Teresia Constantia Muilman (1709–1765)

Teresia Constantia Phillips or Con Phillips was born in England in about 1709; very little is reliably known about her early life. Her mother died when she was two years old, and her education was said to have been paid for by her godmother, Catherine Powlett (Paulet), Duchess of Bolton. She attended Mrs Filler's boarding school in Westminster, London, until her father remarried. She was sexually attacked at a young age by a man identified by recent researchers as Thomas Lumley-Saunderson, 3rd Earl of Scarborough. In 1722, Con married Francis Devall. Two years later, at the same church, she married Henry Muilman, a wealthy Dutch merchant and banker. This marriage did not last long, either. Within a year, she was living in Paris with another man. Henry Muilman began a lawsuit to annul the marriage on the grounds of bigamy. He refused to pay Con the money that had been agreed between them, and a long court case ensued. Con went abroad several times to avoid her creditors, but this was not always successful and she served time in debtors' prison from 1742 to 1744. The long-drawn out court case between her and Muilman was finally settled in 1748.
Con Phillips wrote some scandalous memoirs that contained thinly-disguised descriptions of her liaisons. Her main work was An Apology for the Conduct of Mrs. T.C. Phillips, which was published in 18 parts from 1748 to 1749. The book described her five marriages and affairs with well-known men, and pointed out the patriarchal double standard that was applied. This book provides much of what we know about her life, although she was an admittedly unreliable source. In 1751, Con Phillips settled in Jamaica with Henry Needham, a wealthy planter. She is said to be have been the only woman in the 18th century to hold an official government post when she was appointed by the Governor of Jamaica as Mistress of the Revels, an office tasked with supervising and organizing the official celebrations and entertainments in the colony.