Life
1727-1797 [Mrs Leeson]; 18th century Dublin brothel keeper; first established
in Drogheda St., a premises wrecked by Pinkindindies; compensated by £500
for loss of marriage to son of Earl of Avedon; re-eastablished at Pitt.
St., on site of present Westbury Hotel; attended Theatre Royal with her
girls; portrait painted as Diana; moved to refused service to Westmoreland
for ill-treating his second wife; retired with worthless IOU’s from
the nobility; attempted suicide in debtor’s prison; and published her
The Memoirs of Mrs Leeson from debtors’ prison; two volumes
appeared to the embarrassment of many; a third, and the first naming names,
remained in manuscript when she was attacked by footpads, and raped; died
of VD purportedly in consequence; wrote ‘Memoirs’, rep. 1995.
[No DNB entry.]
Criticism
CRIT, Mary Lyons, ed., The Memoirs of Mrs Leeson, Madam [in 3 vols.]
(Lilliput UP 1995), 280[196]pp.
Notes
NOTE, Mary Lyons, who has broadcast the story of Mrs Leeson with others
of that period on Radio Eireann, is a fnd.-mbr. of the Rare Books Group;
worked in the British Library as antiquarian cataloguer and bibliographer.
NOTE, William Carleton read Mrs. Leeson, the infamous Peg Plunket, while
staying in Francis St., where he wondered at the morality of his landlady
and how such an immoral library could exist. (See Benedict Kiely, Poor
Scholar, 1947; 1972 edn., p.54.)
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Princess Grace Irish Library (Monaco)