Sybil Sassoon, Marchioness of Cholmondeley

Sybil Sassoon, Countess of Rocksavage by John Singer Sargent, oil on canvas, 1913

Sybil Rachel Betty Cecile Sassoon, Marchioness of Cholmondeley, CBE (30 January 1894 – 26 December 1989) was Chief Staff Officer to Director WRNS, WRNS HQ, Admiralty (HMS Pembroke III) from 12 November 1939 until 1946. On 9 February 1945 she was appointed as Supt. of the Women's Royal Naval Service (WRNS) and the following year was made CBE. She belonged to the prominent Sassoon and Rothschild families.

Family

Houghton Hall

Sassoon was born in London, to a Jewish family (from India and Iraq on her father's side, and Germany and France on her mother's side). She was the daughter of Sir Edward Albert Sassoon (1856–1912), 2nd Bt., and Baroness Aline Caroline de Rothschild (1865–1909)

• Sister of Rt. Hon. Sir Philip Sassoon, PC, 3rd Bt.

Married on 6 August 1913 to George Cholmondeley, 5th Marquess of Cholmondeley (19 May 1883 – 16 September 1968); they had two sons and one daughter:

• Lady Aline Caroline Cholmondeley (5 October 1916 - 30 June 2015)
• George Cholmondeley, 6th Marquess of Cholmondeley (24 April 1919 – 13 March 1990)
• Lord John George Cholmondeley (15 November 1920 – October 1986)

The Sybil Sassoon gardens at Houghton were opened to the public in 1996. Lady Sybil's grandson, the current marquess, developed the gardens in honour of his grandmother. In 2008, the garden was named Historic Houses Association and Christie's Garden of the Year. In "the pool garden", the entwined initials "SS" are represented in the outlines of the clipped box-hedge which surrounds plantings of lavender and rosemary.

Sassoon died in Cheshire.

Through her son George Hugh Cholmondeley, Sybil is the great-grandmother of actor Jack Huston.

Titles

She was identified by a number of changing titles during the several phases of her life:

• 1894–1913 Miss Sybil Sassoon
• 1913–1923 Sybil Cholmondeley, Countess of Rocksavage
• 1923–1968 Sybil Cholmondeley, Marchioness of Cholmondeley
• 1968–1989 Sybil Cholmondeley, Dowager Marchioness of Cholmondeley

Honors

• 1939–1945 Superintendent in Women's Royal Naval Service
• 1939–1946 Chief Staff Officer in Women's Royal Naval Service
• 1946 Commander of Order of the British Empire (CBE)

See also

• Rothschild family
• Sassoon family
• Cholmondeley Award (poetry), established 1966

References

• Mosley, Charles Mosley. (2003). Burke's Peerage, Baronetage and Knightage. Stokesley : Burke's Peerage & Gentry, 2003. ISBN 978-0-971-19662-9; OCLC 52621466
• Stansky, Peter. (2003). Sassoon: the Worlds of Philip and Sybil. New Haven: Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-09547-0

External links

• WRNS Website
• Biodata