Jacques Balsan

Who was Jacques Balsan?

Louis Jacques Balsan was a French aviator and industrialist, born at Châteauroux in 1868, who was the second husband of society beauty Consuelo Vanderbilt, Duchess of Marlborough. He married her immediately after her divorce from the 9th Duke of Marlborough in 1921.

Jacques Balsan came from a manufacturing family which supplied the French Army with uniforms from the time of Napoleon onwards which were the origin of the famous cloth "the blue horizon". The family's textile factories were situated at Châteauroux.

At the age of 24, Jacques Balsan entered the family business and travelled the world buying wool. Passionate about ballooning, he held the record for the highest altitude flight at the "Exposition Universelle" in 1900. A pioneer of flying, he bought his first plane in 1909 and obtained a Number 22 licence to pilot aircraft.

In February 1910, in his monoplane Blériot, he won the "Le Prix d'Héliopolis". During the First World War, General Maunoury gave him charge of the aerial reconnaissance of the site of the First Battle of the Marne.