Kitty Fisher - Life As A Courtesan

Life As A Courtesan

Born Catherine Marie Fischer, she was originally a milliner, whom Lieutenant-General (then Ensign) Anthony George Martin (d. 1800) reportedly introduced to London high life. With a flair for publicity, she became known for her affairs with men of wealth. Her appearance and dress were scrutinized and copied, scurrilous broadsheets and satires upon her were printed and circulated, and her portrait by Reynolds as Cleopatra Dissolving the Pearl was engraved.

When he visited London in 1763, Giacomo Casanova met Fisher and wrote:

... the illustrious Kitty Fisher, who was just beginning to be fashionable. She was magnificently dressed, and it is no exaggeration to say that she had on diamonds worth five hundred thousand francs. Goudar told me that if I liked I might have her then and there for ten guineas. I did not care to do so, however, for, though charming, she could only speak English, and I liked to have all my senses, including that of hearing, gratified. When she had gone, Mrs Wells told us that Kitty had eaten a bank-note for a thousand guineas, on a slice of bread and butter, that very day. The note was a present from Sir Akins, brother of the fair Mrs Pitt. I do not know whether the bank thanked Kitty for the present she had made it.

Kitty maintained a famous rivalry with Maria Gunning, who became Lady Coventry, due to Kitty's affair with Gunning's husband, George William Coventry, 6th Earl of Coventry.

Giustiniana Wynne, visiting London at the time, wrote:

"The other day they ran into each other in the park and Lady Coventry asked Kitty the name of the dressmaker who had made her dress. Kitty Fisher answered she had better ask Lord Coventry as he had given her the dress as a gift." The altercation continued with Lady Coventry calling her an impertinent woman, and Kitty replying that she would have to accept this insult because Maria became her 'social superior' on marrying Lord Coventry, but she was going to marry a Lord herself just to be able to answer back.

Giustiniana also wrote that

"She lives in the greatest possible splendor, spends twelve thousand pounds a year, and she is the first of her social class to employ liveried servants - she even has liveried chaise porters."