Anne Mynns (d. 1717)

Pat Rogers, University of South Florida
June 2026

Anne Mynns and Hannah Lee

The shows put on at London fairgrounds, often featuring spectacular scenery and effects, enjoyed their brief heyday in the first half of the eighteenth century. This had something to do with changing tastes, but was mainly conditioned by the attitude of officialdom. Both the national and municipal authorities sought to control the activity of the major fairs in the capital by a variety of means, ranging from acts of parliament and government decrees to measures by the Corporation of London and local justices. While the fair was in session, an ancient tribunal called the Piepowder Court had jurisdiction over offences such as breaches of licensing laws: in practice, the hearings in London were now generally held in front of City magistrates. The sway of a historic regulator known as the Master of the Revels largely died out in the early Hanoverian years, but Bartholomew Fair, Southwark Fair, Mayfair and lesser venues continued to face the threat of restrictions or closure.

Mayfair reached the peak of its popularity at the start of the century, but the magistrates were always seeking to have its patent from James II revoked, until in 1764 a landowner finally managed to get the event abolished, leaving a peaceful environment for hugely profitable developments suitable for the gentry around Shepherd’s Market. Southwark Fair had already gone, having been banned by the Court of Common Council in 1762. The following year, a group of showmen and women tried to erect their booths as usual, but more than a hundred constables arrived on the scene and ordered them to be demolished. As for the venerable Bartholomew Fair, across town at Smithfield, which was the centre of attention through its shows and the disorder that often accompanied them, this lasted until 1855, having gradually subsided into irrelevance.

In this window of time, preserved in its tumult and energy by William Hogarth’s print Southwark Fair (1734), the most noteworthy impresarios in the world of showground drolls were Anne Mymms and her daughter Hannah Lee (or Leigh). Almost nothing is known of their private lives, but the professional side is a little better documented. Anne may have been married to an actor known simply as “Mr. Mynns,” who from around 1696 to 1733 took mainly secondary roles in Ireland and England, including work for the principal London stages and the provincial touring companies. But this is uncertain, like almost all the information about Anne’s life. She may have had another daughter, sometimes listed as Elizabeth Leigh, but again the evidence is confusing.

The Famous Mrs. Mynns

What has clearly emerged in modern work on theatrical history is that Mrs. Mynns (variously spelled) was the most ambitious and innovative director of her times. According to Anne Wohckle, it is not unduly surprising to find that she and her daughter(s) “operated a thriving business in the heart of a city fast becoming a global centre.” In reality, as Wohlcke demonstrates, “fairgrounds provided a space for working women of all income levels.” Most of these naturally came from a poor background and arrived at the fairgrounds, located chiefly on the margins of the historic City, in search of “ways to supplement meagre resources to meet their household needs.” Many of the jobs available would involve seasonal or parttime employment. However, a fuller review of the evidence makes it clear that the pool of female workers was not wholly confined to casual or low-skilled labour. During the 1720s women accounted for about a quarter of the licences granted annually to various traders by the Piepowder Court for Bartholomew Fair. In the light of these facts, Wohlcke concludes that women “were visible and successful as managers in fairground commerce and its supporting industry of inn- and tavern-keeping.”

Anne remans invisible until after the turn of the new century, although she may have been carrying out an anonymous role on the fairground before that. In this period it was common for the established theatres to take a short break when the fairs were in town, and for their performers to accept an occasional gig in one of the drolls. One of the outstanding comedians of the period, William Penkethman, was equally active on either side of the divide. However, Mynns appears to have had her own company, which was probably made up of touring players who sent most of the year in the provinces. In 1705 “Mr. Mynns” was recruited to appear at the new Haymarket theatre, and Sybil Rosenfeld suggests that his wife (if she was that) may have brought a group of strolling actors to London at his time to head off the competition from “legitimate” performers. In any case, sheer acting ability was not the most important attribute required for the success of her greatest hit, The Siege of Troy. This was a piece in three acts by Elkanah Settle, stripped down from his own tragedy entitled The Virgin Prophetess or the Fate of Troy, put on at Drury Lane in May 1701 with a star cast including the young Anne Oldfield and music by Gottfried Finger. The new show was first seen in the autumn of 1707, when it was put on “in the Rounds at Smithfield” by Mynns at her booth opposite the gate of St. Bartholomew’s Hospital. It was by far the most famous of all the productions to come on the fairground stage in this era, and was revived periodically for the next forty years.

We can tell that the new offering was felt to be something special by the fact, unlike the majority of items staged in this environment, it was published in the same year and sold at the booth under an impressive-looking title: The Siege of Troy, a Dramatick Performance. Presented in Mrs. Mynns’s booth. Over against the Hospital-gate in the Rounds in Smithfield, during the Time of the present Bartholomew-Fair. Containing a Description of all the Scenes, Machines and Movements, with the whole Decoration of the Play, and Particulars of the Entertainment.

Another sign is found in a press advertisement from May 1708: “At Epsom. During the Summer Season, and beginning on Whitson-Monday, in the new Cock-Pit, will be Acted variety of Tragedies and Comedies, by that Company of Players who perform’d the Siege of Troy with so much Applause last Bartholomew Fair, and who have had the Honour for several Years to play at Windsor for the Entertainment of the Nobility, being by long Travel together able to act near Fifty Plays perfect.”

Anne revived the play in 1715 and 1716 at a tavern during Southwark Fair, and it was reprinted by S. Lee (thought to be her son-in-law). It was to be performed to achieve “the full Grandeur” of its earlier incarnation at Bartholomew air. Indeed, several new scenes had been added, with enhanced painting and gilding, “so as to make it superior even to its first Original.” Some of the most able actors from the patent theatres had been recruited, among them Thomas Walker, who later created the role of Macheath in Gay’s Beggar’s Opera. A huge cast included nine priests and priestesses, ten more persons in the retinue of Paris and Helen, twenty-two officers and trumpeters and a posse of theatrical spear-carriers posing as the Trojan mob. Among the audience when the young law student Dudey Ryder went to the fair on 19 September 1715 were “the Duke of Montagu and some company of fashion,” enjoying the fare at Penkethman’s booth that featured rope dancing and tumbling, all of which “made us laugh with a just pleasure.”

Settle’s abridged text made room for the comic elements which were the lifeblood of the offerings at Smithfield, however melodramatic the action: “The poet left out four or five serious characters, cut down all the serious dialogue, and reduced his work from five acts to three, interpolating a sufficient quantity of right Bartholomew buffoonery” (Henry Morley). The real selling point, however, was the unprecedented level of stage spectacle. From the printed introduction, cumbrous as the writing is, we can gauge the intent of both Mynns and of Settle (a proven contriver of such effects, based on his long experience in devising pageants for the Lord Mayor’s Day):

A Printed Publication of an Entertainment performed on a Smithfield Stage, which, how gay or richly soever set off, will hardly reach to a higher Title than the customary name of a Droll, may seem somewhat new. But as the present undertaking, the work of ten Months’ preparation, is so extraordinary a Performance, that without Boast or Vanity we may modestly say, In the whole several Scenes, Movements, and Machines, it is no ways Inferiour even to any one Opera yet seen in either of the Royal Theatres; we are therefore under some sort of Necessity to make this Publication, thereby to give ev’n the meanest of our audience a full Light into all the Object they will there meet in this Expensive Entertainment; the Proprietors of which have adventur’d to make, under some small Hopes, That as they yearly see some of their happier Brethren Undertakers in the Fair, more cheaply obtain even the Engrost Smiles of the Gentry and Quality at so much an easier Price; so on the other side their own more costly Projection (though less Favourites) might possibly attain to that good Fortune, at least to attract a little share of the good graces of the more Honourable part of the Audience, and perhaps be able to purchase some of those smiles which elsewhere have been thus long the profuser Donation of particular Affection and Favour.

It is reported that Settle was granted an annual salary by Mynns to write drolls ”with proper decorations,” but this has not been confirmed.

A detailed account of the stage effects has been given by the leading scholar in this field, Sybil Rosenfeld, with a description of the dramatic shifts of perspective and elaborate machinery. As she points out, “Trick scenery involving changing statues, transformation, and transparencies were within the scope of this fair company. The theatres royal could provide little more except trapwork.” Some of the props can be assumed to derive from earlier productions by Mymms or others, but some were undoubtedly created for the new show. Almost everybody who commented on the Siege expiated on the novelty of what they beheld. Moveable side wings with cut-out elephants painted on them for actors to bestride were just one notable feature.

Serious comment is lacking on the literary value of the play. However, we do have an ironic passage in a letter by John Gay, written to Lady Burlington after he attended a revival in 1726:

How poorly are we oblig’d to entertain ourselves! for Kent and I thought ourselves very happy on Friday night with Bartholomew Fair and the Siege of Troy. I think the Poet corrected Virgil with great judgment in the Poetical justice which he observ’d; for Paris was kill’d upon the spot by Menelaus, and Helen burnt in the flames of the town before the Audience. The Trojan Horse was large [as] life and extreamly well painted; the sight of which struck Kent with such astonishment, that he prevaild with me to go with him the next day to compare it with the celebrated paintings at Greenwich. Kent did not care to reflect upon a Brother of the Pencil; but if I can make any judgment from hums, & hahs, and little hints, he seem’d to give the preference to Bartholomew Fair.

Here Gay aims his joke at the supposed preference of the versatile artist William Kent for the daubs at the fair over the sumptuous murals by Sir James Thornhill at Greenwich glorifying George I and his family. The letter draws attention to the climactic event in the Siege, when Helen, “entering above, and seeing Paris dead, laments in two lines; is threatened horribly in three; and finally, with an eight-line speech, ‘leaps down into the Fire.’”

Gay’s friend Alexander Pope was well aware of what went on at the fair. He gave Settle a key role in the third book of The Dunciad from 1728, referring to his role in one of the booths there, appropriately for a work whose theme is announced at the start as the way in which “the Smithfield Muses” have been brought “to the ear of Kings.” The droll amplified some of the special effects presented in The Virgin Prophetess, as in the scene where Cassandra’s wand changes a view of hell not one of heaven, recalled by Pope in the line “Hell rises, Heav’n descends, and dance on earth.”

Mrs. Mymms had some success shortly after the Siege with her version of a perennial favourite. Based on the story of Dick Whittington. Its chief attraction was that it allowed for the creation of a quasi-medieval cavalcade, featuring a series of nine pageants mimicking those put on at the Lord Mayor’s Show. The text does not survive, but the true begetter must surely have been Settle, whom Pope chose for his infamous role in The Dunciad largely because of his history as the City Poet, managing the propagandistic displays that went with the inauguration of the new Lord Mayor.

On 4 January 1718, a London newspaper reported on Anne’s funeral, which had taken place five days earlier: “On Monday last was Interr'd the famous Mrs. Mynns, who had for so many Years constantly kept a Booth in Bartholomew and Southwark Fair. She was a Woman of a very Masculine Temper, and govern’d the Legions under her Power with great Justice and exactness; in so much that Caesar or Alexander have sometimes been content to put up a Box of the Ear from her. She has left three or four Thousand Pounds behind her most of it given to her Daughter; but as her Husband is Living, ’tis expected he wil set aside any Will." A sum of £3,000–£4,000 was certainly a great deal of money for anyone associated with the fair to have accumulated, and if the jobbing actor Mr. Mynns was indeed her husband, it would be no surprise if he tried to assert a claim on it.

The Enterprising Mrs. Lee

In the event, Hannah Lee did continue to run the business she inherited from her mother. Sadly, her personal circumstances are almost as obscure as those of Anne, but she seems to have been at least on the brink of middle age by this time. At some date she apparently married George Lee, a theatrical printer and stationer, who was granted freedom in the Stationers’ Company in 1692, and worked from Blue Maid Alley, near the King’s Bench in Southwark. This alley ran off Borough High Street, a short distance from the area where the Fair took place. In 1737 Hannah’s address was given as “on the Bowling Green near the Borough,” and we know that she put on shows at “the great Tiled Booth on the Bowling Green” at least as early as 1743.

The connection is firmly established in a press advertisement in September 1723. By that date Hannah had joined forces with an actor named John Harper to establish a lasting partnership. Her claims lack for nothing by way of self-assurance:

At Lee’s and Harper’s Great Theatrical Booth, on the Bowling Green, the Lower End of Blue Maid Alley in Southwark, or down the Queen’s Arms Tavern Yard near the Marshalsea-Gate, during the annual Time of the Fair, will be presented that most celebrated Entertainment, call’d, The Siege of Troy. Which in its Decoration, Machinary, and Paintings, far exceeds its first Appearance in Bartholomew Fair. The whole Entertainment having been justly acknowledg’d by all Spectators to be infinitely superiour to all Publick Performances of this Kind, ever seen in a Fair, the Scenes and Cloaths being intirely new. All the Parts will be play’d to the best Advantage, by Comedians from both the Theatres.

According to Sybil Rosenfeld, “So popular was the droll that rival booths designed to have imitations under the same name, and Mrs. Lee was at pains to make clear that hers was the only one.” In subsequent years when the duo revived the play, a similar protestation appears, to effect that they possess the rights to “the only celebrated droll of that kind” (not very much of an exaggeration) and as it was “first brought to perfection by the late Famous Mrs. Mynns and can only be performed by her daughter Mrs. Lee.” In these citations, we see the extent to which the fairground industry had come to rival or even outdo the legitimate playhouses in terms not just of theatrical splendour but also of unblushing self-publicity.

Lee and Harper continued on their successful way during the 1720s. They revived a less notable droll in 1729 called The Siege of Bethulia, based on the story of Judith and Holofernes, and first played at Bartholmew Fair eight years earlier. It was accompanied at both of the main fairgrounds with afterpieces and songs. Harper had a role and the drama was printed by George Lee. The same principals were involved in Female Innocence: or, a School for a Wife. As it is acted at Mrs. Lee's Great Booth, on the Bowling-green, Southwark, by Comedians from the Theatres (1733). We see here a level of synergy within the family business, involving manager, performer and printer.

In 1735 the well-established concern ran into trouble. The circumstances have been explained by Wohlcke, who identifies the occasion as a renewed attempt by the City fathers to stamp out illicit entertainment at fairs, especially that of Bartholomew. Previously the Corporation had given licences that lasted fourteen days to performers such as mountebanks. Now the period was cut down to the eve of the saint’s day, the day itself, and the following day—a window too narrow for those running expensive shows, such as Hannah. In addition, unlike on previous occasions, the aldermen chose to focus “not on prostitution, but on booths intended for plays, gambling, or music.” The campaign deliberately exempted those dealing in “goods, wares, and merchandises, usually sold at fairs,” that is the group around whom the event had once been organised. But as it proved, the only individual targeted by the new order issued by the aldermen was Hannah Lee. On 23 September the City ruled that she had continued “to Act Plays and Interludes [a suitably medieval term] in defiance of the law.” The reason may have been that Hannah, described as a widow of the parish of St. George in Southwark, had petitioned Parliament earlier in the year, opposing a new bill that tightened up restrictions on dramatic performance—this was dropped, but it served as a precursor to the famous theatrical Licensing Act of 1737. Her case has been summarised by Rosenfeld:

Mrs. Lee stated that she and her mother, Anne Mynns, had resided in the parish upwards of thirty years, during which time their servants had annually performed drolls at Southwark Fair for the entertainment of those who resorted there, according to ancient custom. She claimed to have erected at her own expense “Two Booths, and hath expended, in such Buildings, Cloaths, Scenes, Decorations, and other Necessaries, the sum of 2000 l. and upwards; which is her whole Substance and on which she subsists; and that being now infirm in Body, and old, she must be ruined, if the Bill should pass into Law.” She feared that it would prevent her exhibiting her annual entertainments and pointed out “that her and her late Mother's Companies have always been Nurseries for the greatest Performers that ever acted on the British Stage, particularly the celebrated Mr. Powell and Mr. Booth, as well as great Numbers of the present Actors at the Theatres of Drury Lane and Covent Garden.” Her entertainments, she argued, were “innocent and amusing” and honoured by the greatest in the land. She requested that she might be heard, through her counsel, against the section of the Bill that might affect her and asked the House to grant her such relief as seemed fitting.

This is the most forthright claim ever made for the legitimate value of the repertory at the fairgrounds. Not unexpectedly, the House of Commons rejected Hannah’s petition, and in September she was summoned to appear before the court. She must have curtailed her performances that year, but was back at the fair in 1736.

After this she had a new partner: Harper suffered a stroke and gave up performing prior to his death in 1742. She worked increasingly with the puppet master Thomas Yeates, and indeed a newspaper story in 1739 reported that she had married him, making over to the groom “a considerable fortune in South Sea Stock.” This may be pure invention. From the same time Hannah operated regularly in conjunction with Mr. Phillips, a dancer who became a star Harlequin at Drury Lane. Again, we observe the interlocking roles of impresario and performer. At Bartholomew Fair in 1747 the actor Jemmy Warner joined up with Lee and Yeates for a new production of the Siege, with décor and clothes “finish’d according to the Taste of the Antient Greeks.” Eight years later, at the Bowling Green, Warner and the Widow Yeatse’s Company of Comedians were still putting on one of Hannah’s drolls from the 1730s. Hannah’s name appears for the last time at Southwark in 1749, with a revival of Whittington in a remodelled space, almost certainly the Great Tiled Booth. Her ultimate fate is unknown.

Hannah Lee proved a worthy successor to her mother, especially in commercial and professional terms. She may have admitted more of the sideshows than Anne, with songs, dancing, posture-making, puppeteering, harlequinades and the like. If she is unable to claim credit for originating a single item as enduringly popular as The Siege of Troy, she managed to keep the family show going, indeed to hold on to a place at the forefront of spectacular entertainment when fairground theatre enjoyed its greatest prominence in London life.