Page:Biographical catalogue of the portraits at Weston, the seat of the Earl of Bradford (IA gri 33125003402027).pdf/112



No. 2.

LADY DIANA FEILDING.

''Oval. Blue dress. Dark hair.''

DIED 1731.

She was the daughter of Francis Newport, first Earl of Bradford, by Lady Diana Russell. She married, first, Thomas Howard of Ashtead, County Surrey, Esq., Knight of the Bath, Groom of the Bedchamber to George the First, Auditor of the Exchequer, and Clerk Comptroller of the Board of Green Cloth, by whom she had a son, who died while a schoolboy at Westminster, and a daughter married to Lord Dudley and Ward. By her second husband, the Honourable William Feilding, younger son of William, fifth Earl of Denbigh, and second Earl of Desmond (whom she also survived), she left no children. A marble tablet, surmounted by a bust, at Ashtead, where she lies buried, bears this inscription: 'Be this monument sacred to the memory of Lady Diana Feilding, daughter of Francis Newport, first Earl of Bradford. Her first husband was grandson to the Earl of Berkshire. Surviving her children, this illustrious branch of the house of Howard became her family. To it during her life she assured the inheritance of that estate she enjoyed by the bounty of her first husband, and at her death she made provision still more ample to support the honour and dignity of the present Earl of Berkshire and his descendants. That his gratitude therefore may be preserved in the minds of his latest posterity, Henry Bowes, Earl of Berkshire, has caused this monument to be erected, 1773.' Lady Diana was very charitable to the poor, and built and endowed alms-houses for six poor widows in the neighbourhood of Leatherhead.