“As long as I can remember, my family have talked about the Jardine Star Brooch and were aware of the fact that our beloved late queen wore it publicly on several occasions,” says the current Lady Jardine, Gemma, who is married to Sir William Jardine, the 13th baronet and 24th chief of Clan Jardine.
Lady Gemma tells VF that the brooch may have once belonged to Lady Eda Jardine of Applegarth, a Scottish aristocrat, wife of the 9th baronet, Sir William Jardine, and “something of a lively character and quite a woman in her day,” she says.
Another relative of Lady Eda’s, Tim Wright, also links the brooch to her. Wright shared in a 2021 letter to The Telegraph that Eda was born into the Younger’s brewing family. She was a keen sportswoman and race car driver in the 1920s and 1930s, and was once described by a family member as “someone who would have commanded an armored division with distinction.” She won the Monte Carlo Ladies Cup in the large cars division in 1931, racing a Lancia Lambda (the cup is still displayed in Lady Gemma’s home).
The Jardines are a clan of “fighters, writers, adventurers, emigrants, lawyers, rogues, sportsmen, and strong women,” as well as “fluctuating fortunes,” says Lady Gemma. One branch of the Jardine Clan—distinct from the aristocratic line of Lady Eda and Lady Gemma’s husbands—amassed vast wealth and notoriety as merchant shippers and “architects” of the First Opium War in the 19th century.
When Lady Eda died childless in 1960 at age 93, having survived her husband by 45 years, she funded a Scottish charitable trust (still operating today as the Lady Eda Jardine Trust) which supports “arts, conservation, community regeneration, and social welfare,” says Lady Gemma. This was much to the chagrin of her nephew, who hoped to inherit her money, her descendant Wright (one of the charity’s current trustees) wrote in the 2021 Telegraph letter after Queen Elizabeth II wore the star brooch to a meeting with President Biden at Windsor Castle.