Social Victorians/People/Dawson

Also Known As

• Family name: Dawson
• The Dawson sons here were the sons of Hon. Augusta Frederica Annie FitzPatrick and Lt.-Col. Hon. Thomas Vesey Dawson, who died in 1854; they are the stepsons of Hon. Augusta Frederica Annie FitzPatrick and Charles Magniac.

Timeline

1897 July 2, Friday, Major Vesey Dawson attended the Duchess of Devonshire's fancy-dress ball at Devonshire House. A Colonel Duncan Dawson apparently also attended.

1903 December 15, Douglas Dawson and Aimée Evelyn Pirie married.

Costume at the Duchess of Devonshire's 2 July 1897 Fancy-dress Ball

Major Vesey Dawson

Major Vesey Dawson (at 521) attended the Duchess of Devonshire's fancy-dress ball. Major Dawson was dressed as a soldier.

Douglas Dawson in costume as Raoul de Nangis, Les Huguenots. ©National Portrait Gallery, London.

Douglas Dawson

Douglas Dawson (at 673) was dressed as "(Raoul, in "Les Huguenots"), doublet, purple velvet, embroidered in front with bars of passementerie; trunks, purple velvet, slashed with long slashes, and puffed with pale mauve; short mantle, purple velvet, lined with pale mauve satin; hat, purple velvet, embroidered and barred from top to bottom with passementerie."

The Gentlewoman calls him Lieut.-Colonel Dawson and the National Portrait Gallery commemorative album calls him Duncan Dawson, but he was Douglas Frederick Rawdon Dawson.

Lafayette's portrait of "Duncan Dawson as Raoul de Nangis, Les Huguenots" in costume is photogravure #177 in the album presented to the Duchess of Devonshire and now in the National Portrait Gallery. The printing on the portrait says, "Colonel Duncan Dawson as Raoul de Nangis, Les Huguenots."

Other people were dressed as characters from the 1836 opera Les Huguenots by Giacomo Meyerbeer, which was in regular performance at Covent Garden in the 1890s; the production with Nellie Melba and Emma Albani in 1895 was well attended and attracted particular notice. His portrait in the Album says that Archibald, Lord Acheson also went as Raoul de Nangis, but The Gentlewoman identifies him as "Mignon Henri III." William Hay, Marquis of Tweeddale and his daughter Lady Clementine Hay were also dressed as characters from the opera; he was Saint Bris and she was Valentina. Raoul is a tenor's role, the romantic lead.

Demographics

• Nationality: British

Family

• Hon. Augusta Frederica Annie FitzPatrick ( – 24 February 1903)
• Lt.-Col. Hon. Thomas Vesey Dawson (1819 – 5 November 1854)

1. Maj.-Gen. Vesey John Dawson (4 Apr 1853 – 17 January 1930)
2. Sir Douglas Frederick Rawdon Dawson (25 Apr 1854 – 20 January 1933)

• Charles Magniac ()

1. Helen Augusta Magniac ( – 22 Oct 1945)
2. Sybil Aimée Geraldine Magniac ()

• Aimée Evelyn Pirie (1864 – 24 December 1946)
• Herbert Oakley ( – 1899)
• Sir Douglas Frederick Rawdon Dawson (25 Apr 1854 – 20 January 1933)

1. Rosemary Dawson ( – 11 Dec 2003)

Questions and Notes

1. Vesey John Dawson and Douglas Frederick Rawdon Dawson were at the ball, as was their stepsister, Geraldine Magniac.
2. A portrait in the NPG Album has a Duncan Dawson, of whom no other trace exists, even in the newspapers. The portrait of Duncan Dawson, however, resembles a Spy cartoon of Douglas Dawson, Vesey's younger brother.
3. Douglas Dawson's daughter Rosemary Dawson married Lt.-Gen. Vernon Forbes Erskine Crum (11 December 1918 – 17 March 1971) and had one child, apparently: Brigadier Douglas Erskine Crum. Is he traceable? Did he have descendants? Might he or someone know who if Douglas was ever called Duncan? He seems to have a LinkedIn account. A Walter Erskine Crum appeared as one of the "Rowers of Vanity Fair," by "Spy," on 19 March 1896.