Annotation:Lady Flora Charlotte Hastings
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LADY FLORA CHARLOTTE HASTINGS. Scottish, Strathspey. B Flat Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AB. Composed by Nathaniel Gow (1763-1831), named for Flora Mure-Campbell (1780-1840), 6th Countess of Louden (for whom see note to "Countess Louden's Reel"). She was the mother of Lady Flora Elizabeth Rawdon-Hastings (1806-1839), who was the center of a sex scandal involving Queen Victoria's mother, the Duchess of Kent. She was accused of having an affair with John Conroy, who may have been the Duchess's lover. When her abdomen started to swell in January, 1839, it was convincing proof of her infidelity. Unfortunately, it was not a pregnancy, but liver cancer, to which Flora succumbed in July of that year.
Source for notated version:
Printed sources: Carlin (The Gow Collection), 1986; No. 94. Gow (Fifth Collection of Strathspey Reels), 1809; p. 35.
Recorded sources:
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