Anne Wharton

Anne Wharton (née Lee, 20 July 1659 - 29 October 1685) was an English poet and verse dramatist. Little of her work was published in her lifetime, but some 45 pieces have been ascribed to her. Life Anne Lee was born 20 July 1659 at Ditchley Park, Oxfordshire, the posthumous younger daughter of Sir Henry Lee, and a member of a wealthy family. Her mother Anne Danvers, daughter of Sir John Danvers, died not long after her birth. She and her sister Eleanor were brought up at Adderbury House, where they lived with the mistress, mother and grandmother of its owner, the poet and libertine John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester, who was Anne Wharton's uncle. On 16 September 1673 she married Thomas Wharton (1648–1715). She paid visits to Paris for her health in 1678 and 1680, as she suffered from eye troubles and convulsions, possibly linked to syphilis. Her husband soon neglected her and they had no children. Death Anne Wharton died on 29 October 1685 at Adderbury, Oxfordshire. Her death, in her sister Eleanor's house, was very painful. The poet Robert Gould in an eclogue to the memory of Eleanor, who died in 1691, observes that her own was a peaceful one by comparison: "Think how her sister, dear 'Urania' [i. e. Anne], fell, When ev'ry Arte'ry, Fibre, Nerve and Vein Were by Convulsions torn, and fill'd with Pain..."