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​FENTON, LAVINIA, afterwards Duchess of Bolton (1708–1760), actress, was born in 1708. Her reputed father, a lieutenant in the navy named Beswick, on being summoned to duty before the birth of his child, departed with a request that in the event of the unborn proving to be a girl the name of Lavinia should be bestowed upon her.

Not long after her birth her mother married one Fenton in the Old Bailey, and soon afterwards set up a coffee-house in the neighbourhood of Charing Cross. The child was then called by the surname of her mother's husband, and ‘being,’ we are told, ‘of a vivacious, lively spirit, and a promising beauty,’ she was much petted by the fine gentlemen frequenting the coffee-house.

The charm of her voice, and the extraordinary correctness of her ear for music, brought her into notice. She caught at once the tunes which the ‘humming beaux’ (so the musical gentlemen were called) brought from the thea