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Madeleine Talmage Astor Fiermonte (June 19, 1893 – March 27, 1940) was born in Brooklyn, New York City and became famous in 1911 when she married millionaire John Jacob Astor IV. While traveling abroad to avoid the gossip generated by her marriage, Madeleine Astor became pregnant. Wanting to have the baby born in the United States, the Astors booked passage on the maiden voyage of the RMS Titanic. The ship sank on April 15, 1912 and, while Madeleine was rescued, her husband died in the disaster. A few years after the sinking she gave up the Astor fortune to marry William K. Dick. That marriage ended in divorce seventeen years later and shortly after she again remarried, this time to boxer Enzo Fiermonte, which also ended in divorce.

Madeleine Talmage Force was born on June 19, 1893 in Brooklyn, New York to William H. and Katherine Force. She first met John Jacob Astor IV, one of the richest men in the United States, in Bar Harbor, Maine while she was still in school. On September 9, 1911 the eighteen year-old Madeleine married the forty-seven year old John Jacob Astor in Beechwood, the Astor family's Newport, Rhode Island home. The marriage caused a scandal since Astor had divorced his first wife two years before.

To let the gossip die down, the couple took an extended honeymoon in Egypt and Europe. During the trip Madeleine became pregnant, and wanting the child born in the United States the couple booked first-class passage on board the maiden voyage of the RMS Titanic. At 11:40 PM on April 14, 1912, the Titanic struck an iceberg and sank two hours and forty minutes later. The five-months pregnant Madeleine Astor was seen into lifeboat 4 by her husband who asked if he could join her, mentioning Madeleine’s "delicate condition". The officer in charge refused and Mr. Astor stood back, asked for the lifeboat number, lit a cigarette, and tossed his gloves to Madeleine.

John Jacob Astor was one of the 1,500 people who died in the disaster and his partially crushed body was recovered on April 22. Madeleine and the other survivors were rescued by the RMS Carpathia and afterwards Madeleine did not talk about the disaster except to mention her last memory of the sinking was seeing John Jacob Astor's pet Airedale, Kitty, pacing on the deck.

Madeleine gave birth to John Jacob Astor VI, named after his father, on August 14, 1912. According to John Jacob Astor's will, Madeleine received income from a $5,000,000 trust fund as long as she did not remarry.

Madeleine did remarry on June 22, 1916, in Bar Harbor, Maine, to childhood friend and banker William K. Dick. As stated in the will, Madeleine lost her stipend from the trust fund and ability to live in the Astor mansion in Manhattan. During the marriage they had two sons, William, Jr. and John Henry Dick.

The marriage to William Dick did not last and they divorced on July 21, 1933, in Reno, Nevada. Shortly after, on November 27, 1933, Madeleine married twenty-six-year-old Italian boxer Enzo Fiermonte in a civil ceremony in New York City. They divorced three years later on June 11, 1938, in West Palm Beach, Florida, and Madeleine went back to using the surname Dick.

Madeleine Force Astor Dick died of a serious heart ailment in Palm Beach, Florida, in 1940 at the age of forty-six. She was buried in Trinity Church Cemetery in New York City.

She was portrayed by Charlotte Chatton in the 1997 film Titanic.

• Behe, George, Phillip Gowan, Hermann Sōldner. Mrs Madeleine Talmage Astor (nèe Force). Encyclopedia Titanica. Retrieved on July 15, 2005.
• "Mrs. Fiermonte Dead in Florida", New York Times, March 29, 1940.
• The Astors. Retrieved on July 15, 2005.

january 7, 1989