Lady Violet Benson
Lady Violet Catherine Benson (née Manners; 24 April 1888 – 23 December 1971) was an English aristocrat, artist and socialite. Lady Violet was considered a beauty and was the subject of drawings by George Frederic Watts and John Singer Sargent, the latter exhibited at the Royal Society of Portrait Painters in 1916. She attended the Slade School of Fine Art. Family and early life. Violet Catherine 'Letty' Manners was born on 24 April 1888 to Henry Manners, then Marquess of Granby, later 8th Duke of Rutland, and his wife, Violet, an aristocrat and artist. She was the fourth  of the five children they raised together. Due to her mother's alleged affair with Montagu Corry, 1st Baron Rowton, Violet was rumored to be fathered by Rowton. Lady Violet's mother was a member of The Souls. Lady Violet's first marriage was one of at least seven unions between children of Souls' families. Her brother John was an art expert who became the 9th Duke of Rutland, and her sister Diana was an actor, author, and socialite. First marriage and issue. She married Hugo Francis 'Ego' Charteris (from 1914 Lord Elcho), the son of Hugo Charteris, 11th Earl  of Wemyss and Mary Constance Wyndham on 1 February 1911. The wedding was held at St Margaret's Westminster, reported in "The Times", and the reception at 10 Arlington St, London. The couple had two children: Hugo held a commission in the Royal Gloucestershire Hussars, and served in the First World War, with the rank of captain. He was killed at the Battle of Katia near the Suez Canal in Egypt on 23 April 1916 and is commemorated on the Jerusalem Memorial, and, with his brother Yvo, on the village war memorial at Stanway. Second marriage and issue. She married  Guy Holford Benson, son of Robert Henry 'Robin' Benson, on 9 July 1921. The couple had three children: Guy Benson was a partner in Robin Benson & co, and a Director of London Assurance (1927-60). Death. Violet Benson died on 23 December 1971 and is buried in the churchyard at Stanway, Gloucestershire, with her second husband (who died four years later), next to her second son, Martin. The church is adjacent to the Charteris residence in England, Stanway House.