Bridget Annesley Explained

Bridget Annesley (fl. 1610-1630) was a courtier to Anne of Denmark, wife of James VI and I.

Bridget Annesley was a daughter of Robert Annesley of Rathverd or Rathuard and Newport Pagnell, an undertaker of the plantations in Munster, and Beatrix Cornwall, a daughter of John Cornwall of Moor Park, Hertfordshire.

The surname "Annesley" was sometimes written "Anslow" or "Anslowe".[1]

Bridget Annesley became one of the servants of Anne of Denmark, called maids of honour or "chamberers", a lady of the bedchamber in 1609. She may have got this appointment through her mother's parents, who lived near the Earl of Bedford and the Countess of Bedford's house at The More. The Countess of Bedford was influential with the queen. Another link was that the manor of Newport Pagnell belonged to the queen.

Anne of Denmark gave clothes to Bridget Annesley. On 6 January 1610, she received a night gown of carnation and white taffeta, and on 8 December 1610 a dove-coloured taffeta gown with stripes of black and white made for the queen two years previously.[2] Annesley was given mourning clothes on the death of Prince Henry in 1612.[3] In 1614 she was bought a bay ambling gelding horse for £18 to replace her lame grey gelding.[4]

She was known as "the queen's servant Mrs Anslow" in 1616, when her brother Francis Annesley (d. 1660) was promoted to be a joint-secretary of Ireland.[5] Bridget Annesley may have helped her brother gain the favour of the king's new favourite George Villiers, who could assist his friends in careers and appointments.[6]

When the queen died in 1619 the other chamberers were; Elizabeth Murray (probably the Countess of Annandale), Marie Mayerne sister of Théodore de Mayerne who married Gian Francesco Biondi in 1622;[7] Elizabeth Devick, a former attendant of Lady Edmondes; and Mary Gargrave as Maid of Honour, the daughter of Sir Cotton Gargrave and Anne Waterton, and Elizabeth Foukes who was probably a niece of John Finet.[8] [9] Bridget walked in the funeral procession with the ladies of the Privy Chamber, listed as "Mrs Anslow".[10]

In 1627, Bridget Annesley petitioned for payment of back wages amounting to £866.[11]

Connections made in the queen's household were strengthened in 1637 when her niece Beatrice Annesley, Francis Annesley's daughter, married James Zouch, the son of Dorothea Silking, her Danish colleague in the queen's bedchamber, and Sir Edward Zouch of Woking.[12]

The dates of Bridget Annesley's birth and death are unknown.

Notes and References

  1. See for example, John Maclean, Letters from George Lord Carew to Sir Thomas Roe (Camden Society, London, 1860), p. 69.
  2. Jemma Field, 'The Wardrobe Goods of Anna of Denmark', Costume, 51:1 (March 2017), pp. 20-1, & Supplement p. 32 no. 298, 39 no. 351.
  3. https://catalog.folger.edu/record/234783 Folger Shakespeare Library, catalogue X.d.572
  4. Frederick Devon, Issues of the Exchequer: James I (London, 1836), p. 345.
  5. John Maclean, Letters from George Lord Carew to Sir Thomas Roe (Camden Society, London, 1860), p. 69.
  6. https://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1604-1629/member/annesley-sir-francis-1584-1660 Lloyd Bowen & Simon Healy, 'ANNESLEY, Sir Francis (by 1584-1660)', The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1604-1629, ed. Andrew Thrush and John P. Ferris, 2010
  7. Norman Egbert McClure, Letters of John Chamberlain, vol. 2 (Philadelphia, 1939), p. 479, Chamberlain describes Marie Mayerne as "a very lumpe or great peece of flesh."
  8. Frederick Devon, Pell Records: Issues of the Exchequer (London, 1836), p. 251: Joseph Jackson Howard, Miscellanea Genealogica Et Heraldica, vol. 1 (London, 1868), p. 226: See also a household list of 1619 written in French, BNF MS Français 15990
  9. See Helen Margaret Payne, 'Aristocratic Women and the Jacobean Court, 1603-1625 ', Royal Holloway and Bedford New College, PhD (2001), p. 280 for a list of the queen's women.
  10. John Nichols, Progresses of James First, vol. 3 (London, 1828), p. 541.
  11. CSP. Domestic: Charles I, 1627-1628 (London, 1858), p. 268: She had given the Queen 9 years' service, TNA SP14/107 f.126r.
  12. Brayley & Britton, A Topographical History of Surrey, vol. 2 part 1 (Dorking & London, 1842), p. 9: Francis Annesley & Patrick Little, 'Providence and Posterity: A Letter from Lord Mountnorris to His Daughter, 1642', Irish Historical Studies, 32:128 (November 2001), pp. 556-7.

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