Holland House in Kensington—a London suburb—was a fine Jacobean mansion built in 1606. It had long political and literary associations—Addison married the widow of the third Earl Holland and wrote many of his Spectator essays there. In 1774 it passed to Henry Richard Vassall Fox, third Baron Holland (1773-1840), a close friend and associate of the Whig party leader Charles Grey, and nephew of the radical Whig Charles James Fox whose libertarian philosophy he made it his life work to further. Because his wife Elizabeth, Lady Holland, had divorced her first husband, Sir Godfrey Webster, to marry Holland in 1797, she was ostracised by the Queen and not considered fit company for respectable women. She therefore ensured the …
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Citation: Editors, Litencyc. "Holland House". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 22 December 2007 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/stopics.php?rec=true&UID=4295, accessed 23 November 2024.]