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The Colorful Duchess of Kingston [Kingston, Elizabeth Chudleigh Hervey, Duchess of (1720-1788)]. An Authentic Detail of Particulars Relative to the Late Duchess of Kingston. A New Edition. London: Printed for G. Kearsley, at Johnson's Head, No. 46, Fleet-Street, 1788. [ii], ii, 178 pp. Copperplate portrait frontispiece. Octavo (8-1/4" x 5-1/4"). Later quarter morocco over marbled boards, gilt fillets and title to spine. Wear to spine ends and joints and corners, which are bumped, front board partially detached but secure, small armorial bookplate (Carlingford) to front pastedown. Moderate toning to interior, soiling and smudges to a few leaves, heavier soiling to p. 178, light soiling to title page and frontispiece, which has light edgewear and a short tear to its fore-edge with no damage to image. A good copy. $650. * Second edition, published the same year as the first. A final edition, designated the third, was published in 1790. Kingston was well-known for a colorful life of romantic entanglements and scandals. When she determined to marry the Duke of Kingston, Elizabeth feared the scandal of divorce from her first husband, Augustus Hervey, later Earl of Bristol, who wanted a divorce, so she instituted a suit of jactitation against him. His negative response ignored, she took an oath that she was unmarried, and the court so declared her. She married the Duke of Kingston in 1769, and he died in 1770 and left her a substantial estate on the condition that she remain a widow. The duke's nephew, Mr. Evelyn Meadow, brought suit against her for bigamy shortly after the duke's death, while she was traveling in Italy. She returned to England to stand trial. Found guilty, she would have been "burned on the hand" but she claimed the privilege of her peerage which served to exempt her from corporal punishment. She continued a life of travel and adventure until her sudden death in Paris in 1788. The likely previous owner of this copy was the British nobleman and politician Chichester Samuel Parkinson-Fortescue, 2nd Baron Clermont and 1st Baron Carlingford [1823-1898], who served as President of the Board of Trade, and also served on the Privy Council as Lord President of the Council. Dictionary of National Biography IX:730. English Short-Title Catalogue T93420.
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