Murray Forbes Smith

Murray Forbes Smith (July 21, 1814 – May 4, 1875) was an American commission merchant best known as the father of Alva Belmont.

Early life

Smith was born on July 21, 1814 in Dumfries, Virginia. He was a son of Edinburgh born George Smith (1765–1822) and Delia (née Forbes) Smith (1780–1841). who married in 1799. His sister, Anne Amelia Smith, was the second wife of James Innes Thornton, the Secretary of State of Alabama from 1824 to 1834. Two other sisters were Mary Virginia Smith, who married Dr. Philip Lightfoot (and lived at "Morven Plantation")^[1] and Sally Innes Smith, who married Col. George Bullock Willis (and lived at "Ben Lomond" in Greene County, Alabama).^[2] His brother, George Alexander Smith, a merchant and tobacco manufacturer, was the father of Murray Forbes Smith, a Mississippi State Representative and Senator.^[3]

His maternal grandfather was Dr. David Forbes,^[2] a surgeon on the Revolutionary War who came to Dumfries from Scotland in the 1770s.^[4]

Career

 

The Murray Forbes Smith House at 201 Government Street in Mobile, Alabama.

Smith began his career as a lawyer but soon went into the cotton business in Mobile, Alabama upon the suggestion of his father-in-law. He became very successful and the family summered in Newport, Rhode Island, and went on European vacations.^[5] Around 1859, the Smith family moved North to New York City shortly before the Civil War and settled in Madison Square. After Abraham Lincoln was assassinated in 1865, New York was no longer safe for Southerners so the Smiths moved to Europe where he worked as a cotton broker in the north of England at Liverpool.^[5] His wife and children lived near Paris, where his daughter Alva attended boarding school in Neuilly, France.^[5] In 1869, the family returned to Alabama, but the South was still in reconstruction and Smith was unable to get his business successfully restarted so they again moved to New York. During the difficult 1870s, they lived in a modest house on 44th Street and he was a member of the New York Cotton Exchange.^[6]

He was an investor in the Toledo, Peoria and Western Railway.^[6]

Personal life

Smith married Pheobe Ann Desha (1821–1871), the elder daughter of U.S. Representative from Tennessee Robert Desha and Eleanor "Nellie" (née Shelby) Desha.^[7] Phoebe's uncle was also a U.S. Representative and Kentucky governor Joseph Desha. Together, they were the parents of:^[8][7]

• Desha Smith (1842–1888), who died in Geneva, Switzerland.^[9]
• Murray Forbes Smith (1844–1857), who died young.^[6]
• Alice Smith (1845–1847), who died young.^[6]
• Armide Vogel Smith (1847–1907), who died unmarried in New York City;^[10] she was president of the Orphanage of the Church of the Holy Trinity of the City of New York.^[11]
• Alva Erskine Smith (1853–1933), who married William Kissam Vanderbilt, a son of William Henry Vanderbilt and grandson of Cornelius Vanderbilt,​ ​in 1875. They divorced in 1895 and she married Oliver Belmont, a son of August Belmont, in​ 1896. They remained married until his death in 1908.^[2][12]
• Mary Virginia Smith (1856–1926), who married banker Fernando Yznaga, brother of Consuelo Montagu, Duchess of Manchester, in 1880.^[13][14] They divorced in 1886, and she married William George Tiffany of Baltimore (a nephew of Mrs. August Belmont and first cousin of Charles Lewis Tiffany)^[15] in 1888 and moved to Maisons-Laffitte near Paris (before their eventual divorce in 1903).^[16][17]
• Julia Florence "Mimi" Smith (1860–1905), who married Gaston de Fontenilliat in 1887.^[18][19][20]

Smith died in New York City on May 4, 1875. The flag at the Cotton Exchange was displayed at half-mast following his death in his honor.^[21]

Descendants

Through his daughter Alva, he was posthumously a grandfather of Consuelo Vanderbilt (first wife of Charles Spencer-Churchill, 9th Duke of Marlborough), William Kissam Vanderbilt II, and Harold Stirling Vanderbilt.^[2] Through his daughter Alva, he is an ancestor of the 10th, 11th and 12th Dukes of Marlborough.^[2]

References

1. Lewis of Warner Hall: The History of a Family, Including the Genealogy of Descendants in Both the Male and Female Lines, Biographical Sketches of Its Members, and Their Descent from Other Early Virginia Families. Genealogical Publishing Com. 1979. p. 279. ISBN 978-0-8063-0831-9. Retrieved 13 July 2022.
2. Patterson, Jerry E. The Vanderbilts., pages 120–121. New York: H.N. Abrams, 1989. ISBN 0-8109-1748-3
3. Mississippi Official and Statistical Register. 1904. p. 494. Retrieved 13 July 2022.
4. Pastore, Vera (October 14, 1993). "When they moved the old house, they put all the pieces back together again". The Free Lance-Star. Retrieved 13 July 2022.
5. Viens, Katheryn P. (February 2000). "Belmont, Alva Erskine Smith Vanderbilt (1853-1933), social leader and suffragist". doi-org. Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/anb/9780198606697.article.1500052. Retrieved 13 July 2022.
6. "Murray Forbes Smith (1814-1875)". househistree.com. HouseHistree. Retrieved 12 July 2022.
7. Cisco, Jay Guy (1909). Historic Sumner County, Tennessee: With Genealogies of the Bledsoe, Gage and Douglass Families, and Genealogical Notes of Other Sumner County Families. Higginson Book Company. pp. 139–140. ISBN 978-0-8328-3500-1. Retrieved 13 July 2022.
8. Iversen, Kristen (1999). Molly Brown: Unraveling the Myth. Big Earth Publishing. p. 1888. ISBN 978-1-55566-237-0. Retrieved July 16, 2020.
9. "DIED -- SMITH". The New York Times. 8 August 1888. Retrieved 13 July 2022. At Geneva, Switzerland, on Tuesday morning, Aug. 7, DESHA SMITH, in the 45th year of his age.
10. New York Supreme Court. New York Supreme Court. 1919. p. 91. Retrieved 13 July 2022.
11. Directory of Social and Health Agencies of New York City. Columbia University Press. 1899. p. 146. Retrieved 13 July 2022.
12. Armstrong, Zella (1922). Notable Southern Families. Lookout Publishing Company. p. 324. Retrieved 13 July 2022.
13. "FERNANDO YZNAGA DEAD; Stricken with Diphtheria, He Died at the Minturn Hospital. Friend and Brother-in-Law of William K. Vanderbilt -- His Second Marriage -- Business Career" (PDF). The New York Times. 7 March 1901. Retrieved 14 April 2017.
14. "Well-Known People Married.; Miss Mary V. Smith Wedded to Fernando Yznaga at W.k. Vanderbilt's". The New York Times. 23 September 1880. Retrieved 6 April 2020.
15. "Married Very Quietly; Mr. W.G. Tiffany and Mrs. Fernando Yznaga Become One". The New York Times. 22 July 1888. Retrieved 6 April 2020.
16. "Society at Home and Abroad" (PDF). The New York Times. October 28, 1906. Retrieved February 17, 2012.
17. "Married Very Quietly" (PDF). The New York Times. July 22, 1888. Retrieved February 17, 2012.
18. Fowler, Therese Anne (16 October 2018). A Well-Behaved Woman: A Novel of the Vanderbilts. St. Martin's Publishing Group. ISBN 978-1-250-09549-7. Retrieved 12 July 2022.
19. Annuaire de la noblesse de France et des maisons souveraines de l'Europe (in French). Bureau de la publication. 1889. p. 245. Retrieved 12 July 2022.
20. Depew, Chauncey M. (20 October 2013). Titled Americans, 1890: A list of American ladies who have married foreigners of rank. Bloomsbury Publishing. p. 110. ISBN 978-1-78366-005-6. Retrieved 13 July 2022.
21. "CITY AND SUBURBAN NEWS.; NEW-YORK. BROOKLYN. STATEN ISLAND. WESTCHESTER COUNTY. LONG ISLAND. NEW-JERSEY". The New York Times. May 6, 1875. p. 12. Retrieved 12 July 2022.