The teenage bride ‘sold off’ to an earl
The future Countess of Craven was born to an unassuming Manhattan family in 1877. Bradley Martin, a banker, and his wife, Cornelia, lived modestly in Chelsea, well off but far from wealthy. That is, until Cornelia’s father Isaac Sherman died in 1881 and bequeathed the family a surprise $6 million fortune — $150 million today.
With their sudden riches, the family adopted the Anglicized surname of Bradley-Martin and rented a Scottish castle on the shores of Loch Ness. The 46,000acre estate was perfect for shooting and fishing — and the deer and salmon, they knew, would one day draw sporting nobles who would also stalk their daughter, Cornelia.
Young Cornelia was only 15 when William Craven, the 4th Earl of Craven, arrived for an autumn hunt. William, 24, owned two historic estates in the English midlands but was chronically short of funds. By the end of the shoot, he proposed.
“One day she was playing with dolls, and the next she was engaged and told she could no longer do that,” one of her descendants said.
Their six-month betrothal was scandalously brief. In April 1893, when Cornelia was barely 16, she and the earl married in New York’s Grace Church.
“Poor little Miss Martin looked very nervous and
even miserable as she walked down the aisle,” reported The Saunterer, the Page Six of the day. “I heard many expressions of pity uttered by the crowd.”
“One of the most disgusting exhibitions of snobbery I have ever seen,” another observer wrote. “Even New York was disgusted at such a palpable sale.”
With Cornelia’s $1 million dowry — $28 million today — in hand, her new husband began an extensive renovation of Coombe Abbey, his Warwickshire family seat. The building, parts of which date back to the 12th century, got a new roof, structural repairs, and its first electric lights.
Still, Cornelia never got used to the great house’s infamous chill. “The only time I take my furs off is when I go to bed,” she complained to her mother.
She sold the estate off the moment she could — soon after the earl drowned in a 1921 yachting accident.