Mary Slingsby

Lady Slingsby's name on the Burdett Coutts Memorial, Old St Pancras Churchyard, London (midway, letter Y missing)

Mary Slingsby, Lady Slingsby (née Aldridge) (fl. 1670–1685), d.1693, actress) was an English actress. After a marriage lasting 1670 to 1680 to John Lee, an actor, during which she was on the stage as Mrs. Lee, she was widowed. She then married Sir Charles Slingsby, 2nd Baronet, nephew of Sir Robert Slingsby, and performed as Lady Slingsby. Theatre historians have pointed out the difficulty in identifying her roles in the period when Elinor Leigh, wife of Anthony Leigh, was performing as Mrs. Leigh, because the homophones "Lee" and "Leigh" were not consistently spelled at the time.^[1]

Stage career

In 1671 Mrs. Lee appeared at Lincoln's Inn Fields in the character of Daranthe in Edward Howard's tragi-comedy Woman's Conquest, and as Leticia in Town-Shifts, or the Suburb-Justice, attributed to Edward Revet, and licensed on 2 May 1672. Next, at Dorset Garden, where Mrs. Lee remained for ten years, she played opposite Æmilia in Joseph Arrowsmith's Reformation (1672).^[2][3]

In Henry VI, Part I, with the Murder of Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, adapted by John Crowne from Shakespeare, and acted in 1681, the part of Queen Margaret was assigned to Lady Slingsby. In Henry VI, Part II, or the Misery of Civil War, from the same source, the same character went to Mrs. Lee. As the second part was written first, and probably produced first, Mrs. Lee's marriage may have been in 1681. In Nahum Tate's adaptation of King Lear Lady Slingsby was Regan, in Nat Lee's Lucius Junius Brutus, the Father of his Country, Sempronia, and Marguerite in Lee's Princess of Cleve.^[2]

After the merger of the two major acting companies in 1682, Slingsby played, at the Theatre Royal, the Queen Mother in John Dryden and Nat Lee's Duke of Guise.^[4] In Thomas D'Urfey's Commonwealth of Woman, an adaptation of John Fletcher's The Sea Voyage, produced in 1685, she was Clarinda. Her name then disappeared from the bills.^[2]

Her name appears on the monument erected by Baroness Burdett Coutts in Old St. Pancras Churchyard, listing the names of important graves lost therein. Her date of death is given as 1693. She was buried on 1 March 1693, although there is some doubt as to whether the Mary Slingsby buried is this lady. It has been speculated that the information may have been withheld to prevent her husband's creditors from finding him via his wife.^[5]

In Fiction

Mrs Lee appears as a character in the 2015 play [exit Mrs Behn] or, The Leo Play by Christopher vanDer Ark.

Notes

1. Fisk, Deborah Payne. "Lee, Mary". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/25728. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
2.  Lee, Sidney, ed. (1897). "Slingsby, Mary". Dictionary of National Biography 52. London: Smith, Elder & Co.
3. Mrs. Lee also appeared as Olinda in Afra Behn's Forced Marriage, or the Jealous Bridegroom, Mariamne in Elkanah Settle's Empress of Morocco, and Amavanga in Settle's Conquest of China by the Tartars (1674). In the same year she was Salome in Herod and Mariamne, attributed to Samuel Pordage, but staged by Settle. She was in 1675 Deidamia, queen of Sparta, in Thomas Otway's Alcibiades, and Chlotilda, disguised as Nigrello, in Love and Revenge, a play by Settle, based on the Fatal Contract of William Heming. In Ibrahim, the Illustrious Bassa, taken by Settle from Madeleine de Scudery and licensed on 4 May 1676, she was Roxalana, the wife to Solyman; in Otway's Don Carlos, Prince of Spain, licensed 13 June, she was the Queen of Spain; in D'Urfey's Madame Fickle, or the Witty False One (licensed 20 November), Madame Fickle; and in Pastor Fido, or the Faithful Shepherd, translated from Giovanni Battista Guarini by Settle, she was Corisca. In Otway's Titus and Berenice, licensed 19 February 1677, the part of Berenice was assigned to Mrs. Lee, as were Cleopatra in Charles Sedley's Antony and Cleopatra, licensed 24 April 1677, and Circe in William Davenant's Circe, licensed 18 June. In the Constant Nymph, or the Rambling Shepherd (by a "Person of Quality"), licensed 13 August, she was Astatius, the rambling shepherd. In Pordage's Siege of Babylon, licensed 2 November, she was Roxana, and in Abdelazer, or the Moor's Revenge, adapted by Behn from Lust's Dominion (unjustifiably ascribed to Marlowe), the Queen of Spain. In 1678 Mrs. Lee was Cassandra in John Bankes's Destruction of Troy, licensed 29 January 1679, but played earlier; and Elvira in the Counterfeits (John Leanard), licensed 29 August 1678. Next year she was Eurydice in Dryden and Lee's Œdipus, Laura Lucretia in Behn's Feigned Courtezans, or a Night's Intrigue, and, as Mrs. Mary Lee, Cressida in Dryden's adaptation of Troilus and Cressida; in 1680 she was Bellamira in Lee's Cæsar Borgia, and Arviola in Tate's Loyal General. Mrs. Mary Lee was also Julia in L. Maidwell's Loving Enemies.
4. In 1684 she was, at Dorset Garden, Lady Noble in Edward Ravenscroft's Dame Dobson, or the Cunning Woman, an adaptation of La Devineresse of Thomas Corneille and Jean Donneau de Visé, and at the Theatre Royal, Lucia in the Factious Citizen, or the Melancholy Visioner (Thomas Maddocks). In a revival of Julius Cæsar she was Calphurnia, the only non-original part in which she is mentioned.
5. Deborah Payne Fisk, ‘Lee , Mary [other married name Mary Slingsby, Lady Slingsby] (fl. 1670–1685)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 accessed 17 June 2015

Attribution

 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Lee, Sidney, ed. (1897). "Slingsby, Mary". Dictionary of National Biography 52. London: Smith, Elder & Co.