's 1713 portrait, Chandos family, believed to show Cassandra, rather than the Duke's first wife, mother of the two children in the picture. She was the daughter of
Francis Willoughby of
Wollaton,
Nottinghamshire, a Fellow of the
Royal Society and writer on natural history, and his wife Emma, the daughter of Sir Henry Barnard of
Bridgnorth,
Shropshire and London. Her grandaunt, Elizabeth Weston, was the daughter of
Sir Simon Weston, and niece of Chancellor
David Yale. When her 19-year-old brother Francis disagreed with his stepfather's handling of his finances, Cassandra accompanied him in 1687 to the Willoughby family's earlier seat, Wollaton Hall in Nottinghamshire: "This proposall [of her brother's] I was much delighted with, thinking it would be no small pleasure for me to be Mrs of Wollaton, and to doe whatever I had a mind to." She then oversaw restoration of the gardens and rebuilding of the house over a quarter of a century. In 1713, at the age of 43, Cassandra married her rich cousin,
James Brydges FRS, at
Chelsea College Chapel as his second wife. Brydges' social standing rose the following year when he inherited a barony and baronetcy on the death of his father,
8th Baron Chandos of Sudeley. He was soon created
Earl of Carnarvon and then in 1719 became
Duke of Chandos and Cassandra his Duchess. The
National Gallery of Canada has a portrait of Cassandra and her husband by Sir
Godfrey Kneller dated 1713. It also features the two sons of Brydges by his first wife. estate in Middlesex, England, seat of the
Duke of Chandos Cassandra died childless at the age of 65 and was buried in the
Chandos Mausoleum at
St Lawrence's Church, Whitchurch,
Little Stanmore, near the ducal seat of
Cannons. Both the mother and sister of
Jane Austen were named after Cassandra, to mark their link with a ducal family. Jane's mother was the granddaughter of the first Cassandra's sister-in-law, Mary Brydges, being the sister of her husband
James Brydges, 1st Duke of Chandos. Jane Austen was the author of
Pride and Prejudice (1813) and
Mansfield Park (1814). Her mother, Cassandra Austen, née Leigh, was the great-grandniece of the first Duke of Chandos (1673-1744) and Duchess Cassandra Willoughby.
John Willoughby is a character in her book
Sense and Sensibility. Lord Middleton, also a character in Sense and Sensibility, was the name of Cassandra's brother,
Thomas 1st Baron Middleton. The two surnames, being inspired by the Willoughby family. ==Writings==