Unhitching Post

Fortnight after bidding Jacqueline Kennedy arrivederci, the villagers of Ravello this week turned out to say goodbye to Jackie's sister and hostess, Lee Radziwill, 29. As Lee and her husband, Polish Prince Stanislas Radziwill, packed up for the trip home to London, it turned out that their sprawling Mediterranean villa had been more than a summer pleasure dome; it also served the Roman Catholic Radziwills as a convenient base from which to seek Vatican annulment of a previous marriage.

Just which marriage they wanted to have annulled* was at first not quite clear, since "Stash" Radziwill. 48, was once married to Shipping Heiress Grace Kolin. who last year married the Earl of Dudley, who was formerly married to Laura Charteris, who is now married to U.S. Socialite Michael Canfield, who was the first husband of Lee Bouvier. who since March 19, 1959, has been married to Prince Stanislas Radziwill.

Rothschild Collector. Stash Radziwill explained. No three-ring annulment was necessary, because his first marriage -- to the present Baroness de Chollet, wife of a Swiss banker -- was declared void by the Vatican shortly before he married Lee in March 1959; his second marriage was not even recognized by the church, since it was a civil ceremony, and. in any case, took place before his first was annulled.

The only marriage "outstanding,"' as a Roman Catholic prelate put it, is Lee's.

According to friends. Lee and Stash wanted it annulled to placate Stash's devoutly Catholic father, Prince Janusz Radziwill, 82, who is said to have dis approved of their civil marriage.

Away from Ravello. the Radziwills live relatively unnoticed in their London town house. Bulky, mustachioed Stash Radziwill wrestles a Cadillac around narrow London streets and looks like the chap who got his comeuppance in the final reel of every Pearl White thriller. Except for a slight accent, he is as English as the Ascot--almost. The prince arrived in London after World War II with little to his name but his name. He made some quick killings in real estate, and has settled down to quiet dabbling. Slash's cash has enabled the Radziwills to furnish their elegant Georgian house with works of art, but Radziwill is known to the trade as a "Rothschild collector,'' meaning that he buys objets d'art the way some people buy A. T. & T.

Social Tips. Like Sister Jackie, shy, chic Lee Radziwill devotes as much time as she can to her children. In her first and last ceremonial public appearance--to open Chelsea's annual antiques fair--she was so jittery that she bumped heads with the curtsying moppet who presented her a bouquet of flowers, returned to her seat and sat on the bouquet. Like Jackie Kennedy, too. she has had a fling at journalism, notably last July, when she was barred from a private, nonpress showing by Couturier Hubert de Givenchy after it was learned that she was covering the Paris collections for McCall's--in a St. Laurent dress. Her byline has also appeared in the Ladies' Home Journal, over a piece on manners and social tips.

Last year Britain's Debrett set had some etiquette pointers for the Radziwills. After accompanying the President of the U.S. and his wife to a dinner at Buckingham Palace, they were listed on the official court calendar as Prince and Princess. Proper Britons boggled over the fact that Stash is now a British subject, thus could correctly use his title only if he had a special license from the Queen, which might be as hard to get as some annulments. The accepted explanation for the faux pas was that palace protocol officers consciously elevated the Radziwills on that occasion out of deference to President Kennedy.

However, Lee has never been heard to ask anyone to call her Missus, and her prince--like most of the Eastern Europeans stashed around London, Paris and New York--would probably sooner surrender his Cadillac than his title. Around the Radziwill family, all males are called prince--except Cousin Antony, a Bayswater wine waiter, who is rarely called at all, at least by the Radziwills.

* Annulments are most commonly granted on grounds that either partner entered into the marriage with reservations, usually about having children, or was under outside compulsion to get married. Worldly Italian maidens send friends or relatives premarital postcards hinting at such reservations or compulsions, which can later be used as evidence if needed.

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