The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1896-11-24
w ESCAFADE.
Michigan Girl, Wife of n Prince
ElOpes with n Musician.
New York Sun.

a Paris telegram reports that the Prin-
cess of Chimay and Caraman, wife of
Prlnce Joseph of Chimay and Caraman
Belgium, has eloped with a Hungarian
gypsy musician, who was accustomed 10
play in the Paris restaurants Prince
Joseph will bring suit against his wife for
cess was formerly Miss Clara Ward and
was born in Detroit. Mich. She was mar
ried TO Prince Joseph in Paris in 1890, and
Is the mother of two children.
GoSSplS OF two continents will doubtless
look knowing and air the good old phrase,
Clo tod you So, upon reading the news of
twenty-four years old, and from the time
she was seventeen she has cut a swath
pulse not readily to be exhausted. The
wonder of the American colonies in Europe
at the infinite variety of her girlhood
changed to establishment when she mar
ried Prince Joseph Chimay, fourteen years
her elder. but their interest in her meteoric
flight was not allowed to lag after the
worked into a notoriety which. aided in
keeping the family traits before the public
and he wound up by clipping, as his sister
fancy, had startled the sober-minded of
Michigan by Offering for $4,000 the stocks
and shares-which afterward realized
who had dropped dead in the street. The
man whose end was so sudden was eccen-
trio all his life. and his eccentricities had
furnished conversational topics TO his
Wolverine neighbors in as great plenty as
his children subsequently afforded themes
to Europeans.
He was Capt Eben b. Ward, a Canadian,
who had come over to Michigan without
money. He started sailing on the great
lakes in 1896. In two years he took to ship
building, and in course of time he came
to be called the king of the lake ship own
ers. He built two boats a year-they were
sde-wheel steamers-and by 1s4S had laid
the foundations of a fortune He settled
in Detroit in that year. and bought up
Michigan pine lands and later on built iron
works in Wyandotte and in Chicago and
Milwaukee.
Among his odd leanings was inclina-
ton toward spiritualism, so strong that the
mediums, according to report, made VIC
tim of him. In the early seventies his for
tune was estimated at Sl2,OO0, 600 TO Sl5.-
600 &C., and he was one of the biggest men
of Michigan, but he would never hold ONCE
although he could probably have had any
office in the State. He was unlettered, but
was Of indomitable energy and Will he
was caught short in the panic OF i3, carry
ing too many enterprises on too small a
cash reserve, and some of his property
was sacrificed to cary him through, the
result being a shrinkage of several mil
lions that had not been retrieved, when In
1915 he fell dead.
His first wife,. by whom he had seven
he had. at the age of sixty-one, SIX years
before his end married woman of twenty
eight who became the mother to two chill
dren Clara and her brother By the terms
of her husbands will Mrs. Ward received
all his valuable holdings, out his other rel
vigorous contest and she was Obliged 10
defend lawsuits that extended over nine
teen years. She was victorious, however;
and. a very wealthy woman. she married
Alexander Cameron. another Canadian
Her daughter Clara, then Princess Chimay,
celebrated the partition of the estate ana
also her own twenty-first birthday in Feb
ruary 1894 by a grand dinner at her home
in Paris. The young girl was very beauti-
full as well as of great gayety OF spirit
The title of Princess Chimay was not in
her keeping alone. another Princess chi
NAV having become the wife OF the Duo
de Bouffrement of scandalous memory.
whose name was connected with some OF
the most sensational times of the Third
Empire and who died few years ago
The Princess Claras brother, young
Ward four or five years ago became noto,
rious i'm a scandal. and when his wife sued
for divorce he tossed over 10 her lawyer
a package of papers representing properly
from which she has received slo,vO thhuaI
income He afterward eloped with her
maid and went to Paris TO live
When Prince Baldwin, the heir 10 the BEL
gian throne. died in mysterlously way
the name Chimay was connected with tne
occurrence in the gossip OF the DAY, WnlSh
had ii that the Belgian heir, whose prom
gacy was notorious. had declared wneh
nineteen years old that he would win the
Princess Chimay. of whom he had become
enamored at sight. Gossip SAID that ne was
shot by Prince Chimay.