Unpleasant Mess the Belgian Ambassa
dor’s Wife Stirred Up by Refusing to
Sit Beside a German
*v:v:&£y.y.vit ■ > ' 'v
Dr. Otto Ludwig Wiedfeldt, German Ambassador to the United States, with
his wife and their son, Hermann
CHE dinner given at the White
House the other evening to the
members of the diplomatic corps
was not the completely harmonious af
fair it might have been. It was marred
by acrimonious feelings that rankled in
the breasts of a number of those pres
ent, and if spiteful looks and commenjts
could have killed it is believed that this
important function would have ended
in several fatalities.
The trouble was all due to the fact
that Baroness de Cartier de Marchienne,
the wife of the Belgian Ambassador to
the United States, seems unable to for
get or forgive the enmities brought by
the late war. In spite of the fact that
a treaty at peace was signed some years
ago, the bareness is, as it were, still in
the trenches—ready and eager to take a
shot at anything resembling a German.
Baroness de Cartier is an American
boom and bred and she feels she can
best shear her loyalty to the country she
adopted when she married the Belgian
diplomat by regarding all Germans as
her personal enemies. She scorns to rub
shoulders with them, to take them by
the arm or even to sit beside one of
them through the courses of a formal
dinner.
Some time in advance of the recent
White House dinner the Baroness man
aged to find oat that it had been planned
for her to have for an escort into the
dining room and for a table companion
Dr. Otto Wiedfeldt, the German Ambas
sador. This information brought from
her an outburst which seems to make it
plain that diplomats’ wives can be quite
as temperamental as any grand opera
prima donna.
“I will never walk into the White
House dining room on the arm of Dr.
Wiedfeldt—-or any other German," is
said to have been the substanee of the
Baroness’s protest. "I refuse even to
sit beside him. If I cannot have some
other escort then I cannot be present at
the diplomatic dinner.”
Through the same mysterious channels
which had brought the Baroness her ad
vance information was carried the news
that the White House would have to get
along without her distinguished presence
unless it could rearrange its plans as to
her escort and her place at the table.
ims ultimatum brought perplexity
and dismay to the ofiidals of the State
Department, who had been charged with
the always perplexing duty of arrang
ing the diplomatic dinner. These faith
ful servants of the Republic, whose sala
ries are very largely paid by men who
sometimes dine in their shirtsleeves and
whp are never worried how the guests
range themselves about the dining table,
so long as they get there, were faced
with a new and grave problem.
Untfl they heard the Baroness de Car
tier’s protest they had supposed that
their worries concerning this the first
diplomatic dinner given since President
and Mr*. Coolidge entered the White
House, were over.
For weeks they had been arranging
and rearranging the names of the dis
tinguished guests who were to sit down
to dinner with President and Mrs. Cool
idge. They thought they had everything
arranged in strict accordance with the
time-honored traditions that govern func
tions of this kind.
According to these traditions, the Ger
man Ambassador must take his place in
the grand entry into the dining room
just where they had him placed and he
must escort just the woman who had
been assigned to him, the wife of tho
Belgian Ambassador.
There were to be seventy-nine guests
at the dinner. They were to be seated
at a great oblong table, with the Presi
dent and his wife facing each other in
the middle. The seating of the distin
guished guests had been planned accord
ing to precedents which never before
had been questioned. And so the offi
cials of the State Department who had
worked so hard and conscientiously to
have everything strictly according to the
nest international etiquette were
grreatly upset to hear that the
Baroness did not care at all for the
plan and just would not come un
less it was altered.
Probably the public will
never know exactly what
wires were pulled to bring
about a change in the seating
arrangements for the White
House dinner. But that they
were changed there is no
doubt.
The haughty Baron
ess de Cartier who had
caused all the trouble
was among those pres
ent, but she did not
walk into the dining
room on the arm of
Dr. Wiedfeldt, nor did
she sit at his side
during the fiinner.
No, the German
Ambassador escorted
and had for a din
ner companion Mme.
Hanihara, the wife of
the Japanese Ambas
sador. And the curi
ous thing about this is
that Mme. Hanihara’s
nation was as firmly
linked with the cause
of England, France
and the other allies as
Belgium.
According to the gossip
of some of those who were
at the dinner, the lady
from Japan seemed to en
joy herself very much, in
deed. To judge from the
smiles that wreathed her
face, she found Dr. Wied
ieiat a very acceptable escopt and an
exceedingly pleasant dinner companion.
According to the gossip with which
Washington has been hamming ever
since, that diplomatic dinner was not a
particularly pleasant affair for moat of
the guests.
Nearly everybody present knew what
Baroness de Cartier had done and much
doubt was expressed as to whether the
stand she had taken was either ladylike
or diplomatic or respectful to the coun
try to which her husband is accredited.
Some cast look* of sympathy at the Ger
man Ambassador and others shot at the
wife of the Belgian Ambassador glances
which made it seem as if the disarma
ment conference had been very unfruit
ful of results.
To judge from the proud glint in her
eye. Baroness de Cartier felt extremely
proud of the way she had forced the
hard-working employees of the American
State Department to alter the dinner
arrangements to suit her whims. But
many are wondering if perhaps this
pride of hers was not the sort that goes
before a fail.
It is suspected that she may lie, and
very probably already is, extremely sorry
for huving l>een so snippy to the Ger
man Ambassador and turned the hospi
tality of President and Mrs. Coolidge
into a means for opening up the ugly old
wounds of the war. And there is every
likelihood that she may be htill more re
gretful.
Her husband Is said to have been
The Japanese Ambassador’s wife and chQdraa.
Although her country also has been at war
with Germany, Mme. Hanihara took the place
beside Dr. Wiedfeldt which Baroness Cartier
scorned »
strongly opposed to tho attitude she took.
If be had known how much publicity was
to be given the incident it is believed
that he would have insisted on her going
in to dinner on the arm of the German
Ambassador—or else remaining at home
He knows too well how carefully an
incident of this kind will be weighed by
the Belgian Foreign Office The Baron
is experienced enough in diplomacy to
understand that a diplomat’s wife most
be as tactful and discreet as he himself
if he is to achieve the greatest success.
Whatever one’s personal feelings re
garding the Germans may be, the fact
remains that a state of war no longer
exists. The United States has resumed
diplomatic relations with Germany and
hjs duly welcomed Dr. Wiedfeldt as the
representative of that country. He is
therefore entitled to at least formal cour
tesy—particularly on the occasion when
the President of the United States is his
host.
But the Baroness de Cartier seems to
have been heedless alike of her husband’s
diplomatic future and of her courteous
duty to Dr. Wiedfeldt and to President
and Mrs. Coolidgc. Also, she was heed
less of her own social future, which, as
ulmost everybody thinks, is seriously
jeopardized by her dictation of the ar
rangement of tho seats at tho Whito
House dinner table.
This is tho Baroness’s third marriage,
but never before has she achieved any
thing like the social distinction which
she enjoys as tho wife of the Belgian
Mrs. Calvin
Coolidge, the
hostess at the
dinner h ich
was marked by
a revival of the
war s hatreds on the part of some of
the guests
Ambassador. And now it seems likely
that she has kukvd the fat of her noriul
aspirations into the fire by her foolish
determination to snub Dr. Wiedfeldt.
Not so many years ago the woman
who now holds her head so high as the
Barones* de Cartier was called Miss
Marie Dow a name quite as unknown
to the Social Register as that of Jack
Dempsey.
Her first husband was Klihu R. Frost.
He Was a multi-millionaire, but nil his
millions were unable to push bis young
Baroness de Cartier de Marchienne, the once divorced
and once widowed wife of Belgium’s Ambassador,
' who upset the plans for the recent White House
dinner by refusing to accept the German Am- .
bassador as her escort
Mmnm
wife into the position in the smart set
which she coveted. So Mrs. Frost, after
a few disappointing years of struggiing
for social recognition, went to Reno and
got a divorce.
Iler next husband was Hamilton
Wilkes Cary, and everybody thought that
through him she at last had found a sure
and speedy way to the innermost circles
of New York and Newport society. For
Mr.*Cary was none other than a nephew
of the powerful Mrs. William Astor and
himself a man of the best social status.
But, alas for Mrs. Cary’s ambitions,
this husband of hers died before society
could get its lorgnettes focussed on her
long enough to decide whether or not
she had any right to "belong.”
Then came the war. Like so many
other high-spirited American women, the
once divorced and onee widowed Mrs.
Cary went abroad to nurse the sick and
wounded soldiers and to cheer up the
disgracefully healthy statesmen and dip
lomats who crowded Paris almost as
much as an invading German army would
have done. w
Mrs. Cary found her war work not too
arduous to prevent her playing about a
bit With the rather stern-looking but
very jovial Baron de Cartier. Almost
before anybody realized that it was any
thing more than a pleasant wartime
flirtntion they were married.
When the Baron was appointed am
bassador to Washington his wife saw a
glorious opportunity to achieve the so
cial distinction in he/ native land which
had been denied her with her first two
husbands.
But now even some of her warmest
frifnds and admirers are fearful that
she herself has ruined her chances of
any such thing.
Some of the gossips have hinted that
the Baroness thought, by showing her
utter contempt for Germany, she would
make herself n great popular heroine.
As far as America is concerned, she
already must haw experienced a rude
awakening from any such dream. Tho
Perhaps Baron de Cartier can explain
why his charming wife refuses to un
derstand that the war is over
people of the United States are quite
•trreed that the war is over and they are
ready and eager to lot it remain so,