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Duchess of Kendal (Ermengard de Schulemberg)
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An early inhabitant was the notorious rather than celebrated Ermengard de Schulemberg, Duchess of Kendal. It will be remembered that she arranged the interview between the youthful Horace Walpole and his sovereign, so graphically detailed in Walpole's Reminiscences, where she is described as "a very tall, lean, ill—favoured old lady," which coincides with other accounts of the maîtresse en titre at the time.
The meeting took place in the apartments (at St. James's Palace) of Lady Walsingham. This lady, known as Melusina de Schulemberg, was the reputed niece of the Duchess, but really her daughter by George I.
She was married in September 1733 to the Earl of Chesterfield, who was ungraciously described by Lord Hervey as being "very short, disproportioned, thick and clumsily made; with a broad, rough-featured, ugly face, with black teeth and a head big enough for a Polyphemus." Johnson, however - who, as the entire world knew, had no reason to love him - spoke of his manner as being "exquisitely elegant."
Next page: Lord Chesterfield
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