Thomas Longueville

The Curious Case of Lady Purbeck (Esprios Classics) Thomas Longueville

Frances Coke, Viscountess Purbeck (1602 - 1645) was the central figure in a notable sex scandal within the English aristocracy of the early 17th century that was known at the time as "the Lady Purbeck's business". The first biography of Lady Purbeck was published by an Edwardian gentleman-scholar, Thomas Longueville, in 1909. However, it omits important facts since Longueville was unaware of legal documents in the Public Record Office discovered later by the author Laura Norsworthy and published in her biography of Frances' mother Lady Hatton, The Lady of Bleeding Heart Yard (1935). The well-known British author Antonia Fraser devotes part of a chapter of her The Weaker Vessel (1984) to a modern summary of Frances' life.