Jameson, Anna: Memoirs of the beauties of the Court of Charles the Second, with their portraits: after Sir Peter Lely and other eminent painters$dillustrating the diaries of Pepys, Evelyn, Clarendon and other contemporary writers (London: Henry G. Bohn, 1861)

THE DUCHESS OF SOMERSET.

“ Chaste was she, to detraction’s desperation,
And wedded unto one she had loved well—
A man known in the councils of the nation,
Cool and quite English—imperturbable,
Though apt to act with fire upon occasion,
Proud of himself and her ;—-the world could tell
Nought against either, and both seemed secure—
She in her virtue, he in his hauteur.”
Loud Byron.

In the reign of Charles the Second; there were three Duchesses
of Somerset: it has therefore been a matter of some difficulty to
appropriate the beautiful picture in the gallery at Windsor to its
true original.
The first of these ladies was Frances; widow of William second
Duke of Somerset; more celebrated by the title of the Marquis of
Hertford—he who eloped with Lady Arabella Stuart in the reign
of James the First. She died; very old, in 1679.
The second was Sarah; wife of John fourth Duke of Somerset;
the daughter of a physician; and the widow of George Grimstone;
Esq. The prints and pictures of this Duchess bear no resemblance
to the picture known at Windsor as the Duchess of Somerset;
neither is she mentioned in the Court Chronicles of the day : her
fame rests upon a far different basis;—that of a foundress of alms-