Sarah Cowper

[3] However, the couple were extremely unhappy, with Sarah commenting on their complete emotional incompatibility by saying "Never met two more Averse than we in Humour, Passions, and Affections; our Reason and Sense Religion or Morals agree not".

[4] Her husband's income was inadequate for his rank, and so the couple maintained only modest rented homes in London, with a county seat of Hertford Castle, which at that time was small and run-down.

It was in large part the response to the trial, combined with her dissatisfaction at her domestic conditions, that Sarah would begin writing he diary the following year.

For those 16 years it covered, in detail, all portions of her life, including her feelings about her family, the politics of the time and current gossip, all presented from within her sternly moralistic framework.

She died on 3 February 1720 and was buried St Mary's Church, Hertingfordbury, Hertfordshire, where a monument was erected praising her "industry, virtue, wisdom, and piety".