Nicola here, thinking about those impulsive marriages contracted both in novels and also in real life.
“I’ll marry the first female I see!” Rejected by the Incomparable Isabella, finished with love but urgently needing to obtain his inheritance, Sherry, Viscount Sheringham makes a reckless decision and ends up married to his childhood friend Hero Wantage. Friday’s Child is one of Georgette Heyer’s most charming novels (although at times I want to smack a bit of sense into Sherry and tell Hero to find someone more deserving of her.) It also acted as an inspiration for any number of Regency historicals where young men intent on gaining control of their fortune marry an unlikely heroine. Possibly these days there are books where heiresses marry unsuitable men for the same reason and perhaps someone can recommend one to me.
This always seemed to me an unlikely if entertaining trope in historical romance. I say unlikely because I had an image of the world of aristocratic marriages tightly controlled by parents or guardians. Advantageous marriages, money in return for a title, carefully chaperoned young ladies… It didn’t seem to leave much space for the impulsive marriage. Then I came across Lady Diana Spencer.
I found Lady Diana by a slightly circuitous route, via Lydiard Park, a beautiful 18th century house only a few miles from where I live. Lydiard isn’t particularly well known on the heritage trail and it deserves to be better known because it is a stunningly beautiful house with a fascinating history. It has a room called the “Blue Closet” which is devoted to Lady Diana Spencer and her work as an artist for Wedgwood.
Lady Diana was the daughter of the 3rd Duke of Marlborough. By 1757 she had been on the marriage market for a number of years and had had quite a few offers, none of which she had chosen to accept. She was twenty-two and so not entirely on the shelf and her parents were not pressuring her into marriage. She had a reputation for being a bit on the flighty side but nothing damaging.
And then, as Mrs Delany wrote to her sister, this happened: “Lady Dana Spencer and Lord Bolingbroke… They were together at a party at Vauxhall… The company was teasing Lord Bolingbroke to marry and he turned quick to Lady Diana and said will you have me? Yes, to be sure, she replied.”
At the age of twenty-four, Bolingbroke already had the reputation of being a difficult young man, a rake, a drinker and a gambler with an addiction to spending money. Fortunately for him, Lady Diana had a large fortune. But this marriage, made in haste, did not have the romantic outcome that Heyer would have written. Both Bolingbroke and Lady Diana were unfaithful; she walked out on her unhappy marriage, had an affair with Topham Beauclerk and married him after Bolingbroke divorced her in 1768. That marriage, unfortunately, was no happier than her first.
To my mind the most unusual thing about Lady Diana was that she was one of a circle of aristocratic women whose drawings were commissioned by Josiah Wedgwood to decorate his tableware. Drawing and painting was of course admired as a female accomplishment in the Georgian period but for aristocratic female artists to be paid for their designs by a businessman such as Wedgwood was remarkable. For Wedgwood the benefit of using the drawings of Lady Diana and her colleagues was that they were popular amongst the upper classes although some critics dismissed them as imitative rather than imaginative. I think they are gorgeous!
The glorious painted window in the blue closet at Lydiard Park, originally the dressing room for the main bedchamber, provided much inspiration for Lady Diana’s work. Today the room also holds examples of the designs she did for Wedgwood as well as lovely painted wall panels featuring her children. You can read more about Lydiard Park here and should you be passing, it is well worth a visit!
Lady Diana Beauclerk's story is told in "Improper Pursuits" by Carola Hicks. I’m glad that in our stories if not always in life, the “impulsive marriage” so often turns out well. One of my favourites books in this style is Marry In Haste by Jane Aiken Hodge. Do you have a favourite to recommend?