RARE \"Countess of Bute\" Lady Mary Coke Hand Written Letter For Sale

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RARE \"Countess of Bute\" Lady Mary Coke Hand Written Letter:
$699.99

Up for sale a RARE! "Countess of Bute" Lady Mary Coke Hand Written Letter.

ES-4906

Lady

Mary Coke (6 February 1727

– 30 September 1811) was an English noblewoman known for her letters and

private journal. She made pointed observations of people in her circle and

political figures. Although not intended for publication, an edition of her

letters and journal, including entries from 1766 to 1774, was published in 1889

by a distant great-nephew. She was the fifth and youngest daughter of the

soldier and politician John Campbell, 2nd Duke of

Argyll (1680–1743), and his second wife, Jane (c.1683–1767),

a maid of honour to Queen Anne and Caroline, Princess of Wales.

Mary grew up in Sudbrook[ or in London,

visiting her father's ancestral estate at Inveraray in Argyll at least once and possibly more often.

She married on 1 April 1747, Edward Coke, Viscount Coke (1719–1753);

son of Thomas Coke, 1st Earl of Leicester. Their courtship had been

strained, and in retaliation Edward left her alone on their wedding night and

from then on virtually imprisoned her at his family estate at Holkham Hall, Norfolk. She reacted by refusing to have sex

with him. She never used the title Viscountess Coke. Their families went to

litigation, and eventually produced a settlement in 1750 whereby Lady Mary

could live with her mother at Sudbrook but had to remain married to Coke until

his death, which came in 1753, when Mary was 26. Already having received a

handsome legacy from her father, she set out on her life of independence (she

never remarried), that became (as her entry in the Dictionary of National

Biography puts it) "marked by gossip, travel, devotion

to royalty, and self-imposed misadventure". Mary

occupied Aubrey House, in the Campden Hill area of Holland Park from 1767 to 1788. A London County Council blue plaque commemorates her and other residents of the

house. In

her grandiose shows of grief on the death of Prince

Edward, Duke of York and Albany, in 1767,[4] Lady Mary alleged in veiled hints that they had

been secretly married, a claim that brought her further derision. He had been a

subject of an intensely emotional and lengthy flirtation, which she alleged had

been passionate on both sides. According to most accounts, the relationship had

been one-sided, with York regarding it and her as a joke. On her first trip to

Europe in 1770–71, Lady Mary became a friend of Empress Maria Theresa and

was warmly welcomed at the Viennese court. She alienated her

friend on her third visit in 1773 by interfering in court intrigue.[ Mary,

however, did not see that this predicament had been self-inflicted and from

then on saw any disaster – servants' incompetence, unsuccessful sale offers,

rheumatism – as part of a Maria Theresa-instigated plot pursuing her across Europe.

Emily Barry (née Stanhope, Countess of Barrymore, and wife of the 6th Earl)

was accused by Mary of luring away her previously faithful servant whilst she

was in Paris in 1775, to aid an alleged assassination plot against her by Maria

Theresa's daughter Marie Antoinette and

her underlings. 

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RARE "Countess of Bute" Lady Mary Coke Hand Written Letter

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