Consuelo Yznaga del Valle, Duchess of Manchester

Maria Consuelo, Duchess of Manchester by John Singer Sargent

Doña María Consuelo Iznaga y Clement, Duchess of Manchester (1858 — 1909) was a Cuban-American woman who married the then-Viscount Mandeville and later became known as the Duchess of Manchester. Her life story was fictionalized in her friend and writer Edith Wharton's The Buccaneers.

Biography

Maria Consuelo Iznaga Clement was born on the Ravenswood plantation in Concordia Parish, Louisiana in 1858, the third child of Antonio Iznaga y del Valle and Ellen Clement y Little . Her father hailed from an old and wealthy Cuban family that owned sugar mills and had connections to several Spanish aristocratic houses. Her mother grew up at Ravenswood.

In her teenage years, she became known on the New York social scene as one of a group called the "Bouncers", where she met the Viscount Mandeville. The couple was married at Grace Church, New York in 1876^[1], then settled on an estate in Ireland. The couple had three children, a son William, who succeeded his father as duke, and twin daughters who died of consumption after their father's death in 1892.^[2]

Lady Mandeville was friends from childhood with Alva Belmont, who named her daughter, Consuelo Vanderbilt, in her friend's honor.

Consuelo, Duchess of Manchester, was a renowned beauty, as were her sisters Emily Iznaga Clement and Natividad ( Natica) Iznaga Clement - Lady Lister-Kaye, wife of Sir John Pepys Lister-Kaye, 3rd Baronet. She had great wealth and was a celebrated society figure, belonging to the intimate circle of Edward VII of the United Kingdom (formerly Prince of Wales). A moderately competent practitioner of palmistry, she correctly predicted the sinking of HMS Victoria (1887), a disaster which occurred on 22 June 1893.^[3]

References

1. ^ "DUKE OF MANCHESTER DEAD; SCION OF A FAMILY NOTED SINCE THE NORMAN CONQUEST". The New York Times: p. 9. 1892-08-19. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9F07E0D81331E033A2575AC1A96E9C94639ED7CF. 
2. ^ "THE AMERICAN WOMAN'S INFLUENCE IN ENGLAND; Chiefly Due to the Remarkable Success of Two Members of a Remarkable Group of New York Girls Who, as Bouncers, Flourished Thirty Years Ago.". New York Times: p. SM5. 1907-04-07. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9806E7DD1738E033A25754C0A9629C946697D6CF. 
3. ^ Frederick Ponsonby, 1st Baron Sysonby, Recollections of Three Reigns, London: 1951, p. 43.

Persondata
Name	Iznaga del Valle, Maria Consuelo
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	1859
Place of birth
Date of death	1909
Place of death