Dido Elizabeth Belle was born into slavery in 1761 in the British West Indies. Her father was Sir John Lindsay, a British career naval officer stationed there. Lindsay took Belle with him when he returned to England in 1765, entrusting her raising to his uncle William Murray, 1st Earl of Mansfield. The Murrays educated Belle, bringing her up as a free gentlewoman at their Kenwood House. In his will of 1793, Lord Mansfield conferred her freedom, making her an heiress.
About Dido Elizabeth Belle in brief
Dido Elizabeth Belle was born into slavery in 1761 in the British West Indies. Her father was Sir John Lindsay, a British career naval officer stationed there. Lindsay took Belle with him when he returned to England in 1765, entrusting her raising to his uncle William Murray, 1st Earl of Mansfield. The Murrays educated Belle, bringing her up as a free gentlewoman at their Kenwood House. In his will of 1793, Lord Mansfield conferred her freedom and provided an outright sum and an annuity to her, making her an heiress. Belle lived there for 30 years, and worked as an amanuensis for the Earl in his later years. As she grew she often assisted by taking dictation of his letters, which showed she had been educated. One of her former friends, former American governor of Massachusetts, Thomas Hutchinson, recalled in his personal diary that she was called ‘neither handsome nor gelente’ Dido was baptised as DidoElizabeth Belle in 1766 at St George’s, Bloomsbury. She was a member of the Lindsay family of Evelix and a descendant of the Clan Murray. Her mother was an enslaved African woman known as Maria Belle, who was held as a slave on a Spanish ship which his forces captured in the Caribbean. Belle was raised as an educated woman along with their niece and Dido’s cousin, Lady Elizabeth Murray, whose mother had died.
It is possible that the Mansfields took Belle in to be Lady Elizabeth’s playmate and, later in life, her personal attendant. Her role within the family suggests that she became more that of a lady’s companion than a lady’s maid, as she was treated like the rest of the family when she was in company with only the family, says Mansfield in his will. She died in 1793 and was buried at Kensington Palace in London, where she was buried alongside her great-niece Lady Elizabeth and her brother, the 1st Baron Mansfield, who had died in 1815. She is buried alongside Lady Elizabeth in the family grave at St James’ Park, London, next to her mother, the Countess of Mansfords, and her father, Sir Alexander Lindsay, 3rd Baronet and his wife Amelia, daughter of David Murray, 5th Viscount Stormont. Dido is buried next to Lady Elizabeth, who is buried in St Paul’s Cathedral, London. Belle is buried with her mother and her sister, Lady Mary Murray, in the grounds of St James’ Park, in front of Lady Elizabeth’ and her husband, the 2nd Baron Mansforsh, and their son-in-law, the 4th Baron Murray.
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This page is based on the article Dido Elizabeth Belle published in Wikipedia (as of Nov. 24, 2020) and was automatically summarized using artificial intelligence.
