Speaker 1: the only way you can really do justice to the
Speaker 1: story of the woman who thought of herself as a sensation.
Speaker 1: Later in life, Margaret would reflect quote, I had wealth,
Speaker 1: I had good looks as a young woman, I had
Speaker 1: been constantly photographed, written about, flattered, admired. Included in the
Speaker 1: ten Best Dressed Women in the World list and mentioned
Speaker 1: by Cole Porter in the words of his hit song
Speaker 1: You're the Top. The top was what I was supposed
Speaker 1: to be. That last claim is actually only a half truth.
Speaker 1: In the original version of his song for the musical
Speaker 1: Anything Goes, Coleporter never wrote a line about Margaret. The
Speaker 1: original lyric of the song and the one that is
Speaker 1: used today goes You're an O'Neill drama, your Whistler's Mama,
Speaker 1: great charming. But in nineteen thirty five there was a
Speaker 1: British production of Anything Goes with some of the lyrics
Speaker 1: anglicized by P. G. Woodhouse. Today, that one production is
Speaker 1: a curio of history with lyrics that sound not only
Speaker 1: less relevant but downright confusing to some listeners today. Whatever
Speaker 1: you're expecting the angler size lyric to be, it's probably
Speaker 1: not this, But the P. G. Woodhouse couplet goes your Mussolini,
Speaker 1: your missus Sweeney, missus Sweeney, of course, referencing Margaret. Any
Speaker 1: person who could share a lyric with Mussolini, where audiences
Speaker 1: would think, yes, those two people are of the same
Speaker 1: cultural cachet certainly deserves our historical examination. Unfortunately, for all
Speaker 1: of the glamour of Margaret Wigham Sweeney Campbell's life, there
Speaker 1: was also a twisted undercurrent of pain and a now
Speaker 1: all too modern story about how tabloid media builds women
Speaker 1: up just to tear them down. I'm Danish Sports and
Speaker 1: this is noble blood. Margaret was the only child of
Speaker 1: George Wigham, the millionaire chairman of the selling Nanse Corporation,
Speaker 1: and his wife Helen. Though Margaret was born on her
Speaker 1: maternal grandparents estate in a sleepy Scottish town a few
Speaker 1: miles outside of Glasgow, Margaret's first memory of a home
Speaker 1: was the Park Avenue apartment in New York City, where
Speaker 1: she spent much of her childhood. Margaret recalled having no
Speaker 1: friends as a girl, preferring to keep the company of
Speaker 1: teddy bears. When she wasn't with the teddies, she preferred
Speaker 1: the company of her parents. As the only child of
Speaker 1: a wealthy family, she became spoiled and close with her
Speaker 1: doting father. Her relationship with her mother was more difficult.
Speaker 1: Margaret would later recall that she would enter her mother's
Speaker 1: bedroom each morning, not knowing if she was going to
Speaker 1: be quote bright and loving or complaining and bad tempered.
Speaker 1: As Margaret grew up, her mother became obsessive over her
Speaker 1: daughter's appearance. The fixation with looks likely came from Helen's
Speaker 1: own childhood insecurities from never feeling like she was attractive
Speaker 1: enough compared to her siblings. The constant attention given to
Speaker 1: Margaret's looks, even though it was negative, made the young
Speaker 1: Margaret a self described vain little girl. Her mother also
Speaker 1: took issue with Margaret's developing stammer, which began after she
Speaker 1: was forced to start writing with her right hand, even
Speaker 1: though she was naturally left handed. Margaret was taken to
Speaker 1: London to be treated by Lionel Lowe, the same speech
Speaker 1: therapist who helped King George the sixth manage his stammer,
Speaker 1: who you might have seen portrayed by Jeffrey Rush in
Speaker 1: the movie The King's Speech. The real Lionel's methods proved
Speaker 1: ineffective on Margaret, much to her mother's disappointment. Margaret would
Speaker 1: later recount her mother telling her, no matter how pretty
Speaker 1: you are, Margaret, you will get nowhere in life if
Speaker 1: you stammer. As Margaret grew older, the effect of a
Speaker 1: childhood without hearing the word no from her father began
Speaker 1: to cement in Margaret's personality. She believed that anything could
Speaker 1: be bought, and she had little respect for authority or
Speaker 1: for any adults who weren't her parents. Though Margaret was
Speaker 1: beginning to physically appear older and present herself as more sophisticated,
Speaker 1: she still doated on the teddy bears from her childhood,
Speaker 1: much to her mother's chagrin. One day, Margaret forgot to
Speaker 1: bring her teddy bears inside from the lawn and found
Speaker 1: them the next morning soaked and destroyed. She would consider
Speaker 1: this the spiritual end of her childhood. Margaret's mother soon
Speaker 1: gave her the talk, which Margaret recalled as going something
Speaker 1: like quote, it's this awful thing we women have to
Speaker 1: put up with, we close our eyes and bear it.
Speaker 1: Margaret had no desire to hear about this, and the
Speaker 1: discomfort with the topic of sex stuck with her for
Speaker 1: some time. Margaret's parents thought she was growing up too fast,
Speaker 1: and so she was transferred to the Heathfield School, where
Speaker 1: girls learned academics, played lacrosse, and attended twice daily prayer.
Speaker 1: None of that interested Margaret, who detested the school's expectations
Speaker 1: of conformity. She once retreated from her peers and noted
Speaker 1: that she had no friends at the school. Proclaiming quote,
Speaker 1: I don't like women in a mass I think they
Speaker 1: should be individuals. Margaret was brought to and from school
Speaker 1: every day in a chauffeur driven Rolls Royce, which probably
Speaker 1: provides some indication as to how her fellow students saw her.
Speaker 1: Margaret felt that the disdain with which the other girls
Speaker 1: treated her was earned simply because she was much more
Speaker 1: sophisticated than them. As the car drove away, she shouted
Speaker 1: bye bye, girls. Enjoy your hockey and your lacrosse. I'm
Speaker 1: off to a matinee in London. She was at the
Speaker 1: school for only two months before her family was forced
Speaker 1: to make a decision. Margaret could live at the school
Speaker 1: as a boarder or she'd be forced to leave, so
Speaker 1: she left and began learning from a governess. During that time,
Speaker 1: Margaret found her passion for boys. She was surprised to
Speaker 1: find they liked her speech impediment, seeing it as of
Speaker 1: vulnerability they could care for, something she described as a
Speaker 1: cold comfort. When Margaret was fifteen, her family spent the
Speaker 1: Easter holiday at Bembridge on the Isle of Wight. It
Speaker 1: was there she met David Niven, a seventeen year old
Speaker 1: public schoolboy and future Oscar winning actor. Margaret became infatuated
Speaker 1: and soon lost her virginity to him. Even when she
Speaker 1: returned home from the vacation, she couldn't stop thinking about David,
Speaker 1: and she roped a friend into sneaking off to London
Speaker 1: with her to visit him, an incredibly bold move for
Speaker 1: a woman, let alone a fifteen year old girl of
Speaker 1: the time. Her rebellious streak came to a sudden halt
Speaker 1: when she learned she was pregnant. Her father was furious
Speaker 1: and all hell broke loose in the house. This was
Speaker 1: the nineteen twenties and teen pregnancy is still taboo today.
Speaker 1: Margaret underwent a secret abortion and no one was to
Speaker 1: speak of the quote incident again. In nineteen twenty nine,
Speaker 1: Margaret and her mother began preparing for Margaret's debut as
Speaker 1: a debutante, despite being a year younger than the typical
Speaker 1: deb Margaret reflected that quote, my mother must have realized
Speaker 1: that there was no holding me back. On May first,
Speaker 1: nineteen thirty, the first day of the London Social season,
Speaker 1: Margaret's coming out party was held. Their bold choice to
Speaker 1: kick off the season was backed up by an unlimited
Speaker 1: dress budget. They were determined to make a splash. Margaret's
Speaker 1: popularity with boys, while recently traumatizing to her family, led
Speaker 1: her mother to see Margaret in a new light. Margaret
Speaker 1: was no longer simply the stuttering, plain looking creature who
Speaker 1: seemed so foreign to her. The nineteen thirty's wave of
Speaker 1: debutantes favored women like Margaret, bright and bold, fashionable and modern. Quote.
Speaker 1: The girls of the nineteen thirties not only had good looks,
Speaker 1: they knew how to dress, and they had far more
Speaker 1: self confidence than their predecessors. Margaret would later reflect. Margaret's
Speaker 1: party cost forty thousand pounds and entertained four hundred guests.
Speaker 1: She made her entrance to the sound of a big
Speaker 1: band orchestra, and she was dressed in a Norman Hartnell
Speaker 1: turquoise dress embroidered with diamonds and pearls. Her mother had
Speaker 1: insisted that she wear white, the traditional color for debutantes,
Speaker 1: but Margaret wanted to stand out from the others. She
Speaker 1: purposely stained the white dress that her mom had bought
Speaker 1: for her, which of course forced her to change into
Speaker 1: the turquoise one. The dress is designer Norman Hartnell would
Speaker 1: eventually become dressmaker to Queen Elizabeth the scond and Margaret
Speaker 1: would credit herself with Hartnell's rise to fame, and we
Speaker 1: can't say she's entirely wrong. She was a bonafied sensation.
Speaker 1: One society column summed it up by saying, quote, she
Speaker 1: shone out above everyone else, as is fitting for the
Speaker 1: heroine of such an evening. Throughout the season, at just
Speaker 1: seventeen years old, she became one of the most photographed
Speaker 1: women in London, and magazines called her the prettiest debutante
Speaker 1: of the set. Margaret's celebrity was on the rise, and
Speaker 1: her mother, Helen, began to grow exhausted by the number
Speaker 1: of different invitations her daughter received. Eventually, Helen stopped going
Speaker 1: with her altogether, leaving Margaret to attend events unchaperoned. It
Speaker 1: was during this time that Margaret developed what she called
Speaker 1: the Wigham system. She danced with any boy who asked
Speaker 1: her for the first half of the night, decide her favorites,
Speaker 1: and then dance only with them for the second. The
Speaker 1: men didn't mind, but other debs began to refer to
Speaker 1: her as quote that Maggie Wiggham. That year, she also
Speaker 1: began to frequent clubs like the Embassy with a different
Speaker 1: number of men, including the Prince Ali Khan, who tried
Speaker 1: to marry her side note he would later marry Rita Hayworth.
Speaker 1: And Margaret also developed a sizeable friend group of other
Speaker 1: society women. One of the men she would eventually charm
Speaker 1: was American businessman Charles Sweeney, who claimed to initially dislike her.
Speaker 1: I could not stand her, he wrote to me. She
Speaker 1: was a conceited, garrulous show off whose company I avoided
Speaker 1: as much as I could. Their mutual friend groups made
Speaker 1: encounters unavoidable, and one night, due to them both ending
Speaker 1: up without a partner, they agreed to be each other's
Speaker 1: dates to the Embassy Club. Sweeney would write that that
Speaker 1: night changed everything. He quote fell under the spell of
Speaker 1: Margaret Wigham's charm. After a few more dates, Charles Sweeney
Speaker 1: unofficially proposed, and she accepted. This meant the world to him,
Speaker 1: but little to Margaret, who didn't see proposals as real commitments.
Speaker 1: The proof is in the fact that she soon also
Speaker 1: became unofficially engaged to their friend Max Aiken. Neither of
Speaker 1: the men knowing about the engagement she had to the other. Eventually,
Speaker 1: despite a third, more formal engagement being thrown into the mix.
Speaker 1: Margaret had begun to see more of Sweeney, who was
Speaker 1: hurt by her betrayal of multiple engagements but still harbored feelings.
Speaker 1: Once more, Margaret had officially broken off the other engagements.
Speaker 1: She and Charles Sweeney became officially engaged. The wedding date
Speaker 1: was set, and her time as quote the Wigham as
Speaker 1: the press called her, was coming to an end. The
Speaker 1: wedding was a glamorous affair, so many onlookers and members
Speaker 1: of the press wanted to see her heartnel dress, which
Speaker 1: featured an eighteen foot train embroidered with orange blossoms that
Speaker 1: surrounding traffic was blocked for three hours. The literal traffic
Speaker 1: stopping dress was recently displayed at the Victoria and Albert Museum.
Speaker 1: After the wedding, Margaret would become pregnant, but it would
Speaker 1: be the first in a series of miscarriages, of which
Speaker 1: there would be eight total. During a later pregnancy, Margaret
Speaker 1: became so ill that the baby had to be delivered
Speaker 1: stillborn in order to save her life. Margaret fell into
Speaker 1: a deep depression, both from the loss of the child
Speaker 1: but also from Charlie's absence. Despite staying at her side
Speaker 1: droughout her illness. As she recovered, he would visit her
Speaker 1: briefly in the hospital each night before heading out to
Speaker 1: a club. While it would still be a while before
Speaker 1: their divorce, that dynamic, no doubt, reaffirmed Margaret's feeling that
Speaker 1: Charlie Sweeney did not see her for the person she was.
Speaker 1: That quote, all he wanted for a wife was a
Speaker 1: pretty brainless doll. She tried to be that for the
Speaker 1: next several years, but as World War II began, their
Speaker 1: focus was torn away from their personal conflicts, and each
Speaker 1: contributed in their own way to the war effort. While
Speaker 1: the couple did eventually have two children together, the tears
Speaker 1: in their marriage were forever evident. Both of them committed adultery,
Speaker 1: but neither would accept the blame for the dissolution of
Speaker 1: the relationship. In nineteen forty seven, the pair officially divorced.
Speaker 1: Margaret was thirty four years old. In the wake of
Speaker 1: the Second World War, the London social scene was just
Speaker 1: beginning to return, and Margaret was now ready to return
Speaker 1: with it. She would find the next major phase of
Speaker 1: her life beginning not in London, though, but on a
Speaker 1: train to Paris, where she would be seated across from
Speaker 1: a tall man with a pointed nose. She'd come to
Speaker 1: learn that his name was Ian Campbell and that he
Speaker 1: would soon be the Duke of Argyle. He already knew
Speaker 1: who she was. Apparently over a decade earlier, he had
Speaker 1: seen Margaret on the staircase of a London nightclub, and
Speaker 1: he turned to his wife at the time and said
Speaker 1: quote that captivating creature is the woman I'm going to
Speaker 1: marry someday. Ian Douglas Campbell was penniless but titled. His
Speaker 1: great grandfather was the eighth Duke of Argyle, and thanks
Speaker 1: to the ninth and tenth not having sons, Ian inherited
Speaker 1: his family's title and home in Verrey Castle from his
Speaker 1: second cousin, the eleventh Duke of Argyle, was a bit
Speaker 1: of a mad academic, and his neglect of the castle
Speaker 1: in favor of other pursuits saw it fall into ruin.
Speaker 1: That meant that Ian also inherited the responsibility of restoring
Speaker 1: the estate. For this he depended on his wife Janet
Speaker 1: and then his second wife Louise, both heiresses. Ian himself
Speaker 1: never worked and was addicted to alcohol, drugs and gambling
Speaker 1: even before his dukedom, he was in deep debt. Both
Speaker 1: of his wives would later accuse him of abuse and
Speaker 1: squandering their money. Years later, his future son in law
Speaker 1: would describe him as quote one of the cold list
Speaker 1: nastiest men I've ever known in a wild cameo. That
Speaker 1: future son in law also just happened to be the
Speaker 1: writer Norman Mahler, who if you know anything about Norman Mayler,
Speaker 1: you know that he might have given Ian a run
Speaker 1: for his money in the bad husband department. But back
Speaker 1: to Ian and Margaret. When the pair met, they were
Speaker 1: both recently single, Ian and his wife having separated after
Speaker 1: the war on the grounds of mutual adultery. I can
Speaker 1: imagine that pointing out other women he wanted to marry
Speaker 1: while the two were together didn't help. On that train
Speaker 1: ride to Paris where they met, Margaret was a sympathetic
Speaker 1: listener to ian struggles, and he to hers. Ian had
Speaker 1: been a prisoner of war and he was readjusting to
Speaker 1: a life of freedom. Both were starved for connection. Margaret
Speaker 1: invited Ian back to her home as soon as they
Speaker 1: arrived in London, and there they slept together for the
Speaker 1: first time. Margaret soon began to pursue Ian with the
Speaker 1: intention of marriage. Her first husband, Charlie would later write
Speaker 1: in his memoir she had always been intrigued by the
Speaker 1: idea of becoming a duchess Ian. By this point, officially,
Speaker 1: the Duke was still in the process of persuading Louise
Speaker 1: to agree to an official divorce. He was thrilled by
Speaker 1: Margaret's pursuit of him. This time, he didn't have to
Speaker 1: do the work of finding an heiress himself. Their courtship
Speaker 1: was largely secretive due to his status as technically a
Speaker 1: married man and hers as a divorcee. One night, they
Speaker 1: attended a West End play together, Ring Round the Moon,
Speaker 1: about a twins attempt to rescue his brother from what
Speaker 1: he believes will be a disastrous marriage. In hindsight, it
Speaker 1: seems like an omen that evening Ian proposed to Margaret
Speaker 1: with the promise that as soon as the divorce with
Speaker 1: Louise was finalized, she would be his duchess. Of course,
Speaker 1: Margaret accepted. Ian's charm worked on Margaret's parents just as
Speaker 1: it had on her. They were impressed with his title,
Speaker 1: and they were excited at the prospect of their daughter
Speaker 1: becoming a duchess Ian. Even immediately charmed George into becoming
Speaker 1: a patron of the Campbell clan, and he pledged twenty
Speaker 1: five thousand pounds towards Verrey's restoration, with no return expected.
Speaker 1: Margaret herself was determined to bring the castle back to
Speaker 1: its former glory, and she blamed much of its current
Speaker 1: disarray on Louise, his ex wife, and not Ian himself.
Speaker 1: For Margaret and her father's donations, they received a deed
Speaker 1: of gift which will come back to bite her later.
Speaker 1: But in nineteen fifty one, Louise finally agreed to the divorce,
Speaker 1: but with Ian about to be officially Margaret, he began
Speaker 1: to reveal his true colors for the first time. Unprompted,
Speaker 1: one night, he launched into a verbal attack on Margaret's children,
Speaker 1: her father, even Margaret herself. The next morning, she asked
Speaker 1: him what had provoked his rage, which only sent him
Speaker 1: into another tirade. This was just days before their wedding.
Speaker 1: She felt that it was too late to back out,
Speaker 1: and she was too ashamed to tell her father, who
Speaker 1: she knew would tell her to call off the marriage
Speaker 1: and prioritize her happiness, the advice that he had given
Speaker 1: her during one of her earlier engagements. Plus there was
Speaker 1: the guilt that Margaret felt about the money they had
Speaker 1: already sunk into Ian's castle, so Margaret wrote it off
Speaker 1: and went through with the marriage. On the eve of
Speaker 1: Margaret and Ian's wedding, she received a letter from her
Speaker 1: ex husband, Charlie, warning her not to marry Ian. Charlie
Speaker 1: had spoken with with Louise, who had told him of
Speaker 1: Ian's opportunistic scheming and his mistreatment of her and their sons.
Speaker 1: Charlie Sweeney wrote quote, I only hope you're not deluding
Speaker 1: yourself that Campbell is inspired by any great love, because
Speaker 1: he's not. Margaret ignored this letter, thinking that both Charlie
Speaker 1: and Louise were jealous bitter exes. Margaret and Ian were
Speaker 1: married on March twenty second, nineteen fifty one, six hours
Speaker 1: after the divorce with Louise was official. It was a
Speaker 1: smaller ceremony, a far cry from Margaret's first wedding. This time,
Speaker 1: she wore a gray chiffon dress with a pussy bow,
Speaker 1: a feathered hat, and her signature set of pearls. The
Speaker 1: two honeymooned at Inveray, and she spent the time in
Speaker 1: workman's overalls immediately following through on her promise to help
Speaker 1: restore the castle. Host of Margaret's work was unfruitful. Inverrat
Speaker 1: was beginning to seem like a lost cause. The money
Speaker 1: she was putting into the castle was also being put
Speaker 1: towards Ian's debts, which she learned about upon their return
Speaker 1: to the home. As much as Margaret cared about restoring
Speaker 1: the castle, she was not suited to life in the countryside,
Speaker 1: and it was agreed that Margaret would keep her home
Speaker 1: in London for social visits. As you might have predicted,
Speaker 1: Ian's character didn't improve after the wedding. He would often
Speaker 1: get into public altercations, and Margaret spent much of their
Speaker 1: time together in public apologizing for him. His verbal abuse
Speaker 1: eventually escalated into physical violence, and during a trip to Jamaica,
Speaker 1: Margaret remembers an acquaintance having to rush into their room
Speaker 1: to stop Ian from physically attacking her. Margaret attempted to
Speaker 1: prevent her husband from drinking so often, hoping to return
Speaker 1: him to the man she originally knew. She offered to
Speaker 1: recreate his favorite club Whites, in their home so that
Speaker 1: he could avoid the party atmosphere, but he bitterly explained
Speaker 1: that he went to the club to escape her. Ian
Speaker 1: began to belittle her in front of her friends, and
Speaker 1: as a result, her stammer started to worsen, which made
Speaker 1: it difficult for her to speak up for herself. Margaret
Speaker 1: later wrote that quote Ian had a markedly sadistic streak
Speaker 1: in his character. Things like that were done deliberately to
Speaker 1: hurt me, and hurt me they always did. I realize
Speaker 1: now that if I had not given him the satisfaction
Speaker 1: of knowing this, Ian would have been deprived of much pleasure.
Speaker 1: Their relationship was complicated by Ian's manipulative nature and Margaret's
Speaker 1: willingness to make excuses for it. Quote he toyed with
Speaker 1: me as a cat plays with a mouse. Every time
Speaker 1: he sent that I had come to the end of
Speaker 1: my teather. He would then choose to become his most
Speaker 1: agreeable self, ready to do anything to please me. Eventually,
Speaker 1: after three years of marriage, Inveray was ready to open
Speaker 1: to the public for tours. Ian took his role as
Speaker 1: duke seriously and spent his days greeting visitors and leading tours.
Speaker 1: Margaret was hopeful that he had turned a new leaf,
Speaker 1: but when the tourist season ended, he reverted right back
Speaker 1: to his old cruel ways. Margaret decided to take a
Speaker 1: trip abroad, and their lives and eventually homes became separate.
Speaker 1: They remained married, but Margaret considered nineteen fifty six to
Speaker 1: be the real turning point for the rest of her life.
Speaker 1: This is where things take a turn for the soap operatic.
Speaker 1: The divorce wasn't actually the first legal proceeding that would
Speaker 1: make the Argyles headlines. That was actually a libel suit
Speaker 1: against Margaret from Ian's secretary. Vn McPherson was the widow
Speaker 1: of a man who had been a prisoner of war
Speaker 1: with Ian, and so their connection between Von and Ian
Speaker 1: went beyond the typical employer employee relationship. Vaughn's loyalty to
Speaker 1: Ian was so apparent that Margaret began to believe that
Speaker 1: the two were conspiring against her. Margaret's assessment that Ian
Speaker 1: could do something drastic wasn't entirely out of nowhere. Ian
Speaker 1: had recently recovered from influenza, but had become addicted to drinimil,
Speaker 1: a drug that was so widely abused in the UK
Speaker 1: at the time that it's no longer prescribed. The drugs
Speaker 1: led to bouts of erratic behavior and mania. We don't
Speaker 1: know if Margaret's suspicions about yvon were accurate, but Ian
Speaker 1: was in act plotting against her with his doctor to
Speaker 1: have her certified as insane. Years earlier, Margaret had fallen
Speaker 1: down an elevator shaft, and the pair Ian and his
Speaker 1: doctor wanted to claim that it had caused brain damage.
Speaker 1: To do so, they needed a note from Margaret's doctor,
Speaker 1: who had refused and informed her of their plan. Margaret,
Speaker 1: even having her paranoia validated, continued just to blame her
Speaker 1: husband's actions on the drenamine and so loyal as ever
Speaker 1: to her husband, Margaret focused on the belief that Yvonne
Speaker 1: was the one speaking to the press. She later claimed
Speaker 1: that the proprietor of the Daily Mail told her that
Speaker 1: Yvonne was on the books for years, but there's no
Speaker 1: actual evidence. Margaret was so convinced in fact, and so
Speaker 1: determined to prove her case, that she sent Ian a
Speaker 1: fake telegram pretending it was from Yvonne. It read quote
Speaker 1: rushing off for ten but all is ready as we
Speaker 1: planned to tear strips off Margaret financially and otherwise a
Speaker 1: million Thanks for your love, support and invaluable information without
Speaker 1: which I would be helpless. Happy Easter and then into
Speaker 1: battle side by side Yvon. Ian asked Margaret to apologize.
Speaker 1: She refused, and soon she received a letter notifying her
Speaker 1: that von was suing her for damages. In nineteen fifty nine,
Speaker 1: Ian and Margaret took a trip to Australia on ducal duty. There,
Speaker 1: Ian discovered the diary that Margaret had kept for the
Speaker 1: past three years. Inside were the names of half a
Speaker 1: dozen men and a meticulously recorded schedule that showed each
Speaker 1: time she had met with them. When Margaret discovered him
Speaker 1: with the diary, he accused her of cheating, and she
Speaker 1: didn't deny it. How could she really Ian flew home
Speaker 1: alone the next day and their marriage was effectively over.
Speaker 1: Instead of following her husband back to England, Margaret extended
Speaker 1: the trip to New York. Ian took the opportunity to
Speaker 1: go through Margaret's belongings in their home. He hired a
Speaker 1: locksmith to break into her cupboards and stole her letters, diaries,
Speaker 1: and a Manila folder addressed to her. Inside were some
Speaker 1: notes of no consequence and two polaroid photos, which would
Speaker 1: go on to become the central scandal that would mar
Speaker 1: Margaret's legacy for the rest of her life. The photos
Speaker 1: showed Margaret performing oral sex on an unidentified man who
Speaker 1: would become something of a folk legend as quote the
Speaker 1: Headless Man. Although Margaret's back is to the camera, she
Speaker 1: could easily be identified by her signature, pearls and hair style.
Speaker 1: Wrapped around the photographs were sheets of paper reading before
Speaker 1: during oh And finished. The polaroids, inflammatory as they were,
Speaker 1: didn't anger Ian as much as another piece of paper
Speaker 1: he found. On a sheet of hotel parchment, Margaret had
Speaker 1: pasted fragments of words cut out from innocuous letters written
Speaker 1: by Louise, Ian's ex wife and the mother of his children.
Speaker 1: The excerpts, which included Louise's signature, were arranged into a
Speaker 1: fake letter in which she is questioning the paternity of
Speaker 1: her and Ian's sons. It seems that Margaret, in an
Speaker 1: attempt to save her status as Duchess, was seeking to
Speaker 1: discredit the legitimacy of Ian's sons from his first marriage
Speaker 1: and then have her own child with him. Or rather,
Speaker 1: Margaret was trying to fake a pregnancy by patting her
Speaker 1: stomach and later pass off a child as Ian's. She
Speaker 1: asked a Polish friend to bring her a baby to England.
Speaker 1: Don't be stupid, dear, was the friend's response, and Margaret
Speaker 1: abandoned the plan, although she kept all of the incriminating evidence.
Speaker 1: This was the final straw for Ian. He wasn't a
Speaker 1: particularly involved father, but his wife had crossed a clear line.
Speaker 1: Margaret was furious when she returned home to see that
Speaker 1: Ian had stolen her possessions, but she had yet to
Speaker 1: realize that he had also discovered her drafts of the
Speaker 1: forged letters from Louise. So when Margaret went through with
Speaker 1: the plan to quote find these letters and show them
Speaker 1: to Ian, it resulted in her second libel suit, this
Speaker 1: time from Louise. Ian knew that he had sufficient grounds
Speaker 1: for divorce, but he still needed the smoking gun, the
Speaker 1: diary that he had found in Australia. He devised a
Speaker 1: plan with his daughter Jean to raid Margaret's house for it.
Speaker 1: At six in the morning, they entered her home using
Speaker 1: a key that Ian had kept. Not having found what
Speaker 1: they were looking for in the study, they entered her bedroom,
Speaker 1: where Margaret was still sleeping. The noise woke her, and
Speaker 1: when she asked what they wanted, Jean held her down
Speaker 1: to the bed while Ian stole the diary from her
Speaker 1: bedside table. The two fled the scene immediately. Ian swiftly
Speaker 1: notified Margaret that his divorce petition was sent to the
Speaker 1: Court of Session in Edinburgh, and he informed her that
Speaker 1: she was now banned from Inveray Castle, which was only
Speaker 1: functioning because of her father's money. She would make sure
Speaker 1: that Ian remembered that, and soon she visited with her
Speaker 1: father and his new wife, Jane, who he married after
Speaker 1: Helend passing several years earlier. In perhaps the most bizarre
Speaker 1: accusation yet. During that trip, Margaret noticed Jane and Ian
Speaker 1: spending time alone together and concluded that they were having
Speaker 1: an affair. Margaret's paranoia was no doubt fueled by her
Speaker 1: view of Jane as an interloper in her and her
Speaker 1: father's relationship. After that trip, Margaret remained persistent in her
Speaker 1: assertion that she had a right to live in Inveraray,
Speaker 1: despite her clear distaste for country life, and so Ian
Speaker 1: formally acquired an interdict banning her from the castle. Margaret
Speaker 1: was given one day to retrieve her belongings and identify
Speaker 1: what was hers, as decreed by the deed of gift
Speaker 1: she and her father had received at the time of
Speaker 1: her engagement to Ian. Margaret would soon learn that the deed,
Speaker 1: like much of her early impression of her husband, was
Speaker 1: a facade. Ian had more mortgaged everything on Margaret's deed
Speaker 1: in nineteen forty nine, before they had even been married.
Speaker 1: Margaret's deed was worthless. In February of nineteen sixty two,
Speaker 1: Margaret and Ian arrived at the Edinburgh Court of Session.
Speaker 1: The courtroom was packed to capacity, with both British and
Speaker 1: foreign press, all eager to see what would become of
Speaker 1: the Duke and the quote dirty Duchess. Presiding over the
Speaker 1: case was Lord Wheatley, a judge known for his harsh
Speaker 1: sentences for crimes involving sex. He also happened to be
Speaker 1: a member of the Campbell clan on his mother's side.
Speaker 1: The trial began with Ian presenting his evidence. Margaret's lawyer
Speaker 1: rejected the use of her diary on the grounds of confidentiality,
Speaker 1: but Wheatley approved it and it remained the key piece
Speaker 1: of evidence. Ian was cross examined for five hours. Margaret
Speaker 1: was cross examined for thirteen while Ian ultimately accused her
Speaker 1: of sleeping with eighty eight men. There were three who
Speaker 1: were brought into the trial, Baron Sigmund von Braun, a
Speaker 1: former Nazi and then West German ambassador to the UN,
Speaker 1: John Khan, an American businessman, and Peter Combe, the former
Speaker 1: chief press officer at the London Savoy Hotel. Worth noting
Speaker 1: is that of the eighty eight men that the Duke
Speaker 1: claimed he could list, a number were actually gay. Margaret
Speaker 1: didn't want to out her friends at a time when
Speaker 1: homosexuality was still a criminal offense, and so she didn't
Speaker 1: defend herself against the accusation. Of the three men who
Speaker 1: were brought into question, only Combe denied an affair. Margaret
Speaker 1: confessed she had an affair with von Braun, who was married,
Speaker 1: but it had happened before her own marriage to Ian.
Speaker 1: As their letters were not dated, the court couldn't conclude
Speaker 1: that she was lying. The evidence against Kohane was also
Speaker 1: too weak to utilize. That left Combe the sole defender
Speaker 1: present in court. He was twelve years younger than Margaret,
Speaker 1: and she knew his mother, so Margaret claimed the relationship
Speaker 1: was strictly platonic. What she didn't know was that Ian
Speaker 1: had hired a private investigator to watch her and the
Speaker 1: investigator had taken photographs of Combe leaving her house in
Speaker 1: the early hours of the morning. Margaret argued that Combe
Speaker 1: was helping her to take care of her beloved French poodles,
Speaker 1: but the judge dismissed that claim with the belief that
Speaker 1: Margaret would have entrusted that task to servants. Having gone
Speaker 1: through the diaries and the letters, only the polaroids, those
Speaker 1: pieces of evidence that would follow Margaret for the rest
Speaker 1: of her life remained. Initially, Margaret denied she was the
Speaker 1: one in the photographs, insisting they were from Ian's pornography.
Speaker 1: Collect once the court was able to identify that it
Speaker 1: was in fact her due to the specificity of the
Speaker 1: necklace and hair, she admitted that, yes, it was her,
Speaker 1: but she claimed the headless man was Ian. This story
Speaker 1: wasn't bought, but to prove that it wasn't him, Ian
Speaker 1: underwent a medical examination. It provided a win in court,
Speaker 1: but a loss in self esteem. As Margaret's biographer put it,
Speaker 1: Ian had to live with the humiliation of publicly declaring
Speaker 1: his lesser dimensions. Margaret never revealed the identity of the
Speaker 1: headless man, but it has been the topic of speculation
Speaker 1: for years. Was he a Hollywood actor politician? The British
Speaker 1: press debated for years. It even prompted a personal investigation
Speaker 1: from the Master of Roles at the time, who came
Speaker 1: up with a scheme to compare the handwriting of government
Speaker 1: men he suspected as potential culprits to the handwriting on
Speaker 1: the captions of the polaroid. It was a fruitless attempt. Ultimately,
Speaker 1: Ian was granted a divorce from Margaret on ground of
Speaker 1: adultery with Peter Combe in May, three months after the
Speaker 1: proceedings began. Margaret was not present when Lord Wheatley read
Speaker 1: his fifty thousand word judgment, a reading that lasted three
Speaker 1: hours and ten minutes. Ian was there, though, and he
Speaker 1: heard the judge his distant cousin describe his now ex
Speaker 1: wife as quote a highly sexed woman who had ceased
Speaker 1: to be satisfied with normal relations and had started to
Speaker 1: indulge in what I can only describe as disgusting sexual
Speaker 1: activities to gratify a basic sexual appetite. Years later, in
Speaker 1: a rare interview, Margaret would reflect on Wheatley's judgment quote,
Speaker 1: I thought he was such a bastard. You don't tack
Speaker 1: if you're a judge, you judge, she said, mimicking balancing scales.
Speaker 1: It was the longest and costliest divorce Britain had ever
Speaker 1: seen up until that point. Margaret was ordered to pay
Speaker 1: seven eighths of the cost. Ian paid just one eighth,
Speaker 1: seeing as that was all he could afford. Ian's own
Speaker 1: adultery was of little concern to Wheatley or the public
Speaker 1: at large. Margaret was given all sorts of nicknames in
Speaker 1: the press, all crude and none particularly clever. Quote dirty duchess,
Speaker 1: blow job duchess, filatio duchess. Some of the headlines at
Speaker 1: the time read such dirty linen in high places or
Speaker 1: She's a poisonous liar. Margaret was one of the earliest
Speaker 1: targets of the British presses relentless vitriolic fixation on a
Speaker 1: noble woman, a relationship from the British press that we've
Speaker 1: seen in more recent years with women like Diana, Princess
Speaker 1: of Wales and Megan Markle. Calling Margaret a liar wasn't untrue.
Speaker 1: She had lied to Ian, and she had lied in court,
Speaker 1: but the press went steps beyond steps too far. Later
Speaker 1: in life, Margaret, who had been a tabloid star since seventeen,
Speaker 1: reflected that she had seen a drastic shift in the
Speaker 1: tabloid press's level of professionalism and their treatment of celebrities.
Speaker 1: In a very British statement, she remarked, they've become very unkind.
Speaker 1: To put it quite mildly. Just three weeks after the
Speaker 1: divorce was finalized, Ian married an American heiress with whom
Speaker 1: he had been having an affair for the past two years.
Speaker 1: He and the heiress remained together until his death in
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy three. Over the course of the years following
Speaker 1: the divorce, Ian sold the right to publish his and
Speaker 1: Margaret's private letters. His thirst for revenge, even after he
Speaker 1: had won in court, would come back to bite him.
Speaker 1: His beloved Club Whites, where he had once went to
Speaker 1: quote escape Margaret, voted him out on grounds of poor conduct.
Speaker 1: As for Margaret, she never remarried, but she continued to
Speaker 1: live her life as she always had. This included more men,
Speaker 1: more scandals, more legal conflicts, and more poodles. It's possible
Speaker 1: the poodles were maybe the truest loves of her life.
Speaker 1: When she eventually began to run out of money, she
Speaker 1: opened her London home up for tours. She was later
Speaker 1: forced to move into a suite in a hotel, and
Speaker 1: when she couldn't pay that rent, she moved into a
Speaker 1: nursing home, where she ultimately passed in nineteen ninety three.
Speaker 1: She was eighty one years old. Two years later, an
Speaker 1: opera based on her life and divorce, titled Powder Her Face, premiered.
Speaker 1: To sum up his work, the composer Thomas A. Day
Speaker 1: quoted the phrase, even horrible people are tragic. That's the
Speaker 1: story of the Duchess of Argyle. But stick around to
Speaker 1: hear Margaret in her own words. So much of Noble
Speaker 1: Blood is me attempting to create portrayals of historical figures
Speaker 1: that are nuanced and empathetic, but not fawning. I always
Speaker 1: try to frame a story to be true to the
Speaker 1: fundamental humanity of the people involved. No one is all
Speaker 1: good or all bad. Everyone is products of their environment
Speaker 1: and experiences. But because this is a history podcast, often
Speaker 1: we're constructing our versions of figures from history from multiple sources. Sometimes,
Speaker 1: if we're lucky, we get their own writing, but usually
Speaker 1: it's from the writing of other people around them. My
Speaker 1: goal with this podcast is always to give voice to
Speaker 1: people from the past. Who maybe we never thought about
Speaker 1: in nuanced terms. In the case of the Duchess of Argyle,
Speaker 1: we are afforded a rare gift her actual voice. Thanks
Speaker 1: to the BBC Archives, you can hear the Duchess actually
Speaker 1: speaking about her own life and for scandalous divorce. I'm
Speaker 1: linking a video in the episode description and I think
Speaker 1: it's well worth a listen to try to understand one
Speaker 1: of the most impossibly complicated women in history in her
Speaker 1: own words. Noble Blood is a production of iHeart Radio
Speaker 1: and Grimm and Mild from Aaron Mankey. Noble Blood is
Speaker 1: hosted by me Danashworts. Additional writing and researching done by
Speaker 1: Hannah Johnston, hannah's Wick, Mira Hayward, Courtney Sender, and Lori Goodman.
Speaker 1: The show is produced by rima Il Kali, with supervising
Speaker 1: producer Josh Thain and executive producers Aaron Manke, Alex Williams,
Speaker 1: and Matt Frederick. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the
Speaker 1: iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your
Speaker 1: favorite shows.