Frances Bowes-Lyon, Countess of Strathmore and Kinghorne

Who was Frances Bowes-Lyon, Countess of Strathmore and Kinghorne?

Frances Dora Bowes-Lyon, Countess of Strathmore and Kinghorne was a British noblewoman. She was the paternal grandmother of Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother and thus a great-grandmother of Queen Elizabeth II.

Her father was Oswald Smith, of Blendon Hall, and her mother was Henrietta Mildred Hodgson. Her paternal grandparents were George Smith and wife Frances Mary Mosley, daughter of Sir John Parker Mosley, 1st Baronet, and wife Elizabeth Bayley, granddaughter of Nicholas Mosley and wife Elizabeth Parker, and sister of Sir Oswald Mosley, 2nd Baronet, great-great-grandfather of Oswald Mosley.

On 28 September 1853, she married Claude Bowes-Lyon. He became the 13th holder of the Earldom of Strathmore and Kinghorne following the death of his brother Thomas in 1865. Frances then assumed the title and style of Countess of Strathmore and Kinghorne. Together the couple had 11 children.