Dominick Elwes

Bede Evelyn Dominick Elwes (24 August 1931 – 5 September 1975) was an English portrait painter whose much publicised elopement with an heiress in 1957 created an international scandal.

Early life Elwes (pronounced "El-wez") was born on 24 August 1931 at Billing Hall, Northamptonshire to English portrait painter Simon Elwes (RA, KM), and the Hon. Gloria Rodd, daughter of the 1st Baron Rennell, some-time British Ambassador to Rome, and Conservative MP for St. Marylebone (1928–1932).

Elwes was descended from the Catholic Cary-Elwes (sometimes known simply as Elwes) family, which includes such noted British prelates, priests and monks as abbot Columba Cary-Elwes, Bishop Dudley Cary-Elwes, and Father Luke Cary-Elwes. Dominick was the grandson of Gervase Cary Elwes (1866–1921), a diplomat and professional classical tenor, and Lady Winifride Mary Elizabeth Feilding, daughter of the 8th Earl of Denbigh. Dominick was a nephew of the English novelist, biographer and journalist Nancy Mitford, and a godson of Evelyn Waugh. One of his cousins was the 3rd Baron Rennell. For his early education, Dominick spent much of his childhood during the Second World War in the United States, after which he returned to England to attend Downside School in Somerset.

Career In January 1960 Elwes became the assistant editor of Lilliput Magazine until its closure in July of that same year. From 1960 to 1962, he was the Company Director of Dome Press where he began the newsweekly Topic Magazine as editorial director, along with William Rees-Davies and Maurice Macmillan. Topic was backed by twenty persons amounting to $420,000. The backers included Macmillan, and the Duchess of Argyll. While at Topic, Elwes discovered and hired a then unknown art student to be a graphic artist for the magazine, Ridley Scott, who went on to become a famous director. In 1963, together with Nicholas Luard, he published and subsequently became the director of Design Yearbook, which developed into the book-packaging firm November Books. The company's clients included Thames & Hudson, a publisher of books on art, architecture, design and visual culture. In 1964, he co-wrote a book with Luard, Refer to Drawer: Being a Penetrating Survey of a Shameful National Practice – Hustling, which included illustrations by cartoonist John Glashan. Elwes subsequently became a member of the National Union of Journalists.

Following in his father's footsteps Elwes then became a portrait painter, painting many of London's Clermont Set. Around 1967 he moved to Andalucia, Spain, where, with the aid of architect Philip Jebb, he designed a Mediterranean-style apartment complex, completed in 1970. Clients included Luard and the actor Hugh Millais. In 1975, Elwes and George Britnell became owners of a hair salon, Figurehead, on Pont Street in Knightsbridge which he filled with paintings by his father. His then ex-wife helped promote the salon for an article in The Daily Telegraph. One of Elwes's portraits was of John Bingham, 7th Earl of Lucan, who disappeared in November 1974 after the murder of his children's nanny. Elwes and Lucan had been close friends since their schooldays.

On 27 November 1957, Geoffrey Kennedy obtained a restraining order against Elwes from Justice Sir Ronald Roxburgh, barring the couple from marrying. The High Court Tipstaff was not authorised, however, to apprehend Elwes anywhere outside England and Wales. After initially attempting to marry in Scotland while being pursued by the press, Elwes and Kennedy eloped to Havana, Cuba, where they married in a civil ceremony on 27 January 1958 as guests of American mobster Meyer Lansky, who provided accommodation for them at his hotel, the Habana Riviera.

When Fidel Castro's revolution threatened the stability of the country, the newlyweds fled aboard a raft with two National Geographic explorers who were sailing to Miami. They flew to New York City from Miami, obtaining a marriage licence on 31 March in New York. On 1 April, the couple repeated the ceremony to ensure they were legally married in Manhattan's Supreme Court; the ceremony was officiated by Justice Henry Clay Greenberg. On 15 July, the two set sail for England aboard the liner SS Liberté docking at Southampton. The next day, accompanied by his wife and an attorney, Elwes turned himself over to authorities and was transferred to Brixton Prison, where he remained for two weeks while awaiting trial for contempt of court for defying the judge's order to return Miss Kennedy to her parents. At trial, the judge accepted that Elwes loved his bride but commented that every parent knows that love was not "readily convertible into bread and butter" for the support of a wife. In his ruling he directed that Elwes be released from custody but also ordered that Kennedy remain a ward of court. Elwes and Kennedy were married and had three children, Cassian Elwes, who became a film producer, Damian Elwes, an artist, and Cary Elwes, an actor. The marriage was dissolved in London in January 1969, and Elwes never remarried.

In her biography of her husband, Kathleen Tynan later said of Elwes "Dominick Elwes was a bounder and a wit, and Ken adored him." It happened about a month after the death of his father. His body was found by his girlfriend Melissa Wyndham. In his book The Gamblers, John Pearson implicated James Goldsmith in the suicide.

Elwes's mother Gloria Elwes died on 8 October 1975, at Amberley, West Sussex, leaving an estate valued for probate at more than £56,000 .

Selected paintings 1969 – Portrait of John Aspinall 1970 – Portrait of Min Aspinall & Mushie 1971 – Portrait of Sir Vivian Naylor-Leyland 1972 – Portrait of Lord Lucan