Alice de Janzé

Alice de Janzé
Alice in Chicago, 1919
Born	(1899-09-28)28 September 1899 Buffalo, New York, U.S.
Died	30 September 1941(1941-09-30) (aged 42) Gilgil, Kenya
Occupation	Heiress
Spouse(s)	Frédéric de Janzé (m. 1921–27) Raymond de Trafford (m. 1932–37)
Children	Nolwén Louise Alice de Janzé Paola Marie Jeanne de Janzé
Parent(s)	William Edward Silverthorne Julia Belle Chapin

Alice de Janzé, née Silverthorne (28 September 1899 – 30 September 1941), also known as Alice de Trafford and holder of the noble title Comtesse (Countess) de Janzé for a few years, was an American heiress who spent years in Kenya as a member of the Happy Valley set of colonials. She was connected with numerous scandals, including the attempted murder of her lover in 1927, and the 1941 murder of The 22nd Earl of Erroll in Kenya. Her tempestuous life was marked by promiscuity, drug abuse and several suicide attempts.

Growing up in Chicago and New York, Silverthorne was one of the most prominent American socialites of her time; a relative of the powerful Armour family, she was a multi-millionaire heiress. She entered French in the early 1920s, when she married Count de Janzé. In the mid-1920s, she was introduced to the infamous Happy Valley set, a community of white expatriates in East Africa, notorious for their hedonistic lifestyle. In 1927, she made international news when she shot her lover in a Paris railway station and then turned the gun on herself; they both survived. De Janze stood trial but was only fined a small amount, and was later pardoned by the French state. She further scandalized the public by marrying, and then later divorcing, the man she shot.

In 1941, she was one of several major suspects in the well-publicized murder of her former lover and friend, Lord Erroll, in Kenya. After a long history of numerous failed suicide attempts, she died of a self-inflicted gunshot in September 1941. Her personality has been referenced both in fiction and non-fiction, most notably in the book White Mischief and its film adaptation, where she was portrayed by Sarah Miles.

Alice was born in Buffalo, Erie County, New York, the only child of textile industrialist William Edward Silverthorne and wife, Julia Belle Chapin (14 August 1871 – 2 June 1907) a relative to the Armour family, of meatpacking success through the Armour & Company brand, at the time the largest food products company in the world. Silverthorne was a first cousin, once removed, to J. Ogden Armour and great-niece to Philip Danforth Armour and Herman Ossian Armour, the granddaughter of their sister Marietta, who left much of her estate to her mother, Julia, in 1897. William and Julia were married in Chicago on 8 June 1892, the city where Alice spent most of her childhood and adolescence, living with her parents in the affluent Gold Coast district. Alice herself became a favorite of her cousin, J. Ogden Armour. Her family's great wealth prompted her childhood friends to take a cue from her surname and give her the nickname "Silver Spoon".