A story through the diary · The man
Other women
The women he made sexual advances to over nine years, many of them dependent on him for a husband's post, a widow's pay or a place in his house.
318 days across 10 years, 1660–1669 · 23 steps in its story
Across the nine years of the diary Pepys made sexual advances to women other than his wife, and wrote down what he did. Many of them depended on him or on his favour: Betty Lane, who sold bands and cuffs in Westminster Hall and in 1664 married Martin, a man who needed a post (from then on she is Betty Martin; Doll Lane is her sister); Mrs Bagwell, whose husband wanted a better ship; Mrs Burroughs, a widow owed her husband's pay; Mrs Daniel, who asked for her husband's promotion; Betty Michell, whom he had known before her marriage as Betty Howlett of Westminster Hall, whose husband's ticket money he paid and for whose husband he found paid work, and whose mother complained to him of the husband; maids and Elizabeth's companion in his own house. Frances Tooker, a neighbour's daughter at Greenwich who later stayed in his house, he calls a child in October 1665 and almost a woman in March 1666; the diary never gives her age. The actress and singer Elizabeth Knepp, a married woman who wrote to him and told him how her husband treated her, did not depend on him.
He records consent, pressure and force. Mrs Bagwell refused him on 3 November 1664 and again on 19 December; the next day he records force, and after his visit of 20 February 1665 a finger strained from struggling with her. At other times, while her husband's place depended on Pepys, she sought him out (February 1665, October 1666, April 1669). Others refused him too, and he wrote that down: Betty Lane would not consent to sex (September 1663), Jane Welsh would not go out with him (September 1664), and Mary Mercer put his hand away (February 1668). Often he records only what he wanted, not what she felt. He wrote the most private passages in a mix of French, Spanish, Latin and English words (“baiser” is to kiss, “hazer” to do). Wheatley's edition, the text this page uses, cut many of them; the card marks each cut day. Deb Willet has her own thread, and Elizabeth's jealousy is told in hers.
The story in 23 steps
Step 1 · Sunday 12 August 1660
He gives Betty Lane of Westminster Hall a bottle of wine in Sandwich's garden, then takes her to his house and fondles her. He records that she was willing.
I was exceeding free in dallying with her, and she not unfree to take it
12 Aug 1660Step 2 · Friday 7 August 1663
At Deptford the carpenter Bagwell and his wife stop him in the road to ask his help to a better ship. He will only pretend to help; his aim, he writes, is the wife.
which I shall pretend to be willing to do for them, but my mind is to know his wife a little better
7 Aug 1663Step 3 · Thursday 24 September 1663
Telling Elizabeth he is going to Deptford, he takes Betty Lane to Lambeth and does all he wants with her except sex, which she refuses. At home he is ashamed.
there found my poor wife hard at work, which grieved my heart to see that I should abuse so good a wretch
24 Sep 1663Wheatley cut part of this entry.
Step 4 · Monday 15 August 1664
Married now, Betty Lane says her husband “proves not worth a farthing” and she is pregnant. He takes his pleasure of her, he writes, and calls her “an impudent jade” for relying on his help, and resolves to have no more to do with her.
she is with child and undone, if I do not get him a place
15 Aug 1664Step 5 · Tuesday 15 November 1664
Dressed plainly for the purpose, he gets Mrs Bagwell, “with much ado”, to follow him to an alehouse. He records her “hard looks” and that she was, he thinks, “troubled at what I did”; in the end, he writes, he got what he wanted.
many hard looks and sooth the poor wretch did give me, and I think verily was troubled at what I did, but at last after many protestings by degrees I did arrive at what I would
15 Nov 1664Step 6 · Tuesday 20 December 1664
Unobserved, he walks home with Bagwell at Deptford to dinner. Afterwards he finds a reason to send Bagwell out, and records in French that, alone with Mrs Bagwell, he did what he wanted with her “contre sa force”: against her resistance.
After dinner I found occasion of sending him abroad
20 Dec 1664Step 7 · Monday 20 February 1665
Mrs Bagwell comes to the office, and as she asks he writes to Sandwich for her husband's promotion. After dark, at her house, he records in French that it was “with a great deal of difficulty”, but in the end he had what he wanted.
there had ‘sa compagnie’, though with a great deal of difficulty, ‘neanmoins en fin j’avais ma volont d’elle’
20 Feb 1665Step 8 · Monday 13 November 1665
At Greenwich he spends an evening with Mrs Penington, a lady whose talk had seemed to him very modest. When she lets him put his hand in her bosom, he decides he was “mightily deceived in a lady”.
she willingly suffered me to put my hand in her bosom very wantonly, and keep it there long
13 Nov 1665Step 9 · Thursday 23 November 1665
He sends for “little Mrs. Frances Tooker”, a neighbour's daughter at Greenwich, and when his guests have gone touches her as he wishes for an hour. Elsewhere he calls her a child; the diary never gives her age, or her response.
I sat dallying with her an hour, doing what I would with my hands about her
23 Nov 1665Step 10 · Tuesday 2 January 1666
Elizabeth Knepp, an actress and singer who did not depend on him, sings at Lord Brouncker's. In the crowded coach home he takes her on his knee and handles her breasts. What she made of it is not recorded.
got her upon my knee (the coach being full) and played with her breasts and sung
2 Jan 1666Step 11 · Sunday 18 March 1666
At Betty Martin's (Betty Lane, now married) he records doing “what I would with her” while her husband goes out for wine. He resolves to try to get the husband a purser's place.
The poor man I do think would take pains if I can get him a purser’s place, which I will endeavour
18 Mar 1666Step 12 · Friday 15 June 1666
Mrs Burroughs, a widow, comes to the office to get her dead husband's pay ticket paid. He sees to the payment himself, kisses her, and hopes some day to have her “company”, as he puts it. Her response is not recorded.
to get her ticket paid for her husband’s service, which I did her myself, and did ‘baisser her moucher’
15 Jun 1666Step 13 · Tuesday 19 June 1666
Mary Mercer, Elizabeth's companion in his house, helps him dress in the mornings. He writes that he is beginning to love her too much, and how: he handles her breasts while she dresses him. Her response is not recorded.
whom I feel myself begin to love too much by handling of her breasts in a’ morning when she dresses me
19 Jun 1666Step 14 · Tuesday 23 October 1666
He finds Betty Michell alone in her new house at Shadwell. He thinks her “mighty modest”, kisses her as much as he likes, and pays her the money due on her husband's ticket.
I paid her L10 1s. that I received upon a ticket for her husband, which is a great kindness I have done them
23 Oct 1666Step 15 · Friday 21 December 1666
Mrs Daniel, daughter of Mrs Clerke of Greenwich, asks his help to get her husband command of a new pleasure boat. He promises to help, and in his chamber kisses her and touches her breasts. Her response is not recorded.
there it was to help her husband to the command of a little new pleasure boat building, which I promised to assist in
21 Dec 1666Wheatley cut part of this entry.
Step 16 · Monday 4 March 1667
At Deptford he finds Mrs Bagwell washing and records doing what he wanted with her. Then he sends for her husband, to talk over the new ship at Harwich he has got him.
discoursed of his going to Harwich this week to his charge of the new ship building there, which I have got him
4 Mar 1667Step 17 · Friday 8 March 1667
People in Westminster Hall laugh at Betty Martin's husband, now a purser by Pepys's favour, carrying a picture he has bought. Pepys fears they guess why he was raised.
as if they guessed whence my kindness to him springs
8 Mar 1667Step 18 · Monday 17 June 1667
He writes that he has lately been handling the breasts of Nell, a maid in his house. What she made of it, the diary does not say.
I have lately played the fool much with our Nell, in playing with her breasts
17 Jun 1667Step 19 · Saturday 6 July 1667
Doll Lane, Betty Martin's sister, returns in tears, cursing a Dutchman she says pulled her into a stable and “did tumble her and toss her”. Pepys scorns her outcry as “the best instance of a woman's falseness”: she has let him, he writes, do anything.
when she knows that elle hath suffered me to do any thing with her a hundred times
6 Jul 1667Step 20 · Tuesday 17 September 1667
At the Michells' he kisses Betty; she receives it, he writes, “with a great deal of seeming regret”, which vexes him. He does not doubt “overcoming her”, he writes, as he did the wife of the man at Deptford: Mrs Bagwell.
I do not doubt overcoming her as I did the moher of the monsieur at Deptford
17 Sep 1667Wheatley cut part of this entry.
Step 21 · Thursday 6 February 1668
Coming home in the evening, he puts his hand under Mary Mercer's skirts and touches her thigh. She puts his hand away; “no hurt done”, he writes, and she talked and sang and was merry.
I did put my hand under the coats of Mercer and did touch her thigh, but then she did put by my hand and no hurt done
6 Feb 1668Step 22 · Saturday 30 May 1668
Meeting Knepp, he is relieved she seems not angry about what he attempted with her days before, nor likely to tell of it. What she thought, the diary does not say. The passage ends in dots; Wheatley may have cut what follows.
freed from a fear that Knepp was angry or might take advantage to declare the essay that je did the other day
30 May 1668Step 23 · Monday 31 May 1669
On the diary's last day, which he closes that night because of his eyes, he calls at the Michells' on his way to Whitehall, finding her mother there and the husband out of town. He kisses Betty, regretting he had no chance to do more.
And here je did baiser elle, but had not opportunity para hazer some with her as I would have offered if je had had it
31 May 1669
See all 318 days on the mood grid
Related stories
- Deb Willet Elizabeth's young companion: his sexual advances in his own house, the discovery, her dismissal, and how he went on pursuing her.
- Elizabeth Nine years of a marriage in his own words: tenderness and quarrels, her loneliness, his jealousy and his violence, her reproaches, and the night she found him embracing Deb Willet.
- The household Servants hired and dismissed, boys and maids beaten, and Will Hewer, the clerk who stayed.
- Music Singing in parts, the viol and the flageolet, songs of his own: from the diary's first month to its last week.
Sources: The Diary of Samuel Pepys, ed. Henry B. Wheatley (opens in a new tab)