|
BACKGROUND RESEARCH FOR A DIFFERENT KIND OF WOMAN
Additional reading about the people, events and social customs featured in A Different Kind of Woman |
|
Five books I recommend if you want to know more about the long 18th century. My post at Shepherd Books.
Click here to read more about Peterloo.
Click here to read about Percy Bysshe Shelley. The Luddites There are some excellent resources about the Luddites available on-line, including a semi-novelised history of their movement, entitled The Rising of the Luddites: Chartists and Plug-Drawers, by Frank Peel, first published in 1880. Benjamin Walker was one of four young croppers (men who sheared, or cropped, wool fabric to smooth it) who ambushed a mill owner in Huddersfield in 1812 and shot him. The cold-blooded murder of William Horsfall cost the Luddites much public sympathy. |
|
Benjamin Walker confessed and testified against the other three. He really did write to the Prince Regent and he did accost a stranger in the streets of London (not Mr. Orme) asking for help to get the reward he felt he had been promised. Deputy-undersecretary Henry Hobhouse wrote the response which I quote in the novel.
I made up the detail about Benjamin Walker's wandering eye and I don’t know what colour his hair was. One account that I have seen states that Walker did return to his home town, where he died, miserable and shunned
I made up the detail about Benjamin Walker's wandering eye and I don’t know what colour his hair was. One account that I have seen states that Walker did return to his home town, where he died, miserable and shunned
Regency Spies
The British government did hire informers to infiltrate radical working men’s movements. One notorious example was William Oliver, who travelled widely through England, contacting local working men’s groups and assuring them that a mass uprising was imminent throughout the kingdom. He was suspected of being more than a spy, but of actually being an agent provocateur, although the term had not entered the English language in Regency times. Their history is recounted in Regency Spies: Secret Histories of Britain’s Rebels & Revolutionaries, by Sue Wilkes.
The British government did hire informers to infiltrate radical working men’s movements. One notorious example was William Oliver, who travelled widely through England, contacting local working men’s groups and assuring them that a mass uprising was imminent throughout the kingdom. He was suspected of being more than a spy, but of actually being an agent provocateur, although the term had not entered the English language in Regency times. Their history is recounted in Regency Spies: Secret Histories of Britain’s Rebels & Revolutionaries, by Sue Wilkes.
|
Would you turn down the man you loved for your family? Fanny has a difficult choice to make. It might seem unrealistic to ask someone to sacrifice her own happiness for the sake of their family. As historical mystery author William Savage points out, marriage in the past was part of a “wider social contract” between two families, not necessarily a love match between two people. Marriage “was more a matter of ensuring provision for the future of an extended family than something of interest only to the two people involved.” |
Surrey Gaol in Southwark
Richard and the East India Company
The King’s Arms public house was a real establishment. Laura Maiklem, who writes as the London Mudlark, found one of their pottery jugs on the Thames foreshore I picked up valuable details about the Naval service of the East India Company from E. Kelbe Chatterton’s The Old East Indiaman, also known as A World for the Taking. Weird weather
Between 1300 and 1870, Europe and North America experienced much colder winters than today. This period is now known as the Little Age Ice. In some years, the crops failed, people died of starvation, and the Thames froze. I only mention it in passing, but the summer of 1816 was known as the Year Without a Summer. That was when Mary Shelley famously wrote Frankenstein by the shores of Lake Geneva at Lord Byron's house party. The heavy London fog of course was made worse by the use of coal for heating in London. London was very grimy and smoky at this time. Naturally people speculated as to the cause of the changing climate, as they do today. |
Freedom of the Press
During this period in England, the government enacted severe measures against freedom of the press. William Cobbett, an important figure in radical politics and journalism, was jailed for criticising the flogging of an English soldier. Leigh Hunt and his brother, the publishers of a reform-minded journal, were found guilty of libel after they published a rude take-down of the Prince Regent in 1812. William Gibson’s indictment at his trial is taken from the indictment of Henry Hunt in 1820. Surrey Gaol Leigh Hunt was sentenced to two years in prison in February of 1813; to provide comfortable accommodation for William Gibson. I paroled Hunt a little early so Gibson could move in to his old apartments. I read about Leigh Hunt’s unusual prison cell in Daisy Hay’s entertaining history Young Romantics: the Shelleys, Byrons and other Tangled Lives. 
|
|
Frost Fairs
The river Thames sometimes froze solid, especially around London Bridge where the stone archways slowed down the flow of the river. The old London Bridge was demolished in 1832, and since then river has not frozen. The poem about the Frost Fair was actually for sale on the river, but I don’t know who wrote it. |
|
Dear Prudence
Miss Prudence Imlay, the book-seller, is my tribute to kind-hearted Fanny Imlay, the natural daughter of Mary Wollstonecraft and a man named Gilbert Imlay. Imlay abandoned Mary and her daughter. Mary attempted suicide by throwing herself off Putney Bridge, but she was rescued. After Mary Wollstonecraft's death, Fanny lived with her step-father William Godwin. Then he re-married a woman with two children and they had a son. There were five children in the household and no child had the same set of parents! More about Godwin and his second wife here. Tragically, Fanny herself committed suicide, some people think because of her unrequited love for Shelley. She was the plain sister of the family. Her half-sister Mary and her step-sister Claire ran off with Shelley and she was left at home. |
|
French Prisoners of War
The French prisoners at Stapleton Prison near Bristol were indeed caught selling obscene items by Mr. Birtle of the Bristol Society for the Suppression of Vice, and were also prohibited from selling plait—braided straw used to make hats—because the local people, who were of course also the poorest of the working class, complained about the competition. Robert Louis Stevenson’s novel St. Ives: Being the Adventures of a French Prisoner in England, supplemented my research into Stapleton Prison near Bristol. The Society for the Suppression of Vice was a real organisation and their reports are available on-line. In addition to combating public immorality, they brought some prosecutions against publishers. In a country without police officers, it was up to private citizens to bring wrong-doers before the magistrates. In 1821, the Society shut down a re-printing of Percy Bysshe Shelley’s radical utopian poem Queen Mab. |
William Wilberforce, abolitionist and reformer of public morals
|
|
Belfast and Waterloo
The English celebrated the victory at Waterloo, but I was unable to find any record of a celebration in Belfast, despite the help of kind librarians. The mayor of Belfast in 1815 was Thomas Verner and he was actually called the Sovereign of Belfast but that would have been confusing, and would have required some awkward exposition where somebody explains to somebody else that the mayor is called the sovereign, so I just called him the mayor. Belfast’s Society for Promoting Knowledge met at the White Linen Hall where they held their library. Linen was an important source of the town’s prosperity. The Linen Hall no longer exists but the private library does—it is the oldest private lending library in Ireland and is open to the public. It is known as the Linen Hall Library. I even had the pleasure of communicating with the librarians when researching this book. The President’s speech at the annual dinner is adapted from a speech given in Manchester by William Hulton, a justice of the peace, in 1817, on the subject of the English constitution. The drunken Captain Templeton is quoting from the Book of Proverbs. Edmund has put up with a lot from his wife Mary. So why do they stay married? In England at that time, divorce was very expensive. One might acquire a legal separation from one’s wife, but you actually needed Parliament’s permission to re-marry! Each individual case was discussed in the House of Lords! |
The House of Lords
|
And since Edmund took Mary back even after she had committed adultery with Lord Elsham, perhaps he might not have gotten a divorce, even if he had asked for one, because the Lords would have concluded that he condoned the adultery.
Even though the divorce rate was almost non-existent back then, and accessible only to the wealthy, there were of course unhappy marriages, runaway husbands and wives, and bigamists galore in Regency England. Edmund, however, being a clergyman, was stuck between a rock and a hard place.
Even though the divorce rate was almost non-existent back then, and accessible only to the wealthy, there were of course unhappy marriages, runaway husbands and wives, and bigamists galore in Regency England. Edmund, however, being a clergyman, was stuck between a rock and a hard place.
Bazaars The bazaar that Fanny establishes to help women sell their “items of domestic manufacture” is based on a real innovation that was created about that time which enabled people to open a business with little risk because they didn't have to rent an entire shop. Women who wanted to rent a booth at the bazaar had to provide references as to their moral character. An 1816 book called The Bazaar, its Origin, Nature and Objects (that is, its purpose) Explained, listed several bazaars of this type that were opening up around London. The author, John Nightingale, credits philanthropist John Trotter with opening the first bazaar, in SoHo. There is a very quaint 1818 children's book about the SoHo bazaar. The print to the left showing a lady selling baskets is from the children's book. |
Antibiotics
Sam Price lost his arm because of blood poisoning from a minor scratch. Before penicillin, people could die of a little scratch, if the wound became infected. President Calvin Coolidge’s son died in 1924 from an infected blister on his toe after playing tennis. |
Photo credit Mark Burnett, Wiki Commons, Hadrian's Wall near Greenhead
The Clay boys
The Clay boys come to Mansfield Academy after their mother, Penelope Clay, runs away with William Walter Elliot, from Austen’s novel Persuasion. "he in fact intended his school to serve those pupils whose friends, for various considerations… – in Austen’s time, the term “friends” also was used when speaking of family, as people who had a stake in someone’s well-being. 
|
Hadrian's Wall
Perhaps the two Williams took a copy of William Hutton’s 1801 book A History of the Roman Wall with them on their walking tour. Hutton walked the length of the Wall when he was 78! I would have liked to use lots of detail from this interesting book, but space did not permit. In those days, the wall was also known as Severus's wall, who is the Roman Emperor that Julia or Maria mentions in Mansfield Park when they are talking to their Aunt Norris about how ignorant Fanny is. The School
Jane Austen’s father, a clergyman, tutored boys at their home in Steventon. This was my inspiration for the school, with maybe a dash of Louisa May Alcott’s Little Men. Claire Tomalin’s biography of Jane Austen tells of her great-grandmother, Elizabeth Austen, who was left in a Mrs. Dashwood-like situation and found a position as a Matron and housekeeper in a school which provided an education for her many children, including George, who was Austen’s grandfather. This generation, and the one following, were--like the Prices of Mansfield Park--born to struggle and endure. Mary Bellingham
Mary Bellingham (her real name was Mary, not Sarah) was “left totally destitute” after her husband was executed for assassinating the prime minister. Her fictional involvement with Fanny is told in A Marriage of Attachment. Little is known about her life subsequently. Author David C. Hanrahan thinks she may have reverted to her maiden name of Neville. A descendent of John Bellingham became a British MP and now sits in the House of Lords. Funerals
Congestive heart failure, which causes fluids to accumulate in the body, was called dropsy in Regency times. No doubt people got Type II diabetes then, just as they do today. In Regency times, women did not customarily attend funerals. For example Cassandra Austen did not attend her sister Jane's funeral. I expect that women were thought to be too emotionally and mentally frail to go to funerals. |
Food riots
In modern times, Americans spend less than ten percent of the household budget on groceries. Food is abundant and cheap, compared with the past, and of course refrigeration and global shipping have brought variety and out-of-season fruits and vegetables to our diets.
In Regency times, most of a poor family’s wages would go for food, and a wife whose husband was a heavy drinker was placed in a dire situation. The high price of bread occasionally led to riots.
The chief reason for the high cost of bread was the infamous Corn Laws which restricted the importation of cheap grain. By “corn,” we should understand all grain crops, including wheat and barley.
In modern times, Americans spend less than ten percent of the household budget on groceries. Food is abundant and cheap, compared with the past, and of course refrigeration and global shipping have brought variety and out-of-season fruits and vegetables to our diets.
In Regency times, most of a poor family’s wages would go for food, and a wife whose husband was a heavy drinker was placed in a dire situation. The high price of bread occasionally led to riots.
The chief reason for the high cost of bread was the infamous Corn Laws which restricted the importation of cheap grain. By “corn,” we should understand all grain crops, including wheat and barley.
|
In-laws: As I’ve noted in the second volume of the Mansfield Trilogy, the term ‘in-law’ was not really in use at this time, but to save confusion, I have referred to mother and daughter-in-law throughout.
|
First Names:
Jane Austen does not always tell us the first names of her characters, though we can sometimes guess, because first-born sons and first-born daughters are very often named after their parents. Thus Tom Bertram is the heir to Sir Thomas Bertram, Lady Bertram’s first daughter takes her name, and Fanny’s mother is Frances. It seems safe to suppose that Fanny’s father’s name was William because his oldest son is named William. I imagine that Maria Bertram Crawford Orme’s daughter is also a Maria.
Some children were named in honour of other relatives. Jane Austen fans have surmised that Mrs. Norris’s first name must be Elizabeth, because little Betsey Price is her god-daughter (for whom she does nothing). In my story, Mary Crawford Bertram names her second son “Cyrus Crawford Bertram,” in hopes of flattering the Admiral.
In my short story about Penelope Clay which is included in the Quill Collective anthology Rational Creatures, I named her two sons Henry and John, Henry after the late Mr. Clay (I chose the name) and John after Penelope’s father, John Shepherd.
However, this re-use of names in succeeding generations can be confusing for the reader. That’s why I did not name Edmund’s first-born son after him. His mother named him Thomas, which emphasizes the point that he is the heir apparent, after Edmund, to the Bertram baronetcy because older brother Tom, the current heir, is a confirmed bachelor.
Mary’s half-sister Mrs. Grant’s first name is not supplied in Mansfield Park. I named her Anna. My character Lady Delingpole’s first name is Imogen. Edmund and Mary’s daughter is named “Anna Imogen” to honour both of them, and they are her god-parents.
No-one knows how Elena Adelaide, Shelley’s “Neapolitan ward” got her name. As Miranda Seymour, author of a major biography of Mary Shelley, points out, Adelaide “was a name which belonged to neither the Shelley nor the Godwin family trees.” I named her after Mary Crawford’s mother (I gave her the name Elena) and the Princess Adelaide, who was much in the news at that time as the newest Royal bride.
Perhaps Fanny will name her first daughter Harriet, in honour of Mrs. Butters.
Jane Austen does not always tell us the first names of her characters, though we can sometimes guess, because first-born sons and first-born daughters are very often named after their parents. Thus Tom Bertram is the heir to Sir Thomas Bertram, Lady Bertram’s first daughter takes her name, and Fanny’s mother is Frances. It seems safe to suppose that Fanny’s father’s name was William because his oldest son is named William. I imagine that Maria Bertram Crawford Orme’s daughter is also a Maria.
Some children were named in honour of other relatives. Jane Austen fans have surmised that Mrs. Norris’s first name must be Elizabeth, because little Betsey Price is her god-daughter (for whom she does nothing). In my story, Mary Crawford Bertram names her second son “Cyrus Crawford Bertram,” in hopes of flattering the Admiral.
In my short story about Penelope Clay which is included in the Quill Collective anthology Rational Creatures, I named her two sons Henry and John, Henry after the late Mr. Clay (I chose the name) and John after Penelope’s father, John Shepherd.
However, this re-use of names in succeeding generations can be confusing for the reader. That’s why I did not name Edmund’s first-born son after him. His mother named him Thomas, which emphasizes the point that he is the heir apparent, after Edmund, to the Bertram baronetcy because older brother Tom, the current heir, is a confirmed bachelor.
Mary’s half-sister Mrs. Grant’s first name is not supplied in Mansfield Park. I named her Anna. My character Lady Delingpole’s first name is Imogen. Edmund and Mary’s daughter is named “Anna Imogen” to honour both of them, and they are her god-parents.
No-one knows how Elena Adelaide, Shelley’s “Neapolitan ward” got her name. As Miranda Seymour, author of a major biography of Mary Shelley, points out, Adelaide “was a name which belonged to neither the Shelley nor the Godwin family trees.” I named her after Mary Crawford’s mother (I gave her the name Elena) and the Princess Adelaide, who was much in the news at that time as the newest Royal bride.
Perhaps Fanny will name her first daughter Harriet, in honour of Mrs. Butters.