“despicable treachery”: Quoted ibid., p. 207.
“conniptions”: Latané, William Maginn and the British Press, p. 208.
“gossiping of Mr Hall”: L.E.L. to Bulwer, quoted in Sypher, A Biography, p. 273.
“the refutation which the evil report met”: LLR, p. 128.
“all connection between myself and Mr Forster at an end”: L.E.L. to Bulwer, quoted in Sypher, A Biography, p. 273.
Letitia’s letter to him breaking off the engagement: LLR, p. 131.
to spare Letitia at his “own cost”: Quoted in Stephenson, Letitia Landon, p. 49.
“I have suffered for the last three days a degree of torture”: LLR, p. 130.
“melancholia”…“torpor of the liver”: Mayo, Elements of the Pathology of the Human Mind, pp. 112–13.
“feverish illness”: [Thomson], “Memorials,” p. 182.
their second child, Matilda: According to Matilda’s marriage record, she was twenty-one when she married Charles Bickley in 1858. Sourced from www.ancestry.co.uk.
“My ‘fastidious master’ has a pupil”: AWJ, vol. 4, p. 318.
A private memo: TNA, CO 267/167.
“ ‘Have those horrible reports’ ”: Howitt, Homes and Haunts, vol. 2, p. 161.
“I found her, as I have said, variable in spirits”: [Thomson], “Memorials,” p. 186.
“The truth of Miss Landon’s story”: Chorley, Autobiography, vol. 1, p. 252.
“in the exquisite novel of ‘Violet’ ”: [Thomson], “Memorials,” p. 187.
“isn’t she painted con amore?”: Fraser’s, vol. 14, January 1836, p. 80.
“the virgin’s melting kiss”: Ibid., p. 94.
“begged to propose a toast”: Diaries of William Charles Macready, vol. 1, p. 324.
De Quincey had briefly considered challenging: Russett, De Quincey’s Romanticism, p. 132.
“no indelicacy in stating that Mr Grantley Berkeley’s mother”: “Mr Grantley Berkeley and his novel,” Fraser’s, vol. 14, August 1836, p. 243.
“sixteen guineas per sheet”: Grant, The Great Metropolis, p. 322.
“a certain person”: Berkeley, My Life and Recollections, vol. 2, pp. 47–48.
“what blight?”: Ibid., vol. 3, p. 195.
she was presenting such a beautiful tableau in the candlelight: Ibid., vol. 2, p. 51.
slavishly in love with her: Croker, A Walk from London to Fulham, p. 35.
“I could not praise a work as I have done yours”…“should be proud of her bard”: Berkeley, My Life and Recollections, vol. 2, pp. 80–81.
If the Fraserians continued to mock her in print: In 1836, the Fraserian Francis Mahoney, a defrocked Jesuit from Cork, published The Reliques of Father Prout, with a preface by Maginn and pictures by Maclise. The volume is so unintelligible to those “not of the craft” that the modern reader is likely to be left in a state of bemused boredom. However, the images include “Meet me by Moonlight,” in which Maclise portrays himself kneeling at Letitia’s feet in an attitude of exaggerated romantic devotion, hardly a tactful portrayal in the circumstances, and a poem that portrays L.E.L. as a fallen angel.
“I have been so gay lately”: Letters, p. 144.
“The longer I live”: Quoted in Eger and Peltz, Brilliant Women, p. 130.
CHAPTER 11 THE GOVERNOR
“promised…lasting happiness”: Roberts, A Memoir, p. 30.
Katherine Thomson attested: [Thomson], “Memorials,” p. 188.
“change her name”: S. C. Hall, A Book of Memories, p. 274.
“annoyed and depressed by the inconveniences”: Jerdan to Lady Blessington, January 5, 1839, BL, Add. MS 43688, ff. 64–65.
two young Ashanti “princes”: Metcalfe, Maclean of the Gold Coast, p. 204.
precursor companies of the modern Unilever: For example, Forster and Smith’s Gambia-based peanut export business, run by Matthew’s brother William between 1818 and his death in 1849, was incorporated in 1873 into the Bathurst Trading Co., which was itself then acquired by Lever Bros. in 1917: Brooks, Western Africa and Capo Verde, p. 133; Swindell and Jeng, Migrants, Credit and Climate, p. 16.
a fleet of at least fourteen: Sherwood, After Abolition, p. 65.
Matthew was, for example: Ibid., p. 66.
a late Victorian photograph: Shenai, Finding the Bergheims of Belsize Court.
eight live-in servants: Census Returns of England and Wales, 1851, Civil parish: Hampstead; Piece: 1492; Folio: 50; Page: 2.
he acquired a stake: Matoff, Conflicted Life, p. 308.
Forster and Smith decided to go it alone: Wright, The World and a Very Small Place in Africa, p. 128.
“deprecated” her engagement: Jerdan to Lady Blessington, January 5, 1839, BL, Add. MS 43688, ff. 64–65.
Maria’s unpublished diaries: I am grateful to her descendant David Burgess for allowing me to see these.
thrust a sheaf of papers into her hand: Cruickshank, Eighteen Years on the Gold Coast, vol. 1, p. 216.
227 “If Miss Landon still retained” Roberts, A Memoir, p. 29.
“public-private partnership”: St Clair, The Grand Slave Emporium, p. 54.
“heavy debt” it owed Africa “for the crimes”: Sherwood, After Abolition, p. 69.
“highly polished manners”: Blessington, The Idler in France, vol. 1, p. 200.
“Thus is Cape Coast Castle”: Quoted in Metcalfe, Maclean of the Gold Coast, p. 205.
had previously been court-martialed in Jamaica…captain of the guard: Metcalfe, Maclean of the Gold Coast, pp. 191ff.
“somewhat perfunctory inquest”: Ibid., pp. 180–81.
The goods that Forster and Smith: Sherwood, After Abolition, p. 69.
openly manufactured for export in Birmingham: British and Foreign Anti-Slavery Reporter, no. 15, July 15, 1840, p. 161.
an official exchange rate: Thanks to Professor John Styles, who is researching a history of the international textile market, for this information.
“The origins of the Forster & Smith partnership”: Lynn, Commerce and Economic Change in West Africa, p. 87.
estate in the West Indies: According to Valerie Glass (in Creighton, North East Slavery and Abolition Newsletter, no. 7, September 2009), a Matthew Forster (1730–1798)—either our Matthew’s father or his uncle—was a commissary general to forces in the West Indies, and later owned an estate on St. Eustatius in the Caribbean, as well as being elected five times as mayor of Berwick, the constituency for which our Matthew was later returned to Parliament in 1841.
“chivalric energy”: Roberts, A Memoir, p. 29.
after a failed earlier career: Metcalfe, Maclean of the Gold Coast, ch. 1.
centerpiece for Prince Albert: www.royalcollection.org.uk/collection/1570/centrepiece.
“time-honoured customs”: Cruickshank, Eighteen Years on the Gold Coast, vol. 1, p. 184.
the Dos Amigos: Metcalfe, Maclean of the Gold Coast, pp. 245ff.
A young British naval officer: Ibid., p. 260.
were there for debt: Ibid., p. 265.
“to legalise the Slave Trade to a certain extent”: Quoted in Sherwood, After Abolition, p. 73.
“There can be no doubt”: Minute by James Stephen, 2/4/1840, CO 267/162; Metcalfe, Maclean of the Gold Coast, p. 250.
“dry, reserved, hard-headed Scotchman”: Note by Bulwer, CO 96/44, quoted in Metcalfe, Maclean of the Gold Coast, p. vii.
“In her enthusiasm”: [Thomson], The Queens of Society, p. 187.
“his dark-gray eyes were seldom raised”: Ibid., p. 212.
“African habits, African horrors, and African wonders”: LLR, vol. 1, p. 136.
“unaccustomed…to ladies”: Quoted in Metcalfe, Maclean of the Gold Coast, p. 21
4.
“portraits of distinguished authors”: Letters, p. 186.
“much struck by her appearance”: [Thomson], The Queens of Society, p. 188.
“most unattractive”: Vizetelly, Glances Back Through Seventy Years, vol. 1, p. 127.
“plainness of looks and diminutiveness of form”: Madden, Countess of Blessington, vol. 2, p. 268.
The Liddiards invited Letitia and Maclean: Unpublished diary of Maria Liddiard.
proof of her unblemished position in society: LLR, vol. 1, p. 226.
“You are canvassing for us”: Letters, p. 158.
inquiry into his suspected misappropriation of funds: BL, Loan 96, RLF 1/500/25a: “Extracts from the proceedings of the Literary Fund with respect to an enquiry by Charles Wentworth Dilke into the conduct of William Jerdan 12 April–10 May 1837”; also 1/511/31a.
“It was, for both of us”: Chorley, Autobiography, pp. 253–54.
“I believe she is very timid”: Quoted in Latané, William Maginn and the British Press, p. 187.
“I shall never forget”: Letters, p. 162.
Maria and Anne Liddiard had spent the day with her: Unpublished diary of Maria Liddiard.
CHAPTER 12 ENGAGEMENT
fantasized about making her own voyage to Africa: Letters, pp. 7–8.
“Mr Maclean had sought her hand in marriage”: [Thomson], “Memorials,” p. 188.
Two letters Maclean wrote to Matthew Forster: Texts quoted in Metcalfe, Maclean of the Gold Coast, pp. 212–14.
“Never shall I forget the anguish of my poor friend”: [Thomson], “Memorials,” p. 188.
“To those who [to] indulge in a small envy”: Letters, pp. 164–65.
“her applying to you”…“impudence in having written to her so kindly”…“various reports”: Quoted in Metcalfe, Maclean of the Gold Coast, pp. 212–13.
“country marriages”: Priestley, West African Trade and Coast Society, passim; St Clair, The Grand Slave Emporium, p. 148.
1837 list of Cape Coast female traders: Letter to the Colonial Office from Burgoyne, December 22, 1837, CO 267/144.
increase the number of women involved in commerce: See Adu-Boahen, Abolition, Economic Transition, Gender and Slavery.
“of colour, of respectability, living in Accra”: Madden, Countess of Blessington, vol. 2, p. 283.
James Bannerman: Priestley, West African Trade and Coast Society, vol. 2, p. 59.
Yaa Hom: Jones and Sebald, An African Family Archive, p. 131, note 98.
“The African”: Fisher’s Drawing Room Scrap Book (1832), p. 35.
“I can scarcely make even you understand”: Letters, p. 192.
relying on the hospitality: Unpublished letter from L.E.L., author’s collection, November 23, 1837, refers to her staying with the Thomsons; unpublished Liddiard family diary makes plain how frequently she stayed with them.
“large fortune”: [Thomson], The Queens of Society, p. 187.
“only a long sum”…“to write what will sell”: L.E.L., Ethel Churchill, vol. 2, p. 12.
“a sort of Radical”: Quoted in Sypher, A Biography, p. 180.
“Oh, what a waste of feeling and of thought”: LLR, vol. 2, p. 277.
“Which was the true philosopher?”: LLR, vol. 2, p. 261.
“ ’Tis a strange mystery, the power of words!”: LLR, vol. 2, p. 295.
“Gossipping”: LLR, vol. 2, p. 276.
“Self-blindness”: LLR, vol. 2, p. 274.
“Life has dark secrets”: LLR, vol. 2, p. 263.
“The Marriage Vow”: LLR, vol. 2, p. 277.
“Death in the flower”: LLR, vol. 2, p. 281.
“glass mask”: L.E.L., Ethel Churchill, vol. 2, p. 327.
as the victim gasps for breath: Ibid., vol. 3, pp. 257–61.
an excited reader from Bedford: The Times, February 1, 1839, p. 3.
admired the novel’s “astonishing qualities”: Quoted in Sypher, A Biography, p. 179.
translated into German: Adele Churchill, oder, die zwei Bräute, von der Verfasserin der Improvisatorin (Leipzig: Kirchner, 1838).
“I on honey-dews have fed”: Letters, p. 176.
“I saw L.E.L. today”: Madden, Countess of Blessington, vol. 2, p. 183.
In a letter to the Liddiards’ daughter Maria: Liddiard family papers.
“sumptuous” all-male dinner: London Evening Standard, March 19, 1838.
Whittington attended: Liddiard family diaries.
“the moment of his return”: Madden, Countess of Blessington, vol. 2, p. 71.
Letitia applied to Richard Bentley: Letters, p. 179.
Castruccio Castracani: Discussed in Baiesi, Letitia Elizabeth Landon and Metrical Romance, ch. 4, passim.
made vain efforts: L.E.L. to Bulwer, ?early 1838, Sypher, A Biography, p. 281.
should be presented at court: [Thomson], Queens of Society, p. 187.
“utterly different”: Letters, p. 169.
“one huge serpent, and one only”: L.E.L., “The Poppy,” Flowers of Loveliness (unpaginated).
first came across William Jerdan: Blanche Sully to her mother, January 1, 1838, Papers of Thomas Sully, Joseph Downs Collection of Manuscripts and Printed Ephemera, Winterthur Library, Col. 164, Acc. 84x130, vol. 1, accessed online.
The first sitting he made of Letitia: A photocopy of the picture, labeled Letitia Landon, was placed in the Heinz Archive at the National Portrait Gallery shortly after its sale at Christie’s London in 1974. In the 1974 sale catalog it was described as being a portrait of “Miss Maclean,” probably an error for Mrs. Maclean. The same picture later appeared at Sotheby’s New York in 2007 as a first sitting of “Miss McLean.”
a small auction house: Chiswick Auctions. Contacted by me on September 8, 2014.
“Although the profile was not the happiest view of her face”: LLR, p. 291.
“[I]t was all so sad”: Martineau, Autobiography, pp. 422–23.
“two nearest relatives”: George Maclean to Sir John Maclean, October 12, 1838, quoted in Metcalfe, Maclean of the Gold Coast, p. 215.
“very strange and out of spirits”: Unpublished Liddiard diary, May 16, 1838.
“Papa” had “a long confab”: Unpublished Liddiard diary, June 10, 1838.
“Miss Landon told me what surprised me”: Unpublished Liddiard diary, June 21, 1838.
“2 strange notes”: Unpublished Liddiard diary, June 23, 1838.
honed into publishing shape by Letitia: Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.
“which she could not have so long”: S. C. Hall, Retrospect of a Long Life, vol. 2, p. 160.
“If Mrs McLean [sic] has as many friends”: S. C. Hall, A Book of Memories, p. 278.
“More disquietude about the party”: Unpublished Liddiard diary, June 25, 1838.
Letitia watched the procession: [Thomson], The Queens of Society, p. 190.
volume of sermons: A Series of Practical Discourses by the Rev. James Maclean (London: Smith, Elder, 1838).
“I trust that Mr G. Maclean”: Metcalfe, Maclean of the Gold Coast, p. 232.
Only at the “eleventh hour”: Letters, p. 194.
“sitting on a hassock”…“as long as I could trace her figure against the sky”: Whittington’s letter is quoted in full in LLR, vol. 1, pp. 176–81.
“Never is there one moment’s quiet”: Letters, p. 184.
“The sky is filled with stars”: Letters, p. 185.
“But thou hast sunk beneath the wave”: LLR, vol. 1, p. 191.
“ ’Tis Night, and overhead the sky is gleaming”: LLR, vol. 1, p. 191.
“Those who had, in some measure, compromised her”: Chorley, Autobiography, vol. 1, p. 252.
“All
I can say”: Letters, p. 185.
“Cape Coast Castle!”: Letters, p. 185.
CHAPTER 13 HEART OF DARKNESS
alerted by letter in advance: Hutchinson, Impressions of Western Africa, p. 60.
the locals were fond of receiving letters: L.E.L. to Bulwer from Cape Coast Castle, undated; quoted in Sypher, A Biography, appendix 1, p. 288.
the government inspector Richard Madden: Madden, Countess of Blessington, vol. 2, pp. 289–90.
having questioned the castle staff: Ibid., p. 283.
“as well as possible”…“pretty even in England”: L.E.L. to Mrs. Hall, Letters, p. 186. (The text of this letter was published in The Morning Chronicle and The Gentleman’s Magazine in early 1839 when the news of Letitia’s death reached London.)
“dressing-room”: Cruickshank, Eighteen Years on the Gold Coast, vol. 1, p. 224.
“On three sides”…“the band plays all the old popular airs”…“housekeeping”: L.E.L. to Mrs. Hall, Letters, p. 186.
the castle staff remained loyal: Madden, Countess of Blessington, vol. 2, p. 298.
“I begin to see daylight”: L.E.L. to Mrs. Hall, Letters, pp. 186–87.
black prisoners sluggishly scrubbing the floors: L.E.L. to Lady Stepney, Letters, p. 190.
“I am very well and happy”: L.E.L. to Mrs. Hall, Letters, p. 187.
“without variation”…“favourable impressions of the country”: LLR, vol. 1, p. 195.
“The castle is a fine building….I am very well”: Letters, p. 191.
“I am very well and happy. The Castle is a fine building”…“Arabian nights”: Letters, p. 188.
“I am most uninterestingly well and happy”: L.E.L. to Bulwer, quoted in Sypher, A Biography, Appendix 1, p. 288.
“I cannot tell you how much better”: Letters, pp. 194–95.
“I never was in better health”: Letters, p. 196.
“The castle is a fine building”: Letters, p. 198.
Sarah Bowditch: On the insect life at Cape Coast Castle, see St Clair, The Grand Slave Emporium, p. 75.
“stone deaf”: Letters, p. 191.
L.E.L. Page 41
