Frederick Henry Prince IV, 70, of Newport R.I., Marshall V.A. and Washington, D.C. died peacefully on Dec. 16, 2017 at home in Georgetown from complications resulting from Parkinson’s Disease. He was surrounded by family.
Formerly the co-trustee of the Frederick Henry Prince 1932 Trust, Chairman of CMD Corporation and co-managing partner of F.H. Prince & Co, Inc., he grew the company from a family-owned concern into an extremely successful business which attracted the backing of first rate institutional investors.
Prince’s greatest passions in life were his family and his philanthropy. For 40 years, he served as co-trustee of the Prince Charitable Trusts. Prince helped form the community of grassroots activists who were instrumental in preventing The Walt Disney Company’s “Disney’s America,” a culturally insensitive historic theme park, from encouraging unchecked development, ruining hallowed Civil War Battlefields, and destroying the beauty and integrity of the Virginia countryside. The impact of Prince’s ongoing support catalyzed the “smart growth” movement in the D.C. metropolitan area. This left a legacy of advocacy, collaboration and the eventual protection of over 350,000 acres of land. In Rhode Island, Prince’s support helped reinvigorate the Aquidneck Land Trust which has led to the conservation of 2,500 acres of open space, equal to 10 percent of the entire island. Another focus of Prince’s philanthropy was the morale of hospital staff and other caregivers. He helped to establish a protocol for the high-risk group of caregivers who attend scenes of disasters involving children.
Frederick H. Prince was born in Lausanne, Switzerland on July 8, 1947, the only son of Helen Elizabeth Peirce and Frederick Prince III of Boston. He graduated from the Brooks School in North Andover, Mass. in 1965 and Columbia University in 1969. He married Diana Armour Cochrane on February 14th, 1970 in New York City.
Through his father, Prince was descended from the Oxford-educated Reverend John Prince who had immigrated to the U.S. in 1633. Another ancestor, Frederick Octavius Prince, was Mayor of Boston. Prince’s namesake and great grandfather was a renowned financier and early investor in railroads. He served as chairman of the board of the Union Stock Yard, the Transit Company of Chicago and, in the 1920’s, was a director of Armour & Co. Prince’s great-uncle, Norman Prince, and grandfather, Frederick Prince Jr. were two of the original 37 members of the Lafayette Escadrille, a group of American volunteer pilots in World War I whose dashing exploits helped to turn the tide of U.S. opinion towards entering the war.
In his later years, Prince became an avid sportsman. He was a member of the Orange County Hunt, a founder of Prince’s Court in Mc- Lean, V.A. the first Court Tennis Court to be built in the U.S. for 74 years and named for him. He was always a keen skier in the winter and enthusiastic windsurfer in the summer. A long standing Governor of the Spouting Rock Beach Association in Newport, R.I., he was a member of the Brook Club in New York City, the Racquet Club in New York and Chicago, as well as the Reading Room in Newport, R.I.
Funeral services will be held at Christ Church in Georgetown on Friday, January 5 at 4 p.m.
In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the Piedmont Environmental Council (www.pecva.org) or the Newport Preservation Society (www.newportmansions.org). Arrangements by DeVOL. Arrangements by DeVOL.
