Portrait of Harriet Mellon by William Beechey, 1817-1818

Harriet Mellon (11 November 1777 – 6 August 1837) was the daughter of strolling players and became an actress, eventually starring at Drury Lane. When she was younger and appearing at the Duke Street Theatre she attracted the attention of the elderly but very wealthy banker, Thomas Coutts of Coutts & Co, the royal bank. She became his mistress until his first wife died ten years later, after which she became his second wife. She was widely celebrated for her beauty, and was painted by George Romney.

In 1822, after Thomas's death, Harriet became very wealthy and purchased the lease on a country property four miles away at the Holly Lodge in Highgate, holding parties there and at her town house at 131 Kings Road on the corner of Regency Square. In 1827 she married William Beauclerk, 9th Duke of St Albans, who was twenty-three years her junior.

On her death in 1837 her property and fortune went to Coutts's granddaughter Angela Burdett-Coutts, 1st Baroness Burdett-Coutts.

[edit] References

• Old and New London Illustrated: A Narrative of its History, its People and its Places. Illustrated with numerous engravings from the most Authentic Sources. (6 vols) sub vol. 3&4 combined: Westminster and the Westminster Suburbs. 1881. pp. pp. 278–281. 
• Healey, Edna. Coutts & Co 1692–1992: The Portrait of a Private Bank. ISBN 0340558261.