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Villiers and violence she had enticed her son's promised wife out of the hands of her lawful guardians, and insisted upon an immediate marriage and transference of fortune, though the bride was but seven years old (for details of these scandalous proceedings see The Case of Mrs. Mary Wood, an Infant, ap. Harl. MS. 5277, ff. 85 sq.; cf., Chesters of Chichele, p. 486). In this instance, however, the Duchess of Cleveland, unscrupulous as she was, found herself outmanœuvered by the Dowager Duchess of Northumberland [see under Percy, Algernon (1602-1668) (DNB00), tenth ]. With regard to her two daughters acknowledged by the king, Anne and Charlotte Fitzroy, they were granted the precedence of duke's daughters previous to their being married, the former (at Hampton Court on 11 Aug. 1674) to Thomas Lennard, lord Dacre, afterwards (1684) Earl of Sussex [see under Lennard, Francis (DNB00), fourteenth ; the countess died 16 May 1722]; the latter in February 1677 (three years after a formal act of betrothal) to Edward Henry Lee, earl of Lichfield [see under Lee, George Henry (DNB00), third ]. Lady Lichfield, who was celebrated for her 'blameless' beauty and her numerous issue, and who figures in St. Evremond's 'Scene de Bassette,' died on 17 Feb. 1718, aged 55. During 1674 the Duchess of Cleveland was repaid upwards of 1,200l. out of the secret-service money for the sums which she had expended upon 'wedding cloathes, millenary, mercery, and lace' for her daughters.

These family matters settled, the duchess, who felt that her influence at court was past recovery, but who had been cheered by a grant on 7 April 1677 of the stewardship of Hampton Court, together with the rangership of Bushey Park, migrated to Paris. She was much piqued at the neglect of the great ladies of the French court, but consoled herself by an intrigue with the English ambassador, Ralph Montagu (afterwards Duke of Montagu) [q. v.], to revenge herself on whom a little later on for a rapid transference of affection (in the direction of her eldest daughter, Lady Sussex) she commenced an animated correspondence with the king. Her previous intimacy with Montagu enabled her to reveal to Charles the low estimation in which the king was held by his unscrupulous envoy. Montagu hurried back to defend himself without waiting for leave, only to find himself completely ostracised at the English court (July 1678;, Lives, 1814, v. 872; , ii. 148). He was succeeded at Paris by Sunderland, one of the most assiduous flatterers of the still powerful ex-favourite [see Spencer, Robert (1640-1702) (DNB00), second ]. Other recalcitrant lovers of the duchess, secretary Ellis for example, did not get off so easily. Towards the close of 1677 the duchess gave the sum of 1,000l. to the English nuns of the Immaculate Conception, Rue Charenton, Paris, a nunnery in which she placed as pensionnaire her youngest daughter, Barbara, of whom the Duke of Marlborough was father. This young lady, who was never married, and who subsequently, as Sister 'Benedicta,' made her profession as a nun, became in 1691 by the Earl of Arran the mother of Charles Hamilton (1691-1754) [q. v.], and died prioress of the nunnery of St. Nicholas at Pontoise on 6 May 1737 (, Peerage of Scotland, ed. Wood, 1813, i. 720 n.) A few months before the death of Charles II (cf., Diary, 4 Feb. 1685) the Duchess of Cleveland would appear to have returned to England, and Charles on his deathbed asked his brother to be kind to her. A little before this date, while living in Arlington Street, Piccadilly, she would seem to have commenced a liaison with the actor Cardonnell Goodman [q. v.] Goodman had in November 1684 been convicted of a conspiracy to poison two of the duchess's sons (, i. 322), but he was now so zealous in her service that he would not allow the curtain to ascend before 'his duchess' had entered her box; and by him, it appears, 'the gratious lady' in March 1686 had a son, 'which the town has christained Goodman Cleveland' (Peregrine Bertie to the Countess of Rutland, ap. Rutland Papers, ii. 107). The Earl of Castlemaine died on 21 July 1705, and four months later the widow married, at St. James's, Westminster, Major-general Robert Feilding [q. v.] A comical account of the courtship is given in a letter from Lady Wentworth to her son (Wentworth Papers, p. 50). Their married life was brief and stormy. On 24 July 1706 Feilding was committed for a brief period to Newgate by an order of Justice Holt for threatening and maltreating his 'wife' (see A Faithful Account of Feilding's Examination, Brit. Mus. 1851, c. 38). Fortunately for the duchess, a previous wife of 'Beau' Feilding's was proved to be in existence, and on 23 May 1707 the nullity of her second marriage was pronounced at Doctors' Commons. The indecency of some of the letters put into court as evidence by the duchess is noteworthy in connection with anecdotes of the lady's depravity (see Cases of Divorce: The. Trial of R. Feilding, 1776, 4to; cf. Stowe MS. 1055, and art. ). The remaining years of her life were spent at Chiswick, where