Baddeley, Sophia (1745–1786)

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Baddeley, Sophia (1745–1786)

English actress. Name variations: Sophia Snow. Born Sophia Snow, 1745, in London, England; died 1786 in Edinburgh, Scotland; dau. of Valentine Snow (sergeant-trumpeter); m. Robert Baddeley (1733–1794, actor).

Celebrated Shakespearian actress and singer of great beauty, who was renowned for her vanity and notorious conduct; eloped with actor Robert Baddeley at 18 (1763); made stage debut at Drury Lane as Ophelia in Hamlet (1765); appeared as a singer at Ranelagh and Vauxhall; excelled as Shakespearian heroine; had stormy relationship with husband who fought a bloodless duel over her with the brother of David Garrick; though separated from husband, continued to act with him at Drury Lane; suffering from addiction to laudanum, took refuge from creditors in Edinburgh, the site of her last appearance on stage (1784).

See also Elizabeth Steele, Memoirs of Mistress Sophia Baddeley (1781).