However she is best known for her central role in a series of court cases starting in 1921, eventually reaching the House of Lords in 1924, in which her husband, John Russell, unsuccessfully attempted to divorce her on grounds of her alleged adultery.

[note 1] The newspapers were full of salacious details of the evidence given in court which appalled King George V and in 1926 a law was brought in to restrict reporting of divorce cases.

Her elder sister Gwnydd had been born in 1894 and the girls were taught at home by a governess though Christabel received most of her education from her father.

[5] During the Great War she worked at Woolwich Arsenal making munitions and she became promoted to inspector of gun carriages, in charge of 2000 women workers at a salary of £400 (equivalent to £24,600 in 2023).

[note 3] Hundreds of letters arrived in reply and, after rejecting all who had not enclosed a photograph, the officers selected Christabel and arranged to meet her in London.

[note 4] Christabel stayed in contact with all three men and on 18 October 1918 she married Russell at St Jude's Church, Kensington.

[12] The Russells moved to a small house in Chelsea and, with John mostly away on submarine duties, Christabel resumed her extensive socialising but without the awkwardness of marriage proposals.

Christabel Russell's biographer Bevis Hillier considered that, because of the sensational news headlines, she became in 1924 the most famous woman in Britain, succeeding Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon (1923) and preceding Agatha Christie (1926).

[22] In 1941 she designed Elizabeth Jane Howard's wedding trousseau, using parachute silk and curtain netting for the underwear because of the wartime conditions.

On 23 June the couple met and when Christabel told him her news he was delighted, not doubting that he was, mysteriously, the father, and she shared in his pleasure.

[27] Lady Ampthill greeted her son's paternity with disbelief and succeeded in persuading Russell that he could not be the father and that Christabel must have been unfaithful to him.

By July the Ampthills' solicitors notified Christabel that divorce proceedings would be taken against her on grounds of her adultery and citing two named co-respondents (one of them one of the other naval officers from the 1915 partying) as well as a man unknown.

The dress shop thrived, partly on account of curious customers but Christabel accepted her solicitors' advice not to be seen out alone with any man.

[29] Russell's parents hired a very strong legal team including Sir John Simon and Douglas Hogg (later the first Lord Hailsham).

[30] Simon's opening statement was very aggressive, so much so that, when he claimed that the marriage had not been consummated and that the couple shared a dislike of contraceptives, one of the two women jurors became distressed and needed to be discharged.

The judge, Sir Henry Duke, felt the presence of women on the jury was helpful in such a difficult case, and was relieved when the other woman thought she could continue.

[36] Eventually, and after the case had lasted 16 days, the jury found Christabel had not committed adultery with either of the two named co-respondents but could not agree concerning the man unknown.

[39] In 1923 John Russell brought a second divorce case with amended grounds, with Sir Edward Marshall Hall as counsel, claiming that, in addition, his wife had frequently committed adultery with Edgar Mayer.

[43] Under cross-examination Christabel said that at the time of her marriage she did not know what intercourse was but she did know that men were physically different from women because she had been an art student and had studied anatomy from the age of twelve.

[48] By a majority they concluded that, under established English law, a husband or wife is not permitted to give evidence that their child, though born in wedlock, is actually illegitimate.

[52] In the 1930s Christabel had at least two men who her close relatives regarded as her "boyfriends", one of them the dashing Charles de Beaumont, a champion fencer who years later still kept her photograph on which he had written "Chris Ampthill, my great girlfriend in the 1930s".

[55] At the time this news broke Christabel was in Australia as part of travelling solo around the world so she started to drive back to England in her car.

[58] Geoffrey also wrote to his mother to say that a friend from years ago, Eileen Hunter, had just published a biography Christabel: the Russell case and after which he described as "It is just as dreadful as we all expected it would be".