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Anne Fairfax

For other people named Ann or Anne Fairfax, see Anne Fairfax (disambiguation).

Anne, Lady Fairfax
Born1617 or 1618
Died1665
Nun Appleton Hall, near Appleton Roebuck, North Yorkshire, England
SpouseSir Thomas Fairfax

Anne, Lady Fairfax (born Anne Vere, also known as Anne Fairfax; 1617/1618 – 1665) was an English noblewoman. She was the wife of Thomas Fairfax, 3rd Lord Fairfax of Cameron, commander-in-chief of the New Model Army. She followed her husband as he fought and she was briefly taken prisoner. It is said that she was ejected after heckling the court at the trial of Charles I.

Life

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Anne Vere was born in 1617 or 1618 in the Netherlands. Her parents were Mary and Horace Vere, 1st Baron Vere of Tilbury (1565-1635). Her father served as a commander during the Eighty Years' War and the Thirty Years War. In 1637 Anne married Thomas Fairfax, who rose to lead (1645-1650) the New Model Army during the English Civil War. Anne was a woman of influence and she accompanied her husband to battles. Taken prisoner near Bradford by William Cavendish, 1st Duke of Newcastle, she was released a few days later and given an escort back to her husband's army.[1]

Nun Appleton in 1656

Her husband was placed at the head of the judges who were to try Charles I, but convinced that the King's death was intended, he refused to act. Fairfax did not attend the King's trial (January 1649) but Anne did. When the court called the name of Fairfax, it is said that his wife, Anne Fairfax, said "he had more wit than to be there". Later when the court said that they were acting for "all the good people of England", she shouted ‘No, nor the hundredth part of them!". This resulted in an investigation and Anne was asked or required to leave the court.[1][2] It was said that Anne could not forbear, as Bulstrode Whitelocke says, to exclaim aloud against the proceedings of the High Court of Justice.[3] In February 1649 Fairfax was elected Member of Parliament for Cirencester in the Rump Parliament.[4] In January 1649 John Geree asked Anne and her mother to intercede on the King's behalf to prevent his execution.

Anne's daughter Mary was betrothed to Philip Stanhope, 2nd Earl of Chesterfield,[5] but married the royalist George Villiers, 2nd Duke of Buckingham when he returned to England in 1657. Anne and her husband had to negotiate a £20,000 surety to allow the release of Mary's husband, George Villiers, from the Tower of London in 1659 after he was arrested.[1]

Lady Anne Fairfax died in Nun Appleton Hall in 1665.[1] Her husband died there six years later.

Fictional depictions

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In the 2003 film To Kill a King, Anne Fairfax is played by Olivia Williams, and has a role second only to those of her husband, played by Dougray Scott, and Oliver Cromwell, played by Tim Roth.[6]

The Fairfaxes are the main characters in Rosemary Sutcliff's 1959 novel The Rider of the White Horse, and the book views the early stages of the Civil War from Anne Fairfax's point of view. Anne is portrayed as devoted to her husband but unable to secure his undivided attention, partly because of her physical unattractiveness.[7]

References

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  1. ^ a b c d Jacqueline Eales, ‘Fairfax , Anne, Lady Fairfax (1617/18–1665)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 , accessed 10 April 2017
  2. ^ Wedgwood, C.V. The Trial of Charles I (1964)
  3. ^ Chisholm 1911, p. 131.
  4. ^ Helms & Cruickshanks 1983
  5. ^ Bruce Yardley, ‘Villiers, George, second duke of Buckingham (1628–1687)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004; online edn, May 2009, accessed 10 April 2017
  6. ^ "To Kill A King". British Council. Retrieved 22 February 2024.
  7. ^ Andrew Hopper; Philip Major (2016). England's Fortress: New Perspectives on Thomas, 3rd Lord Fairfax. Taylor & Francis. p. 128. ISBN 9781317143291.

Sources

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