Oliver Eaton Bodington (1859–1936), barrister at law of the Inner Temple, Licensee en Droit, University of Paris, Member of the United States Federal Bar and President of the British Chamber of Commerce, was born March 6, 1859, in Kingsford, Staffordshire, the son of George Fowler Bodington (September 22, 1829 – May 8, 1902), a physician, and his wife Caroline Mary Eaton (born 1825).
Des Capuchins, he specialized in international law and practice concerning domicile, marriage, inheritance, wills and foreign companies and firms doing business in Paris.
[3][4] Bodington also conducted a successful sideline of helping monied American young ladies (those "lovely trans-Atlantic invaders" as Edith Wharton called them) find suitable titled European husbands in the pre-World War I marriage market.
[5] Pursuant to these services, Bodington sued the American diplomat and Ambassador John George Alexander Leishman regarding unpaid fees relating to the property of his son-in-law, Louis de Gontaut-Biron.
Dubbed the "champagne king" of Rheims, Baron von Mumm, a pioneer aviator and future Olympic Games bobsledder (1932, Lake Placid), was wounded seriously, but refused to press charges.
These avocations he translated into books: “Thirty Seasons at Monte Carlo” (1924), "Bridge (card game) Wisdom for Beginners and Others" (1933) and “The Romance Churches of France” (1925).