Book description
When Mary Eleanor Bowes, the Countess of Strathmore, was abducted in
Oxford Street in broad daylight in 1786, the whole country was riveted
to news of the pursuit. The only daughter of a wealthy coal magnate,
Mary Eleanor had led a charmed youth. Precocious and intelligent, she
enjoyed a level of education usually reserved for the sons of the
aristocracy. Mary was only eleven when her beloved father died, making
her the richest heiress in Britain, and she was soon beset by eager
suitors. Her marriage, at eighteen, to the beautiful but aloof Earl of
Strathmore, was one of the society weddings of the year. With the death
of the earl some eight years later, Mary re-entered society with relish
and her salons became magnets for leading Enlightenment thinkers - as
well as a host of new suitors. Mary soon fell under the spell of a
handsome Irish soldier, Andrew Robinson Stoney, but scandalous rumours
were quick to spread. Swearing to defend her honour, Mary's gallant hero
was mortally wounded in a duel - his dying wish that he might marry
Mary. Within hours of the ceremony, he seemed to be in the grip of a
miraculous recovery. Wedlock tells the story of one eighteenth-century
woman's experience of a brutal marriage, and her fight to regain her
liberty and justice. Subjected to appalling violence, deception, kidnap
and betrayal, the life of Mary Eleanor Bowes is a remarkable tale of
triumph in the face of overwhelming odds. Wendy Moore is a writer and
journalist. Her work has been published in a range of newspapers and
magazines, including the Times and the Sunday Telegraph and has won
several awards. Her first book, The Knife Man, was published to great
critical acclaim. She lives in South London with her husband Peter, also
a journalist, and two children, Sam and Susannah.
