Last Years

Abstract

In 1724, the year after his son’s death, Collins married again. His second wife, who was to show herself a woman of individuality and determination, was the daughter of Sir Walter Wrottesley, a Staffordshire baronet, and the sister of Hugh Wrottesley, a friend of Collins and Desmaizeaux. It was to Hugh Wrottesley that Desmaizeaux had dedicated his Collection of Several Pieces of Mr. John Locke,¹ in 1720, and his name recurs in Collins’ letters. It would seem that Collins had deliberately refrained from marrying again while his son was alive. This, at least, is the statement in the anonymous biography.² It is true that in the brief biographical notes, in the Desmaizeaux collection, in the latter’s hand, there occurs the cryptic entry, “He courts Mrs. Pool etc.,”³ under the year 1713, but the time of the marriage, coming as it does only after his son’s death, seems significant. Perhaps he felt the need for companionship after that tragic loss. Though the new Mrs. Collins was to send her good wishes to Desmaizeaux, and though he was to visit Great Baddow again,⁴ his relations with Elizabeth Collins were not to be entirely happy.