Journal of My Life During The French Revolution by Grace Dalrymple Elliott

Convinced of his wife's infidelity, John Eliot had the couple followed and eventually sued Valentia for criminal conversation (adultery). In 1774 Elliott met and fell in love with Lord Valentia, with whom she entered into an affair. The couple entered fashionable society, but eventually grew apart due to their difference in age and interests. They were married on 19 October 1771 in London, when she was 17. She accepted, although Eliot was about 18 years her senior. Her beauty made such an impression on John Eliot, a prominent and wealthy physician, that he made her an offer of marriage in 1771. She was educated in a French convent, and on her return to Scotland, was introduced by her father into Edinburgh society. Her parents separated around the time of her birth, and she was most likely brought up at her grandparents' house. She was arrested several times but managed to avoid the guillotine, and was released after the death of Robespierre.Įlliott was born probably in Edinburgh about 1754, the youngest daughter of Grissel Brown (died 30 September 1767) and Hew Dalrymple (died 1774), an Edinburgh advocate concerned in the great Douglas case. Elliott trafficked correspondence and hid French aristocrats escaping from the French Revolution. She was mistress to the Duke of Orléans and to the future George IV, by whom she is said to have borne an illegitimate daughter.

She was an eyewitness to events detailed in her memoirs, Journal of my life during the French Revolution (Ma Vie sous la Révolution) published posthumously in 1859.

1754 – ) was a Scottish courtesan, writer and spy resident in Paris during the French Revolution. Journal of my life during the French Revolution Mistress of the Louis Philippe II, Duke of Orléans

Journal of My Life During The French Revolution by Grace Dalrymple Elliott