Person:Gladys Deacon (1)

Her father was imprisoned after shooting her mother's lover to death in 1892 and the girl was sent to school at the Convent de l’Assomption at Auteuil. After her father's release from prison, her mother abducted her from the convent. Her parents later were divorced.

Artistic and a keen gardener, the new Duchess of Marlborough had enlarged images of her startling blue-green eyes painted on the ceiling of the main portico of Blenheim Palace, where they remain today. Later in their unhappy, childless marriage, she kept a revolver in her bedroom to prevent her husband's entry. As her behaviour became increasingly erratic, especially after the Duke converted to Roman Catholicism, the couple started drifting apart. The Duchess pursued a hobby of breeding Blenheim Spaniels, much to her husband's displeasure. He moved out of the palace and two years later evicted her, dying in 1934 before they could be divorced. The Dowager Duchess moved with her dogs first to north Oxfordshire and later to the Grange Farm at Chacombe. She began retreating from the world and eventually became a complete recluse.

1. ↑ MacColl, Gail, and Carol McD. Wallace. To Marry an English Lord. (New York: Workman Publishing, 1989).
2. ↑ ^2.0 2.1 Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia
   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gladys_Deacon.