Kitty Fisher
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| Catherine Maria 'Kitty Fisher', Nathaniel Hone |
In 1758, a young ‘lady’ of nineteen was fast becoming the
biggest celebrity across the land. One Tom Bowlby wrote to a friend in
Derbyshire, ‘You must come to town to see Kitty Fisher, the most pretty,
extravagant, wicked little whore that ever flourished....’ Believed to be the
daughter of a German silver-chaser, Catherine Maria Fischer, as she was born,
was a renowned courtesan. She is said to have turned down Casanova, at a
price of ten guineas for an hour of her company, although he would have it he
declined the offer because she spoke only English and he preferred all his
senses gratified, including his hearing. The procuress, Mrs. Wells, then told him that earlier in the
day Kitty had ‘eaten a bank-note for 1000 guineas on a piece of bread and
butter’. According to Casanova, it was a gift from Sir Richard Akins, ‘brother
of the fair Mrs. Pitt’. Variously, however, this note was £20, £50 and £100 and
the donor the Duke of York. There is another story of the Duke having been invited
to tea at Kitty’s house, and after a convivial meeting, he left a £50 note as
he departed, no doubt feeling this was largesse enough. Kitty, it seems, had
expected more of the royal sibling and ordered her servants not to admit his
Grace again. Much like the celebrities of today, Kitty was the subject of
gossip-mongering and tittle-tattle; racehorses were named after her, Sir Joshua
Reynolds painted her, and she was immortalized in the nursery rhyme ‘Lucy
Lockett dropped her pocket, Kitty Fisher found it.’ You must therefore pay your
penny and take your choice as to how much truth lies in any of the many tales.
‘From a physical point
of view she was a beautiful girl. Though slight, her figure was moulded in
graceful curves, and her limbs possessed the roundness and elasticity of
perfect health. Her ripe, provoking lips and saucy tilted nose gave her face an
expression of roguery, but when she chose the look would soften, and a glance
of childish innocence stole into her grey-blue eyes. Dainty to the finger tips,
she was always attired with consummate taste, and no woman was more clever in
choosing a gown to suit her style of beauty.’
One March day in 1759, she took her morning gallop beside
the Serpentine in Hyde Park, dressed in a ‘stylish black habit’ and riding a
frisky piebald. Having passed through into the Green Park and enjoyed a steady
canter, Kitty’s party were approaching ‘the palings of St. James’s Park’. A rank
of soldiers startled the horse, which bolted down the road. Checked by the
interception of some gentlemen, the piebald stopped suddenly and reared. With a
cry of alarm, Kitty fell to the ground, whereupon a crowd of concerned
onlookers surrounded her, helping her up and enquiring if she were injured. The
sobs ceased, became merry laughter as ‘officious hands’ dusted off her habit.
After a few minutes, a painted and gilded chair was brought from an appointed
position nearby. Kitty, laughing a goodbye to her companions, threw herself
into it and was borne away down the Mall. Whispers of “It is Kitty Fisher, the
famous Kitty Fisher!” began to circulate through the gathering crowd. Then, it
seems, a bluff individual declared forthrightly his indignation.
“D—
my B—d," he cried, aloud, “if this is not too much.
Who would be honest when they may live in this state by turning —?
Why, ’tis enough to debauch half the women in London.”
The episode has all the hallmarks of a publicity stunt, does
it not? Indeed, very soon the tale of the accident was being talked about,
broadcast in the popular press and celebrated in song, so it achieved the
desired result. The following appeared in the March issue of the Universal Magazine.
“On K—
F—’s Falling from her Horse.”
Dear Kitty, had thy
only fall
Been that thou met’st
with in the Mall,
Thou had’st deserved
our pity ;
But long before that
luckless day,
With equal justice
might we say,
Alas! poor fallen
Kitty!
Then, whilst you may,
dear girl, be wise,
And though time now in
pleasure flies
Consider of hereafter;
For know, the wretch
that courts thee now,
When age has furrowed
o’er thy brow.
Shall change his sighs
to laughter.
Reform thy manners,
change thy ways:
For Virtue’s sake, to
merit praise
Be all thy honest
strife:
So shall the world
with pleasure say,
“She tasted folly for
a day,
And then grew wise for
life.”
Kitty was purportedly unamused, if not incensed, by the attention her fall had
received. Mayhap her youthful beaux had pulled her leg over it; certainly, a
handbook was published, entitled The Juvenile
Adventures of Miss Kitty F—r, with a second
volume promised. This was too much and Kitty wrote a scathing piece to the
newspapers, published in the Public
Advertiser’s pages two days later. Needless to say, there was a backlash
(which only goes to show why one should never answer bad reviews) which served
Kitty no good a turn, since the author answered in pithy terms and the second
book was still published, the ‘Adventures’ being a scurrilous and rude tale containing
little truth. Nevertheless, the sordid occurrence did gain Kitty the sympathy
of the public.
Sadly, in the Georgian era, gentlemen were rarely faithful
to their wives. Kitty Fisher counted many aristocratic gentlemen among her
conquests, not least the 6th Earl of Coventry. Although he married
the beautiful Maria Gunning, elder of the two Irish sisters who took London by
storm despite their lowly birth, there were many misunderstandings within the
marriage and the Earl made Kitty his mistress. In a letter to Andrea Memmo,
Giastiniana Wynne – later the Countess of Rosenberg – who was staying in London
at the time, wrote:
“The other day they ran into each other in the park and Lady Coventry
asked Kitty the name of the dressmaker who had made her dress. Kitty Fisher answered
she had better ask Lord Coventry as he had given her the dress as a gift.”
The rivalry was infamous and the exchange drew some notice.
The Countess informed the courtesan she was an ‘impertinent woman’. To this
Kitty replied – no doubt in a haughty tone – that she “would have to accept this insult because Maria was socially superior
since marrying Lord Coventry, but she was going to marry a Lord herself just to
be able to answer back.”
Miss Wynne also wrote of Kitty Fisher:
“She lives in the
greatest possible splendour, spends twelve thousand pounds a year, and she is
the first of her social class to employ liveried servants – she even has
liveried chaise porters.”
Catherine ‘Kitty’ Fisher was born, then, in about the year
1738. Her working life began in a milliner’s shop, during which time she was
seduced by an army ensign, Anthony George Martin, known by the sobriquet, ‘The Military
Cupid’. He was the son of an English merchant by a Portuguese mistress and
blessed with a fresh-faced handsomeness. Kitty moved into his lodgings and was
much in love, but Martin was sent to the Continent and Kitty was left alone and
bereft. Now a Fallen Woman, she was solicited by another patron and this time material
gain governed her decision. Once on the path of infamy, she rose, as we have
seen, to be the lover, not only of Lord Coventry, but of Admiral Augustus Keppel
and General Lord Ligonier. She drove about London in a coach drawn by four of
the finest grey horses money could buy, the toast of the ordinary folk and
celebrated, not just for her beauty but for her wit as well.
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| Augustus Keppel |
“Even had she been
wholly plain her cavaliers would have been numerous, for her wit and high spirits
made her a fascinating companion. One who should have known speaks of her as ‘…the
essence of small talk and the magazine of contemporary anecdote ... it was
impossible to be dull in her company.’ Since she was endowed by nature with a
distinct personality, her bon mots and repartees had an uncommon zest, and were
quoted in the club rooms as frequently as the sallies of Foote, the player.”
Although her origins were lowly,
Kitty had “...assumed the ease and
politeness of a high-bred gentlewoman and although she could be as wild a madcap
as any in the company of devil-may-care admirers, her sprightliness was never
tinged with vulgarity.” Despite her immoral occupation, she was clearly both
clever and captivating. She had another weapon in her armoury, however, which
helped to set her above others of her ilk, both before and since her tenure.
Kitty was a skilful horsewoman, taught by Richard Berenger, author of A New System of Horsemanship.
It was a common event for her to
be spotted ‘at high noon’, galloping along ‘the Mall’ of St. James’s on a
spirited charger. She was, in effect, a woman who liked to be out of doors – no
‘stately promenade once a day’ in order ‘to take the air’ for her. She was
given to frequenting the tea gardens and parks throughout the hours of
daylight.
That austere publication, the Public Advertiser, was not above printing the following effusive
lines from the pen of Mr. Thomas Wilkes, in the sure knowledge of garnering a
slew of readers for so fashionable and attractive a subject.
Fair Venus, who oft
among Mortals goes ambling,
Was lost t’other day;
and she somewhere went rambling;
It put all the Gods to
their trumps, to find out.
Her Dress, her
Disguise, her Engagement or Route.
Apollo and Cupid, who
seldom unite
(Love and Reason being
different as Darkness and Light);
Soon jointly agreed to
go search for the dame,
At high Noon, to the
Mall of St. James’s they came.
I have found her, says
Cupid, see yonder, look there;
’Tis my Mother, I know
her Deportment and Air;
Look again, said
Apollo, you blundering calf.
Your Mother was
never so handsome by half,
Look a little more
sharply, repining you’ll own.
Such beauty can be
Kitty Fisher’s alone.
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| Kitty Fisher and a Parrot, Sir Joshua Reynolds |
Sir Joshua Reynolds painted her twice, as Cleopatra Dissolving a Pearl and with
a parrot; and Nathaniel Horne also took her portrait, picturing her with a
kitten, its paw in a goldfish bowl. This portrait hangs in the National
Portrait Gallery. Her name became identifiable with a particular kind of bead
used in lace-making, a white bead with blue and red spots decorating it, and,
of course, she is immortalized in the nursery rhyme. It is very likely she is
the Kitty Fisher referred to, for she was a heroine of the ordinary folk and
could well have been added to a popular rhyme – many were written about her,
some extremely rude. Lucy Lockett (or Lockit) was a character in The Beggar’s Opera of 1728, by John Gay.
Lucy Locket lost her
pocket,
Kitty Fisher found it;
Not a penny was there
in it,
Only ribbon round it.
Kitty led a life of fame and fortune in the public eye for
ten years. Then she married John Norris Jnr., the son of a landowner in Kent.
At last her infatuation for Anthony Martin died and she fell genuinely in love. At
Hemsted Park, high above the village of Beneden, she rode her spirited coal-black
mare (a wedding gift from her husband) with a renewed passion that stunned the
villagers to awe at her grace, dash and courage as she leapt any obstacle in
her path. She became beloved for her kindness, liveliness, charity and
willingness to listen. For the first time, Kitty was truly happy.
She must have known it could not last, such had been the law
of her life. She developed a hollow cough which became harsher, deeper and very painful. Her
cheeks began to burn and her strength began to fail. Although her friends
whispered she had fallen a victim of lead poisoning, as had her adversary, Lady
Coventry, it has been suggested it was not so. The ‘evil-liver’ was said to be
the cause and Kitty died in Bath whilst travelling with her husband to the ‘Hotwells’
at Bristol. She was the tragically young age of 29 and had been married less than five months. She was buried at Beneden, in those last months of her life a
reformed character.
All pictures public domain.
© Heather King
