Joseph was Clare's third husband. Her first was in the French military. The second was a Russian who had some hand in perfecting the use of acetylene gas. She was of French ancestry. She had a large house in Manhattan which she eventually sold for a large sum and bought a residence in a converted stable on Fingerboard Road in Staten Island. She and her sister were friends of Marie (Marguerettaz) Dunscombe. (Cecil) Edward Dunscombe remembers her as something of a Bohemian. He and his friends used to go to her place on Staten Island to play, and he recalls he and his sister Marguerite sleeping on tables at her residence in Manhattan as there were no beds to spare. She had a servant who would make them pancakes. Sometime later, probably during the 1940's or 1950's, he went back to try to find the place on Staten Island. He did find the location, but was told that it had burned down and that Clare had been killed in the fire. (Recollection of (Cecil) Edward Dunscombe, 8/18/1997).
A Passenger list shows she arrived in New York aboard the Scotia from France on August 5, 1868 at the age of two, "Claire de Riviere" with Henri de Riviere age six months. Claire is listed as a male. The name following their's is Maria (Treube?), age 24 from France, a servant. Possible they were travelling with her.
The 1910 census has Claire and Joseph living at 344 E 57th St. in New York City (Manhattan). It states that she, her father, and her mother were born in "Switz French" and that the Claire and Joseph have been married for seven years (found on familysearch.org)
The 1930 census shows her at 59 Radcliff Road which is just around the corner from Fingerboard Road. Also states she was born in Switzerland, her father born in France, and her mother born in Alabama, and that she immigrated in 1880. (found on familysearch.org).
The 1947 New Canaan Ct. directories shows her as a widow of Joseph F. Darling and living in Woodland Rd. The 1949 directory says she died 9/14/1948. (ancestry.com)
I am confused about some aspects here. The 1947 directory has her living in New Canaan at the time of her death, while my father had her dying in a fire on Staten Island. An August 13, 1927 New York Times article has a Mrs. Claire Darling, daughter of Baron Henry Arnous de Riviere, selling a residence at 344 East Fifty-Seventh St. in Manhattan after owning it for 22 years. On Google Books I found "Reports of Cases Argued and Determined in the Supreme Court of Alabama..., Volume 197." This references a Claire de Riviere Darling and a Sabine M. Arnous de Riviere and a Emilie A. de Riviere.
aka Emilie Marie Claire Arnous-Riviere