Excerpt: Instead of a raunchy temptress, Impeachment presents Lewinsky as a lovestruck young woman, desperate to please the married man she adores. And as this relatively quaint story is pulled deeper and deeper into the politics of D.C., it devolves into pure horror. You’ll leave Impeachment feeling many things: anger at Linda Tripp, disgust toward Bill Clinton, revulsion about the cutthroat media landscape and our current team mentality of politics. But you’ll also leave it understanding that Monica Lewinsky was a real person rather than a punchline.
Friday, August 15, 2025
AMERICAN CRIME STORY - IMPEACHEMENT : MONICA LEWINSKY IS A REAL PERSON AND NOT A PUNCHLINE
Excerpt: Instead of a raunchy temptress, Impeachment presents Lewinsky as a lovestruck young woman, desperate to please the married man she adores. And as this relatively quaint story is pulled deeper and deeper into the politics of D.C., it devolves into pure horror. You’ll leave Impeachment feeling many things: anger at Linda Tripp, disgust toward Bill Clinton, revulsion about the cutthroat media landscape and our current team mentality of politics. But you’ll also leave it understanding that Monica Lewinsky was a real person rather than a punchline.
Monday, August 11, 2025
Saturday, August 9, 2025
MONICA LEWINSKY SYMBOL OF STRENGTH by the band DOUBLE VICTOR
Thursday, August 7, 2025
THE 2025 ROLLING STONE INTERVIEW OF MONICA LEWINSKY
https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-features/monica-lewinsky-reclaiming-podcast-interview-1235264549/ article by Kate Storey from February 14, 2025
MONICA LEWINSKY: ‘I MANAGED TO SURVIVE SOMEHOW, SO IT’S POSSIBLE’The White House intern turned advocate opens up about her new podcast, survival, and charting a new course...
Finally, people were ready to really hear her side. She continued writing for Vanity Fair, appeared in anti - bullying PSAs, produced a documentary called "156 Minutes of Shame", about people who’ve been publicly humiliated, and starred in a voter-registration ad campaign for the fashion brand Reformation. She was becoming a symbol of resilience.
Today, Lewinsky is using her voice in a different way. She’s launching a podcast called Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky, a Wondery production in which she’ll sit down with guests to talk about something that shaped who they are — and how they’ve come to think of it on their own terms. Some early guests are Molly Ringwald, who talks about her own experiences with fame at a young age, as well as Kara Swisher, novelist Anne LaMott, and Lewinsky’s good friend Alan Cumming. She gives each guest a crystal at the end of the show.
Sunday, August 3, 2025
Saturday, August 2, 2025
MONICA LEWINSKY : A SURVIVOR WHO IS MOVING FORWARD and STILL EVOLVING
This month is dedicated to MONICA LEWINSKY - A Survivor Who Is Moving Forward and Still Evolving.
In March 2012 I dedicated a month to Monica with my introductory post title GET OFF THE BACK OF MONICA LEWINSKY - Why Not Blame President Bill Clinton? I elected Monica to MISTRESS MANIFESTO here because it just was never fair that she took the brunt of the revelation that she had an affair with the President William Jefferson Clinton and she has suffered criticism and blame for years since. She was never a Mistress, and she isn't the first woman to have an affair with a married man, but is one of the few who became part of history - 20th Century history - because of it.
Some of the issues for all of us that come up with the scandal that hurt her, beginning when she was just twenty-four years old, include women's sexuality, power-over (an authority figure with responsibilities taking advantage of an underling), and the betrayal of a "friend" (Linda Tripp) pretending to have our best interest in mind - and pretending to be a person who one can confide in - and have that information used against us.
It is now 2025, Monica is much older (51ish) and wiser than when she was an intelligent college girl who was hired to be a White House Intern, and who had the possibility of a dazzling future career ahead of her. She has had to find her way through one obstacle after another. Monica is still evolving.
MONICA SAMILLE LEWINSKY
1974- Present
Note: The photo of Monica is from her government ID photo by the Office of the Secretary of Defense, taken in May 1997, originally from US DOD. This image is a work of the U.S. military or Department of Defense employee, taken or made as part of that person's official duties. As a work of the U.S. federal government, the image is in the pubic domain in the United States.C 2025 Mistress Manifesto - BlogSpot All Rights claimed including Internet and International Rights
Friday, August 1, 2025
Thursday, July 31, 2025
HER EX MAY BE A SEXUAL PREDATOR : IS THERE ANYTHING SHE CAN DO?
QUESTION FOR MISSY
Dear Missy,
I live in a small town area of Los Angeles County. I had a brief relationship with a man who I soon thought might be one of those who will say anything he thinks you want to hear. It was confusing but I decided against him. Anyway, when I thought he might be sleeping around or have a steady girlfriend somewhere that he was cheating on, I decided to avoid encounters with him. He became predatory towards me even though months went by and we weren't dating.
I'm not sure what would've happened if I'd resisted the time he saw me at my storage unit, where it turns out he rents too, and expected to have sex in the bathroom there. I managed to stop it before things went too far. Then there was the time I happened to see him in the park and he suddenly gave me a hug but also squeezed my rear for anyone who was looking to see. He seems to want to give other men the impression I'm his...
More months went by and one day I saw him at the park where I sometimes walk at lunch. He offered me a ride back to work and I thought what the heck. Well, he pulled over in a parking lot and all of a sudden he was masturbating. I wasn't participating and I kept saying "Stop it. Let's get out of here. We could be arrested!" Finally a man was looking at the car and he said "He just wants to watch!" I insisted we leave.
Let's say he's just full of surprises.
More time went by. The last time I saw him I was walking down the street and heard someone calling "Hey Little Girl!" He was in his van. (He has two cars and a van.) He didn't remember my name and I'm no little girl and he wanted me to get in. I kept walking and did not get in. I remembered the time I got into the van and he wanted me to get into the back.
I haven't responded to his texts or e-mails that say things like "I'm worried about you."
I don't want his friendship. I actually feel ashamed of myself for being a mature woman who was fooled. But ever since that day where he called out "Hey Little Girl", thinking back on remarks he made like that he was having too much "fun" and was in his van sleeping in the next town for a week even he has an apartment in our town. I have this sick gut feeling that he might be driving around and trying to pick up females, who he will get sexual with, that he may molest or rape, since he is either always seductive or doesn't get no right away.
Is there anything I can do? I mean to have him checked out?
Nance
Los Angeles County
ADVICE FROM MISSY
Nance,
I don't know if he's a sexual predator in general or focused on underaged girls or simply thinks he is seductive and adventurous but you are far from comfortable with him. That discomfort has translated to a suspicion that he may actually be picking up women in his van and that "Hey Little Girl" could be that he's preying up women, offering rides, even very young girls. I get it. Chances are the way he has been with you is the way he's been with other women.
I suggest you block his phone number and e-mail without any commentary or response. We think he just wants to assure himself you're still in his life in some way.
We also think that should you run into him again and he asks if he can give you a ride or whatever, keep saying no.
We get the small town aspect of this. Telling him you're involved with someone else - lying basically - can backfire on you because there might be a good man who is interested you and a healthy relationship who might hear you have a boyfriend when you don't. If you see him, therefore, and he is any way wants to reconnect, just be simple and say, "I'm not available." If he presses you say you have moved on. Don't give details or make up a boyfriend who does not exist.
As for reporting him to the authorities, other than your own experience, which you as an adult female participated in, you have no proof. We are strong knowing that even a husband, steady boyfriend, or date can be a rapist. What we don't know is if perhaps he actually has a prior record. I ran a search on Google using the terms Los Angeles and Sexual Predator and I see there may be someone to talk to about your suspicions.
Maybe someone who knows more about this can talk with you and refer you?
***
Call the Los Angeles Police Department's non-emergency number at (877) 275-5273 to report an individual who abused you and to press charges, if applicable. Call and ask if there is anyone local you can speak to in the sex crimes unit.
***
THIS IS THE NATIONAL SEX OFFENDER WEB SITE. You can possibly use it to see if he has been convicted in the past!
NSOPW GOV (SEX OFFENDER LOOK UP)
Next time you meet a man who interests you, meet up with him a number of times in a brief and friendly way, such as having coffee, or in a group of friends, before you spend time just the two of you, and allow some time before you go past the goodbye kiss. It's not about being old fashioned or conservative, it's about being self protective.
Missy
PS: Check out Cassandra Peterson's book Yours Cruelly Elvira and the month I dedicated to her!
Tuesday, July 29, 2025
MARTHE DE FLORIAN : REMAINS A MYSTERIOUS COURTESAN THOUGH A LOVELY FICTION BOOK HAS BEEN WRITTEN ABOUT HER
Excerpt: There was also a remarkable psyche console (a kind of dresser); drawers full of letters; a multitude of trinkets; faded lace and even an extravagant stuffed ostrich in the entrance. Try to imagine the amazement of Maitre Olivier Choppin de Janvry upon discovering this place, entirely frozen in its 1900 state.
Everything was made of quiet luxury and voluptuousness, all in the full rococo style so typical of Paris at the turn of the century. Through the grey fog of dust and the saturated atmosphere, a bright life could be imagined. An existence frozen in time, not unlike the hands of time on the dial of the small golden alarm clock, situated in the middle of hairbrushes and mignonette perfumes. Ming vases and Louis XVI shepherdesses were shaded by dusty curtains with shell prints. The first time he entered this chamber, Maitre Choppin de Janvry made a spatio-temporal journey that the Situationists would have described as psychogeographical; entering this apartment, untouched
Mignonette perfumes under a carpet of 100-year-old dust...
Missy here! If you know of a biography or memoir about Marthe, please leave me a comment with the title or location!
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Saturday, July 26, 2025
THE STEREOTYPE OF A KEPT WOMAN : CAROLE TREGOFF NO - MARTHA DE FLORIAN YES
MISTRESS LIFESTYLE ?
The short tenure and terms and conditions of Carole Tregoff as Dr. Bernard Finch's Mistress - in waiting to be Wife number three - and in hopes of wealth enough to collaborate in a murder plot - while she worked as an assistant or as a waitress at a Vegas casino-restaurant - defies the stereotypes of a Mistress. For a Mistress has long assumed to be a Kept Woman, a woman who "does not have to work" because her man is fully supporting her and he can do that because he's rich.
Today, that notion is blurred by economic realities these days.
However, I do want to give a little time this month to Marthe de Florian, who was most certainly Kept. She may have been Kept by more than one man, but not too many, and one of them, who was likely the Love of Her Life, provided for her after his death...
Missy
Friday, July 25, 2025
Wednesday, July 23, 2025
DOCTOR BERNARD FINCH SERVED ELEVEN ? YEARS : LET OUT IN 1971
It's TRUE! I THINK HE GOT OFF EASY CONSIDERING.... WHAT DO YOU THINK? LEAVE A COMMENT!
Aug. 18, 1971
Excerpt: SACRAMENTO, Calif., Aug. 17 (AP) — Dr. R. 13ernard Finch was ordered released on pa role today, from a life term In the slaying of his wife. Approached about jobs in Missouri, Nebraska and Maryland. The Missouri offer was from a small rural community that wanted him to operate a small hospital and clinic.
His sweetheart at the time of the slaying Carole Tregoff, was paroled in 1969 from the same sentence.
The eight-member California Adult Authority granted the once-wealthy Finch parole in his second bid for freedom since he entered prison 10 years after three sensational trials. he will be released December 5.
Excerpt: Henry Kerr, chairman of the Adult Authority Board, said that Finch had been approached about jobs in Missouri, Nebraska, and Maryland. The Missouri offer was from a small rural community that wanted him to operate a small hospital and clinic.Finch's medical license was revoked in California. It can be reinstated by another state, Mr. Kerr said...
Monday, July 21, 2025
CAROL TREGOFF FREED AT AGE 32 IN MAY 1969
Center for Biographical Studies and Research, : CAROL TREGOFF FREE
Excerpt: This week, however, she won approval, and after 10 years inside the California Institution for Women she walked to freedom Thursday—a silent woman hoping for a new' life. She will be on parole for the rest of her years. Still attractive at age 32, her hair was now' its natural brown shade, and although she put on weight when she first came to prison, she w r as more slender now than when she began her sentence. Miss Tregoff and Finch w'ere finally convicted in 1961 of murder and conspiracy after three sensational trials. The first two ended in hung juries, mostly because of the tactics of defense attorney Grant T. Cooper, the veteran criminal lawyer who later defended Sirhan R. Sirhan. Iverne R. Carter, superintendent of the prison, said Miss Tregoff will live in the Los Angeles area but had asked that her whereabouts not be revealed. “She has to get her bearings in the community,” Mrs. Carter said. “She will do nothing to call attention to herself.”
Friday, July 18, 2025
Thursday, July 17, 2025
CAROLE TREGOFF TRIED TO HIRE A HIT MAN TO KILL DR. BERNARD FINCH'S WIFE BARBARA : TESTIMONY AT TRIAL
Excerpts Page 164-165-166-167 : James Cody, sometimes known as Jack or John Cody, had been sentenced to an additional year of confinement after walking off the prison farm in Minnesota. In exchange for his testimony, he was granted immunity for any crimes connected with the death of Barbara Jean Finch... My notes in parenthesis. There is no doubt from this testimony at trial that Carole was a full participant in planning the murder of her rival, Mrs. Bernard Finch - Barbara.
... Cody: "She wanted me to kill Mrs. Finch."
... Cody: "I told her Dona (an intermediary) had explained everything and that I thought I should get $2000 for doing the job. She said she thought $1000 was more reasonable, and we dickered around, you know, back and forth for a little while. Anyway, with the expense money I told her I would need - to buy a weapon and a car - we finally agreed on $1400. She was going to give me $300 up front and the rest when the job was done."...
Cody: She drew out some maps on napkins. One was a map of the Finch house and the other was a map of how to get to an apartment in Hollywood that Mrs. Finch had. Carole told me, 'If Mrs. Finch is not at the West Covina residence, she would be at the Hollywood apartment.' It was named the Hollywood Hills Motel or Hotel, or something. Anyway, I had the address and a map of how to get there."
Cody: "She told me it should look like a robbery, and that I should take the woman's rings and jewelry. I told her I would do it in my own way. Then we decided to do it on the following weekend, the Fourth of July weekend. Carole said that Dr. Finch goes to a tennis tournament in San Diego every Fourth of July, and that he would have a good alibi.
***
My notes: Cody said that he knew he was not going to do it right away but agreed to do it for the money he needed. He cooperatively flew to Phoenix on a plane with the plan to take a bus to LA from there and do the murder. The travel was to hide his location when the murder occurred.
Cody: "She said "I've made up my mind Jack. If you don't do it, Dr. Finch will, and if he doesn't, I will.
Cody: "Then she gave me $330 that she had in an envelope.
My notes page 168 -169 - 170
That night Cody and Carole met again and he told her that he had done the job with a shotgun at the Hollywood apartment. She handed him the rest of the money. As gasps were heard around the courtroom, Cody mentioned that after this Carole was happy. However, she soon questioned whether or not the man had actually murdered Barbara. He claimed Barbara's body was in the trunk of the car. When the truth - that Barbara was indeed alive - was presented to Cody, he claimed he must have killed the wrong woman, maybe a girlfriend of Barbara's. He agreed to go back and do the job right. Then Mr. Finch gave Cody more money for another gun and expenses. This implicated the doctor in full knowledge of the plan to murder. Cody claimed he admitted he had not followed through on the plan. In yet another meeting an angry Finch asked Cody again to do the deed but also said he would do it himself. Cody accepted more money again.
CODY WAS A LIAR, so how much truth could be in this testimony?
In the end both Carole Tregoff and Bernard Finch were convicted of murder. Carole would claim that she soon knew she was no longer in love with the man.
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Tuesday, July 15, 2025
CAROLE'S TESTIMONY VARIED : SHE SAID IT WASN'T A "CHEAP RELATIONSHIP" and WOULDN'T ADMIT THEY HAD SEX and TRIED TO HIRE KILLERS BUT...

Pages 68 and 69 and 70 :
On July 29th 1959, after giving testimony in which she tried to avoid answering if she'd had sex with Bernard, Carole was arrested in the courtroom. She was not handcuffed but lead to the back of an unmarked car, charged within an hour with first degree murder.
Page 71 : "We are confident that the tow of them planned this thing together. We think they planned to tie up Mrs. Finch, inject her with a lethal dose of Seconal, and run her car over a cliff.
Notes: Seconal among others, is barbiturate drug used for insomnia, i.e. a sleeping pill. A newer will in which Barbara Jean finch left Dr. Finch the bulk of the estate was found. (Note: She had never filed it so it was invalid.)
Meanwhile Bernard continued to say that the problem was that the Swedish nanny and Carole had simply not been in the same place - the garage - at the same time and that what they did not know was what happened between him and his wife in that garage. It was suggested that Barbara had a gun aimed at her husband at the time.
The headlines had made her a star of sorts and some people attended the trial just to see what she looked like. She claimed to have been forced to testify to incriminate herself and that she was no longer in love with Bernard. The press and the neighborhood women were sympathetic to Carole as they thought she had fallen in love and then used by Bernard.
But then two nineteen year old prostitutes in Vegas came forward to say that they knew someone who had been paid by Carole and Bernard to kill Barbara.
Excerpt page 91: (What the young prostitutes said.) "Turns out the doctor's girlfriend has been looking for somebody to 'take care of' the doctor's wife. ... She glanced at her friend quickly, then back to Powell. "We both heard Ritchie talking with a friend of his from when he worked at the Sahara. Didn't we?" She looked at her companion, nodding her into speaking.
"It's true," the other added, after a pause....
The girls, who wanted out of their pimp's control and to go home knew they had a deal .
Notes from pages 92 - 96 :
Forty eight days after her arrest, Carole was allowed out of jail on bail of $25,000. A Nevada state university student told Las Vegas police he had arranged with Carole Tregoff Pappa and Dr. R, Bernard Finch, early in 1959, to hire two men to kill Mrs. Barbara Jean Finch. There was a nationwide bulletin out for Richie Keachie and James Patrick Cody. Donald Sanford Williams also said that she had asked him if he knew any gangsters, he was an old eighbor. Williams had introduced her to Keachie but Keachie didn't want the job. Then Cody was asked... She offered or paid $1000,000... Cody requested immunity in exchange for his testimony. Three men said she did.
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Sunday, July 13, 2025
Wednesday, July 9, 2025
PLANNED MURDER : MYSTERY ATTACHE CASE MURDER KIT EXPLAINED AWAY?
Incriminating evidence of a plan to murder was explained away. The plan to murder wife Barbara Finch occurred because the paid hitman took the money and didn't commit the murder. When it was discovered that Barbara was still alive, the would-be hitman, who later testified against Bernard Finch and his Mistress Carole Tregoff. first lied that he must have murdered the wrong woman, and then that he needed more money to pull it off. Carole Tregoff reportedly warned the man that if he didn't do the evil deed, Doctor Bernard Finch would do it himself... And so, evidence of a plan, which was also cleverly "explained away" by Carole and Bernie was what was contained in a brown leather attaché case...
Excerpt page 59: (Note that seconal was a popular sleeping pill and could be used to overdose a person.)
Brown leather attaché case....
two pieces of rope, each two feet in length, an eight inch kitchen knife, a plastic sheet about two feet on a side, a half empty box of .38 caliber ammunition, an elastic bandage role, small bottle of seconal tablets, two sets of surgeon's gloves, a vial of injectable seconal, a syringe and needle, a flashlight, a brown shaving kit bag...
My notes from pages 65-66:
Carole claimed that the flashlight was so she could see where she was walking and that the sleeping pills were for her. She said that he had asked her if she needed anything for her apartment and she said a can opener, trying to explain a hammer, screwdriver, and knife. The rope was explained as something to tie bumpers of a boat he kept at Lido Shores. The gloves because he was blowing them and playing with them like balloons with the family dog.
She said that she had seen Barbara with a gun in her hand.
Missy here : When I read this, I thought that Dr. Finch and his Mistress Carole had tried to think of everything, including explanations, in advance of being questioned. To me this planned murder was as cold blooded as murders could get.
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Sunday, July 6, 2025
Saturday, July 5, 2025
DR. BERNARD FINCH : A MAN DRIVEN BY LUST AND MONEY TURNED MURDERER

(The divorce attorney for Barbara Jean Finch, the murdered wife of Doctor Finch, Joseph T, Forno of Los Angeles, gave telephone interviews to several newspapers.)
***
"Dr Finch threated a number of times to take Mrs. Finch to the desert and kill her," he was quoted. When asked about the status of the divorce action, he noted that the Finches had been scheduled to appear in conciliation court the next day to discuss their differences. "Dr. Finch had expressed a desire to reconcile with his wife. The divorce action was postponed. In the meantime, we asked for all of the community property and estimated it was worth $500,000 to $1,000.000." (Note that in 2025 dollars that is about five to eleven million dollars.)
"No fault divorce" was not to come for many years. A wife who could prove "fault," especially adultery, had a very good chance of getting virtually all of the community property.
Forno served a restraining order on Dr. Finch. "We filed an order to show cause after he violently assaulted his wife on June 25 of this year, trying to force her into his automobile. Dr. Finch had threated his wife with a gun in the past also. She was in constant fear for her life. This was preceded by an attempt on May 16 to strangle her at her home in West Covina." Forno continued. It was after this first assault Mrs. Finch decided to file for divorce."
Mrs. Finch had filed divorce papers, and at a June 11 hearing before Superior Court Judge Roger A. Pfaff, had requested and been granted $1,650 a month in alimony and child support. She was also given complete control of Dr. Finch's revenues from the clinic. All the revenues were deposited into her personal checking account. Barbara Jean paid the clinic's bills with her personal checks. She also signed her husband's salary checks.
.... Interestingly, the most recent (malpractice) suit had been filed by James T. Pappa, former husband of Carole Tregoff Pappa. Mr. Pappa filed his suit the Tuesday before the murder, claiming Cinch had negligently repaired a knee abnormality.
In my opinion, erratic driving, possibly alcoholism, unnecessary surgeries just to make money, and malpractice suits against him proved that the doctor was not necessarily rational or trustworthy and may have been driven by lust and money. However, California has been a community property state since no-fault divorce and by today's standards the Doctor's wife getting everything including future profits from his clinic would probably be considered extreme, unless perhaps he was considered incompetent.
How did 22 year old Carole Tregoff get involved in this? Was it love? I think OBSESSION!
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Friday, July 4, 2025
Wednesday, July 2, 2025
CAROLE TREGOFF : MISTRESS OF SOCIETY SURGEON BERNARD FINCH and CO-CONSPIRATOR IN THE MURDER OF HIS WIFE BARBARA FINCH
In subsequent testimony, Carole's stories didn't match. She claimed that she had moved to Vegas to avoid being called into the divorce action between Bernard and Barbara that May.
* Re Dorothy Kilgallen : in 1960 she went to cover the trial of society surgeon Bernard Finch, accused of shooting his wife Barbara once in the back while his co-conspirator and mistress, Carole Tregoff cowered in a clump of bougainvillea. " The crime was s slapdash do-it- yourself job done after a hoodlum named Cody took payment for the hit from the lovers, lost his nerve, blew the money in Vegas and then lied to Finch about having done the murder.
You may be interested in :
April 2023
Tuesday, July 1, 2025
Sunday, June 29, 2025
LADY EMMA HAMILTON, SIR WILLIAM, HORATIO NELSON, and NELSON'S WIFE: THE HUSBAND ACCEPTED, NELSON FLAUNTED, NELSON'S WIFE MADE A BRAVE FACE BUT WEPT
Excerpt pages 254-255 : Every time they opened a newspaper, Sir William's family, friends, and ex-colleagues were shocked to see him represented as a cuckolded, bam-boozled, out-of-touch antiquarian. They were even more scandalized by his sanguine acceptance of the situation. Sir William ignored their complaints, perhaps because he thought them too concerned about whether he would leave his money to Emma.... William's motives in forgiving the affair were complex. He owned Nelson more than $2000 for expenses by complaining in front of her lover that she gambled too much and would make herself a pauper. He was also genuinely fond of Nelson; furthermore, he knew their friendship gave him social consequence.
Society commentators found Emma's behavior bewildering, although they hardly blinked when a man kept both mistress and wife (such as the setup at Devonshire House, where the duke lived with both his wife and Bess Foster, her friend and his mistress.*) Sir William excused his wife because he loved her, valued her companionship, and welcomed not having to be her sole support. And, as he knew, his only alternative was being alone.
As her pregnancy advanced, Emma was often ill, even vomiting in front of Fanny, Nelson's wife. Nelson had taken to being unkind to Fanny, who was humiliated. Emma endured the censure of her royal and aristocratic friends who could not be associated with scandal, whatever their more liberal leanings or affection for her were. Her husband continued to travel with them. Emma arrived in London eight months pregnant. Nelson honorably decided to separate from his wife and gave Fanny half his income, which was very good of him since men were not required to give a wife they left anything.
Born in 1765, Emma was in her mid thirties when she gave birth on January 28,1801, with a doctor, midwife, and nurse to deliver her. She had another girl and named her Horatia. Nelson and his wife had been childless and he was a first time father at forty-three. She had not hidden this pregnancy as she had to do with her first. Again the cartoonists and commentators had their fun.
Missy here: Emma's story continues with the Prince of Wales but within the limits of this blog and focus on her rise to becoming Lady Hamilton, I can only highly recommend you obtain and read a copy of Kate William's wonderfully written and researched book that has been the primary reference for this month's posts. Thank you for persisting with me as we learned more about her amazing rise out of dire poverty in the late 1700's.
Amy Lyon, aka Mrs. Emma Hart, and Lady Emma Hamilton, died in 1815 at age 49.
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*The relationship is portrayed in the film The Duchess. According to Wikipedia, "The Duchess: is a 2008 historical drama film directed by Saul Dibb, who co-wrote the screenplay with Jeffery Hatcher and Anders Thomas Jenson, based on the 1998 book Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire by Amanda Foreman, about the late 18th century aristocrat Georgiana Cavendish, Duchess of Devonshire.
Friday, June 27, 2025
THE LADY EMMA HAMILTON YELLOW SHRUB ROSE
Image from Pixabay - artist Stux
The Lady Hamilton shrub rose is described by one website that sells the rose, David Austin Roses, like this: Dark red buds with dashes of orange, open to chalice-shaped blooms of rich tangerine orange, with yellow-orange on the outside of the petals. They are held against very dark, bronzy green, polished leaves that slowly become dark green with age. The flowers have a strong, delicious, fruity fragrance with hints of pear, grape, and citrus fruits....
There are three women who have been subjects here at MISTRESS MANIFESTO who have roses named after them.
Do you know who the other two are?
Missy
Thursday, June 26, 2025
SIR WILLIAM HAMILTON ALLOWS HIS WIFE LADY EMMA HAMILTON AN AFFAIR WITH HORATIO NELSON, DUKE OF BRONTE : ANOTHER PREGNANCY AND SCANDAL
Monday, June 23, 2025
EMMA WAS NOT SHY ABOUT LETTING SIR WILLIAM HAMILTON KNOW SHE WANTED TO MARRY HIM and AT LAST SHE BECAME LADY EMMA HAMILTON
While Sir William denied to all to his friends - who asked for the truth - that he had married her, there were those who believed he already had. By 1790 it was the gossip in fashionable London that the Ambassador to Naples and his mistress were about to arrive. It was a bit of the kind of scandal people loved. Those of his rank imagined that he was not her sexual partner, perhaps because he was, in fact, a senior. So it went with the English.
However, those of his friends who lived in Naples and had seen them as a couple thought otherwise. They encouraged him to marry Emma. Even the Queen Maria Carolina of Naples and the Two Sicilies encouraged marriage.
Emma traveled England with Sir William and his entourage. Her mother was part of the entourage but the daughter she had been forced to send away by Charles Greville, now nine years old, went unvisited by Emma. (Instead her mother, Mary, called Mrs. Cadogan, went.)
His family had a reason to discourage a marriage besides Emma's background and that was that they wanted his estate intact to inherit it. He claimed her to have made him extremely happy. He suggested that they would be "engaged for life" but proudly seeing how popular she was, he began to reconsider. Ultimately, and by my way of thinking, much to his credit, the man began to follow his heart.
Excerpt page 158 : Sir William confessed to his friends that he had decided to "make an honest Woman of her." He promised that he would never set her above visiting female aristocrats by allowing her to present them to Maria Carolina. Declaring himself entirely confident about the future, he cheerfully knocked two years off Emma's age. He wrote to his friend, Georgiana, Countess Spencer, mother of the Duchess of Devonshire:
A man of 60 intending to marry a beautiful young Woman of 24 ad whose character on her first onset of life will not bear a severe scrutiny, seems to be a very imprudent step, and so it certainly would be 99 times in a 100, but I flatter myself I am not deceived in Emma's [resent character --- We have lived together five years and a half, and not a day has passed without her having testified her true repentance for the past.
On August 28, Sir William attended court at Windsor and gained the king's consent to the marriage. Two days before her marriage, she sat for artist George Romney for the last time. The artist had created dozens of paintings of Emma, but for the first time he wrote Lady Hamilton rather than Mrs. Emma Hart in his record of models who sat for him.
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Sunday, June 22, 2025
Saturday, June 21, 2025
EMMA, MISTRESS OF SIR WILLIAM HAMILTON, DEVELOPS HER PERFORMANCE CALLED "THE ATTITUDES" BASED ON ANTIQUITY : SHE AIMS TO MARRY SIR WILLIAM
Amy Lyon, born into the poorest of the poor, because her mother was a Mistress, was able to develop into a beauty, but her rough and bumpy life included unpaid servitude, a bout with the theatre, work as a tavern prostitute, and becoming the Mistress of Honorable Charles Greville who grew bored of her. She bore a child at sixteen to Greville who was sent away to be raised, but was passed along to his relative, the older man, Sir William Hamilton. Hamilton had the beautiful young woman model for painters, sculptors, and cameo makers, and was proud of her progress as a singer and dancer, as well as an increasingly cultured and sophisticated entertainer at his dinner parties in Naples. He wowed his guests with a spectacle. Emma doing her Attitudes, which she modeled on the paintings she saw in Pompeii and antiquities being sold in Naples.
Excerpt pages 140-141 : ... When they were all assembled, he called them to hush and servants snuffed a few of the candles. In the gloom, they could just catch the sight of a female figure draped in white, her dark hair flowing around her shoulders. As she came closer, they recognized Mrs. Hart, Sir William's pretty, witty mistress, who had been laughing at all their jokes, flushed with gaiety, entertaining them with anecdotes about England. But now she was pale and ethereally composed. Taking up the shawls that lay at her feet, she began to swathe them around her, to kneel, sit, crouch, and dance. They quickly realized she was imitating the postures of figures from classical myth. First she pulled the shawls over her like a veil and became Niobe, weeping for the loss of her children; then using them to make a cape, she was Medea, poised with a dagger, about to stab. Then she pulled the shawls around her into seductive shapes, becoming Cleopatra, reclining for her Mark Antony. ...
She combined her dance training and her modeling at the Temple of Health and for Romney with influences she collected in Naples to create her Attitudes, an extraordinary fusion of eightieth-century dance with classical costumes and references, and a truly innovative art form.
THIS IMAGE IS FROM THE NATIONAL MUSEUM OF ART - UNITED STATES
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