Of Bankruptcy And Birds

The fam-ily motto of the Marquess of Aberdeen is fortuna sequatur, or ‘let fortune follow’. However, reading Simon Welfare’s tale of the 1st Marquess’s reversal of his heraldic exhortation, it is difficult not to believe a more appropriate motto would have been ‘no good deed is left unpunished’.

- Kate Green

Fortune’s Many Houses Simon Welfare (Atria, £25)

Inheriting his title unexpectedly in 1872 after the deaths of two impressively wild elder brothers, Johnny Gordon found himself master of Haddo House and 75,000 acres of Aberdeenshire, including the largest parcel of prime arable land in Europe. Mr Welfare, married to a descendant of the Aberdeens, describes how, 60 years later, through a mixture of good deeds, naivety, the expense of Imperial office and a penchant for grandiose property acquisition and improvement that would rival Nicolas Fouquet, Johnny died with £204 to his name. In this, he was ably aided and abetted by his wife, Ishbel Marjoribanks.

At the head of Strathglass stand the ruins of Guisachan House. There, in 1856, a ‘handsome but plain old eighteenth-century house’ was obliterated by a grand pile in the French château style by Ishbel’s father, the fabulously rich brewer Dudley Coutts Marjoribanks, 1st Baron Tweedmouth.

As a ruin, the house has a romantic beauty that, for some, suits its setting better than the great stone edifice it was. But Ishbel adored it, deprecating her marriage to Johnny in ‘dull old St George’s Church, Hanover Square, instead of at my dear beautiful Highland home’. Her father’s flamboyant style left its mark on her.

At Haddo, Ishbel found much to improve, not least the 14 cesspools around the house. It was the first of many expensive construction projects undertaken by the couple. Nos 27 and 37 Grosvenor Square followed, House of Cromar at Johnny’s other Aberdeenshire estate, rented houses outside London and properties abroad all received the same treatment.

Through good deeds, naivety and grandiose acquisition, he died with £204 to his name