You’ve probably seen this picture before, but did you know it’s the 150th anniversary of the birth of the man in it – Henry Cyril Paget, 5th Marquess of Anglesey, who bankrupted his vastly wealthy family estate in under six years?
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Henry succeeded to his title on 13 October 1898, inheriting considerable property and an annual income of over £110,000 a year (about £10m now), and was bankrupt on 11 June 1904. Mind you, he did dress like this
He converted the family chapel at the stately pile, Plas Newydd, into the Gaiety Theatre and put on extravagant shows with himself in the lead, and “bought diamonds as an ordinary man buys cigarettes”
He also “paraded through London with a poodle dressed in pink ribbons tucked under his arm; amazed his audiences with his sinuous ‘butterfly dance’; [and] modified his car so that the exhaust pipe sprayed perfume.”
His family destroyed all his papers after his death, so we can’t be... certain about his sexuality, but it does seem there might be an explanation for why his wife divorced him on the grounds of non-consummation
As Seiriol Davies, author of a show about him said: “He looks like Freddie Mercury drove through a branch of [jewellers] Elizabeth Duke’s covered in Sellotape, and everything stuck on”
Absolute legend and trailblazer. But of course none of that stuff went on back then and it's all chemtrails and vaccines that cause such "individuality" today.
Initially I thought he must be inspiration for Eric Nally of Foxy Shazam (and the Macklemore video of 'Downtown') fame, but Eric is far less flamboyant in his outfits!
Many years ago our lovely, now sadly deceased, neighbours bought some fabulous silk underwear at a country house sale: they turned out to be Henry’s silk and gold thread undercrackers!
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'don't kneel on the parquet floor, you'll ruin your levis!'
I can think of worse ways
That’s Phil Lynott.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madfabulous
I quite admire the fact that he just said 'fuck it - I'm loaded and I'm going to have the time of my life'.