Nicholas Alexander, 7th Earl of Caledon

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Nicholas James Alexander, 7th Earl of Caledon (b. 6 May 1955) is the son of Denis Alexander, 6th Earl of Caledon and Baroness Anne Louise de Graevenitz (a descendant through her paternal grandmother to the von Siemens fortune)[1]

Caledon was educated at Gordonstoun in Elgin, Scotland. He married, firstly, Wendy Catherine Coumantaros, daughter of Spiro Nicholas Coumantaros, a shipping magnate, on 15 November 1979 (King Constantine II was the best man). They were divorced in 1985 without any issue; his first wife uses the style of Wendy, Countess of Caledon. He married, secondly on 19 December 1989, the interior designer Henrietta Mary Alison Newman, daughter of John Francis Newman, himself a son of Sir Cecil Newman, 2nd Bt. and has issue:

  • Frederick James Alexander, Viscount Alexander (b. 15 October 1990)
  • Lady Leonora Jane Alexander (b. 26 May 1993)

In 1997 the Countess of Caledon obtained a decree nisi on the grounds of her husband's relationship with the artist Emma Sergeant[2], but the couple were reconciled and the divorce was rescinded. Three years later she petitioned again and Lord and Lady Caledon were divorced in 2000 [3].[4] In November 2007 the Earl of Caledon announced his engagement to Amanda Cayzer, former wife of the Hon. Charles William Cayzer (b. 1957), second son of Herbert Robin Cayzer, 2nd Baron Rotherwick, by whom she has two children. They were married on 2 February 2008. His second ex-wife is now known as Henrietta, Countess of Caledon, and his third wife Amanda is now The Countess of Caledon.

The Earl of Caledon inherited the title from his father in 1980 and is a Justice of the Peace and has been Lord-Lieutenant of County Armagh since 1989. He lives at Caledon, County Tyrone, Northern Ireland.


Contents

[edit] Siblings

The Earl has two siblings:

  1. Lady Tana Focke (b. 1945), originally named Cayetana for her godmother Cayetana, Duchess of Alba. Lady Tana, a successful funds manager is the Earl's his elder half-sister by his father's first marriage to Ghislaine Dresselhuys, later Lady Foley[5], who is married to His Honour Justice Paul Focke, and has issue.[6]
  2. Lady (Elizabeth) Jane Alexander, his younger sister (b. 1962), who has been twice married. Until recently, Lady Jane Alexander was living on her brother's estate.


[edit] Heirs in remainder to the earldom

The Earl's only son Viscount Alexander (b. 1990) is the heir apparent, followed by several elder cousins who are in remainder to the earldom created in 1801 for the Anglo-Irish nabob James Alexander who rose in a matter of decades from an East India Company clerk to an Earl in the Peerage of Ireland. (This rise from commoner to earl or higher is rare in the annals of the British and Irish peerage).

[edit] References

  1. ^ Hein Bruins. "Descendants of Christian Ferdinand Siemens and Eleonore Deichmann" Last updated 27 March 2008, and retrieved 3 April 2008. Anne Louise de Graevenitz (1927-1963) was the only daughter of Baron Nikolai Werner Alexander von Graevenitz (1902-1929), himself the fifth and youngest child and third and youngest son of Baron Georg Ludwig von Graevenitz (1857-1939) by his wife Marie Elisabeth Agnes von Siemens (1860-1939), herself the younger daughter of Karl Heinrich Siemens(1829-1906), ennobled as “von Siemens” in 1895. This Karl Heinrich Siemens was the tenth child and eighth son of Christian Ferdinand Siemens, and younger brother of the electronics magnate Ernst Werner Siemens (1816-1892), ennobled as “von Siemens” in 1888. While the Earl of Caledon is certainly a Siemens descendant, it is not clear that his wife was a Siemens co-heiress, as claimed.
  2. ^ The official artist of Charles, Prince of Wales on two overseas tours, she was born 1959, the daughter of Daily Mail editor Sir Patrick Sergeant and Lady Sergeant, and was first wife of Italian banker Riccardo Pavoncelli, now married to Cosima von Bulow, daughter of Sunny von Bulow and her second husband Claus von Bulow.
  3. ^ Richard Kay. 'Third time lucky for Nicky', Daily Mail (no date) and Richard Kay. 'Hetty's in tune with Oliver', Daily Mail, 22 January 2008. The second time, Caledon went off with the ex-wife of a polo player.
  4. ^ Hein Bruins. "Descendants of Christian Ferdinand Siemens and Eleonore Deichmann" Last updated 27 March 2008, and retrieved 3 April 2008. The date of divorce contradicts the information on Hein Bruin's otherwise accurate genealogy website.
  5. ^ Lady Foley (obituary) The Daily Telegraph, 23 August 2001.
  6. ^ Barry Noonan. DESCENDANTS OF EDWARD III: A Continuation of the Marquis de Ruvigny's The Plantagenet Roll of the Blood Royal. Retrieved 3 April 2008.

[edit] Sources

Honorary titles
Preceded by
Michael Torrens-Spence		 Lord Lieutenant of Armagh
1989 – present		 Incumbent
Peerage of Ireland
Preceded by
Denis Alexander		 Earl of Caledon
1980 – present		 Incumbent