Notes and Queries, Vol. IV, Number 88, July 5, 1851: A Medium of Inter-communication for Literary Men, Artists, Antiquaries, Genealogists, etc.Various
History
Notes and Queries, Vol. IV, Number 88, July 5, 1851: A Medium of Inter-communication for Literary Men, Artists, Antiquaries, Genealogists, etc.
Various
Questions and answers -- Periodicals
"A plain Narrative of Facts relating to the Person who lately
passed under the assumed name of the Princess Wilbrahama, lately
detected at the Devizes: containing her whole History, from her
first Elopement with the Hon. Mrs. Sc***ts, till her Discovery and
Commitment to Devizes Bridewell; together with the very
extraordinary Circumstances attending that Discovery, and the
Report of a Jury of Matrons summoned on that Occasion, &c. London:
printed for the Author."
I shall be very thankful for any elucidation of the above case. It
appears to have been sufficiently popular to warrant the publisher in
engaging, as he says, "the best artists" to illustrate it with a series
of caricatures. I have never been able to meet with a copy in any public
library.
J. WAYLEN.
[The notorious impostor noticed in the communication of our
correspondent, performed her surprising feats of hazardous
versatility between the years 1765 and 1768. On different
occasions she assumed the names of Wilson, alias Boxall, alias
Mollineaux, alias Irving, alias Baroness Wilmington, alias Lady
Viscountess Wilbrihammon, alias Countess of Normandy. In 1766 her
ladyship, "with gentle mien and accent bland," received for her
dextrous lubricities something like a whipping at Coventry. In
1767 she was adjudged a vagabond at Devizes, and in the following
year sentenced to transportation at the Westminster assizes.
Alderman Hewitt of Coventry, in 1778, published some memorabilia
of her ladyship in a pamphlet entitled, _Memoirs of the celebrated
Lady Viscountess Wilbrihammon, the greatest Impostress of the
present age_. The alderman does not notice the tract mentioned by
our correspondent, so that it still remains a query whether it was
ever issued, although it may have been advertised.]
_Early Visitations._--In Noble's _College of Arms_, it is stated, p.
25., that--
"Henry VI. sent persons through many of the counties of England to
collect the names of the gentry of each; these lists have reached
our time. It is observable, that many are mentioned in them who
had adopted the meanest trades, yet were still accounted gentry."
Where are these lists to be found?
H. WITHAM.
[Noble's statements upon such points are extremely loose. We know
not of any such lists, but would refer to Grimaldi's _Origines
Genealogicæ_, under "Rolls and Visitations," where, in all
probability, something may be found in reference to the subject,
if there ever were any such lists.]
Replies.
WRITTEN SERMONS.
(Vol. iii., pp. 478, 526.)
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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