Mrs.
OGDEN HAGGERTY HAMMOND (MARY PICTON STEVENS), Saloon Class Passenger
Mary Hammond
and one of her daughters, Millicent.
image courtesy
Amy Schapiro (Hugh Fenwick Collection).
Mary Hammond, née Stevens, 29, was born 16 May 1885 to
John Stevens and Mary Marshall McGuire in Hoboken, New Jersey, United
States. The Stevens family from which Mary was decended were
English
settlers who had settled before the Revolutionary War, hob-nobbed with
George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, founded the city of Hoboken,
pioneered
steam travel by boat and by train, and Mary's grandfather, Edwin
Augustus Stevens, founded the Stevens Institute of
Technology. Much of Mary's childhood was spent at the family
estate
of Castle Point, which was razed in 1959 by the Stevens Institute of
Technology to make way for a modern structure.
When Mary was ten, John bled to death during an operation to remove a
goiter. Her mother died nine years later, leaving the teenage
Mary Stevens a millionaire. Ogden
Hammond, Mary's future husband,
was introduced to her by one of Ogden's Yale friends while in
Bernardsville, New Jersey. Mary and Ogden would marry on 8 April
1907 when she was
a few weeks short of her twenty-second birthday, and when he was
thirty-eight.
For the first year of their marriage, the two lived in Ogden's hometown
of Superior, Wisconsin. Then they moved east where Ogden
purchased a house on 30 East 70th Street in New York City, Manhattan to
be exact,
and an estate in Bernardsville. The Hammonds procured their
forty-seven room, New Jersey "summer cottage" from a Mr. Ellsworth, who
had bought
the estate from Mary's Uncle Edwin Augustus Stevens, Jr., who had built
the house in the late 1880's. Ogden added a swimming pool and a
five-room wing, and in 1908 the Hammonds moved in just in time for the
arrival of
their first child, Mary. A second daughter, Millicent Vernon, was
born on 25 February 1910. A son, Ogden Jr., was born to them in
1912
in New York City.
Among their prized possessions was a Packard, as automobiles were
novelties in those days. Ogden and Mary would often go on Sunday
drives together.
As her husband entered local politics, Ogden and Mary Hammond became
well-known in the social and political circuits. They were known
to be friendly and genuinely concerned for the people. Mary was a
member of the Colony Club. Ogden, running as a Republican, was
elected to a one-year term in the New Jersey assembly in 1915.
Also in 1915, Mary Hammond was eager to aid victims of the ongoing war
in Europe and help the Red Cross establish a hospital in France.
Although rumors persisted for weeks up to the time before the Lusitania's
final departure from New York, Mary would not be dissuaded from her
mission. Whereas other passengers such as Alfred Vanderbilt and Charles Frohman received anonymous
warnings, Mary received one that was much more personal. Mary's
Aunt Elsie was a friend of German Ambassador to the United States,
Count Johann von Bernstorff. Days prior to the Lusitania's
departure, von Bernstorff had stressed to Aunt Elsie, "Do not let
anyone you know get on the Lusitania."
Elsie did not ask why and did not want to know. All that she knew
was that von Bernstorff meant business, and with all speed Elsie made
for Bernardsville to warn Mary and Ogden. Mary laughed at Elsie's
pleads and said, "I'm sailing on the Lusitania."
After all, the Lusitania was supposed to be the fastest and
safest ship afloat.
That night Ogden and his brother John stayed up trying to dissuade Mary
from her mission, but Mary remained obstinate. Her mind was made
up and no one was going to change it for her. Giving up, John
then
asked Mary, "Do you have a will?"
"No I haven't." Mary answered, "Why don't you draw one up for me
aboard the Lusitania before she sails and I'll sign it."
One wonders why Mary, who had lost her parents as a child, did not
think of the possiblity that her own children could lose her in the
face of the German submarine threats. Nevertheless, unable to
dissuade her wife from making the crossing, Ogden too, booked passage
on the Lusitania, unwilling to leave her wife unattended.
Their cabin would be D-20, one of the few with a private bathroom.
On the morning of the Lusitania's sailing, 1 May 1915, the
newspapers ran a warning strategically placed by Count von Bernstorff
amongst the travel advertisements. John came to see Mary and
Ogden
off, but his cause was not for celebrating. He was there to seek
Mary's
signature for the will he had drawn up for her. In the will,
Mary
created a trust for her children and their future children, set up with
money
from the Stevens estate and the Hoboken Land and Improvement Company.
Mary and Ogden were in the saloon class lounge of the Lusitania
when the torpedo hit. To Ogden, the vibration "felt like a blow
from a great hammer striking the ship. It seemed to be well
forward on the starboard side." Going out on deck to see what had
happened, Staff Captain Anderson reassured Ogden that nothing was the
matter and that
he should go back to the lounge.
Another jolt followed shortly afterward and the ship immediately listed
to starboard. Ogden wanted to go back down to their cabin to
fetch lifebelts as those on deck were already gone, but Mary pleaded
with Ogden not to leave her. The two joined Marguerite, Lady Allan for a while
before continuing to along the deck without lifejackets. A young
man then passed them saying that Upper Deck
"D" was already flooded in "a rush of water."
The Hammonds then went to seek a place as high above the water as
possible. Near the aft end of the superstructure on the port side
where Ogden and Mary were, a lifeboat (#20?) was being loaded and a
petty
officer told Mary to get in. Mary refused to be parted from her
husband,
but when it became apparent that there was still room in the lifeboat,
both Mary and Ogden stepped in. The boat was about half filled
with
about 35 people.
As the boat was being lowered, a man at the bow davit let a rope slip
as the the man at the stern was still paying out slowly. The
lifeboat dropped bow first and was going perpendicular, and Ogden, at
the bow, grabbed the rope to halt the lifeboat's descent. Instead
of stopping the lifeboat, however, the rope tore the skin off Ogden's
hands and all in the boat,
including Mary, were thrown sixty feet into the sea. Mary was
never
seen again.
Mary's death notice was in The New York Times, Wednesday, 26
May 1915, page 13, indicating she died at sea. Ogden would later
present to the United Aid
Society the Mary Stevens Hammond Home for the homeless and needy
children
of Hoboken.
In 1925, the Mixed Claims Commission awarded Ogden $17 970 as a Lusitania
survivor. The children Mary, Millicent, and Ogden Jr. were
awarded $5000 each for the death of their mother. Another $31 143
was allocated to Mary's estate, which was already valued at more than
one million dollars. The trust in Mary's will included income and
principal, the latter owned by Mary's yet-unborn grandchildren so the
funds would be transferable without taxes later in life. Half of
the income generated by the principle went to Ogden, the other half to
be equally divided amongst Mary, Millicent, and Ogden Jr. when the
became twenty-one. Ogden successfully petitioned the court to use
some of the income to cover the cost of child care; the remaining funds
were reinvested.
Ogden remarried in 1917 to Margaret "Daisy" McClure Howland.
Ogden then served as United States Ambassador to Spain, bringing
the Hammond children with him, from 1925 to 1929. Ogden died on
29 October 1956.
Mary's eldest daughter Mary, nicknamed "Ma," married Italian count
Guerino Roberti on 8 August 1931. They lived in Rome. "Ma"
died of cancer in 1958.
Ogden Hammond, Jr., was educated at St. Paul's School in Concord,
New Hampshire. He died during Millicent's first term as New
Jersey
Congresswoman.
The second child Millicent lived a long and eventful life. She
married Hugh Fenwick, a man who had divorced his wife for her, on 11
June 1932. This action disgusted her stepmother Daisy, a devout
Catholic, and Millicent was thrown out of the house. The marriage
did not last long
and Hugh and Millicent Fenwick divorced in 1945. Despite never
having
finished her formal education, Millicent also wrote for Vogue
and
became ambassador to the United Nations Food and Agriculture
Organization. Millicent became involved in the Civil Rights
movement in the 1960's and became greatly involved in local and state
politics in New Jersey. In 1975 Millicent Fenwick was elected to
Congress at the age of 64, what the media described as a "geriatric
triumph." Millicent was known for her
outspoken and colorful character and although she ran for Senate she
was
not successful in that bid. Millicent died on 16 September 1992.
Contributors:
Michael Poirier
Maureen Fenwick Quinn
Amy Schapiro
Judith Tavares
References:
Hickey, Des and Gus Smith. Seven Days to
Disaster.
G. P. Putnam's and Sons, 1981.
Preston, Diana. Lusitania: An Epic
Tragedy.
Berkeley Books, 2002.
Schapiro, Amy. Millicent Fenwick: Her Way.
Rutgers University Press, 2003.
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