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The Death of Alexander, A Theatrical Performance at Benham Place at Christmas 1809

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Keppel Craven's diary for December 1809 tells us that he and his friend William Gell were at Benham for Christmas and there was a numerous house-party engaged, as usual, on performing a play. It was The Death of Alexander the Great, or the Rival Queens , by Nathaniel Lee, a Restoration tragedy that had been performed at the Drury Lane Theatre, and had been frequently revived throughout the 18th century. It is a grandiose, bombastic work, full of flights of rhetoric that were tempting to send up. The star, playing the rôle of Alexander, was John Nixon, who had been a friend of the family since 1797, when he had taken part in The Robbers. A gentleman, known as a wit, he was a keen amateur actor and was nicknamed Punch, because of his rather prominent hook nose. The plot features the jealousy of Alexander's first wife Roxana when he marries another one, the Persian princess Statira, for reasons of state. The story is much sentimentalized. The young friends seem to have taken a ...
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Sir George Warren by Sophie de Tott

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A previously uncatalogued painting by Sophie de Tott, close friend and associate of Elizabeth Craven, has come onto the market in London. It is this portrait of Sir George Warren dated 1801.  Sir George Warren, born on 7th February 1735, was the son of Edward Warren and Elizabeth Cholmondeley. He married, firstly, Jane Revel, daughter of Thomas Revel, in May 1758 at Edinburgh, Midlothian, Scotland. He married secondly, Frances Bishopp, daughter of Sir Cecil Bishopp, 6th Bt. and Hon. Anne Boscawen, in 1764. He died on 31st August 1801, aged 66.      He was Member of Parliament for Lancaster between 1758 and 1780 and was appointed a Knight of the Bath in 1761. He became M.P. for Beaumaris between 1780 and 1784; then once again M.P. for Lancaster between 1786 and 1796. He lived at Poynton-Hall, a Jacobean house in Cheshire.    So this portrait was painted not long before his death, and soon after Sophie de Tott had arrived in England as a refugee from Hamburg,...
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Coombe Abbey in the Victorian Period

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In the mid-nineteenth century, Coombe Abbey was owned by the second Earl of Craven, who carried out extensive alterations there. He and his wife also spent a lot of money on improving the gardens, which would have pleased his grandmother, Elizabeth Craven, as she was always a tremendous garden enthusiast. A photograph of Coombe Abbey from the South side taken by Wingrave in 1860, just before the moat was added. The Earl employed William Andrew Nesfield to design and carry out the alterations. A moat was added and a round tower with a turret added to the building, overlooking it. To my mind this has something of the air of a French Gothic château. Some of these alterations were not completed until 1872.  In this period, the gardens of Coombe Abbey were well cultivated and much admired. A detailed description appeared in a periodical of 1864:-  "  Thanks to the refined taste of its proprietor, the gardens of Coombe Abbey are fast rising into notoriet...
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Theophila Berkeley, Lady Coke: a Learned Lady of the Jacobean Court

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    The Berkeley family had a long tradition of producing well-educated women. Theophila Berkeley, daughter of Sir Thomas Berkeley, was one of the earliest we know about. Her mother was Elizabeth Carey, daughter and heiress of Lord Hunsdon, the patron of Shakespeare's theatre company, and Shakespeare wrote A Midsummer Night's Dream to celebrate the Carey-Berkeley wedding in 1595. It is said that Elizabeth Carey, whose godmother was her father's cousin Queen Elizabeth I, was very accomplished and owned "thousands of books". [1]    Theophila, born on December 13th 1596, spent much of her childhood as a companion of James I's daughter Princess Elizabeth at Coombe Abbey (the house that later came into the possession of the Craven family). The royal household must have had the best tutors as Theophila was able to read French, Italian, Latin and Greek.     From a painting by Leonard Knyff (1671) at Berkeley Castle, permission of the Earl of Berkeley. Theophila wa...
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The Berkeleys and the Battle of Nibley Green

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   In 1470, in the middle of the Wars of the Roses, that family squabble that tore England apart in the second half of the fifteenth century, the Berkeley family and a rival clan, the powerful Talbots, headed by the Earl of Warwick, fought their own private civil war.     Like the Wars of the Roses, it was a dispute between cousins over succession and inheritance, and what was at stake was a huge amount of land and power.  The battle painted from imagination by Graham Turner To understand what happened at Nibley Green in 1470 we have to go back two generations, to the time of Thomas de Berkeley, 5th Lord Berkeley (1352/53 –1417), known as the Magnificent. He owned Berkeley Castle and much of the most valuable land in Gloucestershire. In 1367, in the reign of Edward III, Thomas married Margaret de Lisle, 3rd Baroness Lisle suo jure (1360–1392), daughter of Warine de Lisle, 2nd Baron Lisle (d.1382). The couple had no sons, only a daughter and sole heiress: Elizab...
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Annual Newsletter of the Elizabeth Craven Society 2026

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Events.    Benham Park, Elizabeth Craven's former home near Newbury in Berkshire, has been acquired by a company which is advertising it as a venue for weddings and special events. https://benhampark.com/ Publications.     A new edition of Craven's play The Georgian Princess has appeared, but unfortunately the details online, even the Amazon entry, do not seem to name the editor. ISBN: 9791041996261 Page count: 32 Published: April 6, 2024 Format: Paperback Publisher: Culturea Language: English Author: Elizabeth Craven This is the publisher's blurb:- "A tale of intrigue and change unfolds as we delve into the world of "The Georgian Princess" by Elizabeth Craven. Set against the opulent backdrop of 18th-century Europe, this narrative transports readers to a time of political maneuvering and social upheaval. The story centers around a young princess navigating the treacherous waters of court life, where alliances are as fragile as the porcelain teacups from whic...
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Lady Helen Craven, Victorian Novelist

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   The novelist Lady Helen Emily Craven (1874-1926), was a direct descendant of Elizabeth Craven. The daughter of the 3 rd  Earl of Craven, she is usually known by her married name, Forbes, under which her novels were published.   She first ventured into print writing newspaper articles about fashion at the age of sixteen. On 7th October 1890 she advised readers of The Guardian :- "A fine and warm September has delayed considerably the production of autumnal novelties, for in these days of cheap imitation the best milliners and dressmakers jealously withhold their newest inventions till the last possible moment. Despite the rumours that reach us from Paris of a threatened revolution in dress, of stiff Holbein bodices, with padded rolls upon the hips, as yet the simple, graceful gored skirt and Princess polonaise continue to hold their ground. It is in the Tudor times, the long-past days of pearl-broidered kirtles and jewelled stomachers, that we shall find the o...
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