In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

18 Oo Life Stateside and War Abroad After seeing Varvara off to Europe on the Queen Mary, Belle, Lois Massey, and Barbara Donohoe stayed in New York for a month. Belle wanted to buy a small apartment in New York since, in the future, she would be living primarily in the United States. In the meantime, she leased a house in Bedford, New York, just outside the city, and brought two of her favorite horses from Hobcaw. Her sister, Renee Samstag, had a house at Pound Ridge, and the two sisters saw a great deal of each other that summer, drawing closer after the death of their mother. “We always regretted that we weren’t closer,” Renee commented, “especially as we grew older. But there was such a difference in age. Six years is a lot when you’re ten and sixteen, or sixteen and twenty-two. We just didn’t have the same interests. Later, of course, it [age] didn’t matter so much.” Renee apparently accepted her sister’s lesbianism, and they saw a great deal of each other once Belle settled at Bellefield. She always maintained the Baruch conspiracy of silence, declaring such matters “personal, and no one’s business.” Belle savored life and was never one to sit quietly. She kept her group on the run with cocktail parties, trips to Bear Mountain, Woodstock, and West Point, and dinners at a favorite restaurant, Boots ’n’ Spurs. On June 22 they celebrated Bob and Renee Samstag’s third wedding anniversary by attending the Max Schmeling–Joe Louis fight. In just two minutes and four seconds, the “Brown Bomber” defeated the German, who had handed him the only defeat of his career when Schmeling knocked Louis out in the twelfth round of a fifteen-round match the previous year. The fact that Schmeling was a German, Life Stateside and War Abroad 103 honored earlier by Adolph Hitler as representative of the superiority of the Aryan race, made Louis’s victory all the sweeter. They decided to stay in the city for a few days to shop at Macy’s, consult with Marie Glinn on plans for Bellefield, lunch at Schraft’s, see the film Mayerling , and take in some Broadway shows. Two of Belle’s favorites, Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne, were starring in Chekhov’s play The Sea Gull. Bernard Baruch sailed for Europe on a fact-finding tour for President Roosevelt , and his daughters and his secretary, Mary Boyle, saw him aboard ship. Belle then returned to South Carolina to prepare for her last trip to Europe until after World War II, a catastrophic event that would change forever the boundaries and societies of that great continent. Arriving in France in August, Belle wasted no time organizing the transfer of her horses, including Barbara Donohoe’s Malicorn, to the United States. She had persuaded Jean Darthez to move his family from France and had built a white frame house for them near the Bellefield stables. Jean needed little persuasion . The specter of war drew ever closer, and he wanted to protect his family . Also, the thought of parting forever with his beloved Toto was unthinkable. His wife and children did not share his enthusiasm. In the early fall of 1938, just as the Sudetenland succumbed to Nazi intimidation , the Darthez family arrived at Hobcaw Barony. Robert, who was twelve, recalls: “It was raining the day we arrived and I remember thinking,What a dark and dismal place.” The Darthez children were greatly intimidated by Belle. Christiane, the youngest, recalled the first time she met Belle. “I was five or six years old at the time. We were living in Maisons Lafitte near Paris, having moved there from Pau. . . . Standing beside my father, I was completely awed when I looked up at, what seemed to me at the time, the tallest person I had ever seen!” The children were constantly warned by their parents that they were not to disturb Miss Belle in any way, and such reminders only increased their awe and fear of Belle, who could intimidate most adults, let alone small children. “I had the distinct impression,” Robert said, “that she did not like children.” Belle liked children but was not comfortable with them, seldom having occasion to interact with them. Neither her brother nor her sister had children, so there were no nieces or nephews. She could be aloof and haughty and, when uncomfortable, doubly so. Belle’s uncertainty...

Share