Cassandra Willoughby, Duchess of Chandos

Cassandra Willoughby, Duchess of Chandos (23 April[1] 1670 – 16 July 1735) was an English historian, travel writer and artist. She spent more than a quarter of a century overseeing the restoration of the gardens and the rebuilding of the family mansion at Wollaton Hall, near Nottingham.

Biography

She was the daughter of Francis Willoughby of Wollaton, Nottinghamshire, a Fellow of the Royal Society and writer on natural history, and his wife Emma, the daughter of Sir Henry Barnard of Bridgnorth, Shropshire and London.

When her 19-year-old brother Francis disagreed with his stepfather's handling of his finances, Cassandra accompanied him in 1687 to the Willoughby family's earlier seat, Wollaton Hall in Nottinghamshire: "This proposall [of her brother's] I was much delighted with, thinking it would be no small pleasure for me to be Mrs of Wollaton, and to doe whatever I had a mind to." She then oversaw restoration of the gardens and rebuilding of the house over a quarter of a century.[2]

In 1713, at the age of 43, Cassandra married her wealthy cousin, James Brydges FRS, at Chelsea College Chapel.[3] She was his second wife. Brydges' social standing rose the following year when he was made Earl of Carnarvon and inherited a barony and baronetcy on the death of his father, 8th Baron Chandos of Sudeley. He became Duke of Chandos and Cassandra his Duchess in 1719.

Kneller's 1713 portrait of the Chandos family is believed to show Cassandra, rather than the Duke's first wife, who was the mother of the two children in the picture.

The National Gallery of Canada has a portrait of Cassandra and her husband by Sir Godfrey Kneller dated 1713, which also features Brydges' two sons by his first wife.[4]

Cassandra died childless at the age of 65 and was buried at St Lawrence's, Whitchurch, near the ducal seat of Cannons.

Both the mother and sister of Jane Austen were named after Cassandra, to celebrate their link with a ducal family. Jane's mother was the granddaughter of the first Cassandra's sister-in-law, Mary Brydges.

Writings

Before she married, Cassandra Willoughby compiled a history of her father's family entitled The Continuation of the History of the Willoughby Family, which is preserved in the Manuscripts Department at the University of Nottingham Library. Some of her correspondence from before and after her marriage has been preserved at the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust Record Office, at the North London Collegiate School [5] and the Huntington Library and Art Gallery, in San Marino, California. In addition, she left some travel writings and genealogies.

Notes
  1. Johnson, p. 9
  2. Elizabeth Hagglund, "Willoughby, Cassandra [married name Cassandra Brydges, duchess of Chandos] (1670–1735)", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford: OUP, 2004) Retrieved 3 February 2015. Pay-walled.
  3. http://www.thepeerage.com/p21502.htm#i215014
  4. Correspondence holdings

References
  • Cokayne, George E., and Vicary Gibbs. The Complete Peerage of England, Scotland, Ireland, Great Britain and the United Kingdom: Extant, Extinct, or Dormant. Gloucester: A Sutton, 1987.
  • Chandos, Cassandra Willoughby Brydges, and Rosemary O'Day. Cassandra Brydges, Duchess of Chandos, 1670-1735: Life and Letters. Woodbridge, UK: Boydell Press, 2007.
  • Chandos, Cassandra Willoughby, The Continuation of the History of the Willoughby Family: Being Vol. 2 of the Manuscript. Ed., A. C. Wood. Eton, Windsor England 1958.
  • Johnson, Joan. Excellent Cassandra: The Life and Times of the Duchess of Chandos. Alan Sutton Publishing Limited, Gloucester, England 1981.
  • Jenkins, Susan. Portrait of a Patron: The Patronage and Collecting of James Brydges, 1st Duke of Chandos (1674-1744). Aldershot, England: Ashgate, 2007. googlebooks Retrieved November 9, 2008
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