Dimitri Jorjadze

Who was Dimitri Jorjadze?

Prince Dimitri Jorjadze was a Georgian nobleman, Ambassador Hotel executive and race car driver. He was a member of the Georgian nobility of Tbilisi from Jorjadze family, who became exiled after the overthrow of Tsarist Russia and the subsequent Bolshevik takeover.

The 6'3" Prince was probably best known in racing circles. In early July 1931, he won the Touring Car Grand Prix, 24 Hours of Spa, in Belgium. He covered the greatest distance, 1,580.7 miles at a speed of 65.8 miles per hour, in a Mercedes-Benz SSK with Goffredo Zehender.

He was married twice. His first wife was Audrey Emery, the American-born former wife of Grand Duke Dmitri Pavlovich of Russia; he married her in March 1937 in Maidstone, England. The marriage ended in divorce. He married, secondly, in 1954, to Sylvia Ashley, a onetime English showgirl who was the former wife of Major Lord Anthony Ashley-Cooper, Clark Gable, and the widow of Douglas Fairbanks, Sr.

In June 1940, he bought the historic South Carolina plantation known as Boone Hall, eight miles from Charleston in the US, from Thomas A. Stone of Canada. He raced Thoroughbreds under the nom de course, Boone Hall stable.