Alberta Montagu, Countess of Sandwich

Alberta Montagu, Countess of Sandwich was an American heiress, diarist, and letter writer who was the wife of George Montagu, 9th Earl of Sandwich. Like many Gilded Age debutantes from the United States, she married into the British aristocracy and took on the running of her husband's family's ancestral seat, Hinchingbrooke House. Lady Sandwich was a close friend of Mildred Barnes Bliss and was an accomplished musician, writer, and linguist. She was a friend and devotee of the Hindu monk and philosopher Swami Vivekananda, whom she had met in her childhood when he stayed at her family's New York estate. Lady Sandwich hosted Vivekananda in Chicago, New York, and Paris, accompanied him on a trip to Rome, and corresponded with him throughout her life.