In one of the greatest scandals of the royal family, one member was a victim of revenge porn.
Margaret, Duchess of Argyll, could not shake off the scandalous stories of infidelity that haunted her until the day she died in 1993 at age 80. Swirling rumors suggested Margaret, who was the daughter of a millionaire, had slept with over 80 men behind her husband's back and the allegations earned her the nickname "the dirty duchess."
Now she is the subject of a book titled "The Grit Pearl in the Pearl," which paints things in a different light. Author Lyndsy Spence, who was able to access unpublished letters, shared some shocking secrets with Fox News in an interview that appeared this week.
It turns out that there was more to the reports of her infidelity to husband Ian Douglas Campbell, the Duke of Argyll, who she married in 1951.
"Other people could see him coming and say, 'He’s an opportunist, stay away from him,'" claimed Spence. "But Margaret wouldn’t listen to any criticism about him or any forewarnings. She thought people must be jealous or that they don’t understand him. And he really lured her. Once they were married, he completely changed. He was nasty. He was abusive. He had to get what he wanted."
To save their marriage, the couple opted for an open relationship. Ian had a mistress so Margaret saw it as a sign that they would go their "own ways," Spence said. What Margaret did not know was that her husband had followed her around, gathering a trail of evidence proving her adultery to later use against her.
Among his findings were polaroids stashed in Margaret's draw showing her sexual encounters with other men, Fox News noted.
"She was taking those kinds of photographs as early as 1948-1949," said Spence. "During the time she went to New York and was able to buy one of the first Polaroid cameras that were available on the market."
Margaret managed to keep the photos to herself private until her husband allegedly broke into her desk. Spence said Ian was looking for reasons to divorce his wife as she had stopped giving him money to support his gambling, drug and alcohol addiction.
"When she decided that she wasn’t going to give him any more money, he thought, ‘Well, I have no use for you anymore. I need to find another rich woman,'" Spence said. "And that’s when he started to build his divorce petition."
One time he completely ransacked their home in search of evidence. Spence said Ian looked through his wife's diaries, letters and anything else to help him build a case. He then pulled a bookcase away and discovered more polaroids stashed behind it.
When the divorce went to court, the judge sided with Ian and labeled Margaret as "wholly immoral and completely promiscuous."
Margaret had nothing to help her defend herself and slowly lost all her wealth after the disintegration of her marriage in 1963.
"It impacted her for the rest of her life," Spence said. "She was called horrible names and her daughter stopped speaking to her… it just seemed like the scandal followed her. She ended up with no money. She had people who weren’t looking after her best interests and money was stolen."
Now Spence is hoping to change the way Margaret is perceived in the world today.
"If you’ve been treated that way, you wouldn’t recover. But I also admire that she tried to carry on," she continued. "I think a lot of women [today] will empathize with what Margaret went through," she said. "When you think of a similar case today, and how the media covers it, nothing’s really changed."
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