Anthony Van Arsdale Winans: New York Merchant, and His Daughter—The Canary of Lago Maggiore

Abstract

A.V. Winans’ was one of many merchants to experience loss in the “Great Fire of 1835” a conflagration that destroyed 17 city blocks in the heart of New York City. Approximately 150 years later, archaeologists at the Assay site discovered vestiges of Winans’ warehouse including merchandise stored there on the very day of the disaster. These artifacts provided details about the range of Winans’ inventory but provided few particulars about the man. Using archaeological and documentary evidence to explore Winans’ business and personal lives, it has been possible to piece together, at least in part, the story of one man’s rise from obscurity as the son of an indigent New Jersey hatter and Revolutionary War hero, to become a prominent New York City merchant. It also reveals Winans as an individualist with a common-law wife and charismatic daughter who performed opera, married a Russian prince, and gave birth to two of the most talented artists of the early twentieth century.

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Introduction

On the bitterly cold night of December 16, 1835, a fire originating in Comstock & Andrews’ dry goods establishment on Merchant Street destroyed Anthony Van Arsdale Winans’ grocery establishment at 93 Front Street (Fig. 19.1). Winans was one of many New York merchants to experience loss in the Great Fire of 1835, a conflagration that destroyed “nearly one half of the first ward” (Auchincloss 1989:51). Astonishingly, only two people were killed but 674 buildings were destroyed, 80 on Front Street alone where Anthony V. Winans had his business establishment.

Fig. 19.1

View of the Great Conflagration of December 16th and 17th 1835, from Coenties Slip, New York, NY by Bufford and Currier, 1836 (Library of Congress)

Winans recovered quickly, however, and by 1836 was back in business. Opening temporarily at 25 Water Street between Broad St. and Coenties Slip, he was not far from his customers or his original establishment. Within a year, Winans had moved into a newly constructed building at 79 Front Street at the opposite end of the block destroyed by the fire.

Fig. 19.2

Aerial view of the Assay site showing 5′  ×  5′ units placed in a checkerboard pattern in Lot 9, Anthony V. Winans lot (Louis Berger & Associates 1990, Courtesy New York State Museum, Albany, NY)

The Assay Site

Approximately 150 years later, a team of archaeologists led by Diana Wall and Roselle Henn excavated the Assay Site,¹ part of a New York City block delineated by Front and South Streets, Gouverneur’s Lane and Old Slip (Fig. 19.2) (Chap. 16, this volume). During excavations in Lot 9 they uncovered the charred remains of Winans’ warehouse (Louis Berger & Associates 1990:IV-1) (Fig. 19.3).

Fig. 19.3

Barrels in situ on the floor of Winans’ warehouse (Louis Berger & Associates 1990, Courtesy New York State Museum, Albany, NY)

Archaeologists working in lower Manhattan sometimes find burnt layers associated with the Fire but on this occasion they discovered merchandise² stored in Winans’ warehouse on the very day of the conflagration. The remarkable preservation, as well as the quantity and variety of materials in the assemblage, was extraordinary.

Fragments of wide-mouthed wicker baskets with thick reed handles were found in association with grapes carbonized by the flames. These large plump fruits were late-harvest grapes, heavy with sugar and probably destined for a local vintner. Wooden crates chock-full of wine bottles were found where workmen last stowed them (Fig. 19.4). Long-empty wooden barrels that might once have contained salted fish, beer, sugar, salt, flour or a myriad of other comestibles were concentrated near the front of the warehouse along with clumps of thread and fragments of textiles, burlap, packing material, and rope. Mounds of charred coffee beans in the barrels in which they had been shipped, peppercorns nestled in cloth bags, and heaps of blueberries were situated in different parts of the warehouse. Clay smoking pipes were found fused together by the intensity of the flames, while approximately 1,500 other pipes, although charred, were recognizable as styles popular in the first half of the nineteenth century. Glass bottles that once contained English beer, ale, stout and porter, as well as French wines—many embossed “Leoville” from the St. Julien estate of the Marquis de Las Cases in the Bordeaux region of France—were also recovered (Cantwell and Wall 2001:164) some transfigured by heat and others ­completely unaltered by the flames. Pharmaceutical vials, carboys, and demijohns were also present, as were broken stoneware storage jars. Lined paper, perhaps from account books and ledgers, was discovered burned to a crisp, except for a few scraps with illegible handwriting that somehow survived. The remains provided a perfect time capsule of what a particular New York merchant had stored in his warehouse on a particular December day in 1835.³

Fig. 19.4

A wooden crate in situ filled with bottles from Anthony V. Winans’ warehouse (Louis Berger & Associates 1990, Courtesy New York State Museum, Albany, NY)

Winans first moved to Front Street, the principal grocery district of the city, in 1822. According to nineteenth-century definitions, a grocer was a trader who sold a constellation of mostly nonperishable foodstuffs: sugar, spices, coffee, tea, dried fruit, liqueurs, soaps, starches, and oils (Jaffe 1993:3). The archaeologists had found the goods, so to speak, but they knew little about the man listed in the city directories.

I was able to trace the lineage of A.V. Winans’ parents and grandparents, his daughter and grandchildren. And while untangling the sexual choices and genealogical threads of a merchant’s kin, patterns emerged and one surprise came after another in the documentary materials. These threads led me down unexpected paths…to a concert attended by Oscar Wilde, to the Teatro Gallo in Venice, to a villa on the Lago Maggiore, to a southern plantation in Virginia and even as far as the Courts of the Tsar.

The Winans Family Genealogy

The great-great grandfather of Anthony Van Arsdale Winans was John Winans (Jan Winants, Weinans, Wynantz),⁴ a weaver of Dutch or Prussian-Polish ancestry (c. 1640–c. 1694) who married Cornelis Melyn’s daughter, Susannah (c. 1643–c. 1692) in 1664 at New Haven, Connecticut. Winans was among those New Haven and Long Island residents known as the “80 Associates” who founded Elizabeth Town, New Jersey (Burton 1937:136, 139). An inventory of his estate suggests he was literate and wealthy: he possessed a library, a rarity at the time, as well as land, livestock and gold, and silver plate (Ibid.:136). It is likely that John and Susanna Winans were buried on the grounds of the First Presbyterian Church in Elizabeth, New Jersey. Their son, John (1673–1734), a carpenter, wed Remember Baldwin (1678–1722) of Milford, Connecticut. The two are buried side-by-side in the churchyard of the First Presbyterian Church in Elizabeth, New Jersey along with many other Winans’ family members. His grave marker, carved by the Common Jersey Carver (see Baugher and Veit, Chap. 14), is inscribed:

HERE LYES

Interr’d ye Body of John

Winans who Departed

This Life Novr ye 5th

1734 in ye 62 year of his Age

(Wheeler and Halsey 1892:161, 162)

Anthony V. Winans’ grandfather Josiah (c. 1720–1779), John and Remember’s son, was a hatter who married his second cousin, Experience Winans (c. 1722–1759) at Elizabeth Town. They too, are buried in the First Presbyterian churchyard (Wheeler and Halsey 1892:277). Her gravestone was also carved by the Common Jersey Carver:

Here Lyes Interr’d the Corps

Of Experience Winans the

Wife of Josiah Winans Who

Resigned her breath May ye

23d Anno Domini 1759. In ye

37th year of her Age

All Human Bodies yield to Deaths

Decree

The Soul survives to all Eternity

“He of Revolutionary Fame”

Correspondence of Benjamin Webb Winans, October 12, 1905 in the NJ Historical Society.

Josiah and Experience’s second child, John (1745–1825), was born in Elizabeth Town and became a hatter like his father. At the outbreak of the Revolution in 1776, John Winans enlisted in the Continental Army but a serious illness resulted in his early discharge. He subsequently shipped out as a mariner aboard the 16-gun Privateer Hancock and was “much cut up” in the course of a fierce engagement with an enemy vessel (National Archives and Records Administration [NARA] 1820:262). Winans returned to Elizabeth Town to recuperate but was imprisoned by the British. After he was part of a Continental/Tory prisoner exchange in the spring of 1777, he enlisted in a local company of Light Horse that joined the 2nd Regiment of Light Dragoons [NARA] 1776:3). Winans was subsequently reassigned to Count Pulaski’s⁵ Life Guards and promoted to the rank of Captain of Horse. At that time, he sustained a serious foot wound which was to affect his ability to provide for his family in the future (Ibid.). Winans also fought at the Battle of Germantown, Pennsylvania where his horse was killed under him. According to his service records, he mounted another steed and continued to fight, suffering a head wound from an enemy broadsword (NARA 1818:64). Winans commanded his company until 1783.

John Winans was 5′8″, dark complexioned with light hair and dark eyes. As a dashing Captain of Horse in 1779, he married a Philadelphia girl, 19-year-old Anna Margaretha Minck (1760–1834). Anthony Van Arsdale⁶ Winans (1787–1849), the owner of the warehouse destroyed by the Great Fire of 1835, was the fourth of their nine children.

The Winans Family Arrives in New York

Capt. John Winans, his wife and large brood arrived in New York City in 1806. A city directory listed “John Winans, hatter” at John Street near William Street (Longworth 1806:386). On March 31, 1818, at the age of 73, Winans applied for a military pension claiming indigence (NARA 1818:26). At that time, pensions were meted out according to financial need (Rose and Ingalls 1997:191). Winans claimed to own no real estate and his personal possessions consisted only of clothing, bedding, a trunk, chest, two chairs, and a gun, totaling $10.62½.

He is a hatter by trade, but at present has no occupation. Declarent is unable to follow his trade he is afflicted with the Gout and the wound he received in his foot troubles him very much. He has a wife Margaret Winans with him aged 68⁷ years; she is through age & infirmity unable to do any kind of work. He does not keep house, he (has) children who contribute nothing towards support except one (NARA 1820:154).

The “one” was Anthony V. Winans, age 31 who lived with his parents, widowed sister, Susan Stevens, age 34, unmarried sisters Magdalen, 19⁸ and Catherine, 16, and brother John Calvin, age 15. A.V. Winans supported everyone but Susan. When a pension of $20 per month was finally awarded to Capt. John Winans in 1820,⁹ it must have provided some financial relief (NARA 1820:26).

The Mercantile Adventures of A.V. Winans

In 1807, 20-year-old Anthony V. Winans eagerly watched dockhands unload 4 puncheons of rum and 16 barrels of sugar from a ship that had just arrived from St. Croix (Ming’s New-York Price-Current 1807:3). Young Winans could have sold the sugar and rum to any variety of dealers—stowed them aboard a coastal vessel to be shipped to upstate markets, sold them to a local wholesaler or even auctioned them off. In the early-nineteenth century, ship owners carried “their own cargoes but filled up the holds by carrying freight for others” like Winans (Albion 1984:39). Trade was casual to some extent, unspecialized and irregular, with merchants buying and selling bits of this and that as it came their way. After the Embargo Act was repealed in 1809, it is likely Winans continued to buy and sell relatively small amounts of goods until 1812 when he entered into a partnership with merchant James Dobbin¹⁰ (New-York Gazette & General Advertiser 1812:2). Their business was conducted at 39 South Street, corner of Old Slip, under the name Dobbin & Winans. At the grand opening of Dobbin & Winans’ grocery establishment in July 1812, their wares included an assortment of teas—green Hyson, black Souchong and Young Hyson—and a cornucopia of alcoholic beverages: Malaga Wine, Madeira, Port, Cognac, Holland and Country gin, Spanish Brandy, and Jamaica Rum. Also on hand were boxes of brown Havana sugar, hogsheads of molasses and Muscovado Sugars,¹¹ as well as 1,500 pounds of green coffee (raw unroasted coffee beans). Dobbin & Winans also offered pimiento, indigo, chocolate, exotic spices such as nutmeg, mace, and pepper (probably peppercorns similar to those found by the archaeologists), in addition to Hullock’s Cheese, Spermaceti Candles and “a general assortment of groceries, wholesale and retail” (Ibid.) The partners also placed an ad offering “Ships Stores carefully put up” (Ibid.), no doubt hoping to provision fishing boats, coasting vessels, larger merchant ships, ocean going vessels, or perhaps ships involved in the early China Trade.

It took courage to go into business during the War of 1812. Foreign commerce was nearly at a standstill and the southern coastal trade had virtually ceased. A British squadron off Sandy Hook prevented ships from sailing into New York Harbor and soon patrolled Long Island Sound. Although a few coastal vessels were able to slip into New York, most were not able to get into the city. When peace was declared in 1815, New York became the entrepot “where goods of every sort from every place were exchanged and the New Yorkers grew rich from profits, commissions, freights, and other excuses for levying toll upon that volume of business” (Albion 1984:8–10). Most of the liquor bottles found in Winans’ warehouse had English shapes (Louis Berger & Associates 1990:IV-123). Ships brought back alcoholic beverages from England and the Continent. “Nearly every London packet brought a moderate amount of ale, porter, or stout.” Madeira came from Portuguese or Spanish ports by way of London or Hamburg. “Holland gin” came from Amsterdam and whiskey made its way down the Mississippi River from the Midwest or Kentucky to New Orleans and from there to New York (Albion 1984:72–73).

Similar to other nineteenth-century New York merchants, James Dobbin and Anthony V. Winans “diversified their profit sources and activities” (Jaffe 1993:8) by speculating in real estate. In 1816, they advertised for rent a 12 room, three-story brick house at 5 Gold Street, not far from Winans’ residence, claiming it possessed “every convenience for a large family” (Mercantile Advertiser 1818a:4).

The partners were even prosperous enough to attract a thief. In January 1817, 15-year-old George Mills was captured in the act of robbing Dobbin & Winans’ store (Evening Post 1817:2). At this time, in addition to the merchandise listed for sale at their opening, the partners were selling city-inspected beef and pork, bundles of Cassia (a substitute for cinnamon), London Mustard, citron and cloves, an assortment of spirits such as “Teneriffe [sic] wine,” Pierpont’s and Baltimore gin (domestic products), Hibbart’s Brown Stout, “Old Madeira in wood and glass, Genuine Red Port, excellent Claret, Old Hock, Vine de Grave, superior Jamaica Shrub, Cognac Brandy,” as well as Malaga raisins and soft-shelled almonds (Mercantile Advertiser 1818b:1). They continued to specialize in imported and exotic foodstuffs such as spices, wines and spirits, teas, and coffee but also carried general merchandise such as candles and gunpowder. For example, in August of 1818, the schooner, Mary Ann Chapman arrived from Baltimore with dry goods as well as tea, brandy, and molasses for Dobbin & Winans and several other New York City merchants (New York Daily Advertiser 1818:2).

The partnership of Dobbin & Winans was dissolved by mutual agreement¹² on February 1, 1819. The Mercantile Advertiser (1819a:3) reported that A.V. Winans would “continue to transact business on his own account” at the store at 39 South Street and at the end of March 1819, 40 hogsheads of “prime St. Croix SUGARS (sic)” were sold at auction in front of Dobbin & Winans store (Mercantile Advertiser 1819b:2). In May, Winans placed an advertisement reminding customers that he was still selling “Havana Segars” (New-York Evening Post 1819:3).

By c. 1820, the general tenor of trade was beginning to change and merchants were becoming more specialized in specific commodities, types of transactions, and networks of regular customers and vendors (Steven H. Jaffe, 2009, personal communication). In early May 1821, the ship Dublin Packet arrived from Ireland with a consignment of ten hogsheads of salt and Anthony V. Winans added “Basket Salt,” (a purer finer salt derived from salt-springs rather than brine) to his inventory (New-York Evening Post 1821a:3). Winans advertised that he also had 44 hogsheads of Kentucky tobacco and 19 bales of Alabama cotton for sale at 39 South Street (New-York Evening Post 1821b:3).

In July, the ship Atlas arrived in New York after a 30-day voyage from New Orleans carrying cotton, tobacco, and wheat for nine merchants including Winans (Evening Post 1821:2).

Winans continued to transact business at 39 South Street until 1822 when he relocated to 93 Front Street where he remained until the Great Fire of 1835 destroyed the premises. He was in his early 30s when he purchased the 93 Front Street property. It was worth $6,000 when he moved in and $11,000 just prior to the 1835 Fire (Louis Berger & Associates 1990:III-32-33 and Appendix 2-26-27).

During those early years on Front Street, Winans shared the premises with a sail duck store and Hinton & Moore, (Greenhouse Consultants 1983:57), a company that handled large amounts of imported white lead, a pigment and base for paints (Depew 1895:439). Winans resided elsewhere—39 Gold Street until 1819 when he, his parents and the siblings he supported moved to 76 Frankfort St. at the corner of Cliff Street, less than a block away (Longworth 1819:431–432). The family remained on Frankfort St. until 1826 when they moved to 25 Cliff Street between Fulton Street and Maiden Lane (Longworth 1826:525).

Winans & Company was listed by name in a city directory for the first time in 1825, the year that saw the completion of the Erie Canal (Longworth 1825:463). The Canal connected the Hudson River at Albany with the Great Lakes at Buffalo, linked New York to the hinterland beyond, opened up new markets and helped to make New York City the nation’s leading port. Anthony V. Winans invested in the Peru Iron Company established in 1822 in Peru (later Clintonville) New York, near Lake Champlain. The company shipped iron goods to Troy and New York City. When a flood demolished the company’s eight bloomery forges in 1830, a larger bloomery operation with 14 bloomery fires and two forges for making anchors was constructed. Anthony V. Winans was a company director at this time. By the mid-1840s, the facility was producing more than 2,200 tons of market iron and nails per year and was recognized as “the largest charcoal iron forge in the world” (Pollard and Klaus 2004:19). The Peru Iron Company also maintained a warehouse and office in New York City where Winans might have attended meetings and examined the inventory (Haegar 1981:14).

Winans was also a large stockholder and lessee of the Williamsburgh Ferry Company¹³ in the 1830s when the city ordered shareholders to modernize its operation by using steam boats—one boat to run from or above Stanton Street and two boats to run “constantly” from Grand Street to Brooklyn (City of New York 1917:328).

A.V. Winans was also embroiled in a legal dispute involving two enslaved women, Matilda and Sarah, who were the property of one David McCullough and who were surrendered to Winans in lieu of debt in 1836 (U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Alabama [Mobile] 1836). Although the Winans family in New York did not own slaves (it was illegal in New York by this time), it is surmised Winans sold these women in the South to recoup his debt.

Winans Falls in Love

Anthony V. Winans experienced two life-changing events in 1835. In May his common-law wife, “Mrs. Jay,” gave birth to a daughter, Ada, and in December his warehouse was destroyed by the Great Fire. Winans and the girl’s mother never legally married (Wooley 1987:14). It is tempting to speculate that Mrs. Jay was a married woman whose husband had abandoned her. It is even more tempting to speculate that she was an entertainer, given what we know about her daughter’s future career (see below), and entertainers—actresses and singers—were often called “Mrs.”. We don’t know how she and Winans met, when they fell in love, or details about their living arrangements. Although Woolley’s genealogy of the Winans family (1987:38) states that Mrs. Jay and Anthony V. Winans lived together in Burlington, VT, no evidence could be found to support that statement (Marjorie Strong, 2001). City directories place Winans in New York City at all times and family correspondence indicates that their daughter Ada lived at 25 Cliff Street with her father (Winans 1905). After Winans’ death, however, Ada attended school in Burlington, NJ and it is possible that Wooley conflated the two Burlingtons.

Retirement and Death

Winans was a relatively wealthy man, worth $150,000 in 1842 and 1845 (Beach 1842:17, 1845:33)—the equivalent of between 3½ and 4 million dollars today (http://www.westegg.com/inflation; http://www.measuringworth.com/uscompare). He retired sometime prior to 1848. His nephew Anthony William Winans¹⁴ formed a partnership with Alonzo Jones and set up business as Winans & Jones, grocers, at 79 Front Street, the building formerly occupied by his uncle (Doggett 1848:445). It is possible A.V. was a silent partner. The following year another nephew, Anthony Voorhees Winans¹⁵ joined the firm.

Comparable to many self-made men with a little money, A.V. followed the hordes of wealthier folk to “the wide nine-block sweep of Bleecker Street” (Burrows and Wallace 1999:458) and purchased a home at 133 Bleecker. His nephew Anthony William Winans shared the house during his uncle’s lifetime and with his cousin, Anthony Voorhees Winans, continued to reside there for several years after his uncle’s death.¹⁶

In 1849 an ailing Anthony V. Winans traveled to Saratoga Springs to take the waters. He died there on August 25, 1849 after a “short illness of aneurism of the heart” (New York Post 1849:26:37). He was 62 years old. Winans’ funeral was held 3 days later at his home on Bleecker Street and he was buried in Vault 66 at New York City’s Marble Cemetery¹⁷ alongside his father and mother. His sisters, several brothers and a nephew,¹⁸ were also interred in the family vault after their deaths (Fig. 19.5).

Fig. 19.5

Anthony V. Winans, his parents and several siblings are buried in Vault 66 at the New York City Marble Cemetery, 52–74 East Second Street (Photograph by Wendy Harris; Courtesy New York City Marble Cemetery)

For all his business acumen, Anthony V. Winans died in testate. Letters of Administration were granted to his brothers William Wanton and John Calvin Winans, and his nephew, Anthony William Winans (Barber 1950–1951:86; New York County Surrogate’s Court 1849:49-309-55). At the time of his death, A.V. Winans was only worth $20,000 about $475,000 today (http://www.westegg.com/inflation; http://www.measuringworth.com/uscompare).

St. Mary’s Hall

In 1852 17-year-old Ada Winans enrolled at St. Mary’s Hall,¹⁹ an Episcopal boarding school for young ladies in Burlington, NJ (Diocese of New Jersey 1844–1924). One of Ada’s classmates, Mary Haines, recalled in her diary the night several of the girls “slipped out in a boat to hear [Ada] sing in the moonlight on the Delaware river (sic)” (Harker 1935:78). They loved hearing her voice despite the fact that they were severely reprimanded by Reverend George Washington Doane, Bishop of New Jersey and founder in 1837 of St. Mary’s Hall for young ladies and of Burlington College for young men (Longest 1969:59) (Fig. 19.6).

Fig. 19.6

Photo of St. Mary’s Hall and Chapel in 1868. Ada Winans graduated in 1853 but returned to teach voice between 1858 and 1861 when she left for Europe to pursue an opera career (Anonymous photographer 1836, Courtesy of Doane Academy Archives)

Ada graduated from St. Mary’s Hall in 1853 and traveled to Europe to further her musical education. As a merchant’s daughter, she would have travelled by packet ship from the East River docks to Le Havre in France. From there, she would have travelled by coach to Milan where she would study (Brower 2003). “Anthony Van Arsdale had a daughter Ada,” wrote her cousin Benjamin Webb Winans to a family genealogist in 1905 (Winans 1905). “As she was about my age about 19 years old before she went to Italy, I saw her many times… (she) was a fine musician and went abroad to study music”. We can assume Ada’s father recognized her extraordinary talent while he was alive. Perhaps Winans spared no expense in its development and her uncles did the same after Winans’ death. It is possible Ada pursued her musical studies in New York City until her graduation from St. Mary’s Hall. Numerous Italian opera troupes toured New York in the middle of the nineteenth century and many opera companies were established in the United States. The Astor Place House was the venue for wealthy opera lovers; poorer folk went to Castle Garden in Battery Park (Preston 2001:143, 144, 157). Opera singers were the “rock stars” of that era and more than 40,000 people met Jenny Lind when she arrived in New York in the early 1850s (Reich 2001:165).

From Italy, Ada wrote to her friend, Mary Haines, that a Russian “Count Troubetskoy” admired her voice and was falling in love with her (Harker 1935:78). His admiration did not result in a permanent relationship at that time, however, and Ada returned to America. Troubetzkoy was a married man and it is possible the Winans’ family intervened or Ada’s operatic career was not progressing as she had hoped, or that she ran out of money. It is also possible that Troubetzkoy could or would not obtain a divorce. Whatever the reasons, Ada returned to St. Mary’s Hall in 1858 and took employment as a “vocal music teacher” where she remained for 3 long years (United States Census Bureau 1860:119; Diocese of New Jersey 1858:15, 1861:8).

In November 1861, 26 year-old Ada Winans applied for a passport. “I, Ada Winans do swear that I was born in the city of New York on or about the 24th day of May in the year 1835 [and] that I am a citizen of the United States” (NARA 1861a). She described herself as 5′5″ with an oval face, fair complexion, hazel eyes, and light brown hair.

Ada’s cousin, Horatio Nelson Winans, age 31, wrote a letter on her behalf and in his description of her physical appearance, he added “stout,” a word not included in Ada’s personal application (Ibid.). He also applied for a passport for himself (NARA 1861b). Another cousin, Anthony Voorhees Winans age 34, applied for a passport for himself and his wife that same month and year (NARA 1861c). It is likely the cousins accompanied Ada to Europe. Perhaps they did not want her to travel alone or wanted to meet Troubetzkoy. It is also possible Ada’s cousins had business to conduct or were distancing themselves from the Civil War in America.

Prince Pyotr Troubetzkoy

Prince Pyotr [Pierre] Troubetzkoy fell in love with the “incomparable Ada… an American opera singer,” while vacationing in northern Italy in the 1850s (Taylor 1973:69). This statement is supported by the letter Ada wrote to her school friend Mary Haines in 1853 (see above). Troubetzkoy (1822–1892) was married to a close relative of the Tsar and had three daughters. Not long after Ada returned to Europe in 1861 and had attained some distinction as a vocalist, [and surely before 1864 when she gave birth to his son], she and Troubetzkoy embarked on a prolonged love affair. The Tsar tried to convince Troubetzkoy to return to his wife but he refused. Like her mother, Ada became a common-law spouse.

The couple produced three sons in quick succession: Pierre (1864–1936), Paolo (1866–1938), and Luigi (1867–1959). It is not clear when the couple married. St. Mary’s Hall records maintain that Ada Winans and Prince Troubetzkoy married in Venice in 1863, prior to the birth of her sons (Diocese of New Jersey 1875). It is likely Ada provided this information to the school to conceal the fact that she had borne three children out of wedlock. Prince Pyotr’s marriage to the Tsar’s cousin was not dissolved until 1869 (Haskin, 2009). However, it is certain that Ada and her prince eventually married because they later experienced a nasty divorce (Ibid.).

Troubetzkoy was an expert botanist and sought a place with a favorable climate where he could indulge his passions for Botany and Ada. He encountered it at Ghiffa near Intra on the shores of the Lago Maggiore and it was here Troubetzkoy built Villa Ada in the style of a Russian dacha, and its exquisite gardens²⁰. Ada’s vibrant personality and love of the arts transformed the Villa Ada into a haven for artists and musicians. The Italian artist, Daniele Ranzoni, maintained a “passionate friendship” with Ada and lived on the property while painting portraits of the Troubetzkoy boys and their mother, their Saint Bernard, the Villa Ada, and landscapes of the countryside (Sebastiano 2004:27) Although one art critic claimed the Princess Troubetzkoy was “not much to look at,” Ranzoni was so enamored that he transformed her in one painting to a “paradigm of radiant 19th century beauty, flourishing and maternal, and joyous sensuality” (Ibid.). Many great artists visited the Villa and it is likely Ada’s sons absorbed their ideas and philosophies. Pierre and Paolo (Paul) became well-known artists during their lifetimes. Luigi became an engineer, occasional artist, and chronicler of Paolo’s life.

The American Prima Donna

“The opera is a very important thing in Venice,” wrote Elinor Howells, the wife of the U.S. Consul to Venice, to a friend in 1865 (Howells et al. 1988:76). “The impresario engaged Ada Winans this year, and great things were expected [of] her. But the dampness of her lodgings gave her a dreadful cold to begin with, and the public were obliged to put up with a wretched singer [Adele Nardi in her debut] for a week or so, till they would stand it no longer and said ‘Winans now or never’—So Winans appeared” (Howells et al. 1988:77). An Italian critic enthused about Ada’s performance:

Yesterday [January 5, 1865] was the joy of Ms. Winans, and her appearance can be called a joy, as happy greetings were given to her by the crowded audience, having heard her perform. Upon seeing the beautiful and thriving persona, and hearing that voice so fresh, so pure, one would not say that she had just recovered from a sickness…and from which she is still not recovered (Locatelli 1877:129).22

Mrs. Howells also described Ada’s debut in Verdi’s Un Ballo Maschera on January 5, 1865 at the Teatro Gallo, and her subsequent performances:

Her great beauty and—strange to say—her coughing between times in her singing—excited the admiration and sympathy of the volatile Italians so that she was applauded to the skies, and told us next day she was never so much “called out” before. But the next time she sang no better, nor the next, and their sympathy began to flag. After five or six times they applauded her efforts and sometimes quite failed to bring out a note… and after two weeks they began to hiss. Poor Winans was frightened nearly to death and had to give up the engagement, first publishing a letter in the Gazette denouncing the Venetians as the most fickle public in the world and adding she would trouble them no longer etc. a very foolish thing to do, of course (Howells et al. 1988:77).

After Venice, Ada traveled to Piacenza where she had much greater success, [no doubt she was in better voice], and then on to Barcelona where she was paid the “extravagant fee” of 3,000 francs a month (Howells et al. 1988:77)! Ada, who loved money, was delighted.

Her sons later perpetuated the myth that Ada retired from public life after their birth. However, it is clear she continued to perform with some acclaim, at least immediately after the birth of her eldest son, Pierre, in 1864, as Elinor Howell indicated above. Ada also made several other appearances: in England (Musical World 1866:26:405) and Nice where she performed Lucrezia Borgia at the Theatre Italien to raise money for the poor of that city (Daily Southern Cross 1873:3). In 1879, the Gazette Musica announced “that the Princess Troubetzkoy” would perform Norma and Lucrezia Borgia in the theater at Intra (Chicago Tribune 1879:39:6).

Ada and Troubetzkoy separated in 1884 and divorced in 1896. Gossips said she left him when he lost the money he had invested in the Panama Canal (Haskin, 2009). In the end, Ada kept the Villa and Prince Pyotr retired to Milan with his mistress (Ibid.).

Anthony V. Winans’ Grandsons

Artists Pierre and Paolo (Paul) Troubetzkoy exhibited their work at the World’s Columbian Exposition (the Chicago World’s Fair) in 1893 when they were in their 20s. Paul, a sculptor, took first prize. The Chicago Tribune (1893:240:8) described them as “handsome men, something over six feet in height, and vigorous physically and intellectually (Fig. 19.7).” The Tribune also noted that their mother, Princess Ada Troubetzkoy was the American-born Ada Winans. “The Troubetskoys (sic) are decidedly democratic. They do not use their title although they belong to one of the oldest and wealthiest families of Russia” (Ibid.). Ada confided that her boys believed in earning a living and that their greatest joy was in providing her with “American comforts” (Ibid.). Ada’s elder sons clearly made good copy!

Prince (Pierre) Troubetzkoy is very handsome. He stands 6 feet 2½ inches in his stockings and can lift 175-pound dumb bells more times than most men can raise 15-pound weights. He is half an American, his mother being Miss Winans of New York. He has a brother, Paul, who looks like a Viking is even taller and bigger, and who is a sculptor (San Francisco Bulletin 1896:clipping).

Paul Troubetzkoy worked primarily in bronze. He taught at the School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture in Moscow (Alley 1981:729) and exhibited his work at the 1900 Paris International Exhibition where he was awarded the Grand Prix. Troubetzkoy left Russia to live in Paris (1906–1914) but spent his summers on the Lago Maggiore, close to his mother. During World War I he was stranded in the United States.

Many of Paul Troubetskoy’s works in bronze are in museums in the United States, England, Italy, and Spain. One of his most famous, a bust of the young Franklin Delano Roosevelt, is at Hyde Park, New York. However, his most acclaimed work is the 16-ft, 8 ton bronze equestrian statue of Tsar Alexander III now in the Russian State Museum in St. Petersburg. George Bernard Shaw called Paul “the most astonishing sculptor of modern time” (http://www.viswiki.com/en/Paolo_Troubetzkoy).

Fig. 19.7

Anthony V. Winans’ grandson, Prince Pierre Troubetzkoy (1864–1936), was a celebrated portrait painter throughout the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries (Photographed by Emily G. Mew c. 1900, U.S. Library of Congress)

Prince Pierre Meets His Match

In 1894, Oscar Wilde introduced Prince Pierre Troubetzkoy to the American writer, Amelie Rives Chanler, “one of the great beauties of her generation” at a concert in England (Bain et al. 1979:384). Amelie soon set sail for America to divorce her husband, John Chanler, who gallantly said, “the Prince is the man Amelie should have married” (New York Times 1936:26). The couple wed on February 18, 1896 at Castle Hill, Amelie’s family estate in Virginia. By all accounts, they were devoted to each other. Pierre liked to cook and walk barefoot on the lawns; he painted members of the Vanderbilt, Du Pont, Astor and Roosevelt families (Taylor 1973:73). He welcomed movie stars like Katherine Hepburn to Castle Hill although he didn’t know who she was and asked her what she did for a living. Hepburn, in turn, thought he was the gardener! Summers were spent in the guesthouse of the Villa Ada and winters in New York.

Ada’s sons were devoted and continued to visit their mother until she died in 1917 or 1919 of influenza which lead to pneumonia. She was buried in a cemetery in Pallanza, Italy.

Conclusions

In Verbania (a city created in 1936 by the union of Suna, Intra, and Pallanza), today, the family’s name and influence are commemorated in the street name—Via Troubetzkoy. Paolo’s plaster casts are in a Troubetzkoy Museum and several of his sculptures are located in parks and gardens. The Villa Ada still exists, although transformed into modern residences. In New York City, the old Winans’ residence at 25 Cliff Street has been torn down and replaced by a modern building, the location of the Uniformed Sanitation Men’s Association Local 1831.

Anthony V. Winans was a remarkably successful business man. Perhaps it was easier to gain success in New York because less emphasis was placed on class or family connections. However family connections were important to Winans. He supported his parents and siblings. Having no sons, he provided clerkships for his brothers and nephews. Later they established successful businesses of their own. He engaged in a common-law marriage and produced a remarkably gifted daughter who was raised in a close, loving, family environment where it must have seemed conceivable that a poor hatter’s granddaughter could become an opera singer or even a princess. A.V. Winans created a successful business, his father a new nation, and his daughter and two of his grandsons’ prominent careers in the Arts.