Portsmouth, Louise Renée de Kéroualle, duchess of

Portsmouth, Louise Renée de Kéroualle, duchess of (lwēz rənā` də kāräl`), 1649–1734, French mistress of Charles II of England. She exerted a powerful influence over the king in favor of France—and to her own advantage—from 1671 until his death in 1685. She was made duchess of Portsmouth in 1673 and was the mother by the king of Charles Lennox, duke of Richmond. Hated by many English as a French-Catholic menace, she lived mostly in France after 1685.

Bibliography

See J. Delpech, The Life and Times of the Duchess of Portsmouth (tr. by A. Lindsay, 1953).