Charlotte Clayton, Baroness Sundon

Charlotte Clayton, Baroness Sundon (11 December c. 1679 – 1 January 1742) was a British Lady in Waiting. She is known as the influential favourite of queen regent Caroline. She concerned Robert Walpole who suspected that she was selling her influence.

Charlotte Clayton, Baroness Sundon
Portrait by Godfrey Kneller, c. 1730s
Born
Charlotte Dyve

11 December c.1679
Died1 January 1742
Cleveland Row, London
NationalityBritish
OccupationCourtier
SpouseWilliam Clayton, 1st Baron Sundon

Life

Dyve was the daughter of John Dyve, clerk of the Privy Council and Frances Wolseley, and granddaughter of Sir Lewis Dyve of Bromham in Bedfordshire.[1] She married William Clayton, a Treasury official,[2] at some date before August 1714. Her husband was an MP who was also employed to look after the interests of the Lord of Marlborough. In 1735 she became Lady Sundon when her husband was made first Baron Sundon of Ardagh.[3] They had no children.

The Duchess of Marlborough is thought to have interceded so that Charlotte Clayton became a woman of the bedchamber to Queen Caroline from 1714 until 1737. She became very close to the Queen, who served as regent during the king's absence. She was mistrusted by Robert Walpole who accused her of taking a bribe of a pair of earrings to help the husband of Henrietta Fermor, Countess of Pomfret.[4] He suspected that it was her opinions that were making the Queen uncooperative in state affairs. It was alleged that she even proposed that she and Walpole could rule the country. The Queen's death was a great blow to her, and in her last years, she was afflicted with a painful tumour as well as (according to gossip) bouts of insanity.[3]

She died on the first day of 1742 at her home in Cleveland Row, St James's. She was buried at Sundon Hall.[3]

References
  1. Aitken, George Atherton (1898). "Sundon, Charlotte Clayton" . In Lee, Sidney (ed.). Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 55. London: Smith, Elder & Co.
  2. Sedgwick, Romney (1970). "Clayton, William (1671-1752)". In Sedgwick, Romney (ed.). The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1715-1754. London: HMSO. ISBN 9780118800983.
  3. Carter, Philip. "Clayton , Charlotte, Lady Sundon (c.1679–1742)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/5568. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  4. Carter, Philip (23 September 2004). "Clayton [née Dyve], Charlotte, Lady Sundon (c. 1679–1742), courtier". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 1 (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/5568. ISBN 978-0-19-861412-8. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
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