Wellesley, Elizabeth , Duchess of Wellington (1820 -1904)

Lady Elizabeth Hay was the daughter of George Hay, 8th Marquess of Tweeddale, and Lady Susan Montagu, daughter of William Montagu, 5th Duke of Manchester. On 18 April 1839 she was married to Arthur Wellesley, Lord Douro, eldest son of the famous general and former Tory Prime Minister, the 1st Duke of Wellington. Lord Douro succeeded his father as second Duke of Wellington in 1852. The Duchess of Wellington was appointed Mistress of the Robes to Queen Victoria in 1861 by the Liberal Prime Minister Lord Palmerston, and continued in that role until 1868, serving through the governments of Lord Russell, Lord Derby and Benjamin Disraeli. She was again Mistress of the Robes in Disraeli's second government, 1874 to 1880. Her husband died on 13 August 1884, and the Dowager Duchess survived him for exactly twenty years to the day, dying at Burhill Park, Walton-on-Thames on 13 August 1904; she is buried at the family home of Stratford Saye in Hampshire. They had no children, and the marriage, which had been arranged by their respective families, was not a happy one.