Lady Salisbury

Born in Dublin in 1750, Mary Amelia Cecil (otherwise known as Emily Mary Cecil) was a political hostess and sportswoman. Her father was the 2nd Viscount Hillsborough and later the first Marquess of Downshire, so his daughter was at the heart of eighteenth-century politics through her parents’ connections. She was a lifelong supporter of the monarchy and the king’s ministers, particularly under William Pitt the younger. Emily married James Cecil, Viscount Cranbourne, in 1773 and became a prominent political hostess of the Tory Party. Unusually for a woman at the time, she took part in fox hunting and became the first woman to serve as Master of Foxhounds. She died in 1835 aged 85.