– but when I read of its horrors – I cannot help thinking that it is one of the greatest curses that can fall upon mankind. I trust it may not last long – for it really seems to me that no glory to be gained can compensate for the sufferings which must be endured. This tone may seem a little ignoble and unpatriotic – but I think that as we advance towards middle age – nobleness and patriotism bear a different signification to us to that which we accept while young.70
In response to the sufferings, a national Patriotic Fund had been established to raise voluntary subscriptions for the benefit of the wounded and the widows and orphans of the dead. With typical concern, Patrick convened a meeting in the National School on 16 December to raise a subscription in the township; as his eyesight was so poor, however, it was Charlotte and her husband who wrote out the circulars to the leading members of the community inviting their attendance.71
Despite the almost universal gloom and the fact that this was normally her most unhappy time of year, Charlotte remained resolutely cheerful. Marriage had clearly eclipsed the painful memories of her sisters’ deaths which had so overshadowed previous winters. Writing to Ellen on Boxing Day 1854, she ended her letter like any other new bride.
Arthur joins me in sincere good wishes for a happy Christmas & many of them to you and yours. He is well – thank God – and so am I – and he is ‘my dear boy’ certainly – dearer now than he was six months ago – in three days we shall actually have been married that length of time!72
The new year began well enough. Charles Dickens came to Bradford on 28 December to give one of his celebrated public readings of A Christmas Carol at St George’s Hall; he was followed, on 11 January, by the Earl of Carlisle, who gave a lecture on the poetry of Thomas Gray.73 As Charlotte had met both men, one wonders whether she was in the audience for either or both occasions, or whether they were now as remote to her as Cornhill. Her own literary exertions had virtually ceased, though this was more a result of circumstance than decision; her thoughts sometimes reverted to her writing. ‘One Evening at the close of 1854’, Arthur later told George Smith,
as we sat by the fire listening to the howling of the wind around the house my poor wife suddenly said, ‘If you had not been with me I must have been writing now’ – She then ran upstairs, brought down & read aloud the beginning of her New Tale – When she had finished I remarked, ‘The Critics will accuse you of repetition, as you have again introduced a school’ – She replied, ‘O I shall alter that – I always begin two or three times before I can please myself’ – But, it was not to be –74
The two chapters which Charlotte read to her husband were a reworking of’Willie Ellin, the story she had begun in the late spring of 1853. This time, the fragment, which became known as ‘Emma’, introduced a sensitive young girl, Matilda Fitzgibbon, who, though personally unpopular because of her unpromising looks and depressed spirits, is nevertheless petted and fêted by her headmistress because of her apparent wealth and aristocratic pretensions. She is then exposed as an impostor whose father’s title and estate do not exist; as the headmistress turns on her in vindictive spite she finds a new and unexpected protector in William Ellin.75 Even this fragment, however, was over a year old, having been written the previous November. Probably she had written nothing since.
Whether she wished to do so or not, Charlotte was not given the chance to develop her story. In the second week of January, she and her husband were invited to Gawthorpe Hall as the guests of Sir James Kay Shuttleworth. The baronet evidently had some thoughts of persuading Arthur to change his mind about the living of Padiham but was rather thwarted by his persistent refusal and the current incumbent’s withdrawal of his resignation.76 According to Mrs Gaskell, Charlotte returned from Gawthorpe Hall feeling unwell, having aggravated a cold she had caught at the end of November by walking in thin shoes on damp ground. This seems unlikely, though Charlotte had complained of a chill after she had been caught in the rain while walking on the moors above Haworth to see the snow-swollen waterfall on Sladen Beck. This was proffered as a partial excuse for not going to Brookroyd in December. But Charlotte had declared herself to be well in her next extant letter and there is nothing to suggest the ‘linGéring cold’ which Mrs Gaskell describes.77
The real cause of Charlotte’s sudden poor health was the fact that, at thirty-eight years old, she was pregnant. She hinted as much to Ellen in a letter describing the classic symptoms of what is misleadingly known as morning sickness.
My health has been really very good ever since my return from Ireland till about ten days ago, when the stomach seemed quite suddenly to lose its tone – indigestion and continual faint sickness have been my portion ever since. Don’t conjecture – dear Nell – for it is too soon yet – though I certainly never before felt as I have done lately. But keep the matter wholly to yourself – for I can come to no decided opinion at present.78
At first the nausea was not bad enough to prevent her fulfilling her normal round of duties. After their return from Gawthorpe Hall, one of Arthur’s cousins, the Reverend James Adamson Bell, came to stay briefly: ‘the visit was a real treat’, Charlotte told Amelia, ‘– He is a cultivated, thoroughly educated man with a mind stored with information gathered from books and travel – and what is far rarer – with the art of conversing appropriately and quietly and never pushing his superiority upon you.’79 She was also well enough to be making plans for visiting Hunsworth and Brookroyd at the end of January, though assuring Amelia that she would not intrude if Joe was still too ill to derive benefit from her coming: she knew, from ‘sorrowful experience’, she told Amelia, ‘that visits even from dear friends are rarely advisable during serious sickness. Ellen Nussey used, with a good intention enough, to volunteer her presence when my sisters were ill; it was impossible for me to do with her –’.80
Within a few days of making her tentative plans, however, Charlotte herself was compelled to take to her bed. She was too ill even to answer a letter from Ellen, obliging her husband to write one of his ‘plain, brief statements of fact’ on her behalf. Though she still held out hope of going to Brookroyd on 31 January, Arthur added, ‘I should say, that unless she improve very rapidly, it will not be advisable for her to leave home even then –’. By 29 January, Arthur was so concerned about his wife’s deteriorating condition that he sent to Bradford for Dr MacTurk ‘as I wish to have better advice than Haworth affords –’. Dr MacTurk came the next day: ‘His opinion was that her illness would be of some duration – but that there was no immediate danger –’.81
This opinion was echoed by Patrick in a letter to Sir James Kay Shuttleworth.
Owing to my Dear Daughter’s indisposition, she has desired me to answer your kind letter, by return of post – For several days past, she has been confin’d to her bed, where she still lies, oppress’d with nausea, sickness, irritation, & a slow feverish feeling – and a consequent want of appetite and digestion.
A fortnight later there was still no improvement. In answer to an avalanche of anxious letters from Ellen, who seems to have believed that Arthur was forbidding Charlotte to write, he painfully inscribed a few lines. ‘It is difficult to write to friends about my wife’s illness, as its cause is yet uncertain –’, he wrote, ‘at present she is completely prostrated with weakness & sickness & frequent fever – All may turn out well in the end, & I hope it will; if you saw [her] you would perceive that she can maintain no correspondence at present –’.83 Clearly he was beginning to have his doubts about the probability of Charlotte’s recovery.
This thought must have occurred to Charlotte too, for three days later,
on 17 February, she made her will. The brief legal disposition of her property spoke volumes about her marriage and the unexpected happiness it had brought her. Overturning the careful arrangements of her marriage settlement, the will left everything to Arthur Bell Nicholls, ‘to be his absolutely and entirely’. There was no provision at all for Patrick, whose name appears only with that of Martha Brown as a witness to Charlotte’s shaky signature. The will was a declaration of Charlotte’s absolute faith in her husband’s integrity; she now knew that he did not require a legal obligation to compel him to look after her father.84
As if the strain was not already unbearable, on the very day that Charlotte made her will, Tabby Aykroyd died. She was eighty-four years old and had been the Brontës’ servant in weal and woe for over thirty years. It fell to Arthur to bury her in Haworth churchyard, just beyond the parsonage garden wall and within sight of the room where his own wife lay dying.85 Too weak to write anything but the briefest of pencilled notes to her closest friends, Charlotte nevertheless made the effort to sing her husband’s praises in every one. ‘I am not going to talk about my sufferings it would be useless and painful –’, she told Ellen. ‘I want to give you an assurance which I know will comfort you – and that is that I find in my husband the tenderest nurse, the kindest support – the best earthly comfort that ever woman had. His patience never fails and it is tried by sad days and Broken nights.’86 A little later, when Ellen had sent on a cheering letter from Mary Hewitt describing how she had suffered similar weakness and emaciation before being safely delivered of her child, Charlotte responded pathetically: ‘In much her case was wonderfully like mine – but I am reduced to greater weakness – the skeleton emaciation is the same &c, &c. &c. I cannot talk – even to
Let me speak the plain truth – my sufferings are very great – my nights indescribable – sickness with scarce a reprieve – I strain until what I vomit is mixed with blood. Medicine I have quite discontinued – If you can send me anything that will do good – do.
As to my husband – my heart is knit to him – he is so tender, so good, helpful, patient.
Poor Joe! long has he to suffer. May God soon send him, you all of us health strength – comfort!88
Amelia sent medicines but they had no perceptible effect; Charlotte refused to allow her husband to send for the doctor Amelia recommended: ‘I knew it would be wholly useless.’ ‘Oh for happier times!’ she could not help crying. ‘My little Grandchild – when shall I see her again?’ When Martha tried to cheer her by telling her to look forward to her own baby that was coming Charlotte could only sigh, ‘I dare say I shall be glad some time, but I am so ill – so weary –’.89
Though she had days when she revived a little and was able to swallow ‘some beef-tea – spoonsful of wine & water – a mouthful of light pudding at different times –’,90 Charlotte grew inexorably weaker and closer to death. By the second week in March she could no longer even hold a pencil to write and her husband had to answer her letters for her. He, too, had to break the ‘awful & painful’ news to Charlotte that Ellen’s brother-in-law, Robert Clapham, had died suddenly and, though he did it as gently as he could, it was still a great shock. ‘These seem troubled times, my dear Miss Nussey.’, he wrote. ‘May God support you through them –’.91 A week later, Charlotte was no longer fully conscious, having slipped into a ‘low wandering delirium’ during which she constantly craved food and drink. Mrs Gaskell describes how ‘Wakening for an instant from this stupor of intelligence, she saw her husband’s woe-worn face, and caught the sound of some murmured words of prayer that God would spare her, “Oh!” she whispered forth, “I am not going to die, am I? He will not separate us, we have been so happy”.’92
Throughout his tender and ceaseless care of his wife Arthur Nicholls had not failed to do his parochial duties; with terrible irony it even fell to him to conduct the prayers and services on 21 March, which had been declared another Day of National Humiliation and Prayer because of the war in Russia. Towards the end of March, however, even his strength and courage failed him: he abandoned his duties to his old friend, Joseph Grant, and maintained a constant vigil at his wife’s bedside.93 In this crisis, it was Patrick Brontë, now seventy-eight years old and nearly the sole survivor of his large family, who rose to the occasion with dignity and grace. ‘My Dear Madam’, he wrote to Ellen Nussey on 30 March 1855:
We are all in great trouble, and Mr Nicholls so much so, that he is not so sufficiently strong, and composed as to be able to write – I therefore devote a few moments, to tell you, that my dear Daughter is very ill, and apparently on the verge of the grave – If she could speak, she would no doubt dictate to us whilst answering your kind letter, but we are left to ourselves, to give what answer we can – The Doctors have no hope of her case, and fondly as we a long time, cherished hope, that hope is now gone, and we [have] only to look forward to the solemn event, with prayer to God, that he will give us grace and Strength sufficient unto our day –
Will you be so kind as to write to Miss Wooler, and Mrs Joe Taylor, and inform them that we requested you to do so – telling them of our present condition, –
Ever truly and respectfully Yours,
P. Brontë94
Early on Saturday morning, 31 March 1855, Charlotte died, just three weeks before her thirty-ninth birthday. ‘Mr Brontës letter would prepare you for the sad intelligence I have to communicate’, Arthur wrote to Ellen.’– Our dear Charlotte is no more – She died last night of Exhaustion. For the last two or three weeks we had become very uneasy about her, but it was not until Sunday Evening that it became apparent that her sojourn with us was likely to be short – We intend to bury her on Wednesday morng.’ ‘On [the] whole she had not much suffering –’, he wrote to Mary Hewitt soon afterwards, ‘she spoke little during the last few days, but continued quite conscious.’95 Mr Ingham, the Haworth surgeon who had attended Charlotte throughout her last illness, certified the cause of death as ‘Phthisis’, indicating a progressive wasting disease. There seems little doubt that it was the pregnancy and its consequent violent nausea which had worn her down; the baby, of course, died with her.96 Despite their prolific ancestry, there would be no descendants of the Brontës of Haworth.
United in their grief, Charlotte’s father and husband were not to be left to mourn in peace and privacy for long. Only hours after her death the first intrusions began. Ellen Nussey arrived on the doorstep, having taken the first available train after receiving Patrick’s note telling her of Charlotte’s imminent demise. ‘I had begged to go before’, Ellen later wrote in anguish, ‘but Mr Brontë and Mr Nicholls objected, fearing the excitement of a meeting for poor Charlotte.’ It was undoubtedly even more impossible for them ‘to do with her’ than it had been for Charlotte when Ellen had tried to volunteer her presence during her sisters’ illnesses. Not surprisingly, Patrick did not come down to welcome the unwelcome visitor but, as courtesy demanded, he sent a message inviting Ellen to stay until the funeral. It was Martha Brown who escorted Ellen upstairs to the bedchamber to see her friend’s body laid out in death, and it was also Martha who invited Ellen to perform the funeral obsequies: ‘her death chamber is in vivid remembrance,’ Ellen told George Smith five years later,
I last saw her in death. Her maid Martha brought me a tray full of evergreens & such flowers as she could procure to place on the lifeless form – My first feeling was, no, I cannot cannot do it – next I was grateful to the maid for giving me the tender office – what made it impossible at first was the rushing recollection of the flowers I spread in her honour at her wedding breakfast and how she admired the disposal of the gathering brought by Martha from the village gardens …97
On Wednesday, 4 April 1855, the small funeral cortege accompanied Charlotte’s coffin the few hundred yards from her home to her final resting place. The church and churchyard were crowded with parishioners, rich and poor alik
e, who had come to pay their last respects to the woman who had, so unexpectedly, made Haworth eternally famous. Among them, as Patrick was touched to notice, was a poor blind girl from Stanbury who had insisted on being led the four miles to Haworth Church so that she could attend the funeral of the woman who had been kind to her.98 Sutcliffe Sowden, who only nine months before had married her to Arthur Nicholls, now performed the burial service over her and committed her body to the family vault beneath the church aisle.99 Having outlived all his six children, as well as his wife and sister-in-law, all but one of whom lay in the same vault, Patrick returned alone to the parsonage with the son-in-law whose marriage he had so bitterly opposed and who was now to be the sole remaining prop of his declining years. ‘It is an hourly happiness to me dear Amelia’, Charlotte had written some weeks before her death, ‘to see how well Arthur and my Father get on together now – there has never been a misunderstanding or wrong word.’100 Though her own happiness had been all too brief, her marriage had secured her father lasting comfort.
Ellen Nussey returned home an hour after the funeral, nursing her grievances against Charlotte’s father and, more especially, her widower. Bitterly resentful of her exclusion during Charlotte’s last illness, Ellen’s dislike of Arthur was now so intense it must have been palpable. Spitting with venom, she later recalled how, on ‘The very day of my arrival’, he had said to her, ‘Any letters you may have of Charlotte’s you will not shew to others & in course of time you will destroy them.’101 Ellen had been unable to refuse, though she reneged on this promise as she had on her earlier one. If Arthur thought he could keep his wife’s life a private matter, he was sadly mistaken, underestimating not only Ellen’s desire to play a public role as ‘the friend of Charlotte Brontë’, but also that of people whose contacts with her had only been slight.
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