May 31, 2013

Finest Hour 116, Autumn 2002

Page 25

BY JOHN MICHAEL KOPS

In Finest Hour 112:13, about “Churchill Way” at Manalapan Estates, near Palm Beach, Florida, mentioned its relationship to Churchill. Mr. William Benjamin, Mayor of Manalapan, who owns the property, provided us with the following information.

The Manalapan land originally surrounded “Casa Alva,” an estate built in 1936 by Consuelo Balsan, the former Consuelo Vanderbilt, first married Winston Churchill’s cousin, the Ninth Duke of Marlborough. They were divorced in 1921, after which she married Jacques Balsan CMG. She maintained ties with favorite Churchill relatives, prominently including Winston. He was a frequent visitor to her chateau, St. George’s Motel, near Dreux about fifty miles from Paris, in the 1920s and 1930s. Here WSC completed his last painting before the war.

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Casa Alva was the Balsans’ Florida retreat, and the Churchills visited them there in 1946, coming over from the nearby Miami Beach estate of Col. Frank Clarke. Here they were resting while WSC worked on his “Iron Curtain” speech, parts of which, Mr. Benjamin believes, were drafted at what locals called the “Vanderbilt estate.”

Mr. and Mrs. Benjamin purchased Casa Alva and the surrounding property in 1957. During the ensuing years, they developed a friendship with Sarah, granddaughter of the Ninth Duke and Consuelo. Appreciative of the Marlborough connections, they hope to invite the current Duke to the opening of the property.

The main street of the new subdivision, Manalapan Estates, will be named “Churchill Way.” Lined by royal palms, it will be constructed of hand laid bricks and will circle large Banyan trees on the property. Mr. Benjamin intends to install a plaque near the entrance in honor of the Churchills’ visit. 

Mr. Kops is an attorney living in Manalapan, Florida