Lady Katherine, née Wotton, was a staunch Royalist and was rewarded when the Stuarts returned to power. According to Lady Katherine's Wikipedia article, "...After the death of Heenvliet (her second of three husbands - gogm) in 1660, Charles II created her Countess of Chesterfield in recognition of both her service and her friendship. She remained in princess Mary's service until the latter's death in illness on 24 December 1660. She then passed into service to Anne, Duchess of York, and in 1662 to the Queen, Catherine of Braganza.
That same year, Lady Catherine married her friend Daniel O'Neill, another one of the King's men during the civil war. Upon his death in 1664, she increased her by then already considerable wealth by inheriting O'Neill's office of the Postmaster General. She died of an edema in 1667, and was buried on the estate of her father." According to the Wikipedia article for her first husband, Henry Stanhope, she had three children who survived infancy and a fourth child who did not. She had no other children.
Lucy Davies became Lucy Hastings at the age of 10 according to her Wikipedia article. "...Though her husband, then the 6th Earl of Huntingdon, was outwardly neutral during the English Civil War, other members of the family, including his brother Henry Hastings, were ardent Royalists...
Lucy Hastings bore her husband four sons, though three predeceased their father; when the family's heir (another Henry Hastings) died of smallpox in June 1649, his passing inspired a collection of elegies titled Lachrymae Musarum ("Tears of the Muses"), edited by Richard Brome and containing verses by John Dryden, Andrew Marvell, Robert Herrick, and others. When the sixth Earl died on 13 February 1656, he was succeeded by Theophilus Hastings, the couple's fourth and sole surviving son.
Lucy Hastings' poems were not published in her lifetime, as was usually the case for women who wrote in this historical era. Her work has gained more critical attention in the general rediscovery of women writers of previous centuries in the contemporary era."
From Google Art Project via Wikimedia.
Katherine Stanhope's neckline is potentially revealing with the high point in the middle with downward sloping wings. Lady Lucy's dress is more interesting with a capelet and lace cuffs.
Keywords: 1638, van Dyck, Katherine Stanhope, Countess of Chesterfield, Lucy Hastings, Countess of Huntingdon, Davies family, Hastings family, Wotton family, Stanhope family, Stuart family, Lady-in-Waiting, Princess Royal Mary Stuart, Anne Hyde, Catherine of Bragança, hurluberlu coiffure, proto-hurluberlu coiffure, jeweled headdress, bun, chemise, trapezoidal neckline, modesty piece, over-dress, capelet, elbow length puffed sleeves, bodice, cuffs, lace, girdle, shallow-vee waistline, full skirt, necklace, brooch, clasps, wrap