MARY FITTON
Art Neuendorffer
Encyclopedia.http://62.1911encyclopedia.org/F/FI/FITTON_MARY.htm
FITTON, MARY (c. 1578-1647), identified by some writers with the dark lady
of Shakespeares sonnets, was the daughter of Sir Edward Fitton of Gawsworth,
Cheshire, and was baptized on the 24th of June 1578. Her elder sister, Anne,
married John Newdigate in 1587, in her fourteenth year. About 1595 Mary
Fitton became maid of honor to Queen Elizabeth. Her father recommended her
to the care of Sir William Knollys, comptroller of the queens household, who
promised to defend tile innocent lamb from the wolfish cruelty and fox-like
subtlety of the tame beasts of this place. Sir William was fifty and already
married, but he soon became suitor to Mary Fitton, in hope of the speedy
death of the actual Lady Knollys, and appears to have received considerable
encouragement. There is no hint in her authenticated biography that she was
acquainted with Shakespeare. William Kemp, who was a clown in Shakespeares
company, dedicated his Nine Daies Wonder to Mistress Anne (perhaps an error
for Mary) Fitton, Maid of Honor to Elizabeth; and there is a sonnet
addressed to her in an anonymous volume, A Womans Woorth defended against
all the Men in the World (599). In 16oo Mary Fitton led a dance in court
festivities at which William Herbert, later earl of Pembroke, is known to
have been present; and shortly afterwards she became his mistress. In
February 16oI Pembroke was sent to the Fleet in connection with this affair,
but Mary Fitton, whose child died soon after its birth, appears to have
simply been dismissed from court. Mary Fitton seems to have gone to her
sister, Lady Newdigate, at Arbury. A second scandal has been fixed on Mary
Fitton by George Ormerod, author of History of Cheshire, in a MS. quoted by
Mr. T. Tyler (Academy, 27th Sept. 1884). Ormerod asserted, on the strength
of the MSS. of Sir Peter Leycester, that she had two illegitimate daughters
by Sir Richard Leveson, the friend and correspondent of her sister Anne. He
also gives the name of her first husband as Captain Logher, and her second
as Captain Polwhele, by whom she had a son and daughter. Polwhele died in
1609 or 161o, about three years after his marriage. But Ormerod was mistaken
in the order of Mary Fittons husbands, for her second husband, Logher, died
in 1636. Her own will, which was proved in 1647, gives her name as Mary
Lougher. In Gawsworth church there is a painted monument of the Fittons, in
which Anne and Mary are represented kneeling behind their mother. It is
stated that from what remains of the coloring Mary was a dark woman, which
is of course essential to her identification with the lady of the sonnets,
but in the portraits at Arbury described by Lady Newdigate-Newdegate in her
Gossip from a Mvniment Room (1897) she has brown hair and grey eyes.
The identity of the Arbury portrait with Mary Fitton was challenged by Mr
Tyler and by Dr Furnivall. For an answer to their remarks see an appendix by
C. G. 0. Bridgeman in the 2nd edition of Lady Newdigate-Newdegates book.
The suggestion that Mary Fitton should be regarded as the false mistress of
Shakespeares sonnets rests on a very thin chain of reasoning, and by no
means follows on the acceptance of the theory that William Herbert was the
addressee of the sonnets, though it of course fails with the rejection of
that supposition. Mr William Archer (Fortnightly Review, December 1897)
found some support for Mary Fittons identification with the dark lady in the
fact that Sir William Knollys was also her suitor, thus numbering three
Wills among her admirers. This supplies a definite interpretation, whether
right or wrong, to the initial lines of Sonnet 135 : Whoever hath her wish,
thou hast thy Will, And Will to boot, and Will in overplus.
Arguments in favor of her adoption into the Shakespeare circle will be found
in Mr Thomas Tylers Shakespeares Sonnets (1890, pp. 73-92), and in the same
writers Herbert-Fitton Theory of Shakespeares Sonnets (1898).