7. Enter Sea Cloud, the world’s largest private sailing yacht
In 1930, Marjorie decided to build the fifth of the series of yachts named Hussar, this one to be Hussar V. She designed the interior fittings and several of its features herself, having models of her designs constructed in a warehouse space in New York. The plans she created were of a vessel 316 feet in length, with a beam of 49 feet. Rigged as a four-masted bark, with diesel-electric engines to supplement its sails, it displaced over 3,000 tons. In comparison, a contemporaneous US Navy destroyer displaced less than 2,500 tons, fully laden. Krupp Germaniawerft built the vessel in Kiel, Germany and delivered it to Bermuda, where Post and Hutton accepted it on November 30, 1931. The United States was then in the deepest throes of the Great Depression.
Hutton and Post traveled extensively in Hussar V, accompanied by their daughter together, Nedenia Hutton, who later gained fame as the actress Dina Merrill. Their yacht, the largest seagoing privately owned such vessel of its day (It dwarfed that of King George), created an impression wherever it appeared. Hutton’s time with the vessel was short. In the early 1930s, Marjorie began to hear rumors of his several extramarital affairs, both in New York and in others of the locations they frequented during the year. According to a September 7, 1935 article in The New York Times, Marjorie received a divorce, with the proceeds of the hearings sealed, in Patchogue, Long Island. She did not receive alimony, nor a financial settlement. She did retain Mar a Lago, Hussar V (which she renamed Sea Cloud) and custody of their daughter.