Anna Gould

Anna Gould was born on June 5, 1875, in New York City. She was the daughter of Jay Gould (1836–1892) and Helen Day Miller (1838–1889). Her siblings included George Jay Gould I, Edwin Gould I, Helen Miller Gould, Howard Gould, and Frank Jay Gould.

A parody of the circus-like atmosphere of the divorce proceedings of Anna Gould, shown holding a bouquet made of indictments against her husband, Boni de Castellane.

On March 14, 1895, she married Paul Ernest Boniface de Castellane (1867–1932), elder son and heir apparent of the Marquis of Castellane, in Manhattan, New York. He was commonly referred to as Boniface de Castellane with the nickname "Boni" and used the courtesy title of Count of Castellane (Comte de Castellane). Before their divorce, Boni and Anna had five children together:

• Marie Louise de Castellane (b. 1896)
• Boniface, Marquis de Castellane (1896–1946), who married Yvonne Patenôtre, a daughter of Jules Patenôtre and Eleanor Elverson, the daughter of James Elverson, owner of The Philadelphia Inquirer.
• Georges Paul Ernest de Castellane (1897/9–1944), who married Florinda Fernández Anchorena (1901-1995), owner at that time, of the Fernández Anchorena Palace in Buenos Aires.
• Georges Gustave de Castellane (c. 1898–1946)
• Jay (Jason) de Castellane (1902-1956)

They divorced in 1906, after Boniface had spent about $10 million of her family's money. Boniface then sought an annulment from the Vatican in 1924.^[2][3] After several appeals the validity of the marriage was upheld. On April 13, 1925, Time magazine wrote: "Probably not since Henry VIII tried in vain to get an annulment of his marriage with Catherine of Aragon has a matrimonial case been so long in the courts of the Roman Catholic Church as that on which nine Cardinals have just handed down a final decision."^[4]

In 1908, she married Boni's cousin, Hélie de Talleyrand-Périgord, Duc de Sagan (1859–1937), son of the dandy Boson de Talleyrand-Périgord. As eldest son and heir to the Duke of Talleyrand, he was styled Marquis of Talleyrand-Périgord and Duke of Sagan.^[1][5] With Talleyrand, Anna had the following two children:

• Howard de Talleyrand-Périgord, Duc de Sagan (1909-1929), who took his own life when his parents refused him permission to marry until he was 21.^[6][7]
• Hélène Violette de Talleyrand-Périgord (1915-2003), who married Comte James Robert de Pourtalès on March 29, 1937, in Le Val-Saint-Germain. They divorced in 1969 and on March 20, 1969, she married Gaston Palewski (1901–1984), former Minister of Scientific Research, Atomic Energy and Space Questions. She had Issue.

She returned to the United States four months before her death and died on December 8, 1961, in Paris.^[1][2] She is entombed in Passy Cemetery in Paris.

Descendants

Anna was a grandmother to Elisabeth de Castellane (1928-1991), who married Jean Bertrand Jacques Adrien Nompar Comte de Caumont La Force (1920-1986) in Paris on December 7, 1948. She was also a grandmother to Diane Rose Anne Marie de Castellane (b. 1927), who married Philippe François Armand Marie Duc de Mouchy Prince-Duc de Poix (1922-2011) in Paris (civil ceremony) on April 14, 1948 (religious ceremony) on April 20, 1948. After having children, they divorced on March 13, 1974. She was also grandmother to Comte Hélie de Pourtalès who married, as her second husband, the eldest daughter of Princess Marie Clotilde Bonaparte.

• 1875 Birth of Anna Gould
• 1895 Marriage to Paul Ernest Boniface comte de Castellane (1867–1932), on March 14
• 1908 Marriage to Hélie de Talleyrand-Périgord^[8]
• 1929 Suicide of Howard de Talleyrand-Périgord, her son
• 1932 Death of Boniface de Castellane, her first husband
• 1932 Awarded the Cross of the French Legion of Honor
• 1937 Death of Hélie de Talleyrand-Périgord, her second husband
• 1939 Returns to the US and lives in Lyndhurst at her father's estate
• 1961 Death of Anna Gould

• Jenny Jerome, an American who married the Lord Randolph Churchill

• Anna Gould bibliography Archived 2007-04-23 at the Wayback Machine
  • Laure Hillerin, Pour le plaisir et pour le pire – la vie tumultueuse d'Anna Gould et Boni de Castellane, Paris, Flammarion, Nov. 2019. The only existing biography of Anna Gould. Read online