Mary Innes-Ker, Duchess of Roxburghe
{{Short description|British aristocrat}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}}
{{Infobox person
| honorific_prefix =
| name = Mary, Duchess of Roxburghe
| birth_name = Lady Mary Evelyn Hungerford Crewe-Milnes
| birth_date = {{birth date|1915|3|23|df=y}}
| birth_place =
| death_date = {{dda|2014|7|2|1915|3|23|df=y}}
| death_place =
| spouse = {{marriage|George Innes-Ker, 9th Duke of Roxburghe|1935|1953|end=div}}
| father = Robert Crewe-Milnes, 1st Marquess of Crewe
| mother = Margaret Crewe-Milnes
| relatives = Bamber Gascoigne (great-nephew)
}}
Mary Evelyn Hungerford Innes-Ker, Duchess of Roxburghe (23 March 1915 – 2 July 2014), born Lady Mary Crewe-Milnes,[http://announcements.telegraph.co.uk/deaths/179054/roxburghe Obituary for Mary Innes-Ker, Duchess of Roxburghe], announcements.telegraph.co.uk; accessed 12 July 2014. was a British aristocrat. She was a daughter of Robert Crewe-Milnes, 1st Marquess of Crewe, by his marriage to Lady Peggy Primrose, one of the first seven women appointed as magistrates in 1919 following the passing of the Sex Disqualification (Removal) Act 1919.{{Cite book|title=Women, A Modern Political Dictionary|last=Law|first=Cheryl|publisher=I B Tauris|year=2000|isbn=1-86064-502-X|url-access=registration|url=https://archive.org/details/womenmodernpolit0000lawc}} Her maternal grandparents were Hannah de Rothschild and Archibald Primrose, 5th Earl of Rosebery.
Marriage and divorce
A goddaughter of Queen Mary, she was the first wife of George Innes-Ker, 9th Duke of Roxburghe.{{cite web|url=http://thepeerage.com/p246.htm#i2454|title=Lady Mary Evelyn Hungerford Crewe-Milnes|publisher=thepeerage.com|access-date=20 May 2011}} They were married on 24 October 1935, at Westminster Abbey, but divorced in 1953. According to The Daily Telegraph, she was best known for resisting the attempts of her husband to evict her from the family home, Floors Castle.{{cite news|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/10956833/Mary-Duchess-of-Roxburghe-obituary.html|title=Mary, Duchess of Roxburghe - obituary|date=9 July 2014|work=Daily Telegraph|access-date=10 July 2014}}
She was a great patron of the Royal Ballet in the era of Margot Fonteyn and Frederick Ashton.
West Horsley Place
In 1967 her mother, Margaret, Lady Crewe, died and left the Duchess an estate at West Horsley, Surrey, including West Horsley Place, a large country house dating from the 16th century. On her own death, this was inherited by her grandnephew Bamber Gascoigne, the grandson of her much older half-sister Lady Annabel Hungerford Crewe-Milnes.[https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/celebritynews/11486628/Bamber-Gascoigne-to-save-500-year-old-manor-after-accidental-inheritance.html Bamber Gascoigne to save 500-year-old manor after accidental inheritance] dated 21 March 2015 in The Daily Telegraph online edition, accessed 22 March 2015
Death
Bequests
In her will, the Duchess also bequeathed her family's collection of over 7,500 books, including major and hitherto unknown works of English and French literature, to the library of Trinity College, Cambridge, where both her father and grandfather had studied.{{cite news|url=https://trinitycollegelibrarycambridge.wordpress.com/2016/12/16/the-crewe-collection|title=The Crewe Collection|publisher=Trinity College Library, Cambridge|access-date=16 December 2016}} Among the books was discovered a first edition of The Faerie Queene, which had been inscribed by Charles I during his imprisonment.{{cite news |last1=Flood |first1=Alison |title=Charles I's 'message for the future' discovered in poetry book |newspaper=The Guardian |publisher=Guardian News & Media Limited |date=5 July 2018 |access-date=12 September 2021 |url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/jul/05/charles-i-message-poetry-book-university-challenge }}
References
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Category:British duchesses by marriage
Category:Daughters of British marquesses
Category:Place of birth missing
Category:Place of death missing
Category:20th-century English women
Category:20th-century British philanthropists
Category:English women philanthropists
Category:20th-century British women philanthropists
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