The Duchess: Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire. Amanda Foreman

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The Duchess played a key role, with Thomas Beddoes, in formulating the idea of establishing the Pneumatic Institution in Bristol. [29] Her efforts to establish the Pneumatic Institute, which advanced the study of factitious airs, is an important event that provided a framework for modern anesthesia as well as modern biomedical research in gasotransmitters. was almost seventeen and preparing to make her entrance into society. Hers was not to be an arranged marriage in the sense of those common a generation before. She was not exchanged in lieu of gambling debts, nor thrown The New Annual Army List and Militia List for 1854, the 17th annual volume, by Major Henry G. Hart, John Murray, Albemarle street, London, 1854. transformed the city. By the mid-eighteenth century one in ten Englishmen had lived in London at some point in his life. There was a frenzy of building as the capital spread out westwards. Speculators widened country lanes Georgiana was allowed to see her daughter occasionally when the Greys brought Eliza to London, and acted as a sort of unofficial godmother.

We drank tea in the Spring Gardens [recorded Mary Hamilton in her diary]: Lady Spencer and daughter, Lady Georgiana, and the Duke of Devonshire joined us: he walked between Lady Georgiana and I, we were very Chatty, but not one word spoke the Duke to the daughter of the late Duchess of Devonshire by Lord Grey, … a fine girl, sensible and talkative, and easy mannered. By the end of summer, having danced with the Duke on several occasions and sat near him at numerous dinners, Georgiana had fallen in love with the idea of marrying him. His return home upset her greatly; she feared that he would make his choice beforelooked upon the match with favour, hoping that the married state would have a beneficial effect on the Duke. Memorandums of the Face of the Country in Switzerland (1799) is often wrongly attributed to Georgiana. It was in fact written by Rowley Lascelles, based on a Swiss tour in 1794. [28] Walker, John. National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. New York, 1963 (reprinted 1964 in French, German, and Spanish): 319, repro.

He was displeased when she gives birth to a girl, and Georgiana was lest then impressed when she learnt of his affair with her best friend Lady Bess Foster. The apotheosis of the Duchess of Devonshire Georgiana Spencer (1757 – 1806), wife of the 5th Duke of Devonshire (Photo: Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

21. Help a Girl out?

After the election, Georgiana would continue to support the Whigs, although more privately and had an informal, though influential, role advising King George IV, particularly during his tenure as Prince Regent. In 1796, Georgiana succumbed to illness in one eye; the medical treatment resulted in a scarring of her face. However, "Those scars released her from her fears. All the inhibitions about whether she was beautiful enough or whether she was up to the job left her". In her late thirties, Georgiana was able to regain pre-eminence and enjoyment in open society, [3] although her personal life would continue to be marred by degrees of unhappiness, debt, and decline in health. [7]