was an early member of The Lambs, elected in 1887. He was a charter member of the Rhode Island Society of the Sons of the Revolution in 1896. He was eligible for membership in the Society by right of his descent from Captain Christopher Raymond Perry who served as a privateer in the American Revolution. Personal life In 1882, without his parents' consent, Oliver proposed marriage to debutante Sara Swan Whiting, a popular and beautiful socialite. His parents, August and Caroline Belmont, objected to the engagement, thinking Oliver was not mature enough for marriage because of his gambling and playboy lifestyle. As a result, he was sent to Bremen, Germany, to learn the banking trade from the Rothschild family, where his father had been trained. Oliver became dissipated and developed a penchant for absinthe. When Mrs. Belmont realized his decline, she agreed to the marriage. Oliver Belmont married Sara Swan Whiting in Newport, Rhode Island, on December 27, 1882, at her family home, "Swanhurst". The newlyweds traveled to Paris for their honeymoon, where they were joined several weeks later by Sara's mother and two older sisters. Oliver, having originally agreed to the visit, now objected. He took to frequenting gambling houses and brothels, drinking absinthe to escape the situation. His personality was affected by the absinthe; and he had a violent and abusive argument with his new wife, leaving her terrified. Oliver abandoned her in Paris and was later seen in Bordeaux, traveling with a French dancer. Shamed and heartbroken, Sara and the Whiting family returned to America. In April, Sara realized she was pregnant with Oliver's child; but the two divorced and he was prevented from seeing the child. Natica Caroline Belmont (1883-1908) was born September 5, 1883. Oliver disowned her, claiming that she was not his daughter and not a Belmont heir. Sara remarried; Natica was adopted by her stepfather, former Assistant Secretary of State George Lockhart Rives and took his last name. Natica became a prominent New York socialite. In 1907, Natica married Williams Proudfoot Burden, brother of James Abercrombie Burden, Jr. Belmont remarried on January 11, 1896, to Alva Vanderbilt, the ex-wife of his good friend William K. Vanderbilt. He had been a friend of the Vanderbilts since the late 1880s. He had accompanied the Vanderbilts on at least two long voyages aboard their yacht the Alva. Scholars have written that it seems to have been