Frances Countess of Shelburne (1943-2004)
Michael Rhodes
current 9th Marquess of Lansdowne, died in a London hospital, 6
January, 2004. She was aged 60.
She was born 6 March, 1943 as Lady Frances Helen Mary Eliot daughter
of the 9th Earl of St Germans by his 1st wife Helen Mary Villiers,
scion of the Earls of Clarendon, and spent her early childhood at the
romantic 6,000 acre Port Eliot estate on the Tamar estuary in
Cornwall, seat of the Eliot family. Her mother died when she was a
child and she and her brother Peregrine (now 10th Earl of St Germans)
were left in the care of their grandmother - who died in 1962 - and
grandfather - once described as "having all the stiffness of a poker
with none of its occasional warmth."
She married the heir to the 8th Marquess of Lansdowne in 1965, and
after producing 2 sons and 2 daughters divorced in the mid-80s. She
was a familiar name in the gosspip columns of the British press for
several decades.
--
Michael Rhodes (Please remove x to e-mail me)