Feb 1820
Monday Tuesday 1st
Wednesday 2nd
At home--went Firtopping--got a great many--fed my Bobbies--read Spence's Anecdotes--very
good indeed--& wrote another Postscript to Sir
William Elford--read likewise the
Eclectic & British
Reviews.
Thursday 3rd
At home--went firtopping--got a great many--fed my Bobbies
in the Plantations--read The Man in the Moon famous & the Memoirs of the Margravine of Bareith
Friday 4th
Saturday 5th
Sunday 6th
At home--wrote to Mr. Palmer enclosing my letter to Sir William--rode with Drum to Farley
Hill--saw Mrs.
Dickinson--Mrs.
AllinghamMr. Rigby & the Miss
Parfitts--came home to
dinner--a pleasant morning--read Anastasius--very
good.
Monday 7th
At home--wrote to Mrs. Hofland--Lucy finished my new black bombazine gown--Drum went coursing, killed 4 hares & a rabbit--readAnastasius--very fine indeed.
Tuesday 8th
Sent a hare to Mrs.
Hofland--gave one to Mrs.
Havell--went firtopping--got a great
many--read Anastasius.
Wednesday 9th
Went firtopping & wooding
with Granny & Lucy in the plantation
by poor Mossy's grave--got a great quantity
of wood & firtops--read
Windham's
speeches.
Thursday 10th
Went to Reading with Drum--called on the Brookes, Newberys, Tuppens & Valpys--dined at the Jolliffes--Mrs. Maddison,
Harry Marsh & Mr. Sherwood came in the evening--excellent
dinner--very pleasant day--corrected some proofs of Mrs. Jolliffe's little
Tales--came home at night.
Friday 11th
Monday 14th
Tuesday 15th
Wrote to Miss James--sent her a hare--went wooding with Drum & the pets--read Delphine--much too dismal--planted some sweet Williams on dear Mossy's
grave.
Wednesday 16th
Heard from Miss Eliza Webb, Miss James & Mrs.
Hofland--wrote to Sir William
Elford--read the First Volume
of the Tales of Fancy containing the Shipwreck by Miss Burney--good--& Windham's
Speeches good.
Thursday the 17th 1820
Wrote to Eliza Webb--went into Reading with Drum--called at the Jolliffes--Newberys--Sherwoods--Whites--Valpys (witnessed the dear
Drs.
Will)--saw Mr.
Dundas who sent off my letter to Sir
William, & a great many people. Came home to dinner & read
Mme. Necker de
Saussure's Notice sur la caractere et les ecrits de Madame de
Staël--which is good enough.
Friday 18th
At home--went wooding with dear Granny in the
lower Plantation--got a great
deal--read the Eskdale Herdboy (good) &
wrote to Mrs. Hofland.
Saturday 19th
At home--went wooding with dear Granny in the
lower Plantation--wrote to
Miss James & Mrs. Dickinson--read Windham's
Speeches--very good.
Sunday 20th
At home--Dear Drum went to Town in the snow--heard from Mrs.
Dickinson--wrote to Mrs.
Dickinson--read Dudley--very good.
Tuesday 22nd
At home--heard from dear Drum & Miss
James--fed my Bobbies--wrote to dear
Drum & Miss Rogers for Miss
James--read Dudley.
Wednesday 23rd
Thursday 24th
At home--heard from dear Drum & Miss
Rogers--wrote to Mrs.
Dickinson (to tell her of the birth of Mrs. Woodburn's boy) &
to Miss James--read Riley's
narrative of the Loss of the Brig
Commerce--interesting
but Munchausenish.
Friday 25th
Saturday 26th
Sunday 27th
Monday 28th
At home--Dear Drum went into Reading for the Grand Jury--went wooding
in the lower plantation with dear
Granny--fed my Bobbies--read Authentic Account of the
French Revolution--interesting.
Tuesday 29th
At home--heard from Drum--dear Granny went into Reading--wrote to Drum &
to Dr. Harness--fed my Bobbies--Mrs. Valpy &
the Miss Valpys called--went firtopping in the
plantation--got a great many--fed my bobbies there--read No Fiction--sad
methodistical stuff--Heard from Drum
again--who went to London from the Grand
Jury.
Gloss of Names Mentioned
Nature
fir
- species: Abies alba
- genus: Abies
- family: Pinaceae
Evergreen coniferous trees found through much of North and Central America, Europe,
Asia, and North Africa. Unlike other conifers, firs bear erect cones that are raised
above the branches like candles; at maturity, the cones disintegrate to release winged
seeds. One of Mitford’s favorite foraging trees; she calls her collecting activity fir topping. Mitford would likely have been familiar with the European silver fir, which was
brought to England in the 17th century. Other types of firs such as Douglas firs and
noble firs, native to North America and used as Christmas trees, were introduced to
the UK in the nineteenth century.
robin redbreast
- species: Erithacus rubecula
- genus: Erithacus
- family: Muscicapidae
Small songbird, native to Europe, now considered a type of Old World flycatcher. In
Mitford's time, believed to be part of the thrush family, along with nightingales.
Not to be confused with the American robin, a new World thrush, this bird is sometimes
referred to as an English robin in North America. Frequently referenced in British folk tales and popular culture,
the bird became associated with the Christmas holiday in the mid-nineteenth century.
The bird's name derives from the male forename Robin or Robert, which led to nicknames
of Bob and Bobby. Robins in Great Britain are generally less wary of humans than their counterparts
in continental Europe. Mitford calls the tame robins she feeds her bobbies.
brown hare
- species: Lepus europaeus
- genus: Lepus
- family: Leporidae
Hares and jackrabbits are wild members of the rabbit family. Brown hares are small,
furry mammals with golden brown fur with white underbellies and tails and black-tipped
ears. They have longer ears and more powerful legs than European rabbits and live
alone or in pairs, rather than in groups. Thought to be introduced into Britain from
Eurasia with the Romans or earlier.
rabbit
- species: Oryctolagus cuniculus
- genus: Oryctolagus
- family: Leporidae
Small, grey-brown furry mammal that lives in groups in networks of underground burrows.
Same species as domesticated rabbits, and raised for meat, fur, and as companion animals.
Traditionally the fur has been felted for hats as well as used to line garments. The
meat was an important staple in the diet of the poorer classes, purchased, hunted
or trapped, sometimes in violation of game and enclosure laws enacted from the 18th
century forward. Prefer grasslands with nearby treelines or hedges. Native to the
Iberian peninsula and southern France, but has been widely introduced elsewhere. UK
rabbits are believed to have come with the Normans and populations increased during
the eighteenth-century with changing agricultural methods such as predator control
and field crop farming.
flower
Flowering plants, whether domesticated or wild.
common snowdrop
- species: Galanthus nivalis
- genus: Galanthus
- family: Amaryllidaceae
Small white-flowered plant propagated by bulbs, native to Europe and the Middle East
and widely naturalized elsewhere. Believed to be native to the UK since the 16th century.
Flowers in late winter and early spring, around the vernal equinox and so is considered
a harbinger of spring. May also symbolize purity, hope, or the Christian Holy Trinity.
A frequent subject of 19th century poetry including works by Landon and Wordsworth.
Sweet William
- species: Dianthus barbatus
- genus: Dianthus
- family: Caryophyllaceae
Member of the pink family whose clusters of flowers grow in an upward-facing umbrel,
native to the mountains of southern Europe and introduced into northern Europe and
the UK in the 16th century. Wild varieties carry flowers that are variegated red with
white; cultivated varieties come in shades of solid and variegated white, pink, and
red.
primrose
- genus: Primula
- species: Primula vulgaris
- family: Primulaceae
One of Mitford’s favorite
flowers, can bloom with creamy yellow flowers from late December through May in Berkshire. Native to western and southern Europe. It is not to be confused with evening primrose
(Oenothera), a genus of 100+
species of herbaceous flowering plants native to the Americas. Mitford also mentions
the evening primroses, which have been cultivated in
Eurasia since the early seventeenth century and are now naturalized in some areas.
Places
Publications
Anecdotes, Observations, and Characters of Books and Men. Collected from the Conversation of Mr. Pope, and Other Eminent Persons of His Time
- Author:
- Date:
1820
Spence’s Anecdotes were collected and published posthumously in 1820 by Edmund Malone.
The Eclectic Review
- Author: No author listed.
- Date:
No date listed.Monthly periodical published between 1805 and 1868. Focusesd on long and short reviews and topical review essays. Founded by Dissenters and operated as a non-profit; all profits were donated to the British and Foreign Bible Society. Followed a nonsectarian editorial policy with an intellectual tone modeled on 18th-century periodicals but advanced reviewing toward critical analysis and away from quotation and summary. Coverage included American as well as British literature, and other subjects and titles of general interest. Influential editors included co-founder Daniel Parken (until 1813), Josiah Conder (1813-1836), Thomas Price (1837-1855).
British Critic, A New Review
- Author: No author listed.
- Date:
No date listed.Conservative periodical with High Church editorial views. Published monthly between 1792 and 1825 and then quarterly until 1843. Succeeded by the English Review in 1853. Edited until 1811 by Thomas Fanshaw Middleton. Also edited by William R. Lyall (1816-17); Archibald M. Campbell (about 1823-1833); James S. Boone (1833-1837); Samuel R. Maitland (1837-38); John Henry Newman (1838-1841); and Thomas Mozley (1841-43).
The Man in the Moon
- Author:
- Date:
Full title: The Man in the Moon, A Speech from the Throne to the Senate of Lunataria. In the Moon.. Political satire.
Memoirs of Frederica Sophia Wilhelmina
- Author:
- Date:
Full title: Memoirs of Frederica Sophia Wilhelmina: princess royal of Prussia, margravine of Bareith, sister of Frederick the Great. Manuscripts show that her memoirs were written or revised in French between 1748 and 1758, and then printed in German and in French in 1810.
- Author: No author listed.
- Date: No date listed.
Speeches in Parliament of the Right Honourable William Windham
- Author:
- Date:
3 volumes. Full title: Speeches in Parliament of the Right Honourable William Windham, to which is prefixed some account of his life by Thomas Amyot. Mitford rated them good and very good.
- Author: No author listed.
- Date: No date listed.
Hacho; or, the Spell of St. Wilten
- Author:
- Date:
Friday 11th February
1820
Narrative poem in imitation of Scott, written while the author was at Cambridge. Mitford rated it tolerable in journal entry Friday 11th February 1820 .
Delphine
- Author:
- Date:
Mitford rated it not good and much too dismal.
Tales of Fancy: The Shipwreck
- Author:
- Date:
1816
The Shipwreck makes up volume one of the three-volume work. The remaining volumes make up Country Neighbours. As she reads, Mitford rated the volumes famous; very good and very good indeed.
- Author: No author listed.
- Date: No date listed.
- Author: No author listed.
- Date: No date listed.
The Eskdale Herd-Boy
- Author:
- Date:
Full title: The Eskdale Herd-Boy, a Scottish Tale for the Instruction and Amusement of Young People. Mitford rated it good.
Dudley
- Author:
- Date:
3 volumes. by Miss O'Keeffe.
- Author: No author listed.
- Date: No date listed.
- Author: No author listed.
- Date: No date listed.
- Author: No author listed.
- Date: No date listed.
- Author: No author listed.
- Date: No date listed.
Glenfergus. In Three Volumes
- Author:
- Date:
Authentic Account of the French Revolution
- Author: No author listed.
- Date:
No date listed.Author and date unidentified. Mitford rated it interesting. Source: Journal.
No Fiction
- Author:
- Date:
Full title: No Fiction: a narrative founded on recent and interesting facts. Mitford rated it sad methodistical stuff.
Persons, Personas, and Characters
Mary Webb
- Webb Mary Elizabeth
- Wokingham, Berkshire, England
Close friend and frequent correspondent of Mary Russell Mitford. Mary Webb was the daughter of James Webb. and Jane Elizabeth Ogbourn. Baptized on
April 15, 1796 in Wokingham, Berkshire. Sister of
Elizabeth (called Eliza) and Jane
Eleanor Webb and niece of the elder Mary Webb,
Aunt Mary. In
Needham’s papers, he
notes from the Berkshire Directorythat she lived on
Broad street, presumably in Wokingham, Berkshire. She
was the wife of Thomas Hawkins as she is referred to thus in probate
papers of 1858 regarding the wills of her sister Eliza Webb Walter and her
husband Henry Walter. Date of death unknown. Dates unknown.
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.
Mrs. Havell
- Havell Mrs.
Forename unknown. Dates unknown.
Sir William Elford
- Elford William Sir baronet Recorder for Plymouth Recorder for Totnes Member of Parliament
- Kingsbridge, Devon, England
- Totnes, Devon, England
According to L’Estrange, Sir William was first a friend of
Mitford’s father, and
Mitford met him for the first time in the
spring of 1810 when he was a widower nearing the
age of 64. They carried on a lively correspondence until his death
in 1837.
Elford worked as a banker at Plymouth Bank (Elford, Tingcombe and Purchase)
in Plymouth, Devon, from its
founding in 1782. He was elected a member of
Parliament for Plymouth as a
supporter of the government and Tory William
Pitt, and served from 1796 to 1806. After his election defeat
in Plymouth in 1806, he was elected member of Parliament for Rye and served
from July 1807 until his resignation in July 1808. For his service in
Parliament as a supporter of Pitt, he was made a baronet in 1800. After his
son Jonathan came of age, he tried to
secure a stable government post for him but never succeeded. Mayor of
Plymouth in 1796 and Recorder for Plymouth from 1797 to 1833, he was also
Recorder for Totnes from 1832 to 1834. Sir William served as an officer in
the South Devon militia from 1788, eventually attaining the rank of
Lieutenant Colonel; the unit saw active service in Ireland during the Peninsular Wars. Sir
William was a talented amateur painter in oils and watercolors
who exhibited at the Royal Society from 1774 to 1837; he
exhibited still lifes and portraits but preferred landscapes. He was elected
to the Royal Society Academy in 1790. He was also a
talented amateur naturalist and was elected to the Royal Linnaean
Society in 1790; late in life, he published his findings on an
alternative to yeast.
He
married his first wife, Mary Davies
of Plympton, on January 20, 1776 and they had
one son, Jonathan, and two daughters,
Grace Chard and Elizabeth. After the death of his
first wife, he married Elizabeth Hall
Walrond, widow of Lieutenant-Colonel Maine Swete
Walrond of the Coldstream Guards.
His
only son Jonathan died in 1823, leaving him without an heir.
Frederika Sophie Wilhelmine of Prussia
- Frederika Sophie Wilhelmine
- Margravine of Brandenburg-Bareuth
- Berlin, Germany
- Bayreuth, Bavaria, Germany
House of Hohenzollern, granddaughter of George I of Great Britain, daughter of Frederic
William I of Prussia and older sister of Frederick the Great. Patron of music; composer
for voice, strings, keyboard and woodwinds; player on the lute.
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.
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
.
Charles Fyshe Palmer
- Palmer Charles Fyshe
- Long Fyshe
- Luckley House, Wokingham, Berkshire, England
- Wokingham, Berkshire, England
Charles Fyshe Palmer was the son of
Charles Fyshe Palmer and Lucy
Jones. He married Lady Madelina Gordon Sinclair in 1805 at Kimbolton Castle in Kimbolton,
Herefordshire
. They lived at Luckley House, Wokingham,
Berkshire and at East Court, Finchampstead,
Berkshire. Through her siblings, Lady Madelina was connected
to several of the most influential aristocratic families in the country, and
Charles Fyshe Palmer’s marriage to Lady Madelina thus gained him access to
aristocratic houses, including the Holland
House.
A Whig politician, Palmer began running for Parliament elections as the
member for Reading
after 1816, and appears to have served off and
on in that role until 1841. He led the
Berkshire meetings to protest British government’s handling of the Peterloo Massacre in 1819. On March 16, 1820, Palmer ran for a seat in Parliament against
two other candidates. The votes ran: John
Berkeley Monck (418 votes), Charles Fyshe Palmer(399 votes), and John Weyland(395 votes.) Mitford’s
letters around this time indicate she much preferred his opponent J. B. Monck, and she had earlier satirized
Palmer in 1818 as vastly
like a mop-stick, or, rather, a tall hop-pole, or an extremely long
fishing-rod, or anything that is all length and no substance.
Mitford also mentions Palmer in connection with a legal issue surrounding
the Billiard Club, in her letter to Talfourd of 31 August 1822
. Mitford also mentions the ways that Palmer’s political opponents
sometimes undermined his Whig reformist positions by referencing the noble
privileges (and money) he accrued by marrying the Lady Madelina Gordon in 1805.
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).
Mrs. Allingham
- Allingham Mrs.
Likely the mother of Catherine Dickinson. Mitford visited them at Farley Hill in 1820, when their daughter Frances was born. Source: Journal.
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)
Lucy Sweetser Hill
- Hill Sweatser Lucy
- Stratfield Saye, Berkshire, England
Beloved servant for twelve years in the Mitford
household who, on 7 August 1820 married
Charles Hill. She is the basis for
the title character in the Our Village story. Source:
Needham Papers,
Reading Central Library.
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.
Mossy
Mitford’s dog; He died on Saturday, August 21, 1819 at Bertram
House. Mossy was a nickname for Moss Trooper.
William Windham
- Windham William
- Soho, London, England
- London, England
Politican and friend of Edmund Burke. Early in his political career he was a friend of Charles James Fox and the Rockingham Whigs who supported the American Revolution. He later became an
Anti-Jacobin Pittite, served as Secretary of War, and supported the Restoration of
the Bourbon monarchy in France. He was a noted orator, and Mitford read a collection of his speeches.
William Tuppen
- William Tuppen Captain
- Captain Tuppen
In Mitford's time, a captain retired from the Royal West regiment of the London militia.
Later became a magistrate and served as mayor of Reading.
Mrs. Madison
- Madison Mrs.
Mitford dined with her at the Jolliffe's in 1820. May also be spelled Maddison. Forename unknown. Dates unknown.
Henry (Harry) Marsh
- Marsh Henry
MRM's letters in December 1820 indicate that Henry Marsh was involved in a local political
tiff with Henry Hart Milman. The rift between Henry Marsh and H.H. Milman is well documented. See The History of Parliament online.
Mr. Sherwood
- Sherwood Thomas
Practiced medicine in Reading. He was a
friend of John Berkeley Monck, and likely
others in the Reading political
scene. Sources:
Needham Papers, Reading Central Library
;
History of Parliament Online. ReadingBorough
http://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1820-1832/constituencies/reading.
Allaway George
Manservant at Bertram House in 1819; dismissed on September 15, 1820, when the Mitfords moved to Three Mile Cross, a much smaller establishment. He and his brother Frank buried Mossy. Dates unknown.
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.
Sarah Harriet Burney
- Sarah Harriet Burney
- Miss Burney
- Lynn Regis, Norfolk, England
- Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, England
Daughter of Charles Burney by his second wife, Elizabeth Allen. Half sister to Frances Burney.
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 .Charles Dundas
- Charles Dundas
- 1st Baron Amesbury
- Member of Parliament
- Scotland
- Pimlico, Westminster, London, England
Member of Parliament for Berkshire from 1794 to 1832. He generally sided with liberal
and refomist policies but was not an active party member. His first wife Anne brought
him the estate of Kintbury-Amesbury (or Barton Court) in Berkshire as well as other
property. He was also the first chairman of the Kennet and Avon Canal Company; the
Dundas Aqueduct was named after him.
Rev. William Harness
- William Harness
- Wickham, Hampshire, England
- Battle, Sussex, England
A lifelong friend of Mary Russell Mitford
who knew her from their childhood in the 1790s, Harness launched the first
major effort to collect and edit Mitford’s letters into a series of volumes,
which was completed by his assistant, Alfred Guy
Kingan L’Estrange a year after Harness’s death, and published
as The Life of Mary Russell Mitford, Related
in a Selection from her Letters to her Friends. This collection
was originally intended to be six volumes, but was cut back to three by the
publishers, to Harness’s distress. Harness and Byron were also friends from
their schooling at Harrow, as Byron sympathized with Harness’s experience of
a disabled foot, crushed in an accident in early childhood. Byron considered
dedicating the first two cantos of Childe Harold’s
Pilgrimage
to Harness, but refrained so as not to taint Harness’s reputation as
he was taking orders as an Anglican curate. Harness admired and encouraged
Mitford’s playwrighting in particular, and she commented that he was one of
the few of her friends who thought she should prioritize the drama over
prose. When William Macready was
attacked in an anonymous Blackwood’s Magazine piece
in 1825 for his demands and rudeness to Mitford over revisions to
Rienzi, Macready assumed that Harness was
the author of the anonymous piece, though in 1839
after many years of distance, Harness assured Macready in person that he was
not the writer, though he may have shared word of the poor treatment his
friend had endured. William Harness was the son of John
Harness, M.D. and Sarah Dredge; he was baptized at Whitchurch, Hampshire on
April 13, 1790. He received his B.A. in 1812 and his M.A. in 1816 from
Christ’s College, Cambridge. He served as curate at Kelmeston, Hampshire
(1812) and Dorking (1814-1816). He was preacher at Trinity Chapel, Conduit
Street, London and minister and lecturer at St. Anne’s in Soho. He was Boyle
lecturer in London (1822) and was curate at Hampstead from 1828 to 1844. In
1825, he published an eight-volume edition of Shakespeare, including a
biography; his friends would later endow a prize in his name at Cambridge
for the study of Shakespearean literature. He also authored numerous essays
and reviews, some for the Quarterly Review. From 1844 to 1847 he was
minister of Brompton Chapel in London. He undertook to raise the funds to
build the church of All Saints, Knightsbridge, in the parish of St.
Margaret’s Westminster, which opened in 1849, and he then became perpetual curate
of
that congregation. At the 1851 and 1861 censuses, he lived at 3 Hyde Park
Terrace, Westminster St. Margaret, Middlesex, with his sister Mary Harness
and his first cousin Jemima Harness, daughter of his uncle William. He died
while on a visit to one of his former curates in
Battle, Sussex. At the time of his death he living at the same address at 3
Hyde Park Terrace; he is buried in Bath.Sources:
Duncan-Jones, Miss Mitford and Mr. Harness
(1955); Lord Byron and His Times: