Mary Anne

Mary Anne knew the grinding heel of poverty, and determined it would never grind her again. With beauty, brains and ambition, she chose the only route that could take a cockney girl to the top - as mistress to the Royal Duke of York.

Daphne du Maurier's 1938 novel Rebecca made her one of the most successful writers of her time. Alfred Hitchcock's adaptation of the book won the Best Picture Oscar in 1940. He later used her material for The Birds. In 1969, du Maurier was created a Dame of the British Empire.