lady of the bedchamber

The 90-year-old had been the reigning monarch’s Lady of the Bedchamber since 1987 and traveled alongside her on the way to the Diamond Jubilee in 2012 after Prince Philip was hospitalized.

But this lady, who was a Catholic and who, as lady of the bedchamber to the consort of James, was supposed to have exercised a baleful religious influence over her mistress, discreetly refused the offered dignity, which was passed on to the Countess of Dorset, whose husband was to fill the complementary position of governor to the royal child.

She confessed, however, that she should like to have a lady of the bedchamber to whom she could talk in her own language and who could come to church with her, "for the Countess of Buckingham and Madame Savage are often away, and the rest of my ladies are Protestants," she said.

Like a Moorish slave in a harem, the gay young French girl was shut up alone with her Lady of the Bedchamber and was permitted to see no one except the King.

Lady Northumberland was a lady of the bedchamber to the queen soon after her marriage, an appointment maliciously described by Lady Townshend as due to the fact that the queen, who was ignorant of the English language, was anxious to learn the vulgar tongue, Lady Northumberland, she declared, being the most suitable person in the circumstances.