Jane Fleming, later Countess of Harrington

British, 1755 - 1824

BiographyJane Fleming was born in 1755, the eldest of five children of Sir John Fleming (c. 1701-63), 1st Bart., of Brompton Park, Middlesex, and his wife Jane Colman (1732-1813), a niece of Edward, 8th Duke of Somerset. John Fleming's death in 1763 brought Jane (as co-heir with her sisters) a staggering fortune of £100,000. On March 29, 1770, when she was about fifteen, her mother married Edwin Lascelles (1713-95), a wealthy West Indian sugar grower, who was created 1st Baron Harewood in 1790. At the age of twenty-three, Jane became engaged to a glamorous war hero, Charles Stanhope, Viscount Petersham (1753-1829), a lieutenant colonel in the 3rd Foot Guards. He had been in America serving as General Burgoyne's aide-de-camp since February 1776, and returned to England in late December 1777 to find himself the idol of the female population. Viscount Petersham's father, the 2nd Earl of Harrington was deeply in debt, however, and the families became embroiled in protracted legal negotiations. In late October 1778 it was speculated that the match had been called off altogether, but the impasse was evidently cleared by Viscount Petersham's accession as 3rd Earl of Harrington on the death of his father, April 1, 1779. On May 23, 1779 he and Jane Fleming were married at St. Marylebone, London. The new Countess of Harrington immediately garnered praise for her generosity in settling her husband's debts and funding the re-purchase of Stable Yard House in St. James's, London. Her money also enabled Lord Harrington to raise an infantry regiment, which she accompanied to Jamaica in 1780. On their return to England the following year, Lord Harrington was appointed aide-de-camp to the king, and Lady Harrington became prominent in fashionable circles. She was singled out (along with Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire; as one of "the best dressed ladies" at an all-night party hosted by the duchess in September 1782. Like many of their set, Lady Harrington developed a fondness for gambling, and in 1787 she contributed funds to establish a faro bank in partnership with the duchess's sister, Lady Duncannon. In a social milieu notorious for lax morality, however, Lady Harrington was considered a paragon of virtue, "blessed with domestic happiness, a lovely progeny [six sons and two daughters], and every endearment that can make life desirable." An artist of some skill, Lady Harrington may have taken lessons from John Glover, whose practice as an art instructor she helped to establish in the early 1790s. She was a great favorite of Queen Charlotte and served as her Lady of the Bedchamber. The Harringtons' fashionability of dress and behavior persisted into late life. One contemporary was struck by "their sempiternal occupation of tea-drinking," claiming that "neither in Nankin, Pekin, nor Canton was the teapot more assiduously and constantly replenished" than at Stable Yard House. The Countess of Harrington died at St. James's Palace on February 3, 1824, and was buried in Westminster Abbey nine days later. Her husband died on September 15, 1829 at Brighton and was buried at his country house, Elvaston, county Derby.

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