Mary Monck

Mary Monck (née Molesworth; 1677? – 1715) was a celebrated beauty and poet.^[1]

Title page of first volume of Poems by Eminent Ladies 2 Vols. (London: R. Baldwin, 1755)

Life

She was the second daughter of Robert Molesworth, 1st Viscount Molesworth, and Letitia Coote, third daughter of Richard, Lord Coloony, and sister of Richard, Earl of Bellamont.

She became the first wife of George Monck of St Stephen's Green, Dublin, and died at Bath in 1715.^[2][3] They had two daughters (the eldest, Sarah Monck, died in 1739) and one son, Henry Stanley Monck of St Stephen's Green, who died in 1745.

Works

By her own application she acquired a knowledge of the Latin, Italian, and Spanish languages, and read much English literature. Some poems by her appeared shortly after her death under the title of Marinda. Poems and Translations upon several occasions, London, 1716, 8vo.

On her deathbed she wrote some very affecting verses to her husband, which are not included in her works, but which were printed in George Colman and Bonnell Thornton's anthology Poems by Eminent Ladies.^[2][3]

References

1. Webb, Alfred (1878). "Mary Monck". A Compendium of Irish Biograph: Comprising Sketches of Distinguished Irishmen, Eminent Persons Connected with Ireland by Office or by Their Writings. Dublin: M.H. Gill & Son. Digital version at Library Ireland.
2. Cooper 1894.
3. Monk [sic], Mary (1755). "Poems by the Hon. Mrs. Monk". In Colman, George; Thornton, Bonnell (eds.). Poems by Eminent Ladies: Particularly: Mrs. Barber, Mrs. Behn, Miss Carter, Lady Chudleigh, Mrs. Cockburn, Mrs. Grierson, Mrs. Jones etc. R. Baldwin. pp. 187–196. Retrieved 6 August 2013.

External links

• Mary Monck at the Eighteenth-Century Poetry Archive (ECPA)

Attribution

 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Cooper, Thompson (1894). "Monck, Mary". In Lee, Sidney (ed.). Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 38. London: Smith, Elder & Co.