A True Regency Rags to Riches Tale

Michelle Styles examines the life of Harriot Mellon Coutts, Duchess of St Albans, Celebrated actress, senior partner in Coutts Bank and forgotten by today's feminists.

Last month, I blogged about Lady Jersey and Evangline Holland kindly recommended a book – Women Who Made Money – Women Partners in British Private Banks 1752 -1906 by Dawes and Selwyn.   I ordered and read it, not expecting that much. But as I turned the pages , my jaw kept dropping. Why had these women been overlooked? Why aren’t they better known? 14 women possessed licences to print money in 1812. Women in the Regency period not only inherited banks but they also founded banks. When Ann Butlin’s bank was wound up at 100 years, her great grandson retired a wealthy man.

One of the most remarkable  female bankers is Harriot Mellon Coutts who later became the Duchess of St Albans.

Harriot is a true rags to riches story and I am utterly amazed that no one has seen fit to have her as a  subject of a biography since 1915. Born circa 1777 to an Irish actress and one Leiutenant Mellon of the Madras Army (there are no records of the man btw), Harriot went on the provincial stage at an early age.  There is evidence that her mother severely abused her. When she was 18, she met Sheridan who urged her to come to London. She made her debut in 1795 as Lydia Languish at the Drury Theatre. She was considered to be a great comic actress.

Harriot was blessed with incredible good sense and a prudent and sound business head. She became wealthy but continued to work.  She also made sure that she was utterly respectable.

In 1810 while on a professional tour, in Cheltenham, she met the elderly banker Thomas Coutts. She kept the five guineas he sent as good luck pieces for the rest of her life. They rapidly became friends and he became her trusted business advisor. She was welcomed into his family and became friends with his daughters who were known as the Three Graces on account of their beauty. Unfortunately the first Mrs Coutts suffered from serious mental illness and eventually died in 1815. A month later Harriot and Thomas married.  Thomas ensured that Harriot had a proper marriage settlement and she retained control of all her property. Harriot was presented at court by Baroness North (one of Thomas’s daughters). There is a story that Baroness North had offered, expecting the Queen to refuse to meet Harriot as there had been a slight friction that their father remarried so quickly. In the event, the Prince Regent did meet Harriot and was utterly charmed by her (note if you want an actress to be presented, have her meet the Prince Regent).

In 1822, Thomas died and left the senior partnership to Harriot. Harriot was an active partner and controlled the hiring and firing of the other partners. She was also paid 4x as much as the other partners. She did much to introduce Coutts bank to various high flyers.  She knew everyone. And in 1825, she married the Duke of St Albans, a man twenty years her junior. She knew about marriage settlements and continued to retain control of her money and Coutts bank.

She was a great patron of the arts as well as the poor. The over-whelming picture of her was that she was kind and never seemed to notice slights. For a time after she married the Duke of St Albans she was mercilessly caricatured.

She died in 1837, leaving Coutts to Thomas Coutts’ granddaughter Augusta Burdett-Coutts. Lady Burdett-Coutts preferred to concentrate on philanthropy rather than directly running the bank. She did a huge amount for the poor in the East End of London. However when she married an American in 1881, under the terms of Harriot Mellon’s will, the control of Coutts changed. Coutts remains one of the leading private banks in Britain and among other things, there is a cash point machine in Buckingham Palace for the Royal family’s use.

It shocks and amazes me that she is not better known. There is a 1915 biography called The Jolly Duchess which is available on the Open Library if anyone is interested in more detail. And I thoroughly recommend Women Who Made Money for anyone interested in how businesswomen thrived in the Regency and Victorian periods.

Michelle Styles writes historical romance in a number of different periods including the Regency. Her latest To Marry a Matchmaker is an early Victorian set in the North East of England. You can read more about Michelle's books on her website www.michellestyles.co.uk

Carriages and Trains

Images of heroes and heroines on horseback or riding in grand carriages are part of what I love about writing books set in Regency England. So it is daunting to me to know that the beloved characters in my books are about to experience a radical change in their mode of travel. On their horizon is railway travel and in the wink of an eye posting inns and mail coaches are about to be replaced.

Regency people certainly must have known about steam engines and railroads. The the late 1700s, railways in Great Britain served the mining industry, carrying only freight. In 1808 a steam locomotive called Catch Me Who Can was run on a circular track as a sort of novelty exhibition in Bloomsbury. The exhibition closed after a derailment caused by the relatively brittle cast-iron rails breaking.

The early 1800s were a time of great invention and innovation in the development of steam engines and in improving rails. Early steam engines included the Rocket, the Puffing Billy, the Salamanca, and the Blücher. The Salamanca was named after Wellington’s victorious battle at Salamanca in 1812. The Blücher was named for the Prussian general whose arrival at Waterloo secured the victory for Wellington.

In 1825, shortly after the Regency officially ended, the Stockton and Darlington Railway opened. It was 26 miles long and carried passengers as well as freight. In 1830 the Liverpool and Manchester Railway opened as the world’s first inter-city passenger railway. One of the passengers on the train on opening day was the Duke of Wellington.

By the 1840s there were dozens of competing companies building and running railroads to all parts of Great Britain. By 1900, carriage travel became a nostalgic relic of the past.

But carriage travel still lives on in our Regency romances, whether for a leisurely turn in Hyde Park or a mad dash to Gretna Green. We can still enjoy it vicariously.

What do you think Regency people thought of the first railways?
What do you find most romantic about carriage travel?

RITA Spotlight on Cheryl St. John

Congratulations to Cheryl St. John, RITA finalist in the novella category for “Mountain Rose” in the TO BE A MOTHER release from Love Inspired Historical. Cheryl also writes for Harlequin Historical and I’m featuring her on my Facebook page today. Come by www.facebook.com/BlytheGifford to read a special note from Cheryl and to learn how to win one of her upcoming books from Harlequin Historical or Love Inspired Historical: Marrying the Preacher's Daughter, Love Inspired Historical 6/11Her Wyoming Man, Harlequin Historical 7/11. She's giving one of each via my website, www.blythegifford.com.