Brontës (188 page)

15.
PBB, An Historical Narrative of the War of Aggression, [Dec 1833–Jan 1834]: MS Eng 869(2) p.15, Harvard [Neufeldt, i, 442].

16.
The Wool is Rising, 26 June 1834: MS Ashley 2469 p.8, BL [Neufeldt, ii, 48–9].

17.
PBB, ‘The Life of feild Marshal the Right Honourable ALEXAN[D]ER PERCY, vol i, [Spring 1834]: MS p.7, Brotherton [Neufeldt, ii, 117].

18.
Barnet and Fairservice both express a similar blend of pseudo-Calvinistic piety though spoken in Scots dialect. The emergence of the theme of religious hypocrisy in Branwell's writings in late 1833–early 1834 may be a response to his father's very public clash with John Winterbotham, minister of West Lane Baptist Chapel, which occurred at the same time: see below pp.253–4.

19.
PBB, The Life of feild Marshal the Right Honourable ALEXAN[D]ER PERCY, vol i, [Spring 1834]: MS p.13, Brotherton [Neufeldt, ii, 135].

20.
Ibid., p.15. See, for example, PBB, ‘Augusta though Im far away', ‘The Doubter's Hymn' and ‘Thou art gone but I am here', ibid., pp.13–14 and vol ii, pp.14, 16 [JB
SP
, 23–6; Neufeldt, ii, 137–9, 180–1, 183–4].

21.
Branwell was writing several major works simultaneously in 1834. The mss were divided up and sold piecemeal by T.J. Wise, making it extremely difficult to follow their stories: they are reconstructed, transcribed and published in Neufeldt, ii (1999), which unfortunately appeared long after the first edition of my biography. It provides invaluable evidence of Branwell's literary ability and influence on his sisters' work.

22.
CB, My Angria and the Angrians, 14 Oct 1834: MS in Law [CA, ii, pt ii, 245]. Wiggins had already appeared as a caricature of Branwell in CB, ‘A Day Abroad', Corner Dishes, 28 May–16 June 1834: MS HM 2577 pp.4–5v, Huntington [CA, ii, pt ii, 104–15]. Branwell also caricatured himself as a colour grinder to Sir Edward de Lisle about this time: see above, p.227.

23.
CB, My Angria and the Angrians, 14 Oct 1834: MS in Law [CA, ii, pt ii, 248–50].

24.
CB to EN, 11 Feb 1834: MS HM 24406 pp.1, 3, Huntington [
LCB
, i, 125–6].

25.
CB to EN, 20 Feb 1834: MS HM 24407 pp.1–3, Huntington [
LCB
, i, 126–7].

26.
See, for example, Charlotte writing Ellen, as she had demanded, the sort of letter on politics and literature she wrote to Mary: see below, p.258–9.

27.
[Benjamin Binns],
BO
, 17 Feb 1894 p.6. This is confirmed by the many local news-paper accounts of concerts in Haworth: the Brontës had many more opportunities to attend concerts than people in comparable towns today.

28.
LM
, 29 Mar 1834 p.7.For Parker's concert appearances in Haworth see above p.194 and below, pp.247, 365, 479–80, 597, 960. The age of the Haworth Philharmonic Society is deduced from a review of a concert on 5 November 1834: ‘It has been customary with this Society for more than half a century to meet together on the 5th of November, to enjoy a festival of vocal and instrumental music.':
BO
, 13 Nov 1834 p.325.

29.
The band played, for instance, at Theodore Dury's Sunday School treat at Keighley on 30 July 1832 and at a Masonic celebration in Haworth on 2 Sept 1833:
LM
, 4 Aug 1832 p.5; 7 Sept 1833 p.5. The new organ, built by Mr Nicholson of Rochdale, ‘is allowed by many of the best judges to be of exquisite tone, sweetness, and power'. Henry Heap, vicar of Bradford, and Charles Musgrave, archdeacon of Halifax, both preached on the opening day and collections amounting to nearly £30 were taken on behalf of the organ fund:
LM
, 29 Mar 1834 p.7;
BO
, 3 Apr 1834 p.69; 10 Apr 1834 p.77. Although a Baptist, Parker sang at the inauguration and reprised his performance with John Greenwood on 12 Apr 1835 in a concert for the organ fund which raised £15:
LM
, 18 Apr 1835 p.5.

30.
[Benjamin Binns],
BO
, 17 Feb 1894 p.6.

31.
CB, My Angria and the Angrians, 14 Oct 1834: MS in Law [CA, ii, pt ii, 251–2].

32.
PBB, Music Book, 1 Nov 1831–Jan 1832: MS Bon 56, BPM. ‘Oh no, we never mention her' by Thomas Bayly is used to allude to Marian Hume in CB, Something about Arthur, 1May 1833: MS p.24, Texas [CA, ii, pt i, 40] and in AB,
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
, 404, as a sly reference to Helen Huntingdon. I am grateful to Margaret Smith for the latter reference. For Branwell's ability to play the organ and love of oratorio see Leyland, i, 119–20.

33.
The piano is HAOBP: F13, BPM. For its provenance and a detailed description see JB
ST
, no.23. Gawkroger's, the music shop in Halifax, sold cheap mahogany pianofortes, both second-hand and new, ranging in price from £14 to £38:
HG
, 13 June 1840 p.2. EJB/AB, Diary Paper, 24 Nov 1834 notes that Sunderland is expected and that she and Anne have not yet done their music lessons: see below, p.257–8.

34.
Paganini's concert, enthusiastically reviewed the following week, was advertised in
LM
, 4Feb 1832 p.3; for juvenilia references to him see, for example, CB, ‘A Day Abroad', Corner Dishes, 15 June 1834: MS HM 2577 p.5, Huntington [CA, ii, pt ii, 110–11]. For the concerts by Strauss and Liszt see
HG
, 20 Oct 1838, pp.2, 3; 30 Jan 1841 p.3. Mendelssohn had a particularly close relationship with the Halifax Choral Society which premiered many of his works in this country: in gratitude he dedicated his setting of the 95th Psalm to the Society, which gave its first performance in 1846:
BO
, 30 Apr 1846 p.5.

35.
LM
, 30 Nov 1833 p.5; 11 Jan 1834 p.8; 10 Jan 1835 p.3.

36.
LI
, 27 July 1833 p.3. A new court house was opened on 12 Aug 1833 and the first stone of Keighley Church Sunday School, which
was also a National and Infant School, was laid on 19 May 1834:
LM
, 17 Aug 1833 p.5;
LI
, 24 May 1834 p.3. The opening of the new Keighley Mechanics' Institute was celebrated with a concert on 29 December 1834:
LM
, 11 Jan 1835 p.8.

37.
List of Members no.213 in Keighley Mechanics' Institute, Annual Report for year ending 8 Apr 1833, Keighley. In January 1833 Dearden was given a silver medal inscribed ‘Presented to W S Dearden, by the Committee of the Keighley Mechanics' Institute as a testimonial of their estimation of his highly interesting course of lectures on Ancient British Poetry':
LM
, 12 Jan 1835 p.5. For a brief biography see ‘Warley Worthies',
THAS
(1916), 105–8. For the other lectures see
BO
, 10 Dec 1835, 357; Ian Dewhirst, ‘The Rev. Patrick Brontë and the Keighley Mechanics' Institute',
BST
: 14:75:36.

38.
See above, p.174. Bradley emigrated to Philadelphia, USA, in 1831. It is not clear whether the Brontës resumed their lessons with him when he returned permanently to Keighley in 1833.

39.
CB, pencil drawing of Lord Byron entitled ‘Alexander Soult', 15 Oct 1833: original in private hands; CB, pencil drawings of the Countess of Blessington entitled ‘Zenobia Marchioness Ellrington', 15 Oct [1833] and Lady Jersey entitled ‘English Lady', 15 Oct 1834 and watercolour of the Maid of Saragoza, [c.1834] [E.2009.5, HAOBP: P.Br. Bon 2 and Bon 25, BPM] [A&S pp.18–19, nos. 102, 100, 128 and 127]. The portraits of Lady Jersey (in a book recommended by Charlotte to Ellen Nussey) and the Maid of Saragoza were both copied from engravings by William Finden.

40.
ECG to unidentified, [Sept 1853] [C&P, 249]; CB, pencil drawing, ‘Santa Maura', 23 Sept 1833: Princeton; CB, pencil drawing,‘Geneva', 23 Aug 1834: HAOBP: P. Br. Bon 14, BPM [A&S nos. 96, 125]. Edward Finden was William's brother.

41.
CB, pencil drawings ‘Cockermouth', [c. Jan 1833], ‘Bolton Abbey', [c. May 1834] and ‘Kirkstall Abbey', [c. May 1834]: HAOBP P.Br. C33, C73 and C72, BPM [A&S nos. 90, 116, 117, pp. 25–6, 52].

42.
A Catalogue of the Works of British Artists, in the Gallery of the Royal Northern Society, for the Encouragement of the Fine Arts
, 1834 (Leeds, 1834), 24, items 430 and 437 [A&S, 52]; Leyland, i, 129–31;
LI
, 28 June 1834 p.3, 19 July 1834 p.4, 16 Aug 1834 p.3;
LM
, 28 June 1834 p.5, 19 July 1834 p.5. Leyland also exhibited a well-received sculpture of a life-size group of grey-hounds: a study for one of the heads is at BPM.

43.
LI
, 19 July 1834 p.4;Leyland, i, 132–3; Susan Foister, ‘The Brontë Portraits',
BST
:18:9:342–3.

44.
WG,
PBB
, 79. I have been unable to find a contemporary source for this claim. Leyland, ii, 131, 133 suggests that Branwell's sister(s) shared his lessons but this seems inherently unlikely. Charlotte's portraits of Anne (see below n.49) predate both the 1834 exhibition and Robinson's employment as tutor.

45.
Leeds Mercury
, 27 Oct 1834 p.4; Leyland, i, 135–6. One critic at the exhibition in 1834 commented that his portraits of children had ‘very expressive, but somewhat hard features. Considering them as groups, they are formal and matter of fact; there is an absence of the imaginative which we are sure the artist can supply if he pleases. We would point to the works of Reynolds':
LI
, 19 July 1834 p.4.

46.
EN, Reminiscences [
LCB
, i, 598]. See above, n.38.

47.
ECG to unidentified, [Sept 1853] [C&P, 249. Charlotte ‘brought down' the portrait to show Gaskell on her visit in 1853, implying it was not prominently displayed at the parsonage. The image of Branwell was not then visible and Gaskell fancied that the ‘great column, lit by the sun' divided Charlotte from her sisters' melancholy fate… She described it as ‘not much better than sign-painting, as to manipulation; but the likenesses were, I should think, admirable … from the striking resemblance which Charlotte, upholding the great frame of canvas, and consequently standing right behind it, bore to her own representation': ECG,
Life
, 106. Too much significance has been attached to the painting out of Branwell's portrait which has variously been ascribed to dissatisfaction with his own image, a later fit of self-disgust and even to his family's wish to obliterate him from their collective memory by arranging for him to be painted out after his death. Conservators. at the National Gallery are convinced that the same hand painted the image in and out and that the painting out was done at the same time as the rest of the portrait: Susan Foister, ‘The Brontë Portraits',
BST
:18:95:354 n.13. Branwell's image is undamaged and carefully painted over so it cannot have been removed in a fit of pique or anger. The land-scape format of the second portrait (see below, n.48), which lends itself to a much less crowded composition, suggests that
Branwell, perhaps on his tutor's advice, removed his self-portrait to create a more balanced grouping.

48.
T.P. Foley, ‘John Elliott Cairnes' Visit to Haworth Parsonage',
BST
:18:94:293. C.K. Shorter,
Charlotte Brontë and her Circle
(London, 1896), 123–4note, states that Nicholls told him, when Shorter visited him in Ireland in 1893, that he had destroyed all but the profile portrait. Speculation that the profile portrait is actually of Anne, because it is ‘too pretty' to be of Emily, is unwar-ranted. The discovery of Martha Brown's photograph of the complete portrait confirmed the identifications made by Greenwood on his tracings of the original: this proved the profile was that of Emily and that Ellen was wrong in her initialled identifications on the highly inaccurate reproduction of the full portrait in J. Horsfall Turner,
Haworth Past and Present
(Bingley, 1879), opp.137: see Juliet Barker, ‘The Brontë Portraits: A Mystery Solved',
BST
:20:1:3–11.

49.
CB, portraits of Anne Brontë, pencil, 17 Apr 1833 and watercolour, 17 June 1834: HAOBP: P.Br. C17.5 and C21, BPM; a third, undated watercolour [1834] in private hands is on loan as HAOBP: P.Br. C107, BPM [A&S nos.91, 119 and 92].

50.
PB to Charles Dudley, 20 July and 3 Sept 1833: MSS in archives of Bible Society, ULC [
LRPB
, 84].

51.
PB to Archbishop of York, July 1833: MS in Borthwick [
LRPB
, 83], signifying his intention to appoint Bardsley his curate but leaving the salary and date blank. For the story of Bardsley's non-appointment see C.W. Bardsley,
A Dictionary of English and Welsh Surnames
(London and New York, 1901), v. I am grateful to Margaret Smith for this reference. Bardsley officiated once in Haworth at the burial of 4–year-old Suzanna Feather on 2 September 1833: Burials, Haworth. Bardsley was curate of Keighley by 19 May 1834 when he attended the ceremony to lay the foundation stone of the new Keighley Church Sunday School:
LI
, 24 May 1834 p.3.

52.
Crowther preached at the afternoon and evening services on 21 July 1833 and Morgan 2sermons on 20 July 1834: Haworth Church Hymnsheets, 21 July 1833: MS BS x, H, BPM;
LM
, 26 July 1834 p.5.

53.
See, for example, ibid., 28 Dec 1833 p.7.

54.
John Winterbotham's letter in ibid., 8 Mar 1834 p.6 says he is responding to ‘three letters of my friend to the Editor of the
Intelligencer
' but I have only been able to identify one, a letter of 7 January signed ‘P.B.' published in
LI
, 18 Jan 1834 p.4. Winterbotham, replying in a detailed letter in
LM
, 25 Jan 1834 p.6, says this was Patrick's second one. Another letter signed ‘P.BRONTE' and dated 17 February was published in ibid., 22 Feb 1834 p.6. but on content it does not appear to be the one Winterbotham called Patrick's third. I have been unable to find any letters or articles in the
Leeds Intelligencer
,
Leeds Mercury
or
Leeds Times
, either under Patrick's name, initials or a pseudonym which fit Winterbotham's description of and quotation from Patrick's first and third letters. Patrick cannot be ‘A Yorkshire Rector' who had letters in the
Leeds Mercury
and
Bradford Observer
defending the Established Church as he dates at least one from ‘E—. nr Wakefield':
LM
, 4Jan 1834 p.8. Nor can he have been ‘A Churchman' as he had already written 2letters before the one Winterbotham identified as Patrick's second: see
LI
, 23 Nov 1833 p.4; 4Jan 1834 p.3.