The Weaker Vessel: Woman's Lot in Seventeenth-Century England (WOMEN IN HISTORY)

by Fraser, Antonia

  33 Osborne Letters, p.222.

  34 See Trapnel’s Report and Plea, pp.1–20.

  35 Trapnel, Legacy for Saints, p.49.

  36 CSP Domestic, 1654, pp.86, 89, 134.

  37 Trapnel’s Report and Plea, pp.21–37.

  38 CSP Domestic, 1654, p.436; Trapnel’s Report and Plea, p.38.

  39 CSP Domestic, 1654, p.438; Trapnel, Legacy for Saints, p.59.

  40 See ‘Anonymous Folio Volume’, Bodleian Library, S.1.42. Th; note by Bertram Dobell, ‘Unique Book: Trapnel’, p.221.

  41 ‘Anonymous Folio Volume’, Bodleian Library, S.1.42. Th, p.1.

  42 Dobell, ‘Unique Book: Trapnel’, p.223; ‘Anonymous Folio Volume’, Bodleian Library, S.1.42. Th, pp.256, 649, 697.

  43 cit. Capp, Fifth Monarchy, p.142.

  44 Capp, Fifth Monarchy, p.266.

  45 Charles II Letters, p.92.

  46 Clarendon State Papers, II, p.383; Ross, Margaret Fell, p.39.

  47 See Brailsford, Quaker Women, pp.103–6.

  48 Fox Journal, p.96.

  49 cit. Thomas, ‘Women and Sects’, p.47.

  Chapter 14: Worldly Goods

  1 Verney Memoirs, II, p.480; As You Like It, Act III, scene V.

  2 Verney Memoirs, II, pp.361, 365.

  3 Verney Memoirs, II, pp.372, 215, 390; III, pp.213–15; II, p.383.

  4 Verney Memoirs, IV, pp.33–7.

  5 See Habakkuk, ‘Marriage Settlements’; Stone, ‘Social Mobility in England’, p.52; Stone, Crisis of the Aristocracy, pp.637–45.

  6 G.E.C., Complete Peerage, II, p.53.

  7 cit. Coate, Social Life, p.25; cit. Habakkuk, ‘Marriage Settlements’, p.23; Pepys Diary, I, p.269; Hollingsworth, ‘Demographic Study of the British ducal families’, p.9, cites 6 per cent of ducal female offspring unmarried eventually, 1480–1679, compared to 17 per cent, 1680–1729 (at the age of twenty-five the relative figures were 19 per cent to 37 per cent).

  8 King, Natural and political observations, p.39; Graunt, ‘Natural Observations upon bills of Mortality’, II, p.375.

  9 Marriage Promoted in a Discourse, p.27.

  10 cit. Appendix C, Berens, Digger Movement, p.252.

  11 cit. Cartwright, Madame, p.153; Hamilton, Gramont Memoirs, p.108.

  12 Oglander Notebook, p.95; Killigrew Poems, p.31.

  13 Aphra Behn, Feign’d Curtezans, Act IV, scene II; Aphra Behn, The Rover, Part I, Act I, scene I; Charles Sedley, Bellamira, Act V, scene I.

  14 Hamilton, Gramont Memoirs, p.232; Index, p.367.

  15 Verney Memoirs, IV, pp.273–80.

  16 Verney Memoirs, IV, pp.207, 452–4.

  17 Newcastle, Worlds Olio, p.211.

  18 HMC, Salisbury MSS, 1621–88, p.420.

  19 Allestree, Ladies Calling, Part II, p.177; Warwick Autobiography, pp.35–6.

  20 Cust Family Records, series II, p.74.

  21 Woolley, Gentlewomans Companion, p.89.

  22 See Finch MSS, I, pp.xxv, 461–4; III, p.139.

  23 Athenian Oracle, II, p.155.

  24 cit. Hiscock, Evelyn and Mrs Godolphin, p.166.

  25 Although Collins’ Peerage, V, p.516 gives 14 October 1679, I have followed Sidney, Diary, II, p.11, and Cartwright, Sacharissa, page 247, which make it clear the ceremony took place in March.

  26 Cartwright, Sacharissa, p.247; Fraser, King Charles II, pp.348–9.

  27 Cartwright, Sacharissa, p.247.

  28 Cartwright, Sacharissa, p.215; Sidney, Diary, I, p.286.

  29 Sidney, Diary, I, pp.238–9.

  30 Sidney, Diary, I, pp.250–51.

  31 Cartwright, Sacharissa, p.244.

  32 Sidney, Diary, II, p.39; Cartwright, Sacharissa, p.247.

  33 Cartwright, Sacharissa, pp.248–9.

  34 Sidney, Diary, II, p.25; George Farquhar, The Beaux’ Stratagem, Act II, scene I.

  35 Verney Memoirs, IV, p.231; Newdegate, Muniment Room, p.178.

  36 Evelyn Diary, II, p.160; Pepys Diary, VIII, p.139.

  37 Hatton Correspondence, I, p.53.

  38 Shannon, Discourses and Essays, Preface; cit. Jameson, Beauties of Charles II’s Court, p.168.

  39 See Jameson, Beauties of Charles II’s Court, pp.169–70.

  40 Sidney, Diary, I, p.302.

  41 Life of Lady Russell, p.75.

  42 Hatton Correspondence, I, p.236.

  43 Evelyn Diary, II, p.160; Life of Lady Russell, p.75.

  44 House of Commons, I, p.716.

  45 Fea, Some Beauties, pp.40–50; Hatton Correspondence, II p.8; Newdegate, Cavalier and Puritan, p.154.

  46 DNB (Thomas Thynne); Evelyn Diary, II, p.386.

  47 Newdegate, Cavalier and Puritan, p.160.

  48 cit. Fea, Some Beauties, p.69.

  49 Life of Lady Russell, pp. xvi, xcviii.

  50 Scott Thomson, Russells in Bloomsbury, pp.14, 17.

  51 Scott Thomson, Russells in Bloomsbury, p.62.

  52 Lady Russell Letters, I, p.36; Life of Lady Russell, p.36.

  53 Fraser, King Charles II, p.429.

  54 Life of Lady Russell, p.xxv; Pilkington, Celebrated Female Characters, p.311.

  55 Burnet, History, II, p.380; Life of Lady Russell, p.xxvi.

  56 See Strong, When did you last see your father?, p.21; Appendix, p.167.

  57 Life of Lady Russell, pp.xxiv–xxxv.

  58 Life of Lady Russell, p.xliii.

  59 Life of Lady Russell, p.xcvi.

  60 Mary Berry, anonymous editor, Life of Lady Russell, p.viii.

  61 Evelyn Diary, II, p.173; Life of Lady Russell, p.lxxviii; G.E.C., Complete Peerage, II, p.81.

  62 Life of Lady Russell, p.lxxix.

  63 Life of Lady Russell, p.93.

  64 Life of Lady Russell, p.223.

  Chapter 15: Divorce from Bed and Board

  1 Cripps, Elizabeth of the Sealed Knot, pp.89–90.

  2 Gardiner, Oxinden and Peyton, pp.219, 265, 344.

  3 MacDonald, Mystical Bedlam, p.101.

  4 Norsworthy, Lady Hatton, p.30.

  5 Osborne Letters, p.169; Waller Poems, I, p.90; Aubrey, Brief Lives, ed. Powell, p.295.

  6 Carte, Ormonde, IV, p.701; Burghclere, Ormonde, I, p.41.

  7 Longleat NMR MS, 1847.

  8 Verney Memoirs, III, p.435; Carte MSS, Vol. LXXVIII, fo. 412; Giffard Correspondence, p.4.

  9 Fell Smith, Warwick, pp.284–90.

  10 Verney Memoirs, III, pp.430–32; IV, p.199.

  11 Pepys Diary, II, p.6 and note 6.

  12 Hogrefe, Tudor Women, p.89.

  13 Whateley’s tracts, cit. Stenton, English Woman, pp.107–8; see Milton, Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce; Thompson, Women in Stuart England, pp.169–77.

  14 Ladies Dictionary, p.165; HMC, Denbigh MSS, Part V, p.14.

  15 Aphra Behn, The Town-Fop, Act V, scene IV; Sir Patient Fancy, Act V, scene I.

  16 Houldsworth, English Law, I, p.623.

  17 Robinson, Dukes of Norfolk, pp.145–7.

  18 Thomas, ‘Double Standard’, p.201; Athenian Oracle, I, p.428.

  19 Devereux, Earls of Essex, II, pp.304–6.

  20 Pepys Diary, IV, p.254 and note 2.

  21 G.E.C., Complete Peerage, XI, pp.262, 109–12.

  22 Clarendon Life, III, p.17; G.E.C., Complete Peerage, XI, p.263; HMC, Rutland MSS, IV, p.519.

  23 HMS, Rutland MSS, IV, p.340.

  24 Clarendon Life, III, p.172.

  25 Clarendon Life, III, p.172.

  26 Clarendon Life, III, p.172.

  27 Clarendon Life, III, p.173.

  28 Clarendon Life, III, p.174.

  29 Dorchester’s Letter to Lord Roos, with his Answer.

  30 Dorchester’s Letter to Lord Roos, with his Answer.

  31 Clarendon Life, III, p.175.

  32 HMC, Salisbury MSS, XXII, p.441.

  33 HMC, Salisbury MSS, XXII, p.442.

  34 HMC, Rutland MSS, IV, p.547.

  35 HMC, Salisbury MSS, XXII, p.442.

  36 HMC, Salisbury MSS, XXII, p.444.

  37 G.E.C., Complete Peerage, IV, p.40
6 and note A.

  38 Journal of the House of Lords, XII, pp.17, 28.

  39 Journal of the House of Lords, XII, pp.41–52.

  40 Journal of the House of Lords, XII, p.95.

  41 HMC, Rutland MSS, II, p.8.

  42 G.E.C., Complete Peerage, XI, p.iii and note C.

  43 Journal of the House of Lords, XII, p.324; Burnet, History, I, p.471, note 2.

  44 HMC, 8th Report, Appendix, p.117.

  45 Burnet, History, I, p.472; Matthew, 5, VS. 32; 19, VS. 9; Mark, 10, VS. 11–12; Luke, 16, VS. 18; Case of my Lord Roos.

  46 Journal of the House of Lords, XII, p.323.

  47 HMC, Rutland MSS, IV, p.647; Journal of the House of Lords, XII, p.350.

  48 Case of Divorce and Remarriage Discussed.

  49 i.e. Dorothy Lady Stanhope on behalf of her niece Lady Betty Livingstone, cit. Stone, Family, Sex and Marriage, p.184; HMC, Rutland MSS, IV, p.551.

  50 G.E.C., Complete Peerage, IV, p.406; X, p.422; Hatton Correspondence, I, p.159.

  51 HMC, 12th Report, Appendix, Part V, p.140.

  52 Life of Lady Russell, p.lxxiv.

  53 Nichols, Leicestershire, II, Part I, p.62.

  54 HMC, 12th Report, Appendix, Part V, p.iv.

  Chapter 16: Benefiting by Accomplishments

  1 Woolley, Queen-like Closet, Part II, p.540.

  2 Sidney, Diary, I, p.191 and note ii, p.22.

  3 Waller Poems, I, p.56; Grant, Margaret the First, pp.195, 229: Osborne Letters, p.50; Stuart, English Abigail, p.51.

  4 Evelyn, Mrs Godolphin, p.154.

  5 Cripps, Elizabeth of the Sealed Knot, pp.10, 36, 59, 190.

  6 Reid, John and Sarah, p.141.

  7 Green, Queen Anne, p.99.

  8 DNB (Abigail Masham).

  9 Pepys Diary, I, p.288; II, p.232 and note 2, p.4.

  10 Pepys Diary, II, p.139.

  11 Pepys Diary, III, p.223.

  12 Pepys Diary, II, pp.11, 204.

  13 Her Christian name was probably Winifred; see Pepys Diary, III, p.256 and note 2; III, p.277; Verney Memoirs, IV, pp.20–21.

  14 Pepys Diary, IV, pp.79, 280.

  15 Pepys Diary, V, p.152; Lambley, French Language, pp.366–70; John Vanbrugh, Provok’d Wife, Act II, scene II; Pepys Diary, V, pp.265, 274.

  16 Pepys Diary, VI, pp.252, 163–4; VII, p.138.

  17 Pepys Diary, VIII, pp.471, 475; IX, p.210.

  18 Pepys Diary, VII, p.311; VI, p.235; VIII, p.212.

  19 Pepys Diary, IX, pp.337–8, 344, 367.

  20 DNB (Woolley); see Woolley, Gentlewomans Companion, pp.15–17.

  21 See Wallas, Before the Bluestockings, pp.17–54.

  22 Woolley, Gentlewomans Companion, p.10.

  23 Woolley, Gentlewomans Companion, p.288.

  24 Woolley, Gentlewomans Companion, p.65.

  25 Webster, Great Instauration, pp.219–20; Turnbull, Hartlib, pp.120–21.

  26 Reynolds, Learned Lady, pp.270–80; Lambley, French Language, p.381; Makin, Essay on Education, p.23.

  27 cit. Green, Queen Anne, p.99; Lambley, French Language, p.392.

  28 Hamilton, William’s Mary, p.19.

  29 Winchilsea Poems, p.5.

  30 Pepys Diary, V, p.45; Ede, Arts and Society, pp.84–6; see Greer, Obstacle Race, pp.255–7; Ladies Dictionary, p.434.

  31 Makin, Essay on Education, p.22.

  32 Birch, Anna van Schurman, p.73; van Schurman, Learned Maid, p.5.

  33 Stuart, Girl through the Ages, pp.196–7.

  34 Fraser, King Charles II, p.194.

  35 Makin, Essay on Education, Postscript.

  36 Makin, Essay on Education, pp.3–7.

  37 Bowle, Evelyn, p.213; Hiscock, Evelyn and Mrs Godolphin, p.167.

  38 Locke Correspondence, III, p.105; II, p.485; DNB (John Locke); cit. Illick, ‘Child-Rearing’, p.30; Masham, Occasional Thoughts, p.197.

  39 HMC, Hastings MSS, IV, p.348.

  40 Fox Journal, pp.520, 748; see Cressy, Literacy, p.145.

  41 BL Add MSS, 5858, fo. 213–21.

  42 Verney Memoirs, IV, p.221.

  43 ‘The New Letanie’, Thomason Tract, 669. fo. 10/120; cit. Grant, Margaret the First, p.37.

  44 Cressy, Literacy, p.37; Cressy, Education, p.114.

  45 Makin, Essay on Education, p.33.

  46 Poems by Eminent Ladies, I, p.215; Rochester, Works, p.18.

  47 Halifax, Complete Works, p.289; Evelyn, Mundus Muliebris, p.8, Preface.

  48 Life of Lady Russell, p.xcviii.

  49 Sedley Works, II, p.112; cit. Utter and Needham, Pamela’s Daughters, p.23.

  50 Verney Memoirs, IV, pp.225–6.

  51 Barksdale, Letter touching a College of Maids or a Virgin Society; see Florence Smith, Mary Astell, for this and other biographical details.

  52 See Hartmann, Vagabond Duchess, for the life of Hortense Mancini.

  53 Astell, Reflections, pp.4–5.

  54 Burnet, History, 2 June 1708, cit. Smith, Mary Astell, p.22.

  55 Astell, Reflections, Preface.

  56 ‘The Saxon Nymph’.

  57 Elstob, English-Saxon Family, Preface, p.ii.

  58 ‘The Saxon Nymph’.

  59 ‘The Saxon Nymph’; DNB (Elizabeth Elstob).

  Chapter 17: Petticoat-Authors

  1 Masham, Occasional Thoughts, p.199; Winchilsea Poems, p.5.

  2 Aphra Behn, Sir Patient Fancy, Act I, scene I.

  3 Thomas Wright, The Female Vertuosos, Act III, scene I; William Congreve, The Double Dealer, Act III, scene X.

  4 Gildon, Comparison Between Two Stages, pp.26–7.

  5 Needham, ‘Mrs Manley’, p.265.

  6 Mary Manley, The Lost Lover, Prologue, cit. Needham, ‘Mrs Manley’, p.263; Duffy, Passionate Shepherdess, p.138.

  7 There are two recent biographies of Aphra Behn: Maureen Duffy, The Passionate Shepherdess (1977) which casts fresh light on the mystery of her birth, and Angeline Goreau, Reconstructing Aphra, A Social Biography (1980).

  8 Life of Mr Joseph Alleine, Printer’s Note.

  9 Barham, ‘Discovery of the Authorship of the Whole Duty of Man’; Winchilsea Poems, p.xxxviii; Ballard, Memoirs of Several Ladies, p.363.

  10 See her biography by P.M. Souars, The Matchless Orinda (1931).

  11 cit. Souars, Orinda, p.189.

  12 cit. Souars, Orinda, p.91; Aubrey’s Brief Lives, ed. Lawson Dick, p.242.

  13 cit Souars, Orinda, pp.91, 98.

  14 Souars, Orinda, p.253.

  15 cit. Souars, Orinda, pp.110, 43.

  16 Taylor, ‘Treasures of Friendship’, pp.63–5.

  17 Souars, Orinda, p.277.

  18 Killigrew Poems, Publisher’s Note; Dryden’s ‘Prefatory Ode’.

  19 Killigrew Poems, p.85.

  20 Killigrew Poems, p.79.

  21 Killigrew Poems, p.32.

  22 Killigrew Poems, p.51.

  23 Killigrew Poems, ed. Morton, p.xi.

  24 Killigrew Poems; Dryden’s ‘Prefatory Ode’.

  25 Killigrew Poems, p.13.

  26 See Greer, Obstacle Race, p.255, where it is pointed out that her Christian name was Joan, not Anne, as stated previously.

  27 Greer, Obstacle Race, pp.255–7.

  28 Woodforde Papers, p.5.

  29 Sir Oliver Millar in a letter to the author; Millar, Lely; Blunt, Botanical Illustrations, pp.129–30.

  30 See Winchilsea Poems, Introduction by Myra Reynolds, for biographical details.

  31 Winchilsea Poems, p.21.

  32 Winchilsea Poems, p.4.

  33 Winchilsea Poems, pp.268–70, lxxvi.

  34 i.e. by Dale Spender in Man Made Language, pp.194–5, 230.

  35 cit. Winchilsea Poems. p.lxii.

  36 M.H. Nicholson in Conway Letters, p.xxv.

  37 Conway Letters, p.47.

  38 Conway Letters, p.57, note 7.

  39 Conway Letters, p.152.

  40 Conway Letters, p.53.

  41 Sacks, Migraine, p.241.

  42 See Conway Letters, esp. pp.113, 91 note I, 114, 79.

>   43 Conway Letters, p.106, 116.

  44 Conway Letters, pp.248–9.

  45 Conway Letters, p.282.

  46 Conway Letters, p.168.

  47 Conway Letters, p.337.

  48 cit. Conway Letters, p.299–300.

  49 Conway Letters, p.278.

  50 Conway Letters, p.412.

  51 Conway Letters, p.413.

  52 By M.H. Nicolson, Conway Letters, p.378.

  53 Conway Letters, p.433.

  54 Conway Letters, p.436.

  55 Conway Letters, pp.456, 481.

  56 Conway Letters, pp.451, 457.

  57 Conway Letters, p.159; Principles of the most Ancient and Modern Philosophy, Preface.

  58 Principles of the most Ancient and Modern Philosophy, pp.3, 11, 14.

  59 Principles of the most Ancient and Modern Philosophy, p.77.

  60 Conway Letters, p.451; Principles of the most Ancient and Modern Philosophy, Preface; Conway Letters, p.456.

  61 Conway Letters, p.457.

  62 Conway Letters, pp.465–8.

  Chapter 18: Helping in God’s Vineyard

  1 Conway Letters, pp.412, 433.

  2 Brailsford, Quaker Women, p.70.

  3 Brailsford, Quaker Women, p.324.

  4 Ross, Margaret Fell, p.35; Trapnel’s Report and Plea, p.24; see Brailsford, Quaker Women, pp.159–76, 213–16.

  5 Nalson, Countermine, p.93.

  6 cit. Brailsford, Quaker Women, p.15.

  7 See Brailsford, Quaker Women, pp.16–41 for the story of Elizabeth Hooton.

  8 Fox Journal, p.9.

  9 Brailsford,Quaker Women, p.19.

  10 Brailsford, Quaker Women, p.333.

  11 cit. Manners, ‘Elizabeth Hooton’, pp.14–15.

  12 See Brailsford, Quaker Women, pp.94–113.

  13 See Scales, ‘Quaker Women in Dover, New Hampshire’.

  14 Pepys Diary, V, pp.12–13; Bryant, Pepys. Years of Peril, p.204 and note.

  15 Roberts, Monmouth, II, p.205.

  16 Scales, ‘Quaker Women in Dover, New Hampshire’.

  17 Fox Journal, II, pp.213, 436 and note.

  18 See Braithwaite, Beginnings of Quakerism, pp.422–4; Brailsford, Quaker Women, pp.114–32 for Mary Fisher’s expedition.

  19 Braithwaite, Beginnings of Quakerism, p.423.

  20 Marsh, New Survey of Turkish Empire, Part 2, p.33; Paul Ruycaut (later English Consul in Smyrna), Ottoman empire, p.120.

  21 Taken from the account of Willem Sewel, in his History of the Quakers, first published (in Dutch) in 1717. According to M.R. Brailsford, Quaker Women, p.128, Sewel may have heard the details directly from Mary Fisher.