The eccentric Aussie socialite who kept a pet cheetah with a diamond collar
Scandal-plagued socialite Enid Lindeman outlived four husbands, earned the nickname “Lady Killmore”, and swanned around with a pet hyrax perched on her shoulder and a cheetah in her Bentley.
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If there’s one bizarre fact that sums up socialite Enid Lindeman’s eccentric life, it’s that she owned a pet cheetah with a diamond collar that was taken for walks in London’s Hyde Park.
It was that tantalising snippet that inspired author Robert Wainwright to look deeper into the extraordinary life of the granddaughter of Lindeman’s Wines founder Henry Lindeman.
Enid Lindeman is the subject of a two-part series of the free In Black and White podcast on Australia’s forgotten characters, with Part 1 out today.
In his new book, titled simply Enid, Wainwright describes the adventures and misfortunes of a scandal-plagued socialite who outlived four husbands and earned the nickname “Lady Killmore”.
When she visited Australia in 1947 a reporter asked her how many times she had been married.
“Oh, four or five times,” she replied lazily. “I don’t bother with divorce; it’s too messy. I just kill my husbands.”
Never one to shy away from danger, Enid Lindeman moved from Sydney to Europe during World War I, and became a nurse in Paris.
She bought and outfitted her own converted ambulance, and used it to drive to the battlefront and transport wounded soldiers to hospital, often as shelling continued.
By stark contrast, by evening Enid would change out of her nurse’s uniform and into the silks and satins of French designers and head out to enjoy Paris’s still-thriving chic restaurants and night-life.
“The surreal nature of what was happening was that you lived life to the full, one way or the other,” Wainwright explains.
“There was another side to life, and that was to live with, if you like, gay abandon, because tomorrow you might be dead.”
At almost six feet (182cm) tall with striking looks, Enid captivated men with her charm and beauty.
It caused such problems among British armed forces staff in Paris that the Secretary of War was forced to intervene.
“You would think Lord Derby would have had better things to do with his time, but he realised there was a great problem here and so many of his staff were infatuated with this one woman,” Wainwright says.
“So he decided that the best solution was to marry her off to one of his senior staff … and to ensure that the two got married, he even gave Enid away.”
After the war, Enid bought a luxurious villa on the French riviera, which it was rumoured she had bought with her substantial winnings from a game of cards.
There she entertained Hollywood royalty and played bridge with Somerset Maugham.
Later, while living in Cairo, Enid and her eight-year-son were among the first people in the world to enter the tomb of Tutankhamun when it was discovered in 1922.
At times, Enid would dress in disguise as a man and sneak into the officers’ barracks, where she would entertain the men by playing the piano.
Enid always loved animals, and over her lifetime had a bizarre collection of pets.
As a child growing up in Sydney’s outskirts where she learnt to ride, hunt, shoot and fish with her brothers, Enid had a pet kangaroo, which followed her around like a dog.
It was in the 1930s that Enid owned a pet cheetah, which she had rescued from Africa during a honeymoon trip.
According to Wainwright, Enid often took the cheetah with her as she drove around the city in her Bentley.
She would send her daughter, Pat, with the surly governess, called Miss Unger, to walk the cheetah in Hyde Park, a few hundred metres from their home.
Wainwright says Pat recalled other park visitors staring and hurriedly walking away.
During her third marriage, Enid and her husband had a private zoo at the end of their garden, with several species of monkey, parrots and other birds, and porcupines.
Enid’s husband even built a giraffe house, but never quite managed to get one back from Africa to England.
And while living in her French riviera villa, La Fiorentina, Enid often entertained guests with her pet hyrax, a rabbit-like mammal, or a bird perched on her shoulder.
Enid, always a fashionable figure, was friends with Coco Chanel, who designed a special dress for her with a high collar in which the shy hyrax could hide.
“She was an extraordinary woman on many levels,” Wainwright says.
Listen now to the interview in today’s new free episode of the In Black and White podcast on Australia’s forgotten characters on Apple/iTunes, Spotify, web or your favourite platform.
Listen to previous episodes including the story of how a policeman’s wife became Melbourne’s “high priestess of prostitution” Madame Brussels, the Victorian cop who was the “real” Sherlock Holmes, and how shonky evidence and greedy witnesses hanged an innocent man for killing a 12-year-old girl.
And see In Black & White in the Herald Sun newspaper Monday to Friday for more stories and photos from Victoria’s past.