The American Heiress Trade
At about this time, an exodus occurred: literally hundreds of American girls decided that London Society was "all-embracing in its easy-going tolerance and superficial good nature." (Perkin, pg. 65, from Webb), and, before long, London was crawling with beautiful American heiresses itching to get their hands on a coronet. Even better for the impoverished peers, their fathers were perfectly willing to pay dearly for it.
Explore: The hieresses
In all, more than 200 American heiresses ended up marrying into British Society (Pepper, pg. 51), and just the sheer number of them meant that they would have a wealth of imediate effects upon British Society. Of a most immediate importance, there was the plight of whether to accept these young women or not. There were three major problems with this.

First of all, they were Americans. Everyone knew . Many, like the Duchess of Marlborough exclaims that Lady Blanford says, "thought we all lives on plantations with negro slaves and that there were Red Indians ready to scalp us just around the corner." (Balsan, pg. 55) It was quite common for Americans abroad to be told that "no one would take you for an American," (Balsan, pg. 76) this being meant as a very high compliment. The wariness, however, was mutual: it had been no secret which side the textile-producing British had supported during the Civil War, and it took a while before many Americans were willing to forgive and forget.

Secondly, when you got down to it, these American heiresses were no different from the cadre of upstarts at were hanging around London: why on earth did they need to import more? Not only did most of their money come from Industrial ventures of some short, but these girls were actually proud of being self-made. (See MacColl, pg. 234) The British, with their hereditary pride, where you would be accepted into Society because your great-great-great-grandfathers had been a court favorite, just couldn't understand why Americans were so bent on the American Dream of making one's fortune.

Eventually, most of these women were accepted into polite Society, which led directly to the third problem with American girls. These women brought with them a host of friends and younger sisters, many of whom were having trouble being accepted into New York society. But, once a women was accepted into London Society, she could bring her friends around: should these friends be accepted? The answer, generally, was yes, but Americans were an entierly different situation.

Along, however, came the Prince of Wales. Prince Albert (later Edward VII) loved nothing more than food, parties and beautiful Americans. All that an heiress had to do was to catch his eye, and she would be "in." The Prince of Wales was even the deciding factor in many of these marriages: it was he who convinced Lord Randolph's father, the Duke of Marlborough, to allow his marriage with Jennie Jerome. Many of these girls, including probably Lady Randolph Churchill, later became his mistresses (although all three of his official mistresses were of British birth), but for now he just liked to surround his ever-widening girth with young American beauties.

There were, however, only so many heiresses, and they had only so much money (although they brought with them as much as two million pounds), and that really had to be used for practical matters, such as installing running water, patching up roofs, and paying off debts. Society wanted some fun and they wanted it immediately.

Next: Meanwhile, the Nouveaux were settling down