Abigail Masham, Lady
The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition | Date: 2008
Abigail Masham, Lady , d. 1734, favorite of Queen Anne of England. Her maiden name was Abigail Hill. A plain, intelligent person, she became (1704) bedchamber woman to the queen through the influence of her cousin Sarah Churchill, duchess of Marlborough . In 1707 she married Samuel Masham (later a baron), a groom to Anne's husband, Prince George of Denmark. Mrs. Masham gradually supplanted the duchess of Marlborough in the queen's affection and became the instrument through which Robert Harley , her kinsman, exerted his influence on Anne. In 1714, however, Mrs. Masham quarreled with Harley, secured his dismissal as lord treasurer, and assured Viscount Bolingbroke (Henry St. John ) of supreme political power. After Anne's death (1714), she lived in retirement.
Author not available, MASHAM, ABIGAIL, LADY.,
The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition 2008
The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. Copyright 2008 Columbia University Press
Related newspaper, magazine, and journal articles from HighBeam Research
|
Queen Anne. (England)
History Review; 9/1/1998; Wilkinson, Richard; 3352 words
; ... eventual replacement by the red-nosed Abigail Masham led to the collapse of the Whig ministry ... This Anne bestowed on an obscure lady of the court, Sarah Jennings, soon ... go-between was the Queen's bedchamber woman Abigail Masham. The Whigs, the Marlboroughs and Godolphin ... Anne was too ...
Read more
|
|
Annual bibliography of Works about life writing, 2004-2005.
Biography; 9/22/2005; Wachter, Phyllis E. Schultz, William Todd; 44567 words
; ... Fremantle: Fremantle Arts Centre, 2004. Maps the varied invocations of Lawson's life ... Holocaust from WW II to the 1990s. Roy, Wendy. Maps of Difference: Canada, Women, and Travel ... Geography 7.2 (Aug 2004: 155-91. Argues that maps appeared more frequently in travel accounts ...
Read more
|
|
Two marble-hearted fiends
The Spectator; 5/18/2002; Bradford, Sarah; 664 words
; ... she wrote to Mary, 'if she really had been with child, that nobody was suffered to feel [it] stir but Madam Mazarin and Lady Sunderland, who are people that nobody will give credit to.' She took care not to be present for the birth at St James ... including, of course, the notorious Sarah Churchill, who bullied Anne ...
Read more
|
Related entries from encyclopedias, dictionaries, and thesauruses
|
Harley, Robert, 1st Earl of Oxford and Mortimer
A Dictionary of World History
... as Speaker of the House of Commons and Secretary of State. He abandoned the Whigs and used the influence of his cousin Abigail Masham, a lady-in-waiting, to undermine MARLBOROUGH's standing with the queen. In 1710 he headed the new Tory government whose greatest ...
Read more
|
|
Sarah Churchill Marlborough, duchess of
The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition
... Princess Anne. In 1677 she married John Churchill, later 1st duke of Marlborough. On Anne's marriage (1683) she was appointed lady of the bedchamber and became a close confidante. Although temporarily out of favor (1692-94) owing to the political disgrace ... to quarrel over Whig cabinet appointments. Until then Sarah ...
Read more
|