Georgiana Mc Crae - Early Life and Family Background

Early Life and Family Background

Born in London, she was the illegitimate daughter of George Gordon, 5th Duke of Gordon, and Jane Graham. Her father, although he publicly acknowledged her, played little part in her life as far as can be deduced from Gordon's memoirs. In 1805-07 she spent much of her early childhood in Scotland - her first memories were playing with rocks in Newhaven. She was baptised on 6 October 1806 at St James' Church, Piccadilly, her father standing as one of her godfathers.

By 1809, Gordon and her mother had moved to Somers Town, where she began her education at a convent school. Somers Town was full of French refugees from the revolution some thirty years earlier. She did not study there for long; because those who paid her school fees were worried about Catholic revolutionary influences, she was temporarily sent to Claybrook House in Fulham. She stayed there less than a year, and it was when she was tutored at home that her talent was discovered.

Read more about this topic:  Georgiana Mc Crae

Famous quotes containing the words early, life, family and/or background:

    I have always had something to live besides a personal life. And I suspected very early that to live merely in an experience of, in an expression of, in a positive delight in the human cliches could be no business of mine.
    Margaret Anderson (1886–1973)

    War is more like a novel than it is like real life and that is its eternal fascination. It is a thing based on reality but invented, it is a dream made real, all the things that make a novel but not really life.
    Gertrude Stein (1874–1946)

    The American father ... is never seen in London. He passes his life entirely in Wall Street and communicates with his family once a month by means of a telegram in cipher.
    Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)

    Silence is the universal refuge, the sequel to all dull discourses and all foolish acts, a balm to our every chagrin, as welcome after satiety as after disappointment; that background which the painter may not daub, be he master or bungler, and which, however awkward a figure we may have made in the foreground, remains ever our inviolable asylum, where no indignity can assail, no personality can disturb us.
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)