Description:Duchess Millicent's prominent social position as the Duchess of Sutherland and proprietor of Stafford House in London meant that she was prestigious and successful in high society. This success is reflected in much of her correspondence. A letter from Lady Gladstone asks: ‘in memory of dear old days might I bring my Granddaughter to your party tomorrow, we are leaving London on Saturday it will be such a pleasure to look at you both in the house’.
The glamour of Duchess Millicent's social role as a hostess is reflected in a letter dated January 9th 1953 from Elizabeth Lewis at Mary Pickford Cosmetics. Pickfords Cosmentics was a beauty company founded in 1937 in Los Angeles, California by the famous Hollywood actress Mary Pickford.
Lewis writes to the Duchess ‘I have the No. 6 liner for you and am sending it to you airmail, also some special face powder’.
Duchess Millicent's close relationship with the prestigious company is reflected as Lewis goes on to commiserate the Duchess about breaking her leg. ‘How perfectly dreadful’ she writes, adding ‘I broke my ankle once and had it in a cast and had to go on crutches and it was no fun'. Letters amongst Duchess Millicent's personal papers indicate that she was good friends with Mary Pickford herself.
Documents relating to Mary Pickford featured on the Sutherland Collection website courtesy of the Mary Pickford Institute for Film Education. Click on the link below to learn more about the Mary Pickford Institute.