Changing Faces of St Marylebone

Margherita van Raalte married the 8th Baron Howard de Walden, Thomas Scott-Ellis, in St Marylebone in 1912. He was then rumoured to be the richest man in England. They divided their time between Chirk Castle in Wales and Seaford House in Belgrave Square, which Thomas had decorated with friezes, panelling and a staircase of green onyx specially imported from South America.

When the couple became engaged on 29 December 1911 their engagement was front-page news and their wedding in February 1912 attracted extraordinary public attention.

When the First World War broke out Thomas joined the Army and Margherita wanted to serve as a nurse. She defied the Director General of Army Services who refused to give her permission to take on a Matron and eleven private nurses and establish a convalescent hospital in Egypt. It became the Convalescent Hospital No. 6 in Alexandria.

Margherita was also a talented soprano with a passion for music and opera. She had trained as an opera singer in Paris and shared Thomas’s love of Wagner, joining his friends at the opera festival at Bayreuth, Germany. On one memorable occasion she dressed up as Brunhilda to sing on the moonlit shores of Brownsea Island. Somehow she also found the time to have six children!