Gerald FitzGerald, 8th Duke of Leinster

Gerald FitzGerald was the only child of Edward FitzGerald, 7th Duke of Leinster and his first wife, May Juanita Etheridge, a chorus girl.

Relations between Gerald's parents became strained when he was still a toddler. In 1922, Gerald's father became 7th duke upon the death of the 6th duke, and Gerald inherited the courtesy title of Marquess of Kildare. His father took advantage of his new position as duke to secure a separation from Gerald's mother. The couple were divorced eight years later, in 1930. Due to the strain in their marriage and bad environment at home, Gerald spent most of his childhood being cared for by his grandaunt, Lady Adelaide FitzGerald, at Johnstown Castle, County Wexford. Lady Adelaide (1860–1942) was the widow of his granduncle, Lord Maurice FitzGerald, and a daughter of the 7th Earl of Granard. She was a lady of character and dignity, and it was felt that she would provide a suitable environment for the future duke to grow up in. In 1935, Gerald's mother committed suicide by swallowing an overdose of sleeping pills. His father was also to commit suicide forty years later, in 1976.

Gerald's father married four times in all, and became notorious for financial profligacy and mismanagement. Due to this, the trustees of the family estate entrusted Gerald with the care of the family heirlooms and treasures by way of an advance on his inheritance. Despite four marriages, Gerald's father did not have any legitimate children except him. He did however have an illegitimate son, Adrian FitzGerald, born of an affair with a woman named Yvonne Denison Percy Probyn. Gerald did have numerous step-siblings, the progeny of his father's wives by previous marriages, and among them was Joan Yarde-Buller, daughter of his father's third wife Denise Orme. Joan Yarde-Buller, also known as Princess Taj-ud-dawlah, was married to Prince Aly Khan at the time when her mother Denise married Gerald's father in 1946. Joan's son Karim (born 1936) would in time become Prince Aga Khan IV.

Educated at Eton, Gerald became a cadet at the Royal Military College, Sandhurst and took a commission in the 5th Royal Inniskilling Dragoon Guards, with whom he served as a major in the Second World War. He was invalided out of the Army after being wounded in Normandy.

After the war the future duke tried to farm the estate at Kilkea Castle, County Kildare, Ireland, but it proved unprofitable, and in the early 1960s he moved to Oxfordshire and worked in the aviation industry. It was at his Oxfordshire home that, in 1976, the police were called to prevent his father making off with over £100,000 by way of a painting by Joshua Reynolds and a tapestry. The 7th Duke died the same year; however the 8th Duke was prevented from receiving his title momentarily due to an American who claimed to be the son of his father's elder brother Lord Desmond FitzGerald (d. 1916).[1]

The Duke of Leinster was a keen fieldsportsman. He was Master of the North Kilkenny Foxhounds from 1937 to 1940; of the West Percy Foxhounds in 1945-46; and of the Portman Foxhounds in 1946-47.[2]

Similarly, in 1999, the Duke failed in his attempts to prevent a half-brother being formally recognised by both Debrett's Peerage and Burke's Peerage. This man, Adrian FitzGerald, was the illegitimate son of the 7th Duke by Yvonne Probyn (later surnamed FitzGerald by deed poll, who was the daughter of Captain Percy John Probyn, RAMC, who was the eldest son of Frederick Probyn, JP, of Cambridge House, Treverthen, Monmouthshire.[3]

The Duke was twice married, his wives being:

• Joane Kavanagh (1915–1994), eldest daughter of Rt. Hon. Maj. Arthur Thomas MacMorrough Kavanagh, The MacMorrough Kavanagh, Prince of Leinster. Married on 17 October 1936, they divorced in 1946 (Joane, Marchioness of Kildare, married, the next year, Lt. Col. Archibald Macalpine-Downie, and had further issue.) The Kildares had three daughters, one of whom died in infancy:
  • Lady Pamela Hermione FitzGerald (6 November 1937 – 3 April 1938), whose middle name was given in honour of her father's paternal grandmother, Hermione, wife of the 5th Duke of Leinster.
  • Lady Rosemary Anne FitzGerald (born 4 August 1939), married on 9 February 1963 Mark Killigrew Wait. After her divorce in 1967, she returned to using her maiden name.
  • Lady Nesta FitzGerald (born 8 January 1942), married in 1977 Philip Tirard (died 1993), with whom she has two daughters.
• Anne Smith (6 May 1922 – 4 December 2016), daughter of Lt. Col. Philip Eustace Smith of Rothley Crag, High Sheriff of Northumberland in 1931. They married on 12 June 1946 and had two sons:
  • Maurice FitzGerald, 9th Duke of Leinster (born 1948). Succeeded to the dukedom upon the death of his father. Married and had issue three children, but his only son died in a motor accident in 1997.
  • Lord John FitzGerald (3 March 1952 – 3 August 2015). His only son Edward FitzGerald is presently heir to the dukedom and other titles.

After Gerald FitzGerald, Marquess of Kildare, became 8th Duke of Leinster, in 1976, a California artist and teacher, Leonard FitzGerald, claimed to be the rightful duke. He said his father was Lord Desmond FitzGerald, the second of three sons of Gerald FitzGerald, 5th Duke of Leinster, and who was thought to have been killed in the First World War while serving in the Irish Guards. Leonard FitzGerald declared that Lord Desmond, however, secretly emigrated to North America and lived there until his death in 1967, despite eyewitness accounts of Desmond FitzGerald's death and his burial at the public cemetery in Calais, France.[4][5][6][7] A Californian claimant, an 'escape' from the trenches and the fight for a dukedom], Daily Telegraph, 28 February 2006. Retrieved 12 June 2008.[8][9][10][11]

On the advice of his doctor, because of ill health, Leonard FitzGerald withdrew his claim. He died in 1994, but the claim is continued by his son Paul FitzGerald, who filed a suit about this with the Department of Constitutional Affairs in 2006.[12] Paul FitzGerald's claim, however, was eventually dismissed in 2007.[13][14]

In 2010, however, DNA evidence was presented that indicates that Paul FitzGerald is related to the wife of the 5th Duke, the former Lady Hermione Duncombe.[15] As reported in The Scotsman, "With the help of Dunfermline-based genealogist Lloyd Pitcairn, Mrs FitzGerald Caudill [Paul FitzGerald's aunt] traced Maud Crawford, the grand-daughter of Lady Hermione's younger sister Urica [sic] Duncombe. The results of the tests found that it was '41 times more probable' that Ms Crawford and Paul FitzGerald were extremely closely related than were from different families. The evidence that Paul FitzGerald is related to the family of the 5th Duke's wife is the first DNA evidence ever produced in the case, and may support Mrs FitzGerald Caudhill's long-held claim suggesting that her mysterious father was the son of Lady Hermione, the wife of the fifth Duke of Leinster."[15]

• Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by the Duke of Leinster
• Whose pauper's plot it this?
• Daily Telegraph Obituary