A History of the City of Dublin, Volume Three (1859) by John Thomas Gilbert (1829-1898) describes, in passing, a dramatic sounding story involving the “notorious” Catherine Netterville and her lover “Mr. Stone of Jamacia” who killed himself in Netterville’s Grafton Street mansion.
John Thomas Gilbert, A History of the City of Dublin, Volume 3 (Dublin, 1859), p. 221
Who was Catherine Netterville? Why was she “notorious”? Who was her insane Jamacian lover Mr. Stone?
The book The Pursuit of the Heiress: Aristocratic Marriage in Ireland 1740-1840 offers a little background to the Netterville family namely that Catherine Netterville (1712-84) was the daughter of Samuel Burton (1687-1733) of Burton Hall, Co. Carlow.
A. P. W. Malcomson, The Pursuit of the Heiress: Aristocratic Marriage in Ireland 1740-1840 (Belfast, 2006), p. 12
I then was able to find out that Catherine Netterville married Nicholas, 5th Viscount Netterville who died in 1750.
Sir Bernard Burke, A genealogical history of the dormant, abeyant, forfeited, and extinct peerages of the British empire (London, 1866), p. 392
After that, the online trail went dead. I quickly found out why. Catherine Netterville also has been referred to as Katherine.
The story then begins to unravel. It would appear that Catherine (Katherine), in her later life, was a famous Dublin prostitute.
In describing the rise of Margaret (Peg) Plunkett (a.k.a Mrs. Leeson), “the best-known brothel-keeper of eighteenth-century” Dublin it is said that she outmanouvered “established women like Katherine Netterville, alias Kitty ‘Cut-A-Dash'”[1] and Netterville has been described as her “earliest rival”[2]
Kirsten Pullen is able to describe in more detail, the relationship between Mrs. Leeson and Katherine Netterville:
Kirsten Pullen, Actresses and whores: on stage and in society (Cambridge, 2005), p. 78
So, I think I’ve discovered why Mrs. Netterville was described as “notorious” but who was Mr. Stone? If anyone has any information, do leave a comment or email me.
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[1] Unknown, Irish economic and social history, Volumes 31-32, 2004. Available here.
[2] Margaret Leeson, The memoirs of Mrs Leeson (Unknown, 1995) ed. Mary Cecelia Lyons, p. xiii
Click on the book for more.
Click on the book for more.
Donal
Ciarán
Sam
Come Here To Me! 
While I am interested in your linkage of the “notorious” Katherine Netterville to Catherine (Burton) Netterville, I still remain to be convinced that they are one and the same person, whether spelled with a C or K. That is not to say that they were not related, perhaps through marriage.
Katherine (Burton) Netterville d. in 1784 while “Kitty-Cut-A-Dash” d. on 17 May 1787.
“Kitty-Cut-A-Dash” died at Broadstone, Dublin, a virtual pauper, according to the Evening Post issue of that date, while the Netterville family of whom Katherine Burton married into retained significant estates in Wicklow, Dublin, Meath and Westmeath in that period of time.
Yes, Nicholas, 5th Lord Vsct, her husband, was described as ‘a fop and a fool’ but ‘ a lord with a tolerable estate’.
There is no evidence of a breakdown in their marriage and, indeed, their only son, John, 6th Lord Vsct. N. had a substantial monument erected in their honour in the old church at Dowth, Co. Meath, following her death in 1784.
According to The Georgian Society Records and to an Irish Builder issue of 1894, Viscountess Catherine Netterville, widow of Nicholas, 5th Lord Vsct. N. lived at no. 29 Upper Sackville Street (now O’Connell Street) from 1767.
Notwithstanding the above points my mind remains open to be convinced otherwise. I look forward to your comments.
Well, we can add into the confusion/mix the fact that the 5th Viscount had been charged with murder, while the 6th Viscount was a well-known eccentric who spent money liberally and erratically (so, erecting a monument does not necessarily prove a happy marriage). Is it possible that Kitty-Cut-a-Dash/Catherine, Lady Netterville were the same? The widowed Lady Netterville residing in Sackville St. with her young son, the 6th Viscount, while she ran a prostitution business from Grafton St.?
https://www.advertiser.ie/galway/article/68791/it-was-the-landlords-right-to-do-as-he-pleased
This link suggests that Kitty-cut-a-dash got her married name from a different branch of the Nettervilles…..
THe Kilmacud Stillorgan Historical Society will have a talk on Kitty on Oct 10th, 2019
There is a Kitty Cut-A-Dash mentioned on the family tree in this article which is based on Netterville family papers. It may provide some additional information
https://www.jstor.org/stable/25535813
Definitely not the same person. Kitty Cut-a-Dash the courtesan only called herself Netterville because she went through a form of marriage with a lover called Frederick Netterville, who was only very distantly related to the Viscounts. She was of very poor birth, from Lazars Hill in Dublin.