Evening star., 1923-10-13
BY THE MARaUIsE DE FoNTENoY.

John Jay Pierrepont Of Brook
lyn Heights, who died suddenly the
other day on a train on his way
home from Bar Harbor, was the son
of Henry Evelyn Pierrepont. founder
of Greenwood cemetery and of the
Brooklyn Academy of Music. and was
the head of the senior branch OF the
old Anglo-Norman house OF Pierre
pont, which is represented In Eng
land by the present Earl of Manvers.
Moreover, the nephew and second
heir to the earldom and viscounty and
barony of Lord Manvers is Capt Ger
vaise Evelyn Pierrepont, who won a
number of distinctions In the great
war and who is married to an Amer
ican heiress. the daughter of Mr.. and
Mrs. Frederick William Butterheld.
The latter, hailing from New York,
are connections of the Roosevelts,
and have for some time past been
making their home in Europe, hav-
ing a very hospitable London house
on Curzon street, country seat IN
Yorkshire known as Cliffe Castle,
near keidleigh; house in Paris on
the rue Pressbourg-that is to say, In
the immediate vicinity of the Arc de
Triomphe-and q very charming villa
at Nice. Mrs. Butterfield was Miss lis
Mary Roosevelt Burke of New York
daughter of Mr.. H. Burke.
The founder of the Pierrepont fam
lily was Sir Robert Pierrepont, one OF
the companions In arms OF william
the Conoueror at the battle of Hast
ings, and who received from that
monarch the manor of Holme Pierre
pont, in NNottinghamshire. Of which
he was the first lord. The chief OF
the family in the seventeenth cen
tury, in the male line, direct, was Sir
George Pierrepont. whose grandson
Dorchester and Duke of Kingston
married the famous beauty Elizabeth
ChudIeigh, and died without Issue,
the English Pterreponts thereupon
becoming extinct in the male line.
Now, Sir George Pierrepont, the
grandfather Of the first Duke or
Kingston. had a younger son OF the
name of William Pierrepont, whose
SON, James Pierrepont, came to Amer
lea and settled at Roxbury. Mass IN
1896, leaving two sons. John and Rob-
ert. From tlese Julia Pierrepont, the
mother of the late Pierpont Morgan
including John Jay Pierrepont OF
Brooklyn, who died last week, are de-
/ scended In a direct line. But, Whlle
the Pierreponts of America may just
ly claim to represent the only exist
ing male line of the ancient and his
rorlc' Anglo-Norman house of Pierre
pont, they can put forward no pre-
ensions to any of the honors of Eve
lyn Pierrepont, the last Duke OF
Kingston, since the various peer
ages which he possessed were ac-
Quired by his father considerapiy ~
after the other branches had emf
grated to America, and, though the
last duke had no children, he Wllled
the whole of his large fortune, in
of Holme Pierrepont, in Nottingham
shire, to his wife, who figures In
English history as the only duchess
who has ever been tried by the house
of lords on a charge of bigamy.
When his testamentary dispositions
were made known claim to his for
tune and to his estate were made by
his sister, Lady Frances Pierrepont,
married to Philip Meadows. Together
they presented claims for the annul-
mert of the dukes will on the ground
that the duchess was not his wife,
and was described therein as such in
error, consequently that the will was
as invalid as her marriage. The most
extraordinary "cauSe celebre" ensued
| in the house of lords. Evidence was
produced there to show that prior to
her marriage with the last Duke OF
Kingston, the former Elizabeth Chud-
leigh. renowned as the greatest
1 beauty of her day, had been secretly
| married to Augustus Hervey, at that
time a lieutenant of the royal navy,
] but who had, In the meantime, be-
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