Patricia Russell, Countess Russell (1910 – 2004) was the third wife of philosopher

Bertrand Russell Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell, (18 May 1872 – 2 February 1970) was a British mathematician, philosopher, logician, and public intellectual. He had a considerable influence on mathematics, logic, set theory, linguistics, ...

and a significant contributor to his book ''

A History of Western Philosophy ''A History of Western Philosophy'' is a 1946 book by the philosopher Bertrand Russell. A survey of Western philosophy from the pre-Socratic philosophers to the early 20th century, it was criticised for Russell's over-generalization and omissio ...

''. Lady Russell was born Marjorie Helen Spence in 1910. As her parents had always wanted a boy, she was known as 'Peter', a nickname she retained throughout her life. She met Bertrand Russell in 1930 when she was a 21-year-old undergraduate at the

University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...

, hired by Russell's second wife Dora Black as a governess. They had an affair and were married at the

Midhurst Midhurst () is a market town, parish and civil parish in West Sussex, England. It lies on the River Rother inland from the English Channel, and north of the county town of Chichester. The name Midhurst was first recorded in 1186 as ''Middeh ...

register office on 18 January 1936. They had one son, Conrad Sebastian Robert Russell, 5th Earl Russell, who became a prominent historian and one of the leading figures in the

Liberal Democrat Several political parties from around the world have been called the Liberal Democratic Party or Liberal Democrats. These parties usually follow a liberal democratic ideology. Active parties Former parties See also *Liberal democracy *Lib ...

party. They had an acrimonious separation in 1949. Patricia was a member of the first board of the Harlow Development Corporation, serving from 1947 to 1950. She smoked a pipe.Gibberd et al. p.378

Notes

References

Ray Monk Ray Monk (born 15 February 1957) is a British biographer who is renowned for his biographies of Ludwig Wittgenstein, Bertrand Russell, and J. Robert Oppenheimer. He is emeritus professor of philosophy at the University of Southampton, where he ...

, ''Bertrand Russell. The Ghost of Madness'', London 2000 *Gibberd, Frederick et al. ''Harlow : the story of a new town.'' Stevenage: Publications for Companies. 1980.

External links

* '' Details of 12 portraits, 8 of them reproduced'' Bertrand Russell 1910 births 2004 deaths British countesses {{UK-philosopher-stub