16.00 USD
Elise De Vere (also Devere), born in Belgium, was English thru and thru. Her father, Herbert Shakespeare Gardiner Williams, took the name Charles Devere (sometimes De Vere) as a stage name. We include the image of one of his posters, in this case "Professeur De Vere." It is not in our possession, and is therefore *Not for Sale*, but shown for your enjoyment.
A very popular song and dance gal in Paris music halls of the early 1900s, Mlle De Vere was the daughter of English stage magicians who at the time this photo was taken, performed in Paris, and ran a magic shop. Her little sister Clementine, would later take after mum and dad, and become a famous stage magician herself, known as Ionia the Enchantress. We don't run across Mlle. Devere on English postcards all that often, but here she is, in her typical costume (wonderful, yes?) in a portrait by the great Parisian photographer Leopold Reutlinger.
This card was posted to, as far as we can make out, a Mademoiselle L. Luluin, or J. Juluin, who was at that time staying at Bletchley Hall in Buckinghamshire, England. The card's sender, who signs the card "con," writes, "I feel so cross. I have just taken the dogs for a run and they got all over mud." Haw haw....evidently one of the "horsey" set :) Downton Abbey, anyone?
Bletchley Hall was the home of Sir Herbert Stanley Leon and Lady Fanny Leon. If the name Bletchley Hall sounds familiar, perhaps you are a WWII history buff, or caught the wonderful BBC Mystery mini-series "The Bletchley Circle," about a group of women, formerly WWII codebreakers, who solve a murder mystery. Great stuff.
In any case, Bletchley Hall wouldn't become the British Secret Service Cypher and Code section for about 35 years, when, in 1938, Admiral Hugh Sinclair, (known as "C"), Chief of the SIS, saw war on the horizon, and bought the old gothic mansion with 58 acres of surrounding property with his own money before it could be demolished by a land developer named Faulkner. Funny where these wonderful old postcards (we call them time machines) can take you :)
One of the nicest portraits of Mlle. Devere we've run across. The pale vertical line running across the image at about head level is a scanner line and not on the card itself. (We have to get a new scanner!)
Please examine our high res scans for detail.
Postage is for first class shipping in a secure photo mailer, and we happily combine shipping on all paper goods. If you purchase two cards, we will refund the postage on the second card, and when you purchase three or more cards from us at the same time, your shipping will be entirely free, except for international orders which, because of sudden increases in international shipping rates will still be charged one card's shipping fees on orders of three or more.
And please come visit our blog at:
redpoulaine.blogspot.com
where we post biographical and historical tidbits, images of cards and photographs for sale, some already sold but remembered fondly, related images of historical interest and sometimes even images of items that have not yet arrived in the shop, but that are expected to arrive soon, as well as coupon codes, links to other related sites, and more!