Harriet Sophia Parker was born in 1809, the only daughter of Montagu Edmund Parker of Whiteway and his wife Harriet Newcombe. She was baptised at St David’s, Exeter, on 27 December 1809. Through her father she belonged to the Whiteway branch of the Parker family, connected by blood and landholding to the Parkers of Saltram, later Lords Boringdon and Earls of Morley. Her first marriage, at Chudleigh on 29 January 1834, was to William Coryton of Pentillie Castle, Cornwall. He died in 1837, leaving her with one daughter, Fanny Harriet Coryton, born in 1836. In 1842 she married her second cousin Edmund Parker, 2nd Earl of Morley, thereby linking the Whiteway line directly with the peerage. Their children were Albert Edmund Parker, later 3rd Earl of Morley, and Lady Katherine Emily Parker. The 2nd Earl died in 1864, after which Harriet was styled Dowager Countess of Morley.
Her movements can be followed through parish entries and census returns. In 1836 she was living at Chudleigh at the baptism of her daughter Fanny. By 1851 she was in St Margaret, Westminster, with her husband, their children, Edmund’s mother Frances Parker, a governess and a large household of servants. In 1861 the Earl and Countess were at Plympton St Mary with Fanny Coryton, Viscount Boringdon (Albert) and Catherine Parker. In 1871 she was in St George, Hanover Square, London, with her son Albert. By 1891 she had returned to Devon, recorded at Plympton St Mary as Harriet Sophia, Dowager Countess of Morley, living with Albert, now 3rd Earl, and his family. These addresses reflect the expected pattern of residence between London, Saltram and the associated Devon estates.
Contemporary notices reported her marriages in the formal style of the period. The first, from Chudleigh, announced the marriage of William Coryton, eldest son of John Tillie Coryton of Pentillie Castle, to Harriet Sophia, only daughter of the late Montagu Edmund Parker of Whiteway. The second, described as a marriage in high life, took place at Ashcombe by special licence when the Earl of Morley married Harriet Sophia, relict of the late William Coryton. Her death in 1897 was reported from Whiteway House, Chudleigh, identifying her as the daughter of Montagu Edmund Parker, twice married, and mother of the then Earl of Morley.
Portrait of Harriet Sophia Parker — courtesy of Saltram © National Trust
