Rutherfurd Stuyvesant

Rutherfurd Stuyvesant or Stuyvesant Rutherfurd (September 2, 1843 – July 4, 1909) was an American socialite and land developer from New York, best known as the inheritor of the Stuyvesant fortune.

Early life Rutherfurd was born on September 2, 1843. He was the oldest of seven children born to Lewis Morris Rutherfurd (1816–1892) and Margaret Chanler Stuyvesant (1820–1890). and Winthrop Rutherfurd (1886-1944), who was married to Lucy Mercer Rutherfurd, a mistress of Franklin D. Roosevelt.

His paternal grandparents were Robert Walter Rutherfurd (1788–1852) and Sabina Morris (1789–1857) of Morrisania. He was the great-grandson of U.S. Senator John Rutherfurd and 2x great-grandson of Lewis Morris, the Signer of the Declaration of Independence. Rutherfurd was a direct descendant of Peter Stuyvesant, the last Dutch Director-General of New Netherland before it became New York, as well as John Winthrop, the first Governor of Massachusetts. the 2x great-grandson of Peter Stuyvesant, and Helena Rutherfurd Stuyvesant.

Career

Stuyvesant was known as a very successful land developer of New York City.

In 1869, Stuyvesant hired Richard Morris Hunt to build the "first true apartment building in New York", located on the present day site of 142 East 18th Street near Gramercy Park. The building was a five story walk up built for middle-class tenants. The New-York Tribune wrote "It is an attempt to introduce in this city the style of house-building almost universal in Paris, that of including several distinct suites of rooms under a single roof. This is wholly different from the plan of the tenement house."

Society life Stuyvesant was a collector of arms and armor, fine china and paintings.

He was a member of the Union Club of New York, the Century Club, the City Racquet Club, the New York Yacht Club, the Atlantic Yacht Club and the Seawanhaka Corinthian Yacht Clubs, The Downtown Association, The Columbia College Alumni Association, New-York Historical Society, and the American Geographical Society. He was a fellow at the American Museum of Natural History and the National Academy of Design, and a patron and trustee of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. and Anna Maria Jay (1819–1902), and a granddaughter of Peter Augustus Jay. She, along with a son, died at the Stuyvesant mansion during childbirth in 1879.

In 1902, he was married to Countess Mathilde Elizabeth de Wassenaer (1877–1948), the daughter of Joseph Loewenguth, at St. George's Chapel on Albemarle Street in London. She was divorced from a Dutch Count. who married Rosalie Stuyvesant Pillot in 1925, daughter of Peter Stuyvesant Pillot. They divorced in 1930. He later married Elizabeth (née Larocque) Smith in 1934. The couple had one child, Peter Winthrop Rutherfurd Stuyvesant (1935–1970). Elizabeth was the former wife of Schuyler Knowlton Smith and the daughter of Joseph Laroque. Alan Rutherfurd Stuyvesant (1905–1954), who did not marry. He was injured in a car accident in 1934. He died aboard a ship just short of arriving at their destination to France.

Rutherfurd died suddenly while out for his customary morning walk in the Champs-Élysées in Paris on July 4, 1909. After his death, his widow married Prince Alexandre de Caraman-Chimay, the son of Prince Joseph de Caraman-Chimay and brother of Joseph, Prince de Caraman-Chimay. The Princess Alexandre de Caraman Chimay died in 1948 and was buried in the Stuyvesant family plot at Tranquility Cemetery, New Jersey.