(1752 - 1824), s. and h. of Sir William Maynard of Walthamstow, Essex; educ. Eton and Sidney Sussex Camb. 1770; suc. fa. 1772 as 5th Bt.; suc. cos. 1775 as 2nd Vct. Maynard; m. 1776 Anne ('Nancy') Parsons (c.1735 - c.1814).
1777 - 80 Rome, Naples (by mid-Dec. 1777 - Mar. 1778), Rome (Apr.), Florence (Nov.), Rome (Nov. 1778), Naples (5 Jan. 1779 - Jan. 1780), Florence (Apr.), Rome (by 29 Apr.)
1793 Turin (Sep.) [Lady Maynard]
1796 Milan (Mar.) [Lady Maynard]
Lord Maynard and his wife, the beautiful and notorious Nancy Parsons who had been mistress to the Dukes of Grafton and Dorset, had arrived in Naples from Rome by mid-December 1777,1 to the acute embarrasment of Anglo-Neapolitan society. He was twenty-six, she was past forty. Lady Maynard had already been in Naples in 1770 with the 3rd Duke of Dorset, and Lady Hamilton now refused to receive or present her, so that, as Mrs Frederick Hervey explained, Lady Maynard 'having faite la malade till she was tir'd, is crept out in humble style to Lord Tylney's where she distresses all the English that meet her', adding that while she had 'secur'd a resource for her old age' she had been 'better off as she was. A Mrs Parsons was ye delight of ye society she lived in, whilst that coveted by Lady Maynard flies from her'.2 Though Lord Maynard was himself presented, he wanted to fight Sir William Hamilton because of his wife's exclusion from court,3 and when Maynard approached the King informally (in the tennis court) on the question, he was 'refused plump'.4
In April 1778 Lord and Lady Maynard were in Rome;5 early in November they were in Florence and later that month they were expected in Rome.6 Lady Maynard was very fond of Thomas Banks's small daughter, Lavinia, whom she used to take out in her coach.7 In January 1779 they were again in Naples,8 where this time Lady Maynard enjoyed some popularity as the result of her husband having cured the young Prince of Marino with James's Powders; she also shared the friendship of Lady Santo Marco with the Queen.9 In January 1779 there had also been a rumour Lord Maynard had shot himself,10 but the Maynards remained in Naples. Lord Herbert (later 11th Earl of Pembroke) visited them there in September,11 and they were still there in January 1780. By 29 April 1780 they had come to Rome from Florence.(12)
Ten years later in 1789 Lady Maynard took a house at Nice for nine years.(13) In September 1793 Lord Boringdon saw her in Turin and remarked that she had 'made herself perfectly mistress of all the passes of the Alps'.14 In 1796 she was in Milan, quarrelling again with the British minister because he had never enquired after her when she was ill, but really, thought Lady Berwick, because he had refused to present her at Court.15
1. Bell, Banks, 22. Morrison, 1:50 (no.76). 2. Childe-Pemberton, 1:183 (3 Feb. 1778). 3. See Fothergill 1969, 164 - 6. Wal.Corr., 43:375. 4. Swinburne, Courts, 1:202. 5. Jones Memoirs, 70. 6. Eg.2641, f.103 (Mann, 17 Nov. 1778). Childe-Pemberton, 1:221. 7. Bell, Banks, 38. 8. SP 93/31 (Hamilton, 5 Jan. 1779). 9. Wal.Corr., 24:451 and n9. Swinburne, Courts, 1:202. 10. Wal.Corr., 24:435. 11. Pembroke Papers, 1:233, 243, 253. 12. Bankes mss (4 Jan., 29 Apr. 1779). 13. Houblon Family, 2:218 - 19. 14. Morley mss. 15. Attingham mss (10 Mar. 1796).