William B. Coster

William Bay Coster (1867 – December 19, 1918)[1] was an American banker who was prominent in New York Society during the Gilded Age.

William B. Coster
Born
William Bay Coster

1867
New York City, New York, U.S.
DiedDecember 19, 1918(1918-12-19) (aged 50–51)
Bournemouth, England, U.K.
Spouse(s)
​
​
(m. 1900; his death 1919)​
Children3
Parent(s)Charles Robert Coster
Marie Bay James Coster

Early life

Coster was born in New York and lived at a large home at 103 East 71st Street. He was one of four children born to Charles Robert Coster (1839–1888)[2][3] and Marie Bay (née James) Coster (1841–1904),[4][5] who were married in 1864.[6] Among his siblings was brother Charles Coster,[lower-alpha 1][9] and sister Elizabeth Mary Coster, who married Alfred Egmont Schermerhorn.[lower-alpha 2][10] His father was a soldier and public official, who is best known for commanding a brigade at the Battle of Gettysburg.[13]

His maternal grandfather was Augustus J. James of Albany, the brother of theologian Henry James Sr.,[10] making William's mother Marie a first cousin of author Henry James, psychologist William James, and diarist Alice James.[14] His paternal grandparents were John H. Coster and Sarah Adeline (née Boardman) Coster,[15] making his father a first cousin of fellow New York clubman, Harry Coster.[16][lower-alpha 3] His great-grandfather, John Gerard Coster,[18] came from Haarlem in the Netherlands to the United States shortly after the Revolutionary War and founded the family fortune through the mercantile firm, "Henry A. & John G. Coster".[19]

Career

Coster became a stockbroker and opened up an office with his brother Charles and John M. Knapp in 1893.[20] He later transferred his seat to Knapp in 1907, and resigned from the firm.[21] He later became a partner in Morgan Drexel.[22] He was known as a speed walker, who could be seen "traversing the sidewalks between the New York Athletic Club and the stock exchange in record time."[20]

In 1908, his brother committed suicide "after he'd been caught bilking his customers out of millions of dollars."[20][21] Although William was accused of wrongdoing, and, along with his other siblings, worked out of the same office as Charles,[7] William himself was eventually declared by the New York Stock Exchange to be completely innocent in the debacle.[20][23]

Coster also served in the New York National Guard as the aide de camp of the First Brigade, achieving the rank of captain in 1896.[24][25]

Society life

In 1892, Coster, one of the best-known bachelor clubmen,[4] was included in Ward McAllister's "Four Hundred", purported to be an index of New York's best families, published in The New York Times.[26] Conveniently, 400 was the number of people that could fit into Mrs. Astor's ballroom.[27][22] Coster was a member of the Union Club.[22]

Personal life

On October 1, 1900,[28] Coster was married to Maria "Minnie" Griswold Gray (1868–1947)[29] at St. Saviour's Episcopal Church in Bar Harbor, Maine.[30] Minnie, a close friend of etiquette author Emily Post,[20] was the daughter of Henry Winthrop Gray[31] and Mary (née Travers) Gray, and the granddaughter of William R. Travers.[lower-alpha 4] Her parents divorced and her father remarried to Matilda Frelinghuyhsen (daughter of U.S. Secretary of State F. T. Frelinghuysen[33]) in May 1889.[34] Together, William and Maria first lived in New York, then Paris,[35] and became the parents of three children:[36]

After living in New York and Paris for many years, Coster died "of a long illness, patiently borne," in Bournemouth, England on December 19, 1918.[1] His widow, who lived in Paris at 5 Rue Vaneau, died at her home, 39 East 79th Street in New York, at the age of 79 in July 1947.[41]

Descendants

Through his daughter Matilda, he was the grandfather of Mathilda Coster Mortimer (1925–1997), Duchess of Argyll.[42] Mathilda was first married to Clemens Heller, founder of the Salzburg Global Seminar, a school in Salzburg, Austria.[42] They divorced in 1962, and in 1963, she remarried to Ian Campbell, 11th Duke of Argyll (1903–1973), following his rather public divorce from Margaret Campbell, Duchess of Argyll. Mathilda and the Duke of Argyll were the parents of one child, Lady Elspeth Campbell, who lived only five days after her birth in 1967. The Duke and Duchess remained married until the Duke's death on April 7, 1973.[43]

References
Notes
  1. Charles Coster (d. 1908), was married to Helen Louise Anthon, daughter of Rev. Edward Anthon and Helen (née Post) Anthon.[7][8]
  2. Elizabeth Mary Coster (1877–1946) was married to Alfred Egmont Schermerhorn (1871–1932), a real estate dealer and member of the prominent Schermerhorn family.[10][11] Their son, Alfred Coster Schermerhorn, was married to romantic fiction writer, Ursula Parrott.[12]
  3. His grandfather, John H. Coster (better known as a playboy before a businessman), was one of twelve children that married into many prominent families.[17]
  4. Minnie's mother, Mary Mackall Travers (a granddaughter of U.S. Senator and U.S. Ambassador to the U.K. Reverdy Johnson), remarried to John G. Hecksher.[32]
Sources
  1. "COSTER--William Bay". New-York Tribune. 23 Dec 1918. p. 12. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  2. "OBITUARY | CHARLES ROBERT COSTER" (PDF). The New York Times. December 25, 1888. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  3. "FUNERAL OF COL. CHARLES R. COSTER" (PDF). The New York Times. December 27, 1888. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  4. "WHAT IS DOING IN SOCIETY" (PDF). The New York Times. August 31, 1900. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  5. "MRS. COSTER'S ODD DEATH. Body Found in Foot of Water in Larchmont Reservoir" (PDF). The New York Times. October 1, 1904. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  6. "NYC Marriage & Death Notices 1857-1868". www.nysoclib.org. New York Society Library. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  7. "CHAS. COSTER LOST $1,000,000 IN STOCKS Suicide's Plunge on the Short Side with the Firm's Money Forces Its Suspension. RELATIVES HEAVY LOSERS Coster Said to Have Lost $200,000 of His Mother-in-Law's Money — Was $1,200,000 Ahead Until Recently" (PDF). The New York Times. April 30, 1908. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  8. Post, Marie Caroline (1905). The Post Family. Sterling Potter. p. 203. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  9. "BROKER CHAS. COSTER A SUICIDE AT HOME Stock Exchange Member Shoots Himself for No Apparent Cause. CHEERFUL BEFORE HE DIED Had Been Chatting with Family Physician a Few Moments Before — Well Known in Athletics" (PDF). The New York Times. April 29, 1908. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  10. James, William; James, Henry (1997). William and Henry James: Selected Letters. University of Virginia Press. p. 542. ISBN 9780813916941. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  11. The Saint Nicholas Society of the City of New York: history, customs, record of events, constitution, certain genealogies, and other matters of interest. v. 1-. Saint Nicholas Society of the City of New York. 1916. p. 45. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  12. "Milestones, Feb. 27, 1939". Time. 27 February 1939. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  13. Conklin, George W. (1999). Under the Crescent and Star: The 134th New York Volunteer Infantry in the Civil War, p. 31. Axworthy Publishing. ISBN 0-9674985-0-3.
  14. James, Henry (2016). Henry James: Autobiographies (LOA #274) Brother / The Middle Years / Other Writings: A Small Boy and Others / Notes of a Son and Brother / The Middle Years / Other Writings. Library of America. p. 1311. ISBN 9781598534726. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  15. Goldthwaite, Charlotte (1895). Boardman Genealogy, 1525-1895 : the English home and ancestry of Samuel Boreman, Wethersfield, Conn., Thomas Boreman, Ipswich, Mass. [S.l.] : W.F.J. Boardman. p. 332. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  16. Schroeder, John Frederick (1849). Memoir of the life and character of Mrs. Mary Anna Boardman: with a historical account of her forefathers, and biographical and genealogical notices of many of her kindred and relatives. Printed for private distribution. p. 431. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  17. Miller, Tom (21 November 2016). "The Lost Coster Mansion - Nos. 539-541 Broadway". Daytonian in Manhattan. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  18. Townsend, Annette (1932). The Auchmuty family of Scotland and America. New York: The Grafton Press. pp. 257–260. Retrieved 6 January 2019.
  19. Greene, Richard Henry; Stiles, Henry Reed; Dwight, Melatiah Everett; Morrison, George Austin; Mott, Hopper Striker; Totten, John Reynolds; Pitman, Harold Minot; Forest, Louis Effingham De; Ditmas, Charles Andrew; Mann, Conklin; Maynard, Arthur S. (1919). The New York Genealogical and Biographical Record. New York Genealogical and Biographical Society. p. 305. Retrieved 6 January 2019.
  20. Claridge, Laura (2009). Emily Post: Daughter of the Gilded Age, Mistress of American Manners. Random House Publishing Group. pp. 139–140, 180, 189–190, 216, 421. ISBN 9780812967418. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  21. "STOCK BROKERS SUSPEND; C. COSTER A SUICIDE | Failure of Coster, Knapp & Company Announced on New York Stock Exchange | IS DUE TO OVERSPECULATION | Junior Member Who Killed Himself Last Night Had Been Using the Firm's Money". The Brooklyn Daily Eagle. 29 Apr 1908. p. 18. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  22. Patterson, Jerry E. (2000). The First Four Hundred: Mrs. Astor's New York in the Gilded Age. Random House Incorporated. p. 213. ISBN 9780847822089. Retrieved 6 January 2019.
  23. "W.B. COSTER'S LOSSES WERE NEVER SETTLED Inquiry Into Brokerage Firm's Failure Shows an Indebtedness of More Than $500,000. TRADED UNDER NUMBERS He and His Brother Had Joint Accounts in Which Some $1,000,000 Was Lost — The Manager's Testimony" (PDF). The New York Times. June 26, 1908. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  24. Assembly, New York (State) Legislature (1897). Documents of the Assembly of the State of New York. E. Croswell. p. 195. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  25. "SWORD FOR MAJOR ANDREWS | He Receives It from Gen. Fitzgerald and His Old Staff at a Dinner" (PDF). The New York Times. April 26, 1898. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  26. McAllister, Ward (16 February 1892). "THE ONLY FOUR HUNDRED | WARD M'ALLISTER GIVES OUT THE OFFICIAL LIST. HERE ARE THE NAMES, DON'T YOU KNOW, ON THE AUTHORITY OF THEIR GREAT LEADER, YOU UNDER- STAND, AND THEREFORE GENUINE, YOU SEE" (PDF). The New York Times. Retrieved 26 March 2017.
  27. Keister, Lisa A. (2005). Getting Rich: America's New Rich and How They Got That Way. Cambridge University Press. p. 36. ISBN 9780521536677. Retrieved 20 October 2017.
  28. "A DAY'S WEDDINGS; Coster -- Gray" (PDF). The New York Times. October 2, 1900. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  29. "MRS. WILLIAM B. COSTER" (PDF). The New York Times. July 24, 1947. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  30. "Society". Boston Home Journal. Samuel T. Cobb & Company: 6. 1900. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  31. "DIED. Gray" (PDF). The New York Times. 15 October 1906. Retrieved 30 January 2018.
  32. "WALDO TO MARRY MRS. J.G. HECKSCHER; Fire Commissioner's Marriage to Third Wife of Late J.G. Heckscher to Occur To-morrow". The New York Times. 19 April 1910. Retrieved 11 May 2017.
  33. "MRS. M.G.F. GRAY OF OLD FAMILY DIES; Daughter of F. T. Frelinghuysen, Once Secretary of State-Funeral Today" (PDF). The New York Times. 25 March 1926. Retrieved 30 January 2018.
  34. "In Bonds of Matrimony; Marriage of Mr. Gray and Miss. Frelinghuysen. a Quiet Ceremony at the Homestead of the Bride's Family". The New York Times. 17 May 1889. Retrieved 30 January 2018.
  35. Social Register, New York. Social Register Association. 1920. p. 154. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  36. Gray, Edward (1916). William Gray of Lynn, Massachusetts, and some of his descendants. Salem, Mass.: Essex Institute. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  37. "MATHILDA COSTER WED IN CITY GHAPEL; She and Stanley Mortimer Jr. Give Their Friends in Society a BigSurprise. BRIDE'S MOTHER UNAWARE Artist, Brother of Countess di Zoppola, and Bride Hurry Their Marrlage to Sail for Europe" (PDF). The New York Times. January 3, 1925. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  38. "TWO GET PARIS DIVORCES.; Mrs. Fleischman and Mrs. Mortimer Charge Desertion" (PDF). The New York Times. August 15, 1928. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  39. "MRS. M. MORTIMER WED.; New York Woman Married to Luis M. de las Rivas in Monte Carlo" (PDF). The New York Times. March 31, 1932. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  40. "DIED". The New York Times. 4 Nov 1918. p. 13. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  41. "DEATHS ELSEWHERE". The Miami News. 24 Jul 1947. p. 25. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  42. "Mathilda, Dowager Duchess of Argyll, Dies at 70". The New York Times. 8 June 1997. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
  43. Currie, William (January 17, 1993). "MOTHER'S SEARCH". Chicago Tribune. Retrieved 13 January 2019.
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