Fan Casting Dido Elizabeth Belle in Actors by Historical Figures They've Played

Dido Elizabeth Belle (June 1761 – July 1804) was a British gentlewoman. She was born into slavery, an illegitimate daughter of Captain John Lindsay of the Royal Navy and Maria Belle; her mother, Maria Belle, was an enslaved Black woman in the British West Indies. Her father was Sir John Lindsay, a British career naval officer who was stationed there; later knighted and promoted to admiral. Lindsay took Dido with him when he returned to England in 1765, entrusting her upbringing to his uncle William Murray, 1st Earl of Mansfield, and his wife Elizabeth Murray, Countess of Mansfield. The Murrays educated Belle, bringing her up as a free gentlewoman at their Kenwood House.