A writer reading
There are times when I wish I could simply sit and read a good book about the Smiths and Goslings! I, more than anyone, knows the tough situation of TOO MUCH INFORMATION (“TMI”). It’s terribly daunting to have archival manuscripts from approximately the 1780s to the 1880s to sift through. And, (of course), there’s the fervent desire to FIND EVEN MORE. But: to cozy up, with book and tea, absorbing information instead of interpreting information…. HEAVEN!
I love reading publications of letters, diaries, anything relating to women’s history, Britain, 18th or 19th century especially. This morning, earlier finding a sunny spot (now it’s rather back to overcast, which can make for very depressing days…), I was reading Jill Liddington‘s newest ANNE LISTER book, As Good as a Marriage: The Anne Lister Diaries 1836-38. The two ladies are rather “bumping along” at this point in the transcription. Maybe Ann Walker would have been happier had Anne Lister moved in with her. A PLACE (yes, something MORE than just a “room”) of one’s own is EXCEPTIONALLY important to some of us. Anne Lister would NEVER have done that, of course. But as I’ve recently had a relative living cheek-to-jowl with me, I can understand that Ann Walker’s “low spirits” – depression, in some form, certainly – could also stem from the fact that she and Anne have not “set up house”, but she (Ann) has moved into the Listers’ home. Nothing is “hers” – everything is “Lister” property, “Lister” layout, “Lister” servants. “Lister” business concerns. But “Walker” money, often — though Ann is magnanimous enough to rip up what seems to be an IOU sort of document.
_I_ wouldn’t have been happy. And (in truth), such situations (my own, and Ann’s in the far past) always make me think of a long-ago co-worker: He moved into his lady-love’s house. Another (male) co-worker commented: Nothing is “his”; it’s all her furniture, placed as she likes it – no ROOM for “his stuff”. It was a while later that they sold “hers” and purchased “theirs”.
Living “together” is tough!
No wonder Anne dreamed of travel, and maybe that is what Ann also dreamed about. Rather than sitting around the house or being confronted with and consumed by land business, Ann preferred seeing new places, meeting new people! I can’t help but wonder: Maybe Ann just wanted a bit of “company” so as not to be ALONE. She indicates, more than once, that her aunt (Ann Walker, senior), was the one not wishing to have Ann as a “companion” in her home – but Aunt Ann Walker then went through “companions”. There IS something to be said for the CHOICE to ask someone to stay; or ask them to depart.
Devastating to read Anne’s comment that the Shibden servants don’t like Ann. How I feel for Miss Walker! Rather an unwelcome “stranger” in what purports to be her “own” home. Wish there were more from her pen during these months of 1836. It cannot be discounted that in moments (or days) of “being low” Ann Walker was indicating her own need to be given a bit of SPACE.
I must admit, I often “root” for “The Other” over and again. Cassandra Austen, lost in the fame of her sister Jane Austen. Dorothy Wordsworth, seen by some as the lesser light of her brother William Wordsworth. I know there’s someone I’m forgetting… Ah, yes! Emily Dickinson‘s sister – Lavinia Dickinson; and I’ll even include their sister-in-law Susan Huntington Gilbert Dickinson. From the TV series, Gentleman Jack, I would also include Marian Lister. LOVE HER! (Especially the more she annoys her sister Anne. And swipes are even detectable in AL’s diary entries once Marian leaves Shibden.) Of course these women are typically pushed aside because of a lack of primary materials. (Though Dorothy Wordsworth is beloved BECAUSE of her journals and letters.)
For Ann Walker, thank goodness for websites like IN SEARCH OF ANN WALKER (“ISAW”). The link here will bring you to a Comparison of the DIARIES for Ann Walker and Anne Lister, covering the time between the 4 June 1834 and the 19 February 1835. “ISAW – is a collective of researchers, transcribers, administrators and writers whose mission is to tell the full and true story of the REAL Ann Walker.” Check out ISAW’s Ann Walker “booklet” – 37 pages in a PDF (2022).
Reading Liddington’s new book, I am of two minds about comments whereby Anne Lister is “correcting” or “adding” punctuation to Ann Walker’s letter to her sister [25 May 1836], which is noted in code, or otherwise reading Ann’s letter to her sister [1 June 1836]. Was Anne Lister intruding upon Ann Walker’s privacy in her own correspondence, or did Ann invite Anne, who then (maybe) added her sentiments to Elizabeth Sutherland. In my own research, there were people who considered their letters to be PRIVATE (even if an individual letter didn’t exactly “say much”). NOT to be shown to others, NOT to be read out at the breakfast table. Others might indicate a truly PRIVATE passage by writing such before continuing the letter. A hint to SKIP over this section, or pause to read it to oneself first. (Lest someone mentioned be listening!)
Mary Gosling (Lady Smith) is one of these strictly PRIVATE people. Her letters are rarely earth-shattering, although her youthful letters are more characterful. In later letters, where the “heir” of Suttons – her son Charles – is a topic of conversation more often than not [think about it: her four-year-old child inherited their home], Mary is constantly apologizing for things, second-guessing herself, and seeking the advice of (especially) Mamma.
Whereas the Six Smith Sisters cheerfully passed around their letters, written to one, sent on to the next – often with greetings attached from that “interim” recipient, and sent on to yet another sibling.
I don’t know enough about Ann Walker’s correspondence to place, in context, the diary entries whereby Anne knows the contents of Ann’s letters, but you can bet Ann is NOT reading Anne’s letters to the likes of Mariana Lawton!
And what does Ann think when Anne is scribbling away in those diaries? _I_ couldn’t write if someone nearby knew I was sitting down to scribble my thoughts. Nor could I stand knowing that someone in my household was scribbling about ME.
By the way, Leila Straub has contributed to ISAW a fascinating look at the handwriting of Ann Walker, and the resultant letters.
For me, Anne Lister (and Ann Walker) come alive in moments like this, noted 29 May 1836. Says Anne’s diary:
“Mr. Wilkinson … preached 28 min[utes] … I was asleep almost all the while…”
Not many would confess such! Needless to say, the 29th was a SUNDAY.
Emily Shore in Manuscript
A reader recently alerted me to news of the 2022 New York Antiquarian Book Fair having shown TWO manuscript volumes of the Journal of young Emily Shore Born in 1819, Emily died of consumption in 1839. The Shores were related to the Mackworth Praeds, which family included Susannah Smith, herself a diarist, and the politician and poet Winthrop Mackworth Praed. “Sue” Smith (as I call her) was the wife of Thomas Smith of New Norfolk Street, London and Bersted Lodge (in Sussex), and the great aunt of Emma Smith / Emma Austen Leigh (one of my Two Teens). The bookseller had, back in April 2022, called the re-emerged journals their “star item” at the Fair. INDEED!
Emily Shore’s journals were published by her sisters, twice, in the 19th century. The 1891 edition and 1898 edition differ, especially in the inclusion of family images (Emily was an accomplished artist). The newest edition came out in 1991, edited by Barbara Timm Gates.
Published to celebrate the centenary of its first publication, Timm Gates’ introduction speaks to her search for the ORIGINAL Handwritten Manuscripts. One of Emily’s sisters had actually willed the manuscripts to the British Museum. Says Timm Gates, “My jubilant friend writes, ‘Arabella Shore died 9 Jan. 1901 and left a will dated 5 Aug. 1899 with a codicil including these welcome words, “I bequeath the manuscripts and drawings of my sisters Emily and Louisa Shore to the Trustees of the British Museum to be preserved in the department of manuscripts”.'”
Alas! The British Museum had no record of the bequest. Dead End!
Of course, the loss of Emily’s materials is compounded, in my mind, by the loss of sister Louisa’s material as well.
Timm Gates had little choice but to republish the material as presented in the 19th century – but she also found, as her book went to press, that original volumes did EXIST. In the collection of the University of Delaware, (the link is their Finding Aid), are THREE manuscript Volumes. Out of twelve volumes, Delaware holds Nos. 7, 10, and 12: VII (6 Oct 1836-10 Apr 1837); X (14 Apr 1838-5 Jul 1838); and XII (16 Dec 1838-1 Jul 1839). Emily died six days later, on July 7th.
The University of Virginia, publisher of Timm Gates’ edition of the journals, now has updated their website offering to include free OPEN ACCESS to the Journal of Emily Shore. They also provide an up-dated transcription of two of the three Delaware volumes (Nos. 7 and 12); a “combined edition,” which incorporates the manuscripts of Nos. 7 & 12, as well as the “Centenary Edition” complete; some illustrations from the manuscripts are also included.
The most thrilling to see, as an owner of the 1991 book edition (thanks to a gift) are the new transcriptions. Which, now that two more volumes have appeared, begs the questions: Where have the “new found” volumes gone to? and Will Virginia be able to transcribe them (and the Delaware vol. 10)? The University of Delaware has a lengthy biographical offering for those who have not yet discovered Emily Shore.
Jarndyce Books, the UK bookseller at the NY Antiquarian Book Fair in April of 2022, had up-for-sale volume 1 (5 Jul 1831-31 Dec 1832) and volume 2 (1 Jan 1833-7 May 1833). “Entirely written in Shore’s distinctive small, neat, and easily readable hand, these volumes are a remarkable rediscovery more than thirty years after the only other known surviving volumes were sold. …. [H]er wit and intelligence – even in these early volumes – shines through each page.”
BUT the diary is not the sole item to have resurfaced. Part of a Shore novel came up for sale at Bonhams in 2004. Delaware has it in its collection! The manuscript, purchased in 2008, presents chapters 10 to 22 of Emily Shore’s novel “Devereux.”
Of course, one wonders why the University of Delaware didn’t purchase the two volumes (to join their three volumes) – was it the cost? Asking price at the book fair was advertised as $85,000.
So where, oh where, have Emily Shore’s Journals vols 1 & 2 gone?
* * *
In pulling up LINKS for this article, I found a reader who has posted YouTube videos connected to the Journal of Emily Shore:
- February to May 1833 (28:26 minutes)
- May 1833 (11.28 minutes)
- May and June 1833 (12.36 minutes)
- June & July 1833 – Pet Birds & Memories (17.46 minutes)
- Emily becomes an Authoress – January 1838 (8:23 minutes)
- I leave you to find MORE Emily Shore readings at Amy’s Dusty Bookshelf
Happy International Women’s Day (March 8th) and welcome to Women’s History MONTH!
Illustrating Mamma’s Diary, 1805 (part 3)
One of the most difficult parts of researching the family of Emma Austen is the fact that Emma’s parents were BOTH named “Smith”. Hard to winnow out relations and non-relations, with so common an English name as SMITH.
Mrs. Charles Smith – Augusta Smith, senior – “Mamma”. She has, from the beginning, been easy to track, because her father, Joshua Smith, was a Member of Parliament (for Devizes) and a landowner. The estate itself causes problems. Spelled Erle Stoke Park; Erlestoke Park; as well as Earl Stoke Park. Alas, the estate exists, and yet doesn’t. The fabric of the building sustained a fire. The estate is now known as HMP – His Majesty’s Prison – Earlstoke (Wiltshire).
Mr. Charles Smith of Suttons – “Papa”. He had one living sister. The Smith of Suttons children called her “Aunt”. This simple appellation has caused others to mistake her for one of several other aunts. But Aunt Northampton, Aunt Chute, Aunt Emma (all are Mamma’s sisters) are accounted for. It is JUDITH SMITH who is forever and always called, simply “Aunt“.
And it is Aunt, who, by 1805, had a quartet of three nieces and a nephew: Augusta (junior), Charles Joshua, Emma, and Fanny, all of whom visited the Smiths at Stratford, Essex. Judith’s mother was still alive, and the two lived together. Mamma sometimes denotes them as “Old Mrs. Smith” and “Miss Smith,” and they are usually noted together. Aunt remained a “Maiden Aunt” all her life. Judith was born in 1754 and was two years older than her brother, who was significantly older than his (second) wife. Augusta, senior had been born in 1772, and was 26 years old at the time of her 1798 marriage; Charles would turn 44 in September of that year. He welcomed his first child – Augusta, junior – in February 1799.
Mamma – who was super close to her own sisters, Maria (born 1767) [Lady Northampton]; Eliza (born 1769) [Mrs. Chute of The Vyne]; and Emma (born 1774) – took a while to cozy up to her sister-in-law.
But Judith had relatives of her own, more SMITHS, of course!
One family, mentioned in Augusta Smith’s 1805 diary, is the Smiths of Malling. Always denoted by the designation “of Malling,” their matriarch is a third portrait in artist John Downman’s albums, “First Sketches of Portraits of distinguished persons,” held at the British Museum. You can see them online, digitally presented. The “Study for Mrs. Smith of West Malling, Kent, 1805” can also be viewed on the BM website.
Mrs. Smith of Malling presents an interesting case of a young woman, eventually the sole heir of her parents, who seemingly married “for love”. Her full inheritance came through the death of her brother. The Monument Inscription in Meopham gives the unfortunate particulars:
Hither soon followed them
their son WILLIAM, the heir of their fortunes
and their virtues; a fair inheritance:
but alas of their mortality too.
which lot befel him at the early age of 28
April the 12th 1761
‘He died of the small pox
unhappily procured by
inoculation’
Known as “the heiress of Camer,” Katherine (or Catherine) MASTERS married William SMITH of Croydon. Through her came her father’s estate of Camer.
And with her came a slot in the family vault for her husband.
As Downman noted, Mrs. Smith of West Mallling was a widow with numerous children. Her husband died in 1764, aged only 44. He (and his family) are buried at Meopham (in Kent). I have found two sons and two daughters of the reported six children (three of each sex), “all in their infancy,” who remained at the time of their father’s death.
- Rebecca: born 1750, she died in 1802. Mamma mentioned her death in her diary – it was Rebecca’s obituary that enabled me to find more information on the family as a whole. Her obituary says she died after a lengthy illness (which could indicate cancer);
- Catherine: born 1752, she died in 1777;
- George [of Camer]: born 1757; he died in 1831;
- William [of Fairy Hall, Kent]: born 1759; he died in 1830.
William Smith (senior) was related to Charles Smith’s father – Charles Smith of Stratford (Essex), who wrote on the Corn Laws (he died in 1777). His widow, “Old” Mrs. Smith of Stratford, lived until 1808. From Augusta Smith’s diaries, including this one of 1805, “Aunt” (Judith Smith) often visited the Smiths of Malling, and she must have lost a good friend in “Miss Smith of Malling” (Rebecca), when she died.
A 1940 article by Edward Croft Murray from The British Museum Quarterly (vol. 14, no. 3; pp. 60-66) describes these Downmen albums – and gives their background history. The albums, “not sketch-books in the strict sense of the word,” are where “the artist mounted his delicately drawn ‘First Studies’ … with their dates, the names of the sitters, and usually some comments on them, all in his [Downman’s] own handwriting.” Anyone looking at the BM images can see the truth of that statement, but it is mind-blowing to learn:
- “These albums were originally arranged by Downman in four series, more or less in chronological sequence, each series containing four to eight volumes, and each volume between about twenty-five and thirty-five drawings“;
- “Series i is said to have been sold previously [before 1825-1827] and the original eight volumes belonging to it dispersed, some of them having been broken up and their contents scattered even further among various collections”;
- “Vols 1 and 3 of this Series [Series i] however, are still intact, and were sold .. at Sotheby’s on 15 February 1922, passing eventually to the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, in 1938″.
The Fitzwilliam provides a physical description of an album in their collection as, “Red leather coverboards with gold tooling. Green end papers and boards. 61 sheets in total including 26 protection papers [these are usually “tissue-like], bound in. Pages are gold edged. Contained 30 drawings, each laid onto the recto of a folio sheet.”
Downman himself said the albums denoted his “pleasant Employment of many Years; and in this assemblage of Portraits, you will see how different Fashions change ….” He admitted that he had “no Idea of a Collection ’till I found insensibly the Accumulation.” Indeed! Can you imagine the ENTIRE collection as he and his daughter Isabella Chloe (later Mrs. Benjamin) knew it???
Ah, the “lost” portraits! I second the author’s wish for a publication of ALL extant drawings.
Further information, related to the Quarterly article:
- “How Downman drew ‘The Larking Family’” (The Connoisseur, Sept 1926)
- G.C. Williamson’s book, John Downman A.R.A.: His Life and Works (1907)
- Lady Northampton, 1779; by Downman [Jane Compton, née Lawton, the 8th Countess; Uncle Northampton’s mother]
- Other Downman images from the Fitzwilliam Museum
By the way, the Sir Robert Cunliffe of Acton Hall, Wrexham, mentioned in the articles, was a relation to Mary Gosling – with Emma my “Two Teens in the Time of Austen” – through her maternal grandfather, Sir Ellis Cunliffe.
For the woman born Katherine Manners, Mrs Smith of West Malling: her heirs “founded” the familial line of “Smith Masters” and “Masters”. Downman painted in 1805, and Katherine Masters Smith died on 6 February 1814, aged 86 – meaning she had been born circa 1728. No wonder Mamma Smith thought of her as “Old Mrs. Smith of Malling.”
The family who outlived Katherine called her “their excellent mother.” Downman, a West Malling neighbor, must have agreed with that assessment. He wrote below her portrait that she “well managed” her family.
* * *
Part 1 of the series Illustrating Mamma’s Diary, 1805
New Year’s Honours: Helena Whitbread
Looking for information on Helena Whitbread’s biography of Anne Lister, I found notices that she had been honored with an MBE in King Charles’ New Year’s Honours List!
The Halifax Courier’s headlines read, “New Year’s Honours: Historian who uncovered ‘Gentleman Jack’ Diaries.”
Helena Whitbread’s own biography gives researchers like me reasons to hope, and to keep on working towards our goals. Indeed, the article calls her (and two others) “inspiring”. She receives the MBE – Member of the Order of the British Empire – for service to History and Literature.
The 2023 “New Year’s Honours” was the first “Honours List” of King Charles’ reign.
January 2023 also saw Helena awarded an honorary degree (D.Litt.) from the University of Sheffield.
Congratulations, Helena! Well deserved, after all your hard work.
Lots of Anne Lister news
Periodically looking for new books being published — especially with search terms women, biography, England — I recently found Jill Liddington’s As Good as a Marriage: The Anne Lister Diaries, 1836-38. Publication date is scheduled for May 2023 (Manchester University Press).
As Good as a Marriage joins the prior Liddington volumes:
- Nature’s Domain: Anne Lister and the Landscape of Desire – which presents Lister’s 1832 journal entries
- Female Fortune: The Anne Lister Diaries, 1833-36: Land, Gender, and Authority – which fits between the earlier book and the next volume of diaries
Of course Liddington’s publications build upon the Lister diaries published by Helena Whitbread:
- I Know My Own Heart (aka: The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister, volume 1) – featuring journal entries from 1816 to 1824
- No Priest But Love (aka The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister, volume 2) – the follow-up features Lister’s journals from Paris in 1824
All Lister fans are patiently awaiting Whitbread’s biography of Anne Lister.
At the very least, the paths of Mary Gosling & family and Anne Lister crossed via visits to the Ladies of Llangollen. Both visited Plas Newydd, the home of Sarah Ponsonby and Lady Eleanor Butler.
The next piece of news concerns the upcoming ANNA LISTER RESEARCH SUMMIT.
This is a three-day extravaganza features topics like “Shew us the archives”; an update on the Transcription Project; studies of Anne Lister’s Reading Habits; “The Lister Moves”; and “Mining Laughs”. Check out the ENTIRE schedule of offerings on the SUMMIT website – where you can also REGISTER for this FREE conference, which runs October 14-16, 2022 (with videos uploaded to YouTube for those sessions that you miss). They meet over ZOOM and are time-zone friendly.
Saying Goodbye to the Queen
In 1818, Emma Smith noted the death of Queen Charlotte on the 17th of November. Emma’s diary tells us that she put on mourning,on the Sunday following (November 22). What stuck in my mind, and was brought to mind today – the day of Queen Elizabeth’s funeral – were Emma’s words written against the date December 1st:
Tuesday, Dec 1 After much consideration whether we should stay as Mrs Gosling proposed & see the Queen’s funeral at Windsor or go home it was settled that Mamma & Augusta should return to Suttons Wednesday & that I should stay at Roehampton till Monday 7th
Wednesday, Dec 2 Mamma & us besides the Goslings stationed ourselves near Hounslow Heath for the purpose of seeing the procession it was very quiet the hearse seven of the Queens carriages some mourners & a troop of lancers. from thence Mama & Augusta returned to Roehampton they slept there & went the next day to Suttons. I went on with the Goslings to Windsor they had secured a room in the Castle Inn we dined there & about 8 o’clock the procession passed us. the road from the Castle to Frogmore was lined with soldiers every sixth man bearing a flambeau besides some of the cavalry & all the mourners the Regent was Chief Mourner the Dukes of York & Sussex were also present the whole sight was very grand. Mr & Mrs Gosling Elizabeth & Mary & I all laid down in a double bedded room. W:m & Bennett returned to Roehampton
Thursday, Dec 3 The Cavalry was reviewed before our windows. We walked into the Castle but they would not show it then to Eton Coll & returned to Roehampton for dinner
To all those who paid respects
(click to watch BBC broadcast – over 9 hours of coverage)
2/2/22 – Mary’s 222 Birthday
I simply could not let today pass without a passing nod at my first diarist, Mary Gosling — also know here as Lady Smith (following her 1826 marriage to Sir Charles Joshua Smith, baronet).
There could be NO harder name to “search” or “research” than a couple called Charles and Mary Smith!
And yet, the research has been GOLDEN.
I first found Mary’s earliest diary – a set of six trips taken between 1814 and 1824 – in 2006, when I was wishing to note down “authentic” sightings of the Ladies of Llangollen, Sarah Ponsonby and Eleanor Butler. I had visited their northern Wales home, Plas Newydd, in 2005. Mary Gosling met them! And she left her impressions of them. Well… less her impressions than notes of what others always said of them. I was QUITE disappointed, especially in the brevity of her thoughts — for, within a page, the family had DEPARTED Llangollen!
BUT: Mary herself began to intrigue me. Mainly, because the family members were shown around Plas Newydd and they spent about four hours with the Ladies, in their home. THAT one premise began EVERYTHING that has gone on since — from all the research into the Smiths of Suttons, as well as my interest in the Ladies of Llangollen themselves.
The results of all this early research:
- Two Teens in the Time of Austen – this blog, so named because Mary’s sister-in-law, Emma Smith, my second diarist, married James Edward Austen. And Edward was the nephew of writer Jane Austen.
- Ladies of Llangollen – a blog whose information, based on a website I created circa 2006, still needs additional work, but it currently hosts interesting artwork, book excerpts, and information on people who visited Plas Newydd — the GOSLINGS included — during the tenancy of Ponsonby and Butler, as well as after.
The Smiths took over my life – buried me under diaries and stacks of letters, stocked my brain with tidbits of personal and national (England) history, squinted my eyes in deciphering a myriad of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century “hands,” and made me spend my money and my time (not sure WHICH is more costly, in the end), in a never-ending pursuit after more knowledge. The nosing-around their lives has made and still makes me HAPPY.
by Frenchie (Photobucket)
With that thought, I wish Mary Gosling the HAPPIEST 222nd Anniversary of her 2 February 1800 birth. She graced the earth for only 42 years, leaving three youthful children, whose faint faces I have now unearthed. And she opened the door for a true glimpse into the past.
The After-Life of Ann Jackson, Servant
Quite some time ago, I found reference to “Bennett Gosling, Esq.” at the Old Bailey Online. His valet, Thomas Wenlock, was giving testimony in a theft case that had occurred in July 1839. I made mention of both Thomas Wenlock and Ann Jackson as having been part of Bennett’s household on the page “Servants-Clerks-Governesses.” For Ann Jackson, her employment seemed in the past.
Given that I have, (I think), ONE letter penned by Bennett Gosling – a brief note. Given that, among the Goslings, only Mary Gosling, Bennett’s younger sister, has left diaries – which, except for travels, are all daily diaries written after her marriage in 1826 to Sir Charles Joshua Smith, baronet (Emma Austen’s brother). AND given that only a handful of a household’s servant population manage to gain more than one mention in a person’s diaries (ie, there might be at least the hiring and/or the dismissal mentioned), SERVANTS are the hardest to construct any kind of roster. The early 19th century census, unlike our common “every ten years” really comes down to the 1840 census — and people were not always at home on Census Day. I once searched the census for Mary, Lady Smith – I had her birthday — Ancestry could NOT find her. I looked up her diary — she was in town (London) and staying at the Curries’ home (sister-in-law Charlotte and husband Arthur Currie).
Little did I know, at the time, that the age for Mary was incorrectly approximated in the census. In essence, I knew (and searched) too-specific information!
Anyway…
I was happy to find mention of Ann Jackson a few days ago. She turned up in an Australian database because she received a sentence of TRANSPORTATION at her 9 July 1839 trial. This *find* of a new-to-me website made me revisit what I had previously found at the Old Bailey.
The transcript of Ann Jackson’s trial can be read online. She was found to have in her possession disparate items from two households – the stays of Mrs. Pearse, for example, valued at 30 shillings; and two coats (valued at £4) of Bennett Gosling, Esq.
Arrest and trial records of the period tend to be rather sketchily transmitted. The policeman, Andrew Wyness, for instance, according to his testimony, follows the young woman, pushes open a door, and then confronts Jackson, demanding to know what’s in her bundle.
Was Wyness entering a residence? a rear yard? What had made him suspicious of Jackson, other than that he spotted her at “Four in the Morning”…
Wyness could not have known at the time that Ann Jackson would be found to have an alias – Maria Donaldson – though WHAT NAME she was using at the time of her employment with the Pearses (or Bennett Gosling) is not quite noted. Surely Wenlock had not known her under one name and come across her at the Pearses’ (where he lodged) under another, but which name she used when is anyone’s guess.
That she was indicted under the name ANN JACKSON leads me to believe this was her legal name.
Wenlock’s testimony that he and Bennett (“his master”) “went into the country” can only mean they spent the weekend at Roehampton Grove, before returning to banking duties on Monday. Sister Mary’s diary does not indicate a visit to Suttons that July weekend.
The Prisoner at the Bar was summarily sentenced after a brief self-defense. She was given Ten Years and Transported to Van Diemen’s Land. Ann Jackson was 23-year-old at the time of trial.
Jackson’s Australian history is picked up by the website “Edges of Empire Biographical Dictionary of Convict Women from Beyond the British Isles“, edited by Lucy Frost and Collette McAlpine.
Jackson sailed on the Gilbert Henderson, reaching Van Diemen’s Land on 24 April 1840. Steve Rhodes, in his write-up of her biography, supplies interesting details missing from the curt Old Bailey transcript. Born in South America, she had been raised in London. Rhodes believes her legal name to have been MARIA DONALDSON, and promotes a marriage to one Robert Donaldson with a marital home at 1 Tavistock Street, London. The marriage had produced at least one (living?) child.
Surely it is convict records that accounts for the fascinating PHYSICAL details:
Jackson “was a short woman at 4 feet 9 1/2 inches (146.05 cm) tall, had dark brown hair, hazel eyes and fair complexion, and her freckled nose was inclined to the right.”
Records record only a few personal details of her time in Australia. There’s a “case of misconduct” (no information) on 16 April 1842. The delivery of an illegitimate child a few months later, on 28 July 1842. She married John Sykes, “a free man”, in Hobart on 26 December 1843. Evidently in the marriage registry Sykes is described as a 25-year-old mounted policeman. Given the earlier indication of a marriage, Jackson is incorrectly described as a 26-year-old “spinster”. “There were three children known to be born to Ann Jackson”, writes Rhodes, though I am unsure if this includes the two prior children he had already established or not.
Also produced online is the BOOK, Women Transported: Life in Australia’s Convict Female Factories – a tie-in with a (2008) exhibition. Access the PDF catalogue and its essays by clicking on the picture (above). Essays include Gay Hendricksen’s WOMEN TRANSPORTED – MYTH AND REALITY; Carol Liston’s CONVICT WOMEN – IN THE FEMALE FACTORIES OF NEW SOUTH WALES; and Trudy Cowley’s FEMALE FACTORIES OF VAN DIEMEN’S LAND.
PLEASE NOTE: the website listed on the title page goes to a blog. The correct website address evidently is a “dot org”: https://femalefactory.org.au/ which will take you to the website for Cascades Female Factory (currently – early 2022 – closed for construction of a new History & Interpretation Centre).
Interesting reading in their evocative Brochure. There were five such “factories” in Van Diemen’s Land. And, yes, Ann Jackson’s name appears in the catalogue’s list of names.
By Any Other Name
You might ask, given that I research people with the name of “Smith” – and Christen names like Charles and Mary, what name could possibly give me trouble….
Try: Jane Seymour.
Emma’s sister Fanny Smith was the first to marry a Seymour – the Rev. Richard Seymour the new incumbent to the living of Kinwarton (Warwickshire). They married on 30 October 1834.
The following year, September 1835, brother Spencer Smith married Richard’s sister Frances Seymour.
By 1845, not only had youngest sister Maria Smith married (his 2nd wife) the Rev. Sir John Hobart Culme-Seymour, but the Smith’s widowered brother-in-law Arthur Currie had married the widowed Dora (Seymour) Chester.
It was Maria who gave birth (in January 1851) to the JANE SEYMOUR I thought I was chasing. I had unearthed about a dozen photographs of a little girl and young woman – identified in a couple of albums, plus many more loose cartes-de-visite, which (I thought…) pointed to a certain “future” for the young lady portrayed.
I was wrong!
It’s tough, looking at my photographs of photographs – often done under inauspicious conditions of overhead lighting and cradled bound books – some out of focus; others the best that can be taken of the faded nothingness that now remains. Tough, too, to put together some faces that may be the same person – or some sibling – or someone totally different, just seen from an unusual angle that now has you comparing the straight or down-turned mouth, the curved or shell-like ear, the beak-sharp or the bulbous nose.
Such a one was the picture, only ID’ed on the rear with a date – “1877” – of a mother (presume) and frilly-frocked infant (christening?). The adult sitter looked like Jane Seymour – but cousin Jane never married, had had no children. The nose, here, looked sharper; the hair exhibited an mere half-inch of “fringe” (bangs they cannot be called), when in all other pictures there was only a center part and all hair pulled downwards and back. The face looked thinner, more sculpted, but then the face was bent downward, gazing at the child. The one thing all the adult photos had in comment was a clipped-short “side burn” above the ears – very similar to my own (because the bow of glasses sits right over this area).
Mother-and-Babe remained a “mystery” – for later ‘detection’.
Signature Maria L. Seymour
It was while looking through diaries – predominantly those written by Richard Seymour – for further information on the relationship of Mary Smith and Gaspard Le Marchant Tupper, that I came across mention of Richard’s niece, Jane Seymour.
Mary and Gaspard had married in 1861 – but the engagement was so fraught with angst and doubt, that I had to find out more. What I found out was that they initially had become engaged in 1858. I haven’t found out if they stayed engaged the whole time, or if it was on-off-on again. Although other diaries exist, some I don’t have access to, and Richard’s I have to take painstaking reads through microfilmed handwriting. Letters of the period can be hit or miss – and more have tantalizing hints than full-length histories.
But back to Jane Seymour.
This Jane was not the first “Jane” in the family. Of course – OF COURSE! – there were several, over many generations. Maria’s daughter was a “CULME-SEYMOUR” – the “Culme” coming from Sir John’s first wife. For a while, I thought only Sir John’s “Culme” children used the “Culme” name. Maria’s mail always seemed addressed to “Lady Seymour” (see a letter I’m desperately seeking – and from 1861!). BUT: If I looked closely, Maria and her daughters inserted “C” as part of their signature. But who else could the girl called Jenny Seymour and the young woman identified as Jane Seymour or Miss Seymour have been?
Remember I said that Richard mentioned JANE SEYMOUR in his diary…
In 1858’s diary.
The section that caught my eye mentioned Richard’s “Australian niece Jane Seymour”. She arrived in mid-December, having left Sidney, Australia on September 1st. – Dora (née Seymour) and Arthur Currie picked her up at Gravesend! The very Curries who inhabited High Elms, the estate *now* (June 2021) up for sale.
High Elms, estate of the Arthur Curries.
“Australian Jane” was the only child of Richard’s youngest brother, William (Willy) Seymour, who had emigrated, married an Australian girl in 1849, and died in 1857. I had presumed that she had stay Down-Under.
Nope…
Jane had a convoluted history. Her mother had remarried – at some unknown point – in 1858. This poor mother, born Sarah Avory and now Mrs. Pleydell-Bouverie, died in February 1859. Jane’s step-father died two years later, in February 1861.
But none of that mattered: little Jane Seymour had already sailed for England, arriving hardly two months before her mother’s death – which she could never have known about for another six or eight months.
What I do not know is the WHY Jane Seymour sailed from Sidney that September 1st of 1858!
Had the patriarchal arm reached across the globe, and over her father’s grave, to pluck the little girl from the bosom of her Australian family? Had the mother, stricken by some fatal illness (? – it’s a guess) already, made plans for her soon-to-be-orphaned child, plans that did not involve that child’s step-father? Or, had the Pleydell-Bouveries sought out this change for a child they no longer cared to care for?
Such a mystery remains to be solved, awaiting more information, other diaries, more letters.
One mystery that has been SOLVED involves the BIRTH DATE of Aussie Jane. I have found her baptismal information, which gives her date of birth. Given an 1849 marriage, I had presumed the birth of a first child in 1850. Jane Seymour, however, was born in MAY 1852 – which makes our little passenger a mere SIX YEARS OLD when she sailed from Sidney Harbor to Gravesend – and into the arms and the seemingly eternal care of an aunt she had never set eyes upon before: Dora Currie.
Dora’s step-children, Arthur’s children with his first wife, Charlotte Smith, were growing up – the youngest, Drummond Arthur Currie, had been born in 1840 and would attain his majority in a couple of years. Dora had married – after a long-fought-for marriage to the Rev. William H. Clinton Chester (her family disapproved of his slender means). They had married in August 1837, but by April 1841 Dora was burying her husband. They had had no children. Little Orphan Aussie Jane might have provided an opportunity too good for Dora to pass up. A small child to call her own.
The Curries are a branch of the family with very little archival resources. Charlotte had not lived to old age, but she had daughters – and the Smiths, as a group, seem a family that held very tightly on to items like letters and diaries, portraits and memories. So what happened to the items that Charlotte produced or received, and could figure to have been given over to any or all of her daughters – akin to the family letters amassed by Emma Austen, Fanny Seymour, and Maria Lady Seymour.
As you might guess, anyone with further information, please do contact me!
Richard’s 1859 diary speaks to his meeting the child. He was enchanted with his Australian niece, Jane Seymour.
Faint Faces Found
I’ve been searching for several things lately, and usually come across something completely different in that kind of situation. Friday night proved to be no different.
I’ve been reading through old letters, first from 1840 (to go with a diary I’ve transcribed); then those from 1836 – a momentous, tragic year for the Smiths & Goslings, because of the deaths (by drowning) of Augusta and Henry Wilder, in a boat accident. I have recently come across two *new* letters, written in the aftermath of this family tragedy.
1840 was another year of loss – with the death of sister Charlotte Currie. And it was in the hope of (always a hope!) finding more letters from Charlotte that I began reading letters to Charlotte, written predominantly by eldest sister Augusta Wilder.
It was while looking for any “hit” with Charlotte and Arthur Currie, that I searched for one of several addresses at which Arthur lived – and found that his old home, High Elms (Watford), is currently up for sale! It’s a MASSIVE 14-bedroom (7 bath) Grade II listed house:
Arthur settled here long after Charlotte’s death, bringing their children and his second wife, Dora (née Seymour; the widowed Mrs. Chester). The interiors are stunning (if “empty” looking in these photos). Take a peek now (before the listing disappears) – although the price is liable to keep it on the market for a bit of time – asking £7.5 million (it does come with 10 acres of land).
[Be advised: Arthur Currie of High Elms is far different from General Sir Arthur Currie.]
When High Elms was still called “Garston Manor” (from the 1890s until 2010), it was featured in a 2011 episode of Country House Rescue, the series hosted by Ruth Watson. I must see if I can find that particular episode…
Friday, I had also been trying to locate the diary (sounds like there is only one, but one never knows!) of Jane Eliza Currie – the wife of Captain Mark John Currie, Royal Navy, Arthur’s cousin. The one diary – though (great pity!) I’ve not been able to locate images of its written contents – covers the couple’s voyage in 1829 and stay (through 1832) in Australia — in quite a new settlement at the time, which is why she as well as he comes up in searches. I’ve had a brief look through Smith & Gosling letters and early diaries for Miss Wood (I don’t know if she went by ‘Jane’ or ‘Eliza’ – I find people referring to her by each of those; but what did she call herself??) and/or the Mark Curries Junior. Not successful there. Being out of England until their return in the 1830s, means there’s no hope (or very little) that Arthur and Charlotte would be mentioned by Jane Eliza – but one never knows. It is a new avenue to take a look down. What I have found is located at the Mitchell Library, NSW. And Currie just is not an easy name to search for — so much overtaken by a certain “General Sir”.
I have also been trying to remember who I had found – among the grandchildren? (not sure now) – whose death had been looked into via a coroner’s inquest. An accidental overdose. I remember a woman… Laudanum or Morphine… but the WHO escapes me, as does the date (19th century still? Early 20th century?). I thought maybe one in the Capel Cure family – and that was how I located my *FIND*!
Of Mary Gosling’s three children – Sir Charles Cunliffe Smith; Mary Charlotte Smith; Augusta Elizabeth Smith – two married children of Capel Cure and Frederica Cheney. The Cure siblings make for heartbreaking reading in retrospect – five of the eleven children died before the age of 21. The main seat of the Cures, Blake Hall, is very familiar from the letters and diaries of the Smiths and Goslings. Of course Mary (Lady Smith) never lived to see these marriages of her children – she died in 1842 and the first marriage, Sir Charles Smith to Agnes Cure, occurred in February 1855. The next to marry, in 1857, were younger sister Augusta Smith and the Rev. Lawrence George Capel Cure.
[Elder sister Mary married in 1861, Major Gaspard Le Marchant Tupper, Royal Artillery.]
Since much literature that mentions the Capel Cure children does not mention all of them, I will list them here. You can find them in the 2nd volume of The Visitation of England and Wales (same place the Smiths of Suttons turns up):
- Robert
- Henry (died aged 7)
- Frederica (died aged 10)
- Alfred [the photographer]
- (Rev.) Edward
- Rosamund
- (Rev.) Lawrence [married Augusta Smith]
- Emmeline (died aged 19)
- Agnes [married Sir Charles Smith]
- Charles (died aged 8)
- Frederick (died aged 14)
I have known of the photography work done – early in the “life” of photography – by Alfred Capel Cure. I have come across images of trees or estates – but Friday I spotted a LOT of PEOPLE. And when one album, digitized by UCLA, popped up a photograph of a portrait of “Sir C. Smith” by Ercole (whom I knew to have drawn Lawrence Cure), I slowed to savor each of the gentry portraits in Alfred’s album.
WITH SUCCESS!
A couple of photographs of Charles — whom I often still refer to, as his mother Mary did, as “Little Charles”. Mary, of course, was differentiating husband from son; I, on the other hand, know the son through the mother – and he was a child and teen in Mary’s lifetime. (Charles was born in 1827.) At least one album photograph ID’s him. Also ID’ed in a photograph is “Lady Smith and Miss Cure” – Alfred’s sisters, Agnes and Rosamund. Agnes and/or Rosumond (the only surviving girls) feature in a couple of group portraits, one of which surely includes Lawrence – it so resembles his Ercole portrait.
There are pictures of the exteriors of Suttons, Blake Hall, Badgers (a Cheney estate, which came into Alfred Capel Cure’s possession). So many familiar names. So many unknown faces.
Among the familiar names a faint and faded face identified as Lady Marian Alford. Lady Marianne Compton, as she originally was, was the eldest daughter of Spencer 2nd Marquess of Northampton (Emma’s cousin) and Margaret Clephane. There are a LOT of images – painted and photographed – of Lady Marian (Viscountess Alford) out there.
Alas, no one identified as Mr. and Mrs. Leigh or their children … – which might have unearthed some new images of Emma and James Edward Austen.
But, among the faint and faded, came a duo identified as “the Misses Smith” and dated “Badger, 9 Nov:r 1854“. And I knew I had found something “Completely New”.
I usually have a “feeling” about a *FIND* – including excitement and sureness of the “who” or “what”. I don’t know WHY, but I have almost no feelings on this portrait. Except of loving the sweet faces I see.
Maybe it’s because, named “the Misses Smith” – I’m not sure who is who.
I think the elder sister is standing; the younger sister is seated. The standing sister is smiling, broadly. A ring and what looks to be a charm bracelet dangle are on her visible right hand. Her left hand rests on the chair in which her sister is seated. This seated sister has a quieter look, as if not quite “ready” for the camera. And yet, there is an attractive wistfulness that becomes haunting the more one looks.
When they posed at Badger, Mary Charlotte Smith was soon, at the end of November 1854, to celebrate her 26th birthday. Augusta Elizabeth Smith was a few months past her summer celebration of turning 24-years-old. That it IS them is not in doubt – the diary of their uncle, the Rev. Richard Seymour, notes welcoming them to Kinwarton just after their stay at Badger.
The sepia coloring of the album’s print continues strong, fading only along the lines of the gowns and around their hands. It is a remarkable souvenir of their day, (or stay), at Badger during the time of their brother’s engagement.
- To view the album of Alfred Capel Cure, at UCLA
- To see the single photograph of Mary and Augusta, “the Misses Smith” [click on the link under the words “Image Content”; ignore the misspellings in said “link” & “title”]
Two Teens in the Time of Austen 