#15108, Emma GILBERT

It is alleged that after burial in the family vault, grave robbers sought a valuable ring from her finger only to awaken her so that her family were dismayed by her arrival at the dinner table!  We investigated and wrote a Cobbweb about this tale in January 2024, finding it to be without any substance.  Emma was the daughter of the Archbishop of York.

In two contemporary paintings, "La Belle Assemblee" (1787) and "A Witch upon Mount Edge" (1791), she is actually drawn as a witch.  Since Lady Mount Edgcumbe can have been little more than 50 at the time and the portraits seen of her show a very attractive woman, it is scarcely fair to see her through the caricaturist's prejudiced eyes.   But the charge made against her for keeping faro tables at her house seems rather more firmly grounded.  Lady Mount Edgcumbe and her friends, Lady Archer and the Hon. Mrs Hobart (later the Countess of Buckinghamshire) were popularly known as "Faro Daughters."  Gaming was illegal at the time and some noble ladies were cobvicted of this.  The Annual Register for 1797 dismisses one faro case in the following brief paragraph:  March 11th, at the Police Office, Marlborough Street, Lady Buckinghamshire, Lady E. Lutterell and Mrs. Sturt were convicted before N. Conant and T Robinson Esqurs, in the penalty of £50 each for playing at the game of faro.

Picture copyright NPG.