Victoria Josefa Dolores Catalina Sackville-West (Baroness Sackville), (23 September 1862 – 30 January 1936) was a British noblewoman, mother of the writer, poet, and gardener Vita Sackville-West. Early life Victoria was one of seven illegitimate children of the English diplomat Lionel Sackville-West, 2nd Baron Sackville, and a Spanish dancer known by the stage name of "Pepita de Oliva", (Josefa née Durán y Ortega; she was married to Juan Antonio de Oliva). Pepita was referred to as Countess West, though she never divorced her legal husband or married the father of her children. Victoria was, in youth, referred to as Pepita Sackville West, or "Lolo", a diminutive of her name Dolores. While at convent school in 1881, however, the truth of her origins was revealed, and she was advised to be known as Victoria West. Victoria's siblings included sisters Flora (born 1866), Amalia Marguerite Albertine (born 1868), and Eliza (who died in 1866, the year after her birth ); and brothers Ernest Henry Jean Baptiste (born 1869), Maximiliano (born 1858), and a short-lived brother named Frederic who died, along with their mother, soon after his birth in March 1871. Adult life In 1890 Victoria married her first cousin Lionel Edward Sackville-West, 3rd Baron Sackville. Their daughter, born in 1892, was the writer, poet, and gardener Vita Sackville-West. The family lived mainly at Knole House, an estate that had been in the Sackville family for centuries. Victoria was notorious for beginning and dropping various money-making schemes, some intended for supposedly charitable aims, but most for her personal use. Among the schemes was one involving the opening of a shop in South Audley Street, London which Victoria wanted to name Knole Guild following a charitable scheme she had started in Kent of that name. Her husband Lord Sackville objected, and it was doubtless pointed out that the shop was for her own pecuniary benefit and not that of a charity. It was, in the end, named Spealls. Victoria was not good at retailing, and enlisted the services of her even less suitable daughter Vita, to contribute to the store's stocks. The shop ended in failure, as did many of Victoria's enterprises. Lady Sackville was a close friend of the sculptor Auguste Rodin; his marble bust of her, dated 1913, is on display at the Rodin Museum. Victoria's life has been largely overshadowed by the controversial life of her bisexual daughter, Vita. In 1912