Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 13.djvu/457

 sented a bronze cast of this bust in 1826 to the king of Tanjore, who, under the advice of her connection, Sir Alexander Johnston, was trying to introduce European art and sciences. Another bronze bust of Nelson was finished just before her death for the Duke of Clarence, and placed upon the stump of a mast of the Victory in his house at Bushy. She also made a statue of George III for the Edinburgh register office. She presented a bust of herself to the gallery at Florence. Another, engraved in Walpole's ‘Anecdotes,’ was in the collection bequeathed by Payne Knight to the British Museum.

Under the will of Horace Walpole (Lord Orford), who died 2 March 1797, Mrs. Damer was his executrix and residuary legatee. She also had Strawberry Hill for life, with a legacy of 2,000l. to keep it in repair. She lived there till 1811, when she parted with it, according to a provision in the will, to Lord Waldegrave. She saw many friends, especially the Berrys, and gave popular garden parties. In 1800 she produced ‘Fashionable Friends,’ a comedy by Miss Berry [see ], described as ‘found amongst Walpole's papers.’ She recited the epilogue, written by Joanna Baillie. It was produced at Drury Lane on 22 April 1802, but damned by the public (, vii. 535). In 1818 Mrs. Damer bought York House, Twickenham, where she brought together a large collection of her own busts and terra cottas, and her mother's worsted work. She bequeathed these heirlooms to the wife of Sir Alexander Johnston, the daughter of her maternal uncle, Lord William Campbell. Her studio is the conservatory of the present house. She died at her house in Upper Brook Street on 28 May 1828, and was buried at Sundridge, Kent. The church contains monuments by her to her mother and to several of her mother's relations. Her papers, including letters from Walpole, were burnt by her directions. Her working tools, apron, and the ashes of a favourite dog were placed in her coffin.

The merits of her works were chiefly perceptible when proper allowance was made for her position as an amateur fine lady. It was whispered that she received a good deal of assistance from ‘ghosts’—in the slang of sculptors. Allan Cunningham, who criticises her severely, admires her courage in persistently trying to refute Hume's doubts of her powers.

[Walpole's Letters (Cunningham), i. 283, ii. 75, vi. 366, 368, viii. 76, ix. 28, and passim; Annual Obituary for 1829, 125–36; Allan Cunningham's Lives of the Painters (1830), iii. 247–73 (with portrait after Cosway); Walpole's Anecdotes (Wornum), i. xx–xxi (list of her works); Dallaway's Anecdotes, 410–12; Redgrave's British Artists; Thorne's Environs of London, 586, 593, 630.] 