Florence Sellers Coxe Paul

Florence Sellers Coxe Paul (1864-1950) was a leading member of Philadelphia society. She was a socialite who organised an event of the year. She lived in several now historic residences and she is the subject of a portrait by Ida Waugh.
Life
Paul was born on April 22, 1864, the daughter of David Wampole Sellers (1833-1901), a Philadelphia attorney, and Anna Frances Jaquett (1838-1915). Her father was chairman of the Fairmount Park Commission and a senior consultant for the Pennsylvania Railroad Company.
Before her marriage, Florence Sellers was considered one of the most stylish women of the Philadelphia good society, often seen in the most fashionable places and events.
She married, first Marcellus Coxe (1857-1917), a wine merchant, on June 2, 1885. The wedding present from her husband were some strings of pearls inherited from his grandmother. Marcellus Coxe was the grandson of Professor John Redmund Coxe from the University of Pennsylvania. At about this time Ida Waugh took the portrait of Florence Sellers Coxe Paul. From this marriage she had her only son, Francis Travis Coxe (1889 - 1973), vicepresident of the Fidelity Philadelphia Trust Co.
In 1890 Florence Sellers was the patroness of a German Dance held at the Devon Inn, that was considered the most successful of the season. In 1892, Florence Sellers Coxe was included in Boyd's Philadelphia Blue Book, which was "the fashionable private address directory, the ladies visiting and shopping guide and Philadelphia Club list."
On September 8, 1915, at the home of her brother Edwin Jacquet Sellers (a noted genealogist), she married Lawrence Taylor Paul (1854-1926). Paul had been at University of Pennsylvania, class' 74, same alma mater as Edwin Jacquet Sellers, class '86.
She and her second husband, Lawrence T. Paul, lived at Paulhome, 118 Mill Street, Newport. Paulhome was originally the Warren House, built in 1809 by Robert Lawton. At Lawton's death in 1818, the house was inherited by his wife Penelope. Through different owners it became the property of the Paul family from 1886 to 1932. In 1932 it passed to George Henry Warren, Jr. (1889-1971), whose wife was Katherine Urquhart, one of the founders of the Preservation Society of Newport County. In 1996 the Warren House won the Newport Historical Society's Historic Preservation Award.
In Philadelphia the Pauls lived at the Chateau Crillon Apartment House.
In the 1930s, she moved to Paris, moving back to the United States at the outbreak of World War II.
She was one of the original members of the Acorn Club, a private Philadelphia club for women founded in 1889;
She died in 1950 and is buried at Laurel Hill Cemetery, Philadelphia.

Main Menu

See Also

Main Menu