The Legend of Lady Katherine Ferrers

In accordance with popular legend, often spouted together with the various hauntings by her ghost, Lady Katherine became a highway robber during her husband’s absence as a way of redressing her fast-dwindling fortune.

At this time, very many highwaymen were in fact Royalist supporters that were bereft of their homes, estates, or their income, and were thus left to make some form of income the best way they knew how.

Not every highwayman was born into high society such as Claude Duval, the French aristocrat, or James MacLaine, the son of a minister. Nevertheless, it was frequently a romanticized portrayal that even extended to the working classes like those such as MacLaine’s partner William Plunkett.

Lady Katherine’s early death is surrounded by unknown circumstances, which in turn, has led to plenty of speculative comment. The most persistent of rumors is that she was shot while carrying out a robbery on Nomansland Common at Wheathampstead, Hertfordshire, and latterly died of her wounds on her journey back to her family home of Markyate Cell.

Supposedly, her body was then discovered wearing male apparel, including a face mask and a long, black cape, which was commonplace wear for highwaymen in England.

Besides the varying accounts pertaining to highway robbery of the time, there was also a catalogue of mayhem within the vicinity which was attributed to Katherine and included such acts as slaughtering livestock, burning houses, and also the slaying of a police constable.

 

Katherine’s Origins

Katherine Ferrers, born May 4, 1634, was already heir to a considerable fortune. She was brought up at Bayford in Hertfordshire, and her family came into great fortune given that they were favored by both Henry VIII and Edward VI, Edward having granted the family with extensive properties in the area, including Bayford, Angells, Ponsbourne, Flasmstead, and Marykate Cell.

Katherine’s brother was in fact heir to the family fortune. However, he died at a tender age, and thus, through court decree, Katherine was then appointed the sole heir to all of her grandfather’s estates on his demise in 1640.

 

Literature and Film

In 1944, a novel which was authored by Magdalen King-Hall, and entitled The Life and Death of the Wicked Lady Skelton, was published, and was said to have been loosely based on the life of Katherine.

A film version of the novel was released a year later, which starred Margaret Lockwood as Katherine Ferrers and James Mason as Jerry Jackson. The film went on to break every British box office record of the time.

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