Note 356 — A BOOK FOR A RAINY DAY (continued 3)

At this time Mrs. Jordan was absent from the stage, in obedience to her lover, the Duke of Clarence, afterwards William IV. By him she had ten children. She had also four children by Sir Richard Ford, and a daughter by her Cork manager, Richard Daly. But, says Leigh Hunt, she “made even Methodists love her.” In 1811 the Duke of Clarence made an arrangement by which she received £4400 a year for the maintenance of herself and all her children, on condition that if she returned to the stage the Duke’s daughters and £1500 a year were to revert to him. All these daughters married well. Mrs. Jordan died embarrassed and unhappy at St. Cloud, a good deal of mystery shrouding her end. Tate Wilkinson tells how she finally exchanged her maiden name of Bland for Jordan. “You have crossed the water, my dear,” he said to her once, “so I’ll call you Jordan.” “And by the memory of Sam! if she didn’t take my joke in earnest, and call herself Mrs. Jordan ever since.”