Janet Lee Bouvier

Janet Norton Lee Auchincloss (formerly Bouvier), (December 3, 1907 – July 22, 1989)<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> was an American socialite. She was the mother of the former First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy and Lee Radziwill, and the mother-in-law of John F. Kennedy.

Early life and education

Janet Norton Lee was born on December 3, 1907, in Manhattan, New York City. She was the middle daughter of James T. Lee (1877–1968), a lawyer and real estate developer,<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> and Margaret A. Merritt (1880–1943). Although she made differing claims about her genealogy, including that she was “from the Maryland Lees,” both her parents were of Irish Catholic descent.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref> She had two sisters: Marion Merritt Lee (1904–1947), who married John J. Ryan Jr. and was subsequently the mother of Mary Cecil, wife of William Amherst Vanderbilt Cecil,<ref name="1928Wedding" /> and Margaret Winifred Lee (1910–1991), who married Franklin D'Olier.

Janet graduated from Miss Spence's School and attended Sweet Briar and Barnard Colleges. She was a member of the Barnard College class of 1929 but records show that she did not graduate.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> She was a three-time winner of the hunter championship at the National Horse Show.<ref name=obit1/>

Career

Bouvier served as a board member of the Newport Historical Society and the Redwood Library. She was also the honorary director of the Robert E. Lee Memorial Association in Stratford, Virginia.<ref name="obit1" />

Personal life

Bouvier was married three times. In 1928,<ref name="1928Wedding">Template:Cite news</ref> she married her first husband, John Vernou Bouvier III (1891–1957).<ref name="JB3rdObit1957">Template:Cite news</ref> He was the son of Major John Vernou Bouvier Jr. (1866–1948), a successful attorney, and Maude Frances Sergeant (1870–1940).<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> He was also the brother of Edith Bouvier Beale (1895–1977), later known as the subject of the documentary film, Grey Gardens.<ref name=EEBBObit1977>Template:Cite news</ref> Together, they were the parents of two daughters:

• Jacqueline Lee Bouvier (1929–1994), who married John F. Kennedy in 1953.<ref name="1953Wedding">Template:Cite news</ref> After his assassination in 1963, she later married Aristotle Onassis in 1968 and remained married to Onassis until his death in 1975.<ref name="AOObit1975">Template:Cite news</ref>
• Caroline Lee Bouvier (1933–2019), who married Michael Temple Canfield in 1953. Their marriage was annulled in 1962,<ref name=annul>Template:Cite magazine</ref> and later that same year she married Prince Stanisław Albrecht Radziwiłł. They divorced in 1974.<ref>"For Princess Lee Radziwill, It's the End of a Marriage" People, July 29, 1974</ref> In 1988 she married the director Herbert Ross. They also divorced in 2001.<ref name=Ross>Template:Cite news</ref>

Mr. Bouvier's womanizing and drinking led to a separation in 1936, a brief reconciliation for a few months in 1937, and then a divorce in 1940.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

In 1942, she married her second husband, Hugh Dudley Auchincloss Jr., an attorney and Standard Oil heir; becoming his third wife.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Together, they had two children:

• Janet Jennings Auchincloss (1945–1985),<ref name="JARObit1985">Template:Cite news</ref> who was married to Lewis Polk Rutherfurd in 1966.<ref name="1966Engagement">Template:Cite news</ref><ref name="1966Wedding">Template:Cite news</ref>
• James Lee Auchincloss (born 1947)<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation

|CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Hugh Auchincloss died in 1976. In 1979, she married for a third time,<ref name="1979Engagement">Template:Cite news</ref> to her childhood friend Bingham Willing "Booch" Morris (1906–1996).<ref name="Pottker2013">Template:Cite book</ref> Jacqueline served as her witness.<ref name="1979Wedding">Template:Cite news</ref> Morris, a widower, was a retired investment banker who lived in Southampton, New York,<ref name="1979Engagement"/> a graduate of St. George's School and Harvard, where he was a member of the Iroquois and Hasty Pudding Clubs, and was the son of Violet Lee (née Willing) Morris and John Boucher Morris of Baltimore.<ref name="MorrisEngagement1934">Template:Cite news</ref> His late wife, Mary (née Rawlins) Morris,<ref name="1928Wedding"/><ref name="1934Party">Template:Cite news</ref> was a bridesmaid at Janet's first wedding.<ref name="Bradford2001">Template:Cite book</ref> They separated in 1981, but remained married until her death from complications arising from Alzheimer's disease in 1989.<ref name=obit1>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

Further reading

• 740 Park: The Story of the World's Richest Apartment Building, by Michael Gross
• Janet and Jackie: The Story of a Mother and Her Daughter, Jacqueline Onassis, by Jan Pottke.
• "Obituary of James Thomas Lee", The New York Times, January 4, 1968.