Bridget Clinton, Countess of Lincoln explained

Bridget Clinton, Countess of Lincoln, formerly Bridget Fiennes, was an English noblewoman, who became Countess of Lincoln in 1619.

She was the daughter of William Fiennes, 1st Viscount Saye and Sele, and his wife, the former Elizabeth Temple.^[1] She married Theophilus Clinton, 4th Earl of Lincoln, some time before 1619,^[2] and their children were:

• Lady Catharine Clinton (died c.1643), who married George Booth, 1st Baron Delamer of Dunham Massey, and had one child
• Lady Arabella Clinton (died 1667), who married Robert Rolle and had children
• Margaret Clinton (died 1688), who married Hugh Boscawen and had children
• Edward Clinton, Lord Clinton (1624-1657), who married Lady Anne Holles and had one child, Edward Clinton, 5th Earl of Lincoln^[3]

In 1622, her mother-in-law's book, The Countess of Lincoln's Nursery, was dedicated to her.^[4] It praised the young countess for opting to breast-feed her own children.^[5]

Thomas Dudley, who as the earl's steward had been involved in arranging her marriage to Clinton,^[6] wrote to her in 1631, reporting on the experiences of settlers in New England, indicating that she was a popular figure with emigrants from Lincolnshire.^[5]

After Bridget's death, the earl married a second time, to the widow Elizabeth Gorges,^[7] who was a relation of his, but they had no children.

Notes and References

1. George Edward Cokayne, editor, The Complete Baronetage, 5 volumes (no date (c. 1900); reprint, Gloucester, U.K.: Alan Sutton Publishing, 1983), volume I, page 14.
2. Book: Great Britain. Court of Quarter Sessions of the Peace (Middlesex). Calendar to the Sessions Records: New Series. 1937. Sir E. Hart. xix.
3. Mosley, Charles, editor. Burke's Peerage, Baronetage & Knightage, 107th edition, 3 volumes. Wilmington, Delaware, U.S.A.: Burke's Peerage (Genealogical Books) Ltd, 2003. Volume 1, page 824
4. Book: Randall Martin. Women Writers in Renaissance England: An Annotated Anthology. 21 July 2014. Routledge. 978-1-317-86290-1. 145.
5. Book: Madeline Bassnett. Women, Food Exchange, and Governance in Early Modern England. 21 November 2016. Springer. 978-3-319-40868-2. 69–70.
6. Book: Alan Rudrum. Joseph Black. Holly Faith Nelson. The Broadview Anthology of Seventeenth-Century Verse and Prose. 11 August 2000. Broadview Press. 978-1-55111-053-0. 183.
7. Mosley, Charles, editor. Burke's Peerage, Baronetage & Knightage, 107th edition, 3 volumes. Wilmington, Delaware, U.S.A.: Burke's Peerage (Genealogical Books) Ltd, 2003. volume 1, page 1102.