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The Duchess Countess: The Woman who Scandalised a Nation by Catherine Ostler review

<p>Catherine Ostler</p> (Simon&Schuster)

Catherine Ostler

(Simon&Schuster)

Meghan Markle is not the first duchess to cause a media sensation by speaking her truth. In 1776, Elizabeth Chudleigh, “calling herself Duchess Dowager of Kingston”, became headline news in London when she faced a trial for bigamy before the House of Lords.

Details of her secret first marriage, her disloyal staff, her vengeful in-laws and her suicide attempt gripped society. Tickets for the trial in Westminster Hall were the hottest in town, with an audience which included Queen Charlotte, James Boswell and Horace Walpole.

The highlight of proceedings was Elizabeth’s own testimony. “My words will flow freely from my heart, adorned simply with innocence and truth,” she began. But many people did not believe her, dismissing her damningly as “an actress”.

This explosive trial lies at the heart of Catherine Ostler’s new biography of Chudleigh, but we do not arrive at this pivotal moment until two thirds of the way through the book. The build-up is over 250 pages, but if you thrill to the minutiae of 18th-century aristocratic life then you’re in for a treat. Ostler’s CV includes stints as editor of both ES magazine and Tatler, so there’s not a peerage or princely title for which she is not prepared to go the full Debrett’s. Her footnotes are a joy in themselves.

And to Ostler’s obvious delight, Chudleigh’s life is like the longest and most jaw-dropping society story you’ve ever read. She was born in 1721, way down the food chain as the daughter of a younger son of a baronet. Her father died when she was five, leaving her family dependent on the kindness of strangers.

Fortunately for Elizabeth, she was extremely beautiful as well as ambitious. Through favours and charm, she managed to win herself a position at court as maid of honour to the Princess of Wales. This came with a salary of £200 a year (around £40,000 today), and provided an entrée into the fairy-tale world of her dreams.

Ostler paints a glittering picture of London in the reign of George II, with the boom in neo-classical architecture, the remarkable patronage of the arts that fuelled the careers of Handel, Reynolds and Gainsborough, and the rise of journalism as “an incipient always-on form of social media”.

She also provides a close-up of what she calls “the psychodrama of the Hanoverian succession”, with the bitter rivalry between the “foul-mouthed and sexually rapacious” old king and his cultivated son, Frederick, Prince of Wales. There are bisexual royal affairs, scheming politicians, and endless, endless parties. It’s all terrifically entertaining: if you liked Bridgerton, you’ll love this.

At the centre of this social whirlwind was Elizabeth, and everything was going well until she made the impetuous decision in 1744 to marry a penniless but handsome young navy officer during a summer holiday in Hampshire. Augustus Hervey was the grandson of an earl, but way down the line for the title. An elementary mistake by Elizabeth, but Jane Austen hadn’t yet been born to guide her.

Luckily only a handful of people witnessed the wedding in a private chapel, and when Hervey returned to sea, Elizabeth was able to keep her marriage secret. This was essential if she was to retain her salary as a maid of honour, a role for which only spinsters were eligible.

While all the notoriety of Elizabeth’s subsequent life stemmed from this youthful error, it also turned her into what Ostler sees an early form of modern womanhood. Now removed from the marriage market but unable to say why, Elizabeth was forced into the role of strong, independent female with an air of mystery about her.

Being officially unmarried had its advantages. Perhaps the greatest was being able to hold bank accounts and property in her own name, and thus to manage her life as she liked. But what Elizabeth liked was a life of excess, and for this she needed more than £200 a year.

Enter the Duke of Kingston. Elizabeth met “the handsomest man in England” around 1750 and they fell in love, with the duke’s large fortune sufficient to fund her every whim. She siphoned off his money and built a Knightsbridge mansion called Chudleigh House, where she reigned as mistress in her own right.

Eventually, the estranged Hervey, now a naval hero and wanting to marry, decided to sue for divorce. Many complications followed before an ecclesiastical court declared Elizabeth’s marriage void and she was able to marry Kingston in 1769, on her 48th birthday.

As Duchess of Kingston, Elizabeth’s spending only increased. Ostler is brilliant on the details of her decadence, particularly at the Kingston seat of Thoresby, where a new house was built at extortionate cost. The lake had its own flotilla, including a scaled-down 50-gun frigate.

All this came crashing down when the duke died in 1773. His bitter nephews were determined to regain the Kingston fortune, and set about proving Elizabeth’s marriage was bigamous. Cue the sensational trial.

Elizabeth lost the case, meaning she was stripped of her Kingston title. The fact that Hervey had unexpectedly ended up as Earl of Bristol, making her a countess, was no consolation. The only salvation was that she was able to keep Kingston’s money and properties for her lifetime, as stated in his will.

With this huge fortune she set about living a lavish life in exile. She did nothing by halves, building a luxurious yacht to take her to St Petersburg, where she befriended Catherine the Great and built a mansion complete with its own vodka distillery. When this failed to satisfy her she bought a Paris townhouse and began rebuilding it. After that ran into trouble, she acquired a chateau from the Sun King’s great grandson and renamed it Chudleigh.

When Elizabeth died in Paris in 1788, she left behind a trail of debt and diamond-studded chaos. Her will was a mess, and her body lay putrefying for days because there was nobody left to take responsibility. It was a sorry end.

Ostler concludes by describing Elizabeth as a “proto-feminist”, a powerful woman who took “revenge on England’s patriarchy”. She certainly makes her case well. The story romps along with great style and gusto, and her research is impeccable - although some scholars might balk at her decision to seek a modern diagnosis for Elizabeth’s often extreme behaviour (a psychiatrist suggests borderline personality disorder).

This invocation of mental health issues and the battle against patriarchy is a very current take. Less charitable readers might prefer Horace Walpole’s original assessment. “I was weary of her folly and vanity long ago,” he wrote after Elizabeth’s death, “and now look on her only as a big bubble that is burst.”

The Duchess Countess: The Woman who Scandalised a Nation by Catherine Ostler (Simon & Schuster, £25)

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