Alice Amelia GARDINER (née von ZIEGESAR) (c1874-1953)

Alice Marie Gardiner, née von Ziegesar (1873-1953), was the wife of Robert Septimus Gardiner who was the youngest brother of Florence Mourilyan, the sister-in-law of Eugénie Sladden.

Alice von Ziegesar was born on 21st August 1873 in Paris, the daughter of Baron Hermann von Ziegesar and his wife, Susan (née Lardner).  Alice’s parents had been married on 14th October 1871 in the British Embassy, Paris, by the Reverend George Gardiner; 25 years later, Alice was to marry Reverend Gardiner’s son.  Her father belonged to the 40th Hohenzollern Fusiliers and her mother was the daughter of the late Dr Lardner.

At the time of the 1911 census, Alice was boarding in Babbacombe, Devon, in 1911, with her eldest son, 14-year-old Cyril, and a Sick Nurse and Lady's Maid.  Her husband and two younger sons were not present.

From at least June 1915, Alice and Robert lived at Hardres Court, Canterbury.

On the outbreak of the Second World War in 1939, Alice and Robert and their son Cyril and his wife were living at Addington Palace Country Club Hotel – an 18th-century mansion near Croydon.  Two months later, Robert died.  Alice died at Torquay on 1st February 1953.