Month: November 2024

I know I’m not the only one who is endlessly fascinated by those brilliant Brontë sisters – not only by their magnificent poems and novels but by their all too brief lives as well. There are many great sources for information on the Brontë sisters’ lives – from biographies and YouTube channels such as my own House Of Brontë to the hundreds of letters that Ellen Nussey kept from her best friend Charlotte Brontë. One other source of Brontë information has an impeccable provenance – and it began on this very day exactly 190 years ago.

The tin box above contained Emily Brontë’s sewing equipment, a collection of needles, threads and fabrics – but it had within it a very important secret. It came into the hands of Arthur Bell Nicholls, having been passed to him following the death of his first wife Charlotte Brontë, and formed part of his large, much loved yet mournful collection of Brontë ephemera. In 1895, 40 years after the passing of Charlotte, Arthur turned the box around in his hand, heard a click and a secret compartment opened which had not seen the light of day since the death of Emily Brontë in 1848. Inside were tiny scraps of folded paper, incredible treasures. 

What Arthur had discovered was the hiding place of Emily and Anne Brontë’s secret diary papers in which they detailed their life in Haworth Parsonage and beyond, and their dreams for the future. The very first diary paper was composed jointly by Emily and Anne Brontë, and Emily has sketched Anne’s hair flowing down the side of the page. It was dated 24th November 1834, and I produce it below:

“November the 24, 1834 Monday, Emily Jane Brontë, Anne Brontë, I fed Rainbow, Diamond, Snowflake, Jasper, pheasant this morning. Branwell went down to Mr Drivers and brought news that Sir Robert Peel was going to stand for Leeds. Anne and I have been peeling apples for Charlotte to make an apple pudding and for Aunt’s nuts and apples. Charlotte said she made puddings perfectly and she was of a quick but limited intellect. Tabby said just now come Anne pilloputate (ie pill a potato). Aunt has come into the kitchen just now and said, ‘where are your feet Anne?’ Anne answered, ‘on the floor Aunt’. Papa opened the parlour door and gave Branwell a letter saying, ‘here Branwell read this and show it to your Aunt and Charlotte’. The Gondals are discovering the interior of Gaaldine, Sally Mosley is washing in the back kitchen.

It is past twelve o’clock Anne and I have not tidied ourselves, done our bed work or done our lessons and we want to go out to play. We are going to have for dinner boiled beef, turnips, potatoes and apple pudding; the kitchen is in a very untidy state. Anne and I have not done our music exercise which consists of b major. Tabby said, on my putting a pen in her face, ‘ya pitter pottering there instead of pilling a potate’, I answered, ‘oh dear, oh dear, oh dear, I will directly’. With that I get up, take a knife and begin pilling (finished pilling the potatoes). Papa going to walk. Mr Sunderland expected.

Anne and I say I wonder what we shall be like and what we shall be and where we shall be if all goes on well in the year 1874 – in which year I shall be in my 57th year, Anne will be going in her 55th year, Branwell will be going in his 58th year, and Charlotte in her 59th year; hoping we shall all be well at that time, we close our paper. Emily and Anne, November the 24 1834”

Emily and Anne at this point placed little emphasis on spelling and punctuation, yet this is our first glimpse of them in writing – our first insight into two of the greatest literary genii of the nineteenth century. The image above shows Emily’s sketch of herself and Anne at their table composing their 1837 diary paper.

I hope you can join me next week for another new Brontë blog post, put the date in your diary and then seal it away in your secret tin box.

I’ve just returned from a lovely weekend in Bridlington, in the very best company. It was surprisingly busy, as, unbeknownst to us, it was the grand unveiling of the east coast resort’s Christmas tree and illuminations. The resort has been a popular town for visitors for the last two hundred years, and in today’s post we’re going to look at one who is very much of interest to us: Charlotte Brontë.

The resort today has a lot to offer holiday makers of all ages, including stomach churning rides, golden sands and more fish and chip shops than you can shake a stick of Bridlington rock. Some things, and certainly some of the views, available there today would have seemed familiar to Charlotte, but one thing at least has changed: the resort’s name. In the first half of the nineteenth century it was called Burlington not Bridlington, and it was here that Charlotte Brontë came, in company with her great friend Ellen Nussey, for her first ever journey to the seaside.

In August 1839 Charlotte travelled by train to Ellen to what we now know as Bridlington, staying in a cottage in nearby Easton. Ellen Nussey later gave an account of the incredible effect the sea had on Charlotte:

“‘The day but one after their capture they walked to the sea, and as soon as they were near enough for Charlotte to see it in its expanse, she was quite over-powered, she could not speak till she had shed some tears she signed to her friend to leave her and walk on; this she did for a few steps, knowing full well what Charlotte was passing through, and the stern efforts she was making to subdue her emotions her friend turned to her as soon as she thought she might without inflicting pain; her eyes were red and swollen, she was still trembling, but submitted to be led onwards where the view was less impressive; for the remainder of the day she was very quiet, subdued, and exhausted. Distant glimpses of the German Ocean had been visible as the two friends neared the coast on the day of their arrival, but Charlotte being without her glasses, could not see them, and when they were described to her, she said, “Don’t tell me any more. Let me wait.”’

A love of the sea, and awe at its power, lasted for Charlotte – as we see especially in her novel Villette where the sea is both facilitator and destroyer – the channel (in a very real sense) for the beginning of Lucy Snowe’s adventure and the end of her dreams. Love of Bridlington lasted for Charlotte too, as when she was looking for a suitable location to open a school with sisters Emily and Anne Brontë the town was her first choice, although she later decided to try to open a school in Haworth.

Thank you as always for all your support for my blog – you can also now follow my YouTube account with the channel name House Of Brontë, my latest video looks at why the Brontë sisters used male names and the moving stories behind their choices.

I hope to see you next Sunday for another new Brontë blog post.

Today in the United Kingdom has seen a suitably solemn recollection of Remembrance Sunday. It’s a day when we remember wars of the past, when we remember the soldiers who fought in them and the civilians caught up in them, and think of wars still being waged across the globe. Human civilisation has changed a lot in the last two thousand years, at least on a technological scale, but one thing has remained constant: war. Group has fought group and country fought country in every century since then, and surely this is a pattern which will continue until the end of time. 

Certainly war was present in the time of the Brontës, as we shall see, but it was a relative in the succeeding generation who was to see the horrors and the twisted triumphs of war up close and personal. It may seem astonishing that a Brontë relative was amidst the hellish spectacle of the first world war, but that’s exactly what Captain Arthur Branwell was. He was in fact just one generation away from Anne Brontë and her siblings, in other words he was a first cousin once removed. His father Thomas Brontë Branwell was the son of Charlotte Branwell (who had kept her surname by marrying her cousin Joseph Branwell). Thomas was given his middle name in tribute to his mother’s elder sister who had married and taken the Brontë name. This sister was, of course, Maria Branwell who married Patrick Brontë in Yorkshire on exactly the same 1812 day as Charlotte married Joseph in Cornwall – a remarkable triple wedding separated by 400 miles.

Marrying cousins was nothing new for the extended Branwell family of Penzance, for Thomas Brontë Branwell travelled 400 miles from Cornwall to Haworth in 1851. His purpose was to propose to Charlotte Brontë! After being turned down by Charlotte, something she also did to Ellen Nussey’s brother Henry, Thomas married a woman named Sarah Jones. Their son kept up the family tradition of marrying a cousin –a cousin rather remarkably named Charlotte Brontë Jones! So whilst the father failed to marry a Charlotte Brontë the son succeeded in doing so, and it was this very son, the husband of Charlotte Brontë Jones,  who found himself amidst the unspeakable horrors of France in World War One.

Born in 1862, Arthur was a military man by profession. He had served with distinction in the Boer War in South Aftrica and had actually retired from service by the time war in Europe was declared in 1914. Like many others, however, Arthur Branwell was called out of retirement and at first took up a role as an officer in charge of training new recruits. Before long he was somehow in France itself, where he was captured forever in this photograph of the officers of a group of the Royal Warwickshire Regiment. The photograph shows Captain Branwell with his supporting officers, two First Lieutenants and two Second Lieutenants.

As the caption notes: ‘This group has, alas, suffered severely since the picture was taken. In fact, Lieutenant Maunsell was killed in France, 2nd Lieutenant Gamble was killed in Palestine, Lieutenant Elliott and 2nd Lieutenant Gamble were killed at the Battle of the Somme. Only the seated figure, our Captain Branwell, survived the war and returned to England.

What do we know of the Brontë sisters’ attitudes towards war? The childhood Brontë tales of Angria and Gondal were full of intrigue, battles and conflict. They were fierce patriots, and we know that in 1854, the year of her marriage, Charlotte Brontë was helping her father Patrick raising money for the newly launched Patriotic Fund. This was a fund set up by the government to raise money for the widows and orphans of military personnel lost during the Crimean War, raging at the time. A letter sent by Patrick Brontë to an unknown parishioner at the time is reproduced below.

It should be noted that whilst the letter is seemingly sent by Reverend Brontë, it was actually in the handwriting of his daughter Charlotte. The Crimean war was at the forefront of Charlotte’s mind at this time, as we see in this letter of 6th December 1854 to Margaret Wooler. In this letter Charlotte Brontë gives a frank appraisal of the futility of war; Charlotte’s patriotism and love of her country is undiminished, but now she sees war as ‘one of the greatest curses that can fall upon mankind.’

For all those afflicted by that curse, yesterday, today and tomorrow we shall remember them. I hope you can join me next Sunday for another new Brontë blog post.

As you all surely know by now I’m passionate about all things Brontë – and I know that you are too. I also love history, especially Tudor and Stuart history, which is one reason I wrote the gunpowder plot biography The Real Guy Fawkes.

As a Fawkes biographer, a gunpowderologist, my services are often in demand at this time of year. I appeared in the Channel 5 documentary ‘The Gunpowder Plot: Countdown To Treason’ last weekend, and today I was interviewed on Spanish radio. It seems Guy’s story still resonates, and it was certainly one well known to the Brontë sisters.

In my new YouTube channel my latest video looks at bonfire night celebrations at the time of the Brontës, and at the appearance of Guy Fawkes in a very famous Brontë novel! You can watch it here, and if you enjoy it and want to see more please open it up in YouTube and subscribe to the channel:

You can also catch the House Of Brontë podcast version at Amazon music below or on most good podcast providers:

The Brontës And Guy Fawkes Podcast

I hope you can join me on Sunday for my regular Brontë blog post, and if you are celebrating bonfire night tonight please don’t be like James Taylor (find out more in my video and podcast) who made a rather catastrophic error at an 1838 bonfire!

Today’s new Brontë blog post will very much be a post of two halves. In the first part we’ll be saying farewell to a member of the Brontë family who was central to the Brontë story, and in the second we’ll be saying hello to my new Brontë YouTube channel and podcast.

This day in November 1842 was a sad one for Haworth and the Brontë family, for it marked the funeral of Aunt Branwell. Elizabeth Branwell was an elder sister of the Brontë siblings’ mother Maria, and during Maria’s final illness she travelled over 400 miles from Penzance to Haworth to nurse her. After Maria’s death she could have returned to Penzance but she chose to remain in the cold, drafty parsonage and became a second mother to the Brontë children. In my opinion without the love of Aunt Branwell and without the financial support of Aunt Branwell there would be none of the Brontë books we know and love today.

In late October Elizabeth fell suddenly and terribly ill, it was clear that her end was approaching and her nephew Branwell Brontë remained faithfully by her side during her final days of suffering, as he revealed in an anguished letter to his friend Francis Grundy:

Her brother-in-law Patrick Brontë had been extremely close to Elizabeth Branwell, so planning her funeral was another of the many sorrows he had to face. We know that she was buried in accordance to her will – not in Penzance but in Haworth. In her will she states that she wished to be buried: “as near as convenient to the remains of my dear sister.’ This provision was stipulated by Elizabeth Branwell at the start of her will made on 30 April 1833 before witnesses William Brown (brother of the Haworth sexton John Brown,) his son William Brown Jr., and John Tootill, in which she also asks that, ‘my funeral shall be conducted in a moderate and decent manner’.

Moderately and decently, on 3rd November 1842, the remains of Elizabeth Branwell were placed into the Brontë family vault. A plaque above the vault lists members of the Brontë family interred there, but although she rests eternally alongside them her name is not included. In attendance during the ceremony were Patrick, Anne and Branwell Brontë with the service being carried out by Reverend James Bradley. Charlotte and Emily Brontë were in Brussels at the time their Aunt fell ill, and although they raced back to England upon receiving news of her illness they arrived too late for her funeral.

Let us remember Aunt Branwell today. She was a woman who loved the Brontës deeply and unreservedly. 

We now turn to the present day. I’m passionate about the Brontë books and the Brontë story, which is why I blog about them every week here – and will continue to do so. I’m hoping to spread my love of the Brontës even further, however, so I’ve now launched the House Of Brontë YouTube channel and podcast – and created a new page on this website to give you an easy place to access them going forward.

Both the YouTube channel and podcast will look at the Brontë family story from beginning to end, as well as featuring shorter episodes looking at the Brontës and at literature and history.

You can watch the YouTube channel here. Please subscribe to the channel and like the videos to keep up to date with my latest recordings:

You can also listen to The House Of Brontë podcast on Amazon Music here or by searching for The House Of Brontë on your usual podcast provider:

The House Of Brontë Podcast

I hope you can join me next Sunday for another new Brontë blog.