Frances Maria Kelly

[4] After leaving the Drury Lane Theatre, Kelly opened a dramatic school for training young women using £20,000 of her own money.

[3][7] Kelly received random offers of marriage from George Barnett who was infatuated with her but disapproved of the parts that she was playing.

Barnett bought a ticket to see her appear in Modern Antiques, or the Merry Mourners at Covent Garden on 16 February 1816, where he fired a pistol.

Kelly was unhurt but the bullet fell into the lap of Mary Lamb, a British writer who ironically had committed matricide herself in 1796 while temporarily mentally ill. Barnett was later declared insane when he appeared in court.

Mary's brother, Charles Lamb, a writer and poet who had been there on the night of the shooting,[8] later wrote a sonnet about Kelly[6] and proposed marriage to her.

[8] After many years of working at the Royalty Theatre and Dramatic School as well as continuing to give Shakespearian readings, Kelly fell into debt from legal disputes over the theatre.[which?]