High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Rachel Wriothesley, Lady Russell (c. 1636 29 September 1723) was an English noblewoman, heiress, and author. Her second husband was William Russell, Lord Russell, who was implicated in the Rye House Plot and later executed. A collection of the many letters she wrote to her husband and other distinguished men was published in 1773. Lady Rachel was born in about 1636 at Titchfield, Hampshire, the second eldest daughter and co-heiress of Thomas Wriothesley, 4th Earl of Southampton, by his first wife, Rachel de Massue, daughter of Daniel de Massue, Seigneur de Ruvigny and Madeleine de Pinot des Fontaines.