Friday June First
Called at the Dickinson's.
Jun 1821
Saturday 2nd
Monday 4th
At home--worked at my article.
Tuesday 5th
Finished my article--planted a great many flowers indeed in the garden.
Wednesday 6th
Heard from Miss Johnson--wrote to Miss Johnson & sent a Copy of the Catalogue to Mr. Clarke--Mr. Dickinson called.
Thursday 7th
At home--heard from Mr. Haydon--wrote to Miss James & Mr. Haydon--Mrs. Dickinson called--had my own sweet dear Molly washed--looked like a snow ball, sweet lamb.
Friday 8th
At home--heard from Miss James, Mrs. Hofland & Eliza Webb--wrote to Eliza Webb, Mrs. Hofland, Miss James & Talfourd.
Saturday 9th
At home--heard from Charles Kuyvett.
Sunday 10th
Monday 11th
Tuesday 12th
Made another catalogue for Miss Johnson, & sent to her with the frill, & wrote to her.
Wednesday 13th
Walked with Granny--heard from Miss Johnson--did a deal of tatting.
Thursday 14th
At home--heard from Mrs. Dickinson--worked in my garden--walked.
Friday 15th
Dear Granny's birthday--called at Farley Hill--Mrs. Dickinson drank tea here--Mrs. Raggett called--Heard from Miss James.
Saturday 16th
At home--heard from Mrs. Hofland.
Sunday 17th
At home--wrote to Miss James.
Monday 18th
Wednesday 20th
Thursday 21st
Friday 22nd
Sunday 24th
Poor dear Flora died--I think of a bite from a great dog--God bless her, poor dear.
Tuesday 26th
Thursday 28th
Gloss of Names Mentioned
Nature
flower
Flowering plants, whether domesticated or wild.
common European adder
- species: Vipera berus berus
- genus: Vipera
- family: Viperidae
Venomous snake widespread throughout Eurasia and the UK. They are not particularly
dangerous to humans; they are not aggressive and bites are seldom fatal. Also called
the cross adderfor the diamond patterns on its back, although melanated individuals may appear entirely
brown-black with no visible patterning. One of three snakes native to the UK; the
other two are nonvenmous: the barred grass snake and the smooth snake. They have adapted
to a wide range of land habitats such as meadows, rough commons and hedgerows, and
the edges of woodlands, although they require complex habitats to support basking,
hunting for small mammals, amphibians, and insects; protection from predators, and
hibernation. The name is derived from the generic word for serpent in Germanic languages, the same term used for snakes and the Devil in the Old Testament.
The myth of the deaf adder has its source in Psalms 58: 4 and became proverbial for someone willfully refusing
to hear by the early 17th century.
dog
- species: Canis familiaris
- genus: Canis
- family: Canidae
First animal species to be domesticated, before the developmment of farming, by hunter-gatherers
more than fifteen thousand years ago. Descended from an ancient, now-extinct wolf
species. Modern dog breeds were codified beginning in the late 19th century, with
the rise of dog shows and set breed standards. Before that time, dogs were classified
by appearance or function and any such may now be considered landrace, traditional, or heritage breeds. More than 50 named dog breeds originated in the
UK. Breeds extant during the first half of the nineteenth century include: many terrier
breeds in a range of sizes and coat types, originally bred to hunt vermin; several
hounds, hunting dogs used to track or chase prey, such as the scenthounds (bloodhounds,
harriers, fox hounds) and the sighthounds (greyhound, Irish Wolfhound, Scottish deerhound);
mastiffs such as the English bulldog, Bullmastiff and English mastiff, used in blood
sports and as guard dogs; sporting dogs used in bird hunting, such as setters and
pointers; and many spaniels, including the Cavalier King Charles, Clumber, Sussex,
English springer and English cocker spaniels. Now-extinct predecessor breeds include:
Staghound, Buckhound, Talbot hound, Old English Bulldog, Norfolk and Tweed water spaniels,
Black and Tan terrier, Cumberland sheepdog, English cur or drover's dog, Curley-coated
retriever, English water spaniel, and English white terrier. Most so-called extinct
breeds actually contributed bloodlines subsumed by later breeds.
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wild strawberry
- species: Fragaria vesca
- genus: Fragaria
- family: Rosaceae
Places
Publications
Foscari: A Tragedy
- Author: #MRM
- Date: 1826
Persons, Personas, and Characters
Miss Johnson
- Johnson Miss
Friend of Mitford’s. Unmarried
sister of Mr. Johnson. Mitford helps her sort out the books that are part of
her brother’s estate, according to her letter of 1 July
1821. More research
needed..
Ann Body
- Body Ann
A local farmer of Shinfield, farmed at Hyde end farm. Listed among the traders of Shinfield village and parish in 1847 and 1854 in the
Post Office Directory of Berkshire
, and noted by Needham on a list of local tradespeople.
George Mitford
- George Mitford Esq.
- George Midford
- Hexham, Northumberland, England
- Three Mile Cross, Shinfield, Berkshire, England
Father of Mary Rusell Mitford, George Mitford was the son of Francis Midford, surgeon, and Jane Graham. The family name is sometimes recorded as Midford. Immediate family called him by nicknames including Drum, Tod, and Dodo. He was a member of a minor branch of the Mitfords of Mitford Castle in Northumberland.
Although later sources would suggest that he was a graduate of the University of Edinburgh
medical school, there is no evidence that he obtained a medical degree and he did
not generally refer to himself as Dr. Mitford, preferring to style himself Esq.. In 1784, he is listed in a Hampshire directory as surgeon (medicine) of Alresford. His father and grandfather worked as apothecary-surgeons and it seems likely that
he served a medical apprenticeship with family members.
He married Mary Russell on October 17, 1785 at New Alresford, Hampshire. On the marriage allegation papers, both gave their addresses as Old Alresford; they later came to live
at Broad Street in New Alresford. Their only child to live to adulthood,
Mary Russell Mitford, was born two years
later on December 16, 1787 at New
Alresford, Hampshire. He assisted Mitford's literary career by representing her interests in London and elsewhere with theater
owners and publishers. He was active in Whig politics and later served as a local
magistrate. He coursed greyhounds with his friend James Webb.
Edward Daniel Clarke
- Edward Daniel Clarke
- Dr. Clarke
- Professor of Mineralogy at Cambridge University
- Willingdon, Sussex, England
- London, England
Traveller, writer, and naturalist. Author of
Travels in Various Countries of Europe, Asia and Africa.
Charles Dickinson
- Dickinson Charles
- Mr. Dickinson
- Pickwick Lodge, Corsham, Wiltshire, England
- Farley Hill, near Swallowfield, Berkshire, England
Friend of the Mitford family. He was the son of Vikris Dickinson and Elizabeth Marchant. The Dickinson family
were Quakers who lived in the vicinity of Bristol, Gloucestershire. On August 3, 1807, he married Catherine Allingham at St Giles, South Mimms, Middlesex. They lived at Farley Hill, near Swallowfield,
Berkshire, where their daughter Frances was born, and where the Mitfords visited them.
Charles Dickinson owned a private press he employed to print literary works by his
friends (See letters to Elford from March 13, 1819 and June 21, 1820). He wrote and
published an epic poem in sixty-six cantos, The Travels of Cyllenius, in 1795. Upon his uncle's death, Charles Dickinson inherited the considerable wealth
his extended family had amassed in the West Indies.
Haydon Benjamin Robert
- Plymouth, England
- London
Benjamin Robert Haydon was a painter educated at the
Royal Academy, who was famous for contemporary,
historical, classical, biblical, and mythological scenes, though tormented by
financial difficulties and incarceration. He painted William Wordsworth's portrait in 1842 and
painted a cameo of Keats in his epic canvas
Christ's Entry into Jerusalem(1814-20). MRM was introduced to him at his London studio in the spring of
1817, and Sir William Elford was a
mutual friend, and Haydon’s own acquaintances included several prominent
British Romantic literary figures. He completed
The Raising of Lazarus in
1823
. He wrote a diary and an autobiography, both of
which were published only posthumously, and he committed suicide in 1846.
George Paston's
Little Memoirs of the Nineteenth
Century (1893) contends that Mitford was
asked to edit Haydon's memoir, but
declined.
Elizabeth James
- Elizabeth Mary James
- Miss James
- Bath, Somerset, England
- 3 Pembroke Villas, Richmond, Surrey, England
Close friend and correspondent of Mary Russell Mitford. She was the eldest daughter of Thomas Webb and Susanna Haycock. Her father
died in 1818 and her mother in 1835. After her parents’ deaths, she lived with
her two younger sisters, Emily and Susan, in Green Park Buildings, Bath,
Walcot, Somerset; High Street, Mortlake, Surrey; and 3 Pembroke Villas,
Richmond, Surrey. According to Coles,
referring to Mitford’s diary, letters were also addressed to her at Bellevue,
Lower Road, Richmond (Coles 26). She was buried at St. Mary Magdalene, Richmond,
Surrey. In the 1841 census, she is listed as living on independent means; in the 1851
census, as landholder; in the 1861 census, she as railway
shareholder.
Mrs. Dickinson
- Catherine Allingham Dickinson
- Middlesex, England
- St. Marylebone, Middlesex, England
Catherine Allingham was the daughter of Thomas Allingham. She married Charles Dickinson
on August 2, 1807 at St. Giles, South Mimms, Middlesex. They lived in Swallowfield, where their daughter Frances was born, and where they were visited by the Mitford family. According to Mitford, Catherine Dickinson was fond of match-making among her friends
and acquaintances. (See
Mitford's February 8th, 1821 letter to Elford
. Her husband Charles died in 1827, when her daughter was seven. Source: L'Estrange).
Molly
Mitford's dog, whom she describes in a letter of 1820-11-27 as a pretty little Spaniel with long curling hair--so white & delicate & ladylike.
Barbara Wreaks Hofland
- Hofland Wreaks Barbara
- Yorkshire, England
- Richmond-on-Thames
Novelist and writer of children’s books popular in England and
America, Barbara Hofland was a native of Sheffield,
Yorkshire, where she published poems from July 1794 in the local
newspaper, The Sheffield Iris. Her first
marriage to Thomas Bradshawe Hoole left her widowed and in
poverty, raising a son, Frederic, on her own, and she supported herself by
publishing poems and children’s books, and by running a girl’s school in
Harrogate. second marriage was to the artist
Thomas Christopher Hofland. (Source:
ODNB)
Eliza Webb
- Webb Elizabeth Eliza
- Wokingham, Berkshire, England
- Sandgate, Kent, England
Elizabeth Webb, called Eliza, was a neighbor and friend of Mary Russell Mitford. Eliza Webb was the youngest daughter of James Webb and Jane Elizabeth
Ogbourn. She was baptized privately on March 3, 1797, and publicly on June 8, 1797 in
Wokingham, Berkshire. She is the sister of Mary Elizabeth and Jane Eleanor
Webb. In 1837 she married Henry Walters, Esq., in Wokingham, Berkshire. In
Needham’s papers, he
notes from the Berkshire Directorythat she lived on
Broad street, presumably in Wokingham. Source: See
Needham’s letter to Roberts on November
27, 1953
.
Thomas Noon Talfourd
- Talfourd Thomas Noon
- Reading, Berkshire, England
- Stafford, Staffordshire, England
Close friend, literary mentor, and frequent correspondent of Mary Russell Mitford. A native of Reading, Talfourd was educated at the Reading’s newly-established Mill Hill school, a
dissenting academy, from 1808 to 1810. He attended Dr. Richard Valpy’s Reading School from 1810 to 1812. His career in law began with a legal apprenticeship with Joseph
Christy, special pleader, in
1817. He was called to the bar in London in 1821 and ultimately earned a
D.C.L. (Doctor of Civil Laws) from Oxford on June 20, 1844. While
establishing his practice as a barrister and special pleader, he worked as
legal correspondent for The
Times, reporting on the Oxford
Circuit, and also continued his literary interests. After 1833,
he was appointed Serjeant at Law, as well as a King’s and Queen’s Counsel.
He was elected and served as Member of Parliament for
Reading
from 1835 to 1841 and from 1847 to 1849
; he served with Charles Fyshe
Palmer, Charles Russell, and
Francis Piggott. Highlights of his political and
legal career included introducing the first copyright bill
into Parliament in 1837 (for which action Charles
Dickens dedicated Pickwick Papers
to him) and defending Edward
Moxon’s publication of Percy Shelley’s
Queen Mab in 1841
. He was appointed Queen’s Serjeant in 1846
and Judge of Common Pleas in 1849
, at which post he served until his death in 1854. He
was knighted in 1850
.
Talfourd’s literary works include his plays
Ion (1835),
The Athenian Captive (1837) and
Glencoe, or the Fate of the
MacDonalds(1839).
Joanna Baillie
- Baillie Joanna
- Bothwell, Lanarkshire, Scotland
- Hampstead, London, England
Successful playwright, authored Poems: Wherein It Is Attempted to Describe Certain Views of Nature and of Rustic Manners (1790) and more than twenty-five plays. Her best-known works are included in
Plays on the Passions (1798) and were later collected in
The Dramatic and Poetical Works of Joanna Baillie(1851). The sister of the physicians and scientists John and William Hunter and the daughter
of a Professor of Divinity at the University of Glasgow, Baillie belonged to an important
literary-scientific family that operated as a kinship coterie.
William Lisles Bowles
- Bowles William Lisle
- King's Sutton, Northamptonshire, England
- Salisbury, Wiltshire, England
Clergyman and poet, known for his sonnets as well as for his long poems including
The Missionary published 1813
,
The Grave of the Last Saxon published 1822
and
St. John in Patmos published 1833
. Bowles was an acquaintance of Mitford's father for over thirty years. Bowles was a key figure in the Romantic-era sonnet revival.
As a literary critic, Bowles ignited the so-called Pope-Bowles controversy, a pamphlet
war about Alexander Pope's moral authority and literary significance, upon which Mitfordcomments in her letters.
Mitford Russell Mary
- Mrs. Mitford
- Ashe, Hampshire, England
- Three Mile Cross, parish of Shinfield, Berkshire, England
Mary Russell was the youngest child of
the Rev. Dr. Richard Russell and
his second wife, Mary Dicker; she was born about 1750 in Ashe, Hampshire. (Her
birth date is as yet unverified; period sources indicate that she was ten years
older than her husband George, born in 1760.) Through the Russells, she was a
distant relation of the Dukes of Bedford (sixth creation, 1694). She had two
siblings, Charles William and Frances; both predeceased her and their parents,
which resulted in Mary Russell inheriting
her family’s entire estate upon her mother’s death in 1785. Her father’s rectory in Ashe was only a
short distance from Steventon, and so she was acquainted
with the young Jane Austen. She married
George Mitford or Midford on October 17, 1785 at New Alresford,
Hampshire. On the marriage allegation papers, both gave their
addresses as Old Alresford. Their only daughter,
Mary Russell Mitford, was born two years
later on December 16, 1787 at New
Alresford, Hampshire. Mary
Russell died on January 2, 1830 at
Three Mile Cross in the parish of Shinfield,
Berkshire. Her obituary in the 1830
New
Monthly Magazine gives New Year’s day as the date of her death.
Mrs. Raggett
- Raggett Mrs.
Spouse of Mrs. Raggett. In Mitford's Journal in 1819, she indicates that Mrs. Raggett is her cousin, who offers her the position of companion, but she refuses to leave her father George. Forename unknown. Dates unknown.
Dr. Richard Valpy
- Valpy Richard Doctor of Divinity
- Dr. Valpy
- St. John’s, Jersey, Channel Islands
- Reading, Berkshire, England
Richard Valpy (the fourth of that name) was the eldest son of Richard Valpy
[III] and Catherine Chevalier. He was a friend and literary mentor to
Mary Russell Mitford. He matriculated at
Pembroke College, Oxford University on April 1, 1773, aged eighteen, as a
Morley scholar. He received from Oxford a B.A. (1776), M.A. (1784), B.D.
& D.D. (1792). He took orders in the Church of England in 1777. Richard
Valpy served as Second Master at Bury School, Bury, Huntindonshire from 1771
to 1781, and was also collated to the rectory of Stradishall, Suffolk, in
1787. He became the Headmaster at Reading School, Reading, Berkshire, in
1781 and served until 1830, at which time he turned the Headmastership over
to his youngest son Francis E. J. Valpy and continued in semi-retirement
until his death in 1836. During his tenure as Headmaster of Reading Grammar School for boys over
the course of fifty years, he expanded the boarding school and added new
buildings. He is the author of numerous published works, including Greek and
Latin textbooks, sermons, volumes of poetry, and adaptations of plays such
as Shakespeare’s King John and Sheridan’s The Critic. His Elements of
Greek Grammar, Elements of Latin Grammar,,Greek
Delectus and Latin Delectus, printed and published by
his son A. J. Valpy, were all much
used as school texts throughout the nineteenth century. Valpy’s students
performed his own adaptations of Greek, Latin, and English plays for the
triennial visitations and the play receipts went to charitable
organizations. Valpy enlisted Mitford to write reviews of the productions
for the Reading Mercury. In 1803, his
adaptation of Shakespeare’s King John was performed at Covent Garden
Theatre.
Richard Valpy was married twice and had twelve children, eleven of whom
lived to adulthood. His first wife was Martha
Cornelia de Cartaret; Richard and Martha were married about
1778 and they had one daughter, Martha Cartaretta Cornelia.
His first wife Martha died about 1780 and he
married Mary Benwell of Caversham, Oxfordshire on May 30, 1782. Together they had six sons and
five daughters and ten of their eleven children survived to adulthood.
Richard Valpy and Mary Benwell’s sons were Richard Valpy (the
fifth of that name), Abraham John
Valpy, called John; Gabriel Valpy,
Anthony Blagrove Valpy; and Francis Edward
Jackson Valpy. His daughters were Mary Ann Catherine Valpy; Sarah
Frances Valpy, called Frances or Fanny; Catherine Elizabeth Blanch Valpy;
Penelope Arabella Valpy; and
Elizabeth Charlotte Valpy, who died as an
infant.
Richard Valpy died on March 28,
1836 in Reading,
Berkshire, and is buried in All Souls cemetery, Kensal
Green, London. Dr. Valpy’s students placed a marble bust of him
in St. Lawrence’s church, Reading, Berkshire, after his
death. John Opie painted Dr. Valpy’s portrait. See .Mrs. Crowther
- Crowther Mrs.
A correspondent of Mary Russell Mitford in 1855. Forename unknown. Dates unknown.