Widow of eccentric Lord Bath dies aged 78 in Paris
THE Dowager Marchioness of Bath has died aged 78. Anna Gaël, who was 10 days away from her 79th birthday, died in Paris, where she spent a lot of her time.
Anna, a former actress and model, was married to Alexander Thynn, the seventh Marquess of Bath from 1969 until his death in 2020.
The pair had two children together, Ceawlin Thynn, the eighth Marquess of Bath, and Lady Lenka Abigail Thynn.
While Anna is said to have tolerated her eccentric husband’s infidelity – he was nicknamed the Loins of Longleat – the Hungarian-born war correspondent is reported to have taken issue with her son’s choice of wife.
Ceawlin, who inherited the 10,000-acre Longleat Estate following the death of his father two years ago, is married to Emma McQuiston, the half-Nigerian daughter of an oil tycoon who found fame on Strictly Come Dancing.
MailOnline reports that Anna asked her son if he was sure about destroying “400 years of bloodline” by marrying Emma.
Both Anna and her late husband, Lord Bath, did not attend Ceawlin and Emma’s wedding, claiming they had already accepted another invitation for that date.
Following Anna’s question to her son, she is said to have been prevented from seeing her grandson, John, as Ceawlin did not want his child to be “contaminated” by his grandmother’s racism.
The former actress denied that she was racist and said she had “absolutely nothing” against her daughterin-law.
Lord Bath died of pneumonia in 2020 at the age of 87, having also tested positive for Covid.
The pair met in Paris when Anna went to the cinema whilst skipping school, aged 15.
Alexander was a 26-year-old student at La Grande Chaumière art college in Montparnasse at the time.
Within a month of meeting Anna and inviting her to his for a coffee, it is believed that Alexander had convinced her to take off her clothes and pose nude for him in his art studio.
They later spent a year travelling around South America together in the English nobleman’s Jaguar.
In 1963, Anna married French director Gilbert Pineau, who was unaware that she was still seeing Alexander.
While both Alexander and Anna were in separate relationships, they continued to see each other casually, before Alexander decided he needed an heir to pass his sprawling Wiltshire estate down to, leading him to end things with model Tania Duckworth, who did not want to be the mother of the heir.
Anna divorced Pineau and married Alexander in London when she was three months pregnant with Lenka in 1969, with the newlyweds tucking into pizza following their nuptials.
Five years later, in 1974, Ceawlin was born.