The fight between “Strangers” author Belle Burden and her ex-husband is getting grittier, with the revelation she was worth $63 million when they married.
Socialite Burden’s memoir became a best-seller chronicling every woman’s worst nightmare — a husband has an affair, walks out on the family, but keeps a vice-like grip on their finances throughout a bitter divorce.
He walked out on herand their $7.7 million Martha’s Vineyard home at the start of the pandemic, leaving Burden to take care of their three children entirely alone, cutting off all but essential communication.
In her book, Burden says she used her personal money to buy their homes in Tribeca and Martha’s Vineyard, but the terms of their prenup meant because her asset manager husband, Henry P. Davis, 60, (called “James” in the book), was on the deeds to both, he had claim to half of them.
In a recent podcast Burden admitted she had “inherited wealth, shall we say, on both sides — it wasn’t a ton of money,” and that she used all the funds in one of her trusts to buy their Manhattan home.
However, it has emerged this week that when Burden and Davis married she was worth tens of millions — privileged information only known to the couple and their lawyers, suddenly reported in The New Yorker.
Those in Burden’s inner circle believe it was an attempt by Davis and his powerhouse team of lawyers to sabotage Burden publicly, The Post has learned.
“Belle’s inner circle believes he is behind it. That this is his attempt at damage control because in his profoundly narcissistic state it never once occurred to him that her side of the story would have become the sensation and best seller that it has, and he is now reeling,” a source close to Burden told The Post.
Burden does not disclose names or details of their divorce settlement in her memoir and said she “respected the privacy of sealed court records.”
The Post has reached out to Burden, Davis and lawyers for both for comment.
Burden is from a family of wealth and privilege, the daughter of Amanda Burden, the former director of the New York City Department of Planning, and granddaughter of New York socialite and fashion icon Babe Paley. Her late father, Shirley Carter Burden Jr., is the great-great-great-grandson of railroad mogul o0ornelius Vanderbilt.
Burden wrote in her book how she discovered after the divorce filing, Davis — who does not come from wealth, but is a lawyer-turned-investor now President of Arden Asset Management— had been siphoning off millions of dollars of his income into separate accounts.
Burden’s story was hailed as a stark warning for all married women to pay attention to their money.
Oprah referred to “Strangers” as “the manual for every woman” on her podcast. Drew Barrymore lauded the book as “an incredible tutorial” on the perils of women leaving their husbands in control of the family finances, leading to “scenarios where they are very financial hurt.”
Burden agreed: “Absolutely. And if I am a cautionary tale on this subject, I am happy with that,” she said.
However for others, the revelation of Burden’s inherited worth makes her story ring a little differently than is she was of lesser means.
Burden bought the Martha’s Vineyard home for $5.4 million and the Tribeca apartment for around $4 million. The homes had appreciated in value by the time of the divorce in 2019, and she says she couldn’t afford to buy Davis out.
The New Yorker discovered in documents filed in their divorce, Burden — then a stay-at-home mom to Finn, now 17, Evie, now 15, and Carrie, currently 18 — reported an income of $800,000 two years before they split.
That income, according to The New Yorker, included $190,000 from selling her mother’s home in the Catskills.
Although Burden has huge net worth on paper, the majority of her money, around $45 million, is not accessible due to the way her inheritance is structured.
However, according to a disclosure in her prenup, she does have an $8 million share in a charitable trust and $4 million tied up in her family’s WAMBCO company and “minor interests in a number of other trusts.” The same document listed Davis as having just under $400,000 in wages and liquid assets, per the New Yorker.
Burden placed the Tribeca apartment on the market for just under $12 million last year.
In March, two months after it debuted, Burden’s story became such a Blockbuster, Netflix bought the rights to turn the memoir into a movie, Variety reported at the time, with Gwyneth Paltrow set to star as Burden in the lead role.
Readers have remained fiercely supportive of Burden.
One X commenter scoffed on Tuesday: “The point is that even though he was making millions of dollars, she paid for the houses all on her own, and then he threatened to take them from her.
“He also refused to allow her to work, so she couldn’t make much income. Meanwhile, he was making millions of dollars as a hedge fund manager, wasn’t paying for his kids’ schools, and forcing her to check her credit card statement line-by-line with an accountant,” the user claimed.
However, despite all the apparent worry, when the couple’s divorce was finalized in 2020, Davis dropped his claim in half of the properties. He also gave Burden $3 million out of an investment he held in WAMBCO, according to the New Yorker.
Burden, meanwhile, kept the key to their private Black Point Beach on Martha’s Vineyard, which, according to the outlet, Davis bought for her in 2016 and was most recently valued at more than $400,000.
He also reportedly agreed to pay Burden $50,000 per month in baseline child support, not including fees for private-school tuition and other educational expenses.
On Tuesday, “Strangers” remained at No. 2 on the New York Times Bestseller list.
