Portraits of The 4th Marquis and Marchioness of Headfort go on sale at Sotheby’s in May.
From the year of their marriage in 1901 until 1910 the couple lived at Pennington House which is seen from the coast path along Pennington Marshes between Milford-on-Sea and Lymington.
Lord Headfort had shaken society by marrying Rosie Boote who was a Gaiety Girl playing the part of Maisie in ‘The Messenger Boy’ in 1900.
The lonely house was recommended to them by William and Patsy Cornwallis-West who lived at Milford-on-Sea.
The Headforts’ other friends included painter Sir William Orpen who undertook their portraits now going on sale.
The pictures were never hung in Pennington House as the couple did not received them from the studio until 1914. But the portrait of Rosie is as she appeared in the Edwardian years when Pennington was her retreat with her husband.
I recall hearing about Rosie Boote in the 1980s when visiting Lord Lurgan at Pennington House. His family had lived there since the Headforts left in 1910.
