Gem sold for £1,000 to help clear gambling debts could fetch £200k
A PRIZED gem from one of the world’s greatest collections is to be sold for the first time in nearly 100 years.
Expected to fetch £200,000 at auction, the 50-carat jewel, set in a silver and gold brooch, is a spinel – a rare stone often mistaken for a ruby because of its colour.
Such was its value, the jewel sparked a bitter family feud following the death of its owner, London banker and collector Henry Philip Hope.
It later passed through the hands of gamblers and socialites, and sold for a mere £1,060 in 1917. Originally found in the ancient Kuhi-Lal mines in Tajikistan, the spinel was part of Mr Hope’s 700-strong collection of gemstones.
Before he died in 1839, he secretly arranged for them to go to his nephews to avoid death duties. But brothers Alexander BeresfordHope and Henry Thomas Hope fell out over their uncle’s bequest, each believing they were the intended owner. The pair eventually divided the stones and Henry took the spinel.
It was later inherited by his widow, Anne Adele. Her only daughter was married to the 6th Duke of Newcastle, a notorious gambler, so she bequeathed it to her grandson, Henry Francis Pelham-Clinton, on condition he take the Hope name. But Henry Francis also became a gambler. Emily Barber, of auctioneers Bonhams, said: ‘By the mid-1890s Lord Francis Hope, as he was then known, was declared bankrupt … By 1917, all that remained of the Hope collections were finally dispersed at Christies.’
The Hope Spinel sold for the equivalent of £80,000 in today’s money. It appeared years later owned by Lady Mount Stephen, a friend of Queen Mary. When Lady Mount Stephen died in 1933, the spinel went to her niece, socialite Elsie Reford. It had been worn by her daughter-in-law Evelyn when she was presented as a debutante in the 1920s. The current seller is a descendant.
Miss Barber described the Hope Spinel as ‘exceptionally rare’. It will be sold on September 24 at Bonhams in Bond Street, London.