Lady Mary Tudor, Countess of Derwentwater

Mary was born on 16 October 1673, to Moll Davis and Charles II, and was the last of the king’s children.

She grew up surrounded by the high society of the Restoration - nobles, thespians, dramatists, artists, and poets - and, following in her mother’s footsteps, she began acting at a young age. She was part of performances put on at Charles II’s court; aged nine years old she sang the part of Cupid alongside her mother (who was starring as Venus) in the play Venus and Adonis.

On 10 December 1680, Mary, aged seven, received her title from the king in recognition of her paternity. She was granted the name Lady Mary Tudor, as a nod to their collateral descent from the Tudor family, and a few years later in September 1683, she was issued an annuity of £1500.

She was married at aged fourteen, young even by seventeenth century standards, to Viscount Edward Radclyffe, who later inherited the earldom of Derwentwater, making Lady Mary the Countess of Derwentwater. They had four children together, James Radclyffe, 3rd Earl of Derwentwater, Lady Mary Tudor Radclyffe, Charles Radclyffe, and Hon. Francis Radclyffe. Mary and Edward separated around 1700, possibly because he was Roman Catholic and she refused to convert to the religion.

Two of Mary and Edward’s sons, James and Charles, were Jacobites and joined the rising of 1715. They were both captured, tried for treason and sentenced to death. Charles managed to escape prison and fled to France where he regrouped with the Stuarts, but James was not so lucky. Mary, along with several other nobles including Duchess of Cleveland petitioned George I to release James, but the king was determined to make an example of the rebels, and James was beheaded on Tower Hill in 1716.

Charles remained a rebel in France, working continuously towards the Jacobite cause. When he sailed to join the Jacobite forces in Scotland for the rising of 1745, he was re-captured by George II’s army, and later condemned to death under his previous sentence. This time, he could not escape, and he was beheaded in December 1746.

Just one week after her husband, Edward Radclyffe, died in 1705, Mary married Henry Graham. It was rumoured that the pair had already been living together for some time before they married, which would not have been unusual given that Mary and Edward had separated five years earlier. Henry died less than two years later, and within a few months later, Mary had married for the third time to Major James Rooke.

The rest of Mary’s life remains obscure, which is unfortunately not unusual for a woman at that time. However, we do know that that Mary had at some point moved to Paris, as she died there on 5th November 1726 at the age of 53.