Hester Maria Elphinstone, Viscountess Keith

Infobox Person
name = Hester Maria Elphinstone, Viscountess Keith

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image_size =
caption = Hester Maria "Queeney" Thrale (left) aged 15,
with her mother Hester
Painted by Sir Joshua Reynolds (1781)
birth_date = 17 September 1764
birth_place = Southwark, England
death_date = death date and age|1857|3|31|1764|9|17|df=y
death_place = London, England
occupation =
spouse = George Elphinstone, 1st Viscount Keith

Hester Maria Elphinstone, Viscountess Keith born Hester Maria Thrale (17 September 1764 – 31 March 1857) was a British literary correspondent and intellectual. She was the daughter and first-born child of Hester Thrale, diarist, author and confidante of Samuel Johnson, and her husband Henry, a wealthy brewer and patron of the arts. She became the second wife of George Elphinstone, 1st Viscount Keith.

Biography

Johnson gave Hester Maria her lifelong nickname "Queeney" (after Queen Esther) [cite journal |last= Hyde |first=Mary |authorlink= |coauthors= |year=1976 |month=April |title=The Thrales of Streatham Park I: Preface, II "The Family Book" (i) 1764–1772 |journal=Harvard Library Bulletin |volume=XXIV |issue=2 |pages=p. 126 |id= |url= http://pds.lib.harvard.edu/pds/view/2573358?n=11392&s=4 |accessdate=2008-08-28 |quote= ] early in her childhood, and was a regular correspondent of the little girl as well as of her mother. Queeney Thrale was born in Southwark, where her father's brewery was situated, and grew up mainly at the family home, Streatham Park in South London, which was the focus of an important coterie of political, artistic and literary figures known as the Streatham Worthies. She showed early signs of a good memory and sharp intellect, and by age six she was regarded as a greater prodigy than her intelligent and accomplished mother [ [http://pds.lib.harvard.edu/pds/view/2573358?n=11437&s=4 Hyde, April 1976, p. 163] ] . She studied Latin with Dr Johnson, working alongside the novelist Fanny Burney, another family protegée, and also Italian and Hebrew. She was painted by Zoffany [ [http://pds.lib.harvard.edu/pds/view/2573358?n=11425&s=4 Reproduction of Zoffany portrait in Hyde, April 1976] ] at 20 months, and she and her mother were the joint subjects of a portrait by Sir Joshua Reynolds in 1781, as were other members of the Streatham park circle.Queeney's early life and accomplishments were recorded in "The Family Book", one of a collection of her mother's writings, known together as "Thraliana", which Hester Thrale began on her eldest daughter's second birthday [ [http://pds.lib.harvard.edu/pds/view/2573358?n=11411&s=4 Hyde. April 1976. p. 145] ] . A blend of diary, anecdote and personal observation, they are particularly notable for "Anecdotes of Samuel Johnson", the first book-length biography of the author and lexicographer, and a personal account of his final years. "The Family Book" records Queeney's childhood and education, her grasp of languages, astronomy, geography and other subjects, even her liking for the notorious Mad Jack Fullercite book |title=Thraliana: The Diary of Mrs Hester Lynch Thrale (Later Mrs Piozzi) 1776–1809 |last=Thrale |first=Hester Lynch |editor=Katharine C. Balderston |coauthors= | volume=vol. II |year=1951 |publisher=Clarendon Press |location= |isbn= |pages=480 |url= http://johnmadjackfuller.homestead.com/Romance.html ] , whose proposal of marriage was later rejected by her sister Susanna. After her husband's death in 1781 Hester Thrale married her children's Italian music teacher, a Roman Catholic, causing public scandal and a rift with her children, particularly Queeney, who went on to make an independent London life for herself with a respectable widowed friend as chaperone [cite journal |last=Hyde | first=Mary |authorlink= |coauthors= |year=1977 |month=April |title=The Thrales of Streatham Park III: The Death of Thrale and Remarriage of his Widow |journal=Harvard Library Bulletin |volume=XXV |issue=2 |pages=pp. 207–17 |id= |url= http://pds.lib.harvard.edu/pds/view/2573358?n=12025&s=4 |accessdate=2008-08-28 |quote= ] .

On 10 January 1808, aged 44, Queeney Thrale married the widowed Admiral Lord Keith, a distinguished and celebrated senior Naval officer 19 years her senior who had amassed a considerable fortune from prize-money during the Napoleonic wars. They had met in 1791, four years after the death of Lord Keith's first wife, and corresponded for 16 years before their marriage. Lord and Lady Keith were a prominent and well-connected society couple: they had one daughter, the Hon Georgina Augusta, born in December 1809, and the baby's sponsors were the Prince of Wales and the Duke of Clarence, both future kings of the United Kingdom [cite journal |last=Hyde | first=Mary |authorlink= |coauthors= |year=1977 |month=July |title=The Thrales of Streatham Park IV: The Thrale Daughters and Their Children |journal=Harvard Library Bulletin |volume=XXV |issue=3 |pages=p. 334 |id= |url= http://pds.lib.harvard.edu/pds/view/2573358?n=12178&s=4 |accessdate=2008-08-28 |quote= ] .

After Napoleon's final defeat in 1815, Lord Keith retired from the Navy and the family lived mainly on their large estate at Tulliallan, where they had a magnificent castle constructed which is now the Scottish Police College. Left a wealthy widow when their daughter was 13, Lady Keith lived another 34 years, dying in London on 31 March 1857, aged 92. She is buried in the Keith family mausoleum with her husband and daughter.

The "Queeney letters", a large collection of letters addressed to Queeney by Johnson, Fanny Burney and her mother Hester was published in 1934 [cite book |title=The Queeney letters. Being letters addressed to Hester Maria Thrale by Doctor Johnson, Fanny Burney and Mrs. Thrale-Piozzi |last=Petty-Fitzmaurice |first=Henry William Edmund, 6th Marquess of Lansdowne Lynch |coauthors= |volume= |year=1934 |publisher= |location= |isbn= |pages= |url= ] .

In fiction

*Beryl Bainbridge's Booker-longlisted [ [http://www.themanbookerprize.com/prize/books/290 "According to Queeney" at www.themanbookerprize.com] ] novel "According to Queeney" (2001), a fictionalised account of the last days of Dr Johnson, has Hester Maria Thrale as its narrator.
*She also features in Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey-Maturin series of novels as the childhood friend and mathematics tutor of Captain Jack Aubrey; her husband being his mentor in his naval career.

References

External links

* [http://www.thrale.com/history/english/hester_and_henry/children/children_1.php Hester Maria Thrale at Thrale.com]
* [http://pds.lib.harvard.edu/pds/view/8439192 Letter from Hester Maria to Dr Samuel Johnson, July 1783 (Harvard University Library)]