May Yohe (1869-1938)
May Yohe (1869-1938)
Most of those actresses who married into the peerage came from very much humbler backgrounds than their illustrious husbands. As a result, these marriages were frequently opposed, sometimes vehemently, by the families of the gentlemen in question, but in spite of such objections many of these ladies fitted into their new role with remarkable ease and quickly won over the objectors. In some cases, actress wives even proved the making of their husbands, who often had been sheltered from the real rigours of life and were men who needed strong and sensible wives to change their erring and spendthrift ways - exactly the kind of qualities that made actresses a success. But there are exceptions to every rule and some of these marriages proved to be spectacular failures.
On the face of it, May (Mary Augusta) Yohe, even for an actress, did seem a rather unsuitable bride for a staid member of the British aristocracy. An American, born at Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, in 1869, and descended on her mother's side from the Narragansett tribe of American Indians, May already had a somewhat chequered past of romantic entanglements behind her when she met and caught the eye of Lord Hope. Entanglements which, if they had not exactly scandalised her home continent, had certainly provided the newspapers there with plenty of copy.
A distinctively deep contralto voice proved to be her ticket into the theatrical world, with her first appearance of note being at Chicago in 1886 in a musical piece entitled "The Crystal Slipper". She then settled in to a regular engagement with Colonel McCaul's company at the Chicago Opera House. In September, 1888, May's first romantic entanglement was with Edward B. Shaw, the thirty-year old married son of a wealthy Chicago business-man. May, who was then nineteen, spent some time in the company of Shaw before running off with him to Cleveland. Both May and Shaw subsequently denied any wrong-doing, and insisted that the only reason May accompanied Shaw to Cleveland was because the train departed whilst she was still aboard bidding him farewell! In spite of this explanation, May was still named as co-respondent when Shaw's young wife, Jessie, sued for divorce on grounds of abandonment and adultery - and, contrary to the claims of the accused pair, salacious testimony was given in the case that Shaw and May had in fact shared a berth in a sleeping car.
Two years later, nothing lasting seemingly having come of her association with Shaw, she was involved in another lively scandal. May was by this time living in San Francisco and allegedly co-habiting with Tom Williams, a wealthy young sportsman who was known locally as the "Duke of Union Island." But her mother had intervened and persuaded May to leave Williams and accompany her to Australia. That led the San Francisco Evening Post to publish a gossipy article on her abandonment of Williams that so upset the young man that he visited the offices of the newspaper armed with a club and beat the Business Manager senseless.
On returning to America, May was next romantically linked with widowed actor, Jack Mason, said to be the handsomest man on the American stage - but rumours of a clandestine marriage subsequently proved false, as did other rumours of marriage to the manager of the Boston Museum!
In January, 1893, May came to England and made her London debut as Martina in "The Magic Opal" at the Lyric Theatre - a portentous title given that she would soon become associated with a real 'magical' gem - the fabulous Hope Diamond. Before long she met Lord Hope, owner of the infamous 'bad luck' stone, and became his mistress. A London newspaper bugled the news in August, 1894, that the couple had secretly married. A report which, yet again however, proved foundless. But Hope was in fact smitten with her, and eventually a marriage did take place at the Hampstead Register Office on November 27th, 1894.
But if May's past was questionable, Lord Hope's was not much better. He was a wastrel and inveterate gambler addicted to 'the high life'. Following his marriage to May the extravagance only increased and by 1896 his huge fortune, which he had inherited only seven years earlier, was gone and his finances were in ruins. An examination of his accounts showed that he had spent a little under £300,000 in eating and drinking, £350,000 in gambling, a similar amount "on behalf of other people", and £105,000 in backing theatrical enterprises - chiefly at the Court Theatre where his wife had installed herself as actress/manager. Consequently, Hope was forced to sell his famous collection of paintings - 83 in total - including works by Rubens, Rembrandt, and other great masters. This was enough to stave off bankruptcy, but, as he could not sell the famous Hope Diamond in which he had inherited only a life interest, he was then forced to rely upon his wife's earnings.
In spite of these financial troubles the couple, to all outward appearances, seemed happy. In 1900 they embarked on a round-the-world tour and in the final stage of the journey, in New York, made the acquaintance of Colonel Putnamm Bradlee Strong, of the New York Militia. The couple then returned to England but returned to New York later in the year where May had secured a theatrical engagement, taking a flat on West 34th Street. In February, 1901, Lord Hope returned to England to attend to business leaving his wife in America with her aunt. Whilst he was gone, perhaps even before, May began an affair with Colonel Strong - a secret so poorly concealed that it came to the attention of the US War Department and Strong was forced to resign his commission over it. When Hope returned to America in March he found his wife much changed, and refusing to share the flat with him. Lord Hope was unable to change her mind and finally agreed to leave, returning again to England.
May then 'eloped' with Strong to Japan, later returning with him to their native America as common law man and wife. But within a year Strong had deserted her. Worse, she discovered that during their time together he had systematically misappropriated all of her valuable jewels, which she had beleived to be kept safe in a safe-deposit box under his care. When the box was opened following Strong's disappearance it was found to contain only two practically worthless fans and a collection of pawn tickets taken out over the preceding months - showing that Strong had begun to pilfer her jewels almost from the moment of their return from Japan.
May went to the police and a warrant was issued for Strong's arrest, but later rescinded when an arrangement was made with Strong's family to pay the value of the pawn tickets so that May could reclaim the stolen items. In spite of this betrayal, when Strong made overtures of reconciliation to May she accepted him back and they were married in 1902 (soon after May's divorce from Lord Hope). But a leopard does not change it's spots, and true to form Strong deserted her again soon after. May returned to the stage as a cabaret singer and established a residence at Portland in Oregon, whilst Strong was running a gambling establishment in Portuguese Macao. They were divorced in 1910.
Even before the divorce May had already announced her next husband - a Canadian millionaire! That marriage never happened, but there were rumours in the press of a son born in Portland and entrusted to the care of a local druggist (after May's death an unacknowledged son did in fact come forward to lay claim to her estate). In 1914 she did marry again, this time to Captain Jan Smuts, cousin of South Africa's great general. The Smuts drifted from South Africa, where Captain Smuts had fought in the Boer war, to Singapore and the orient. Captain Smuts was then offered a wartime commission in the British Army and hurried to England to join-up, only to be rejected on medical grounds. May, meanwhile, had returned to San Francisco and gave a concert to raise much needed funds. Captain Smuts then rejoined her in America and got work in a shipyard at Seattle, but an accident incapacitated him and May was forced to find work as a janitress to support him until he recovered. Then they settled on a small tract of land near Seattle to raise chickens. May's last foray on the stage was as a singer with a jazz band. She died at her home from heart disease in 1938, in her 70th year.
Throughout her colourful life May had always been something of an eccentric - not for nothing was she widely known as "Madcap May." Although a talented singer she was a mediocre actress, and her on-stage opportunities were always limited by the fact that her managers, as a rule, were afraid to intrust her with important roles, because, as John Russell once said, they "never knew where she would be by daylight next morning." Nor was she especially beautiful, but nevertheless she had qualities that drew men to her - especially men of power and influence. The press loved her for the copy she gave them, but often they treated her badly, quick to report the worst and often showing her little respect. In it's reporting of Captain Strong's jewel thefts, for example, the New York World consistently referred to May only as "the Yohe woman."
May herself blamed the bad luck that dogged her in later life, and left her in such reduced circumstances, on her association with the Hope diamond, even claiming that it was the diamond that made her run away from Lord Hope! She only wore the real thing twice (Lord Hope disputed that she ever wore it at all), but she had a copy made for her stage appearances. Shortly after she left him, Hope came into full ownership of the Hope diamond and was al last freed to dispose of it as he wished. He sold the diamond to a London jewel merchant for £29,000 and it subsequently passed through a number of hands, including those of Pierre Cartier, until it was eventually donated to the Smithsonian Institution, where it resides today, by New York diamond merchant, Harry Winston.