Page:The Story of Nell Gwyn.djvu/21

Rh Of the early history of Nell, and of the rank in life of her parents, very little is known with certainty. Her father, it is said, was Captain Thomas Gwyn, of an ancient family in Wales. The name certainly is of Welch extraction, and the descent may be admitted without adopting the captaincy; for by other hitherto received accounts her father was a fruiterer in Covent Garden. She speaks in her will of her "kinsman Cholmley," and the satires of the time have pilloried a cousin, raised by her influence to an ensigncy from the menial office of one of the black guard employed in carrying coals at Court. Her mother, who lived to see her daughter a favourite of the King, and the mother by him of at least two children, was accidentally drowned in a pond near the Neat Houses at Chelsea. Her Christian name was Eleanor, but her maiden name is unknown.

Whatever the station in life to which her pedigree might have entitled her, her bringing up, by her own account, was humble enough. "Mrs. Pierce tells me," says Pepys, "that the two Marshalls at the King's House are Stephen Marshall's, the great Presbyterian's daughters: