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nesiacha · 4 months ago

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Marie Anne Babeuf: A Largely Forgotten Revolutionary

It is true that many female revolutionaries from the French Revolution period are not well remembered. I'd like to make a post in honor of Marie Anne Victoire Babeuf, née Langlet, who was a revolutionary and a staunch supporter of Gracchus Babeuf before and after his death. I couldn't even find a drawing of her.

She was born in Amiens in 1756 and worked as a servant in a château near the Somme. There, she met her future husband, Gracchus Babeuf, who was then known as François Noël Babeuf. They married for love but unfortunately had to endure the loss of their two daughters, both named Sophie (one died from burns at age 4 in 1787, and the other from malnutrition at age 7 in 1788). They then had three sons: the most famous, Robert Babeuf, born in 1785 and later renamed Emile in honor of Rousseau, Camille Babeuf in 1790, and Caius Babeuf in 1797.

Marie Anne was one of her husband's greatest political supporters and closest collaborators. She printed his newspaper for a long time, and her activism led to her arrest for two days in February 1795.

When her husband was arrested while she was pregnant, she made almost every possible effort to secure his release. She never gave up on him. She walked from Paris to Vendôme with Buonarroti's wife to better assist in the defense of their husband. She attended the trial that sentenced her husband to death. A few months after Gracchus Babeuf's suicide, she gave birth to their last son, Caius. Félix Lepeletier acted as a protector of the family (it appears that Turreau also helped and supposedly adopted Camille Babeuf, one of his very few good deeds). She supported her children through various small jobs, including working as a market vendor, while never abandoning her activism and remaining combative.

And she needed it, because during the rue de Nicaisne attack, which had disastrous consequences for the Jacobins (I’ve already shared my thoughts on this here: https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/756533326215528448/the-jacobins-executed-by-bonaparte?source=share), she lost one of her most loyal allies, Félix Lepeletier, who was sentenced to deportation. She herself was arrested following this event. One can only imagine her anguish, as she was the one supporting her sons amid the violence of the repression even if it seems that she was released soon. It would not be the last time she had trouble with the Bonapartist regime. During a conspiracy of Malet , she was once again visited by the Napoleonic police, who confiscated her papers in 1808.

It seems that misfortunes continued to befall Marie Anne Babeuf, as some sources suggest that her son Caius Babeuf died during the 1814 invasion. Her son Emile Babeuf, also an activist, sided with the Hundred Days regime and, surprisingly, wrote a letter to Carnot (one of the main organizers of the Babouvist repression), although it is less surprising given that he knew what Bonaparte had done to him and his family. I’ve already given my opinion, considering that the Republicans preferred to unite, including with Bonaparte, despite their grievances, to avoid the imminent Bourbon restoration (see this post for more information: https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/755017284158980096/emile-babeuf-and-the-letter-send-lazare-carnot?source=share). He was sentenced to deportation but was pardoned on August 25, 1818. In the meantime, his mother obtained a visitation permit that she often used. It also seems that her son Camille Babeuf committed suicide during the Allies’ entry into Paris in 1815. I hope Caius and Camille did not die like that, as it would add another tragedy (surviving her beloved husband and then four out of five children, not to mention all the problems she faced due to her activism and her surroundings).

We have no record of when this unjustly forgotten revolutionary died. She seemed extremely combative, and her commitment is beyond doubt.But how hard it must have been for her to see that the ideals of the revolution that she and her husband fought to achieve were defeated first by the Directory, then by Napoleon's regime and finally by the Bourbon Restoration.

Most of the sources I used are from historian Jean Marc Schiappa. While working on a project to write her biography, I finally found a biography of her on a French site called Maitron, which I invite you all to see here: https://maitron.fr/spip.php?article25533. I found it just a few days ago, and there are some of portraits of revolutionaries from different periods and countries. Too bad that it is generally only of a political branch because I have not been able to find for example portraits of the Brissottins (for the moment maybe they are in this site)

#frev #french revolution #babeuf #marie anne babeuf #The directory #napoleonic era #women of revolution

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josefavomjaaga · 11 months ago

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Hi Josefa I hope u're doing well and I hope u had a great holiday season!!! c:

I was wondering if you could tell me anything about Eugène in relation to Jerôme Bonaparte? Since they are quite close in age with Jerôme being younger, I was wondering if they had any relationship to one another, and what they thought of each other. I remember hearing about Jerôme being jealous of Eugène for what he perceived as "receiving special treatment" and being prioritized over him by Napoleon, but there weren't any specific sources linked to this statement and I don't know if there is any credence to it 🤔, Yaggy recommended that I should ask u about it because u know a lot about Eugène ^-^

Thank you, @flowwochair, and all best wishes to you, too. May 2024 have nothing but flowers for you!

Your question reminds me of the looong list of unanswered Asks! in my inbox, and that one of my new year's resolutions was to finally get to them. What can I say? I've never been good with that resolution thingie.

Might as well start with yours.

From what I have read, Jérôme Bonaparte and Eugène Beauharnais originally got along rather fine. They actually went to the same school for some time, the "Collège des Irlandais", and it's quite likely that Bonaparte sent his younger brother to this institution because Josephine's son was also there.

If you remember the timeline for Jérôme's naval career that I once put together for you (please scroll way, way down, it's in one of the reblogs 😊), the author also said a bit about Jérôme's school education. Apparently the two boys, Eugène 15 and Jérôme 12 years old, both lived in that boarding school from January 1796 to April 1797. That means, during the time when both Jérôme's older brother Napoleon and Eugène's mother Josephine were away in Italy.

With regards to Jérôme, I feel like it's also interesting to note that when Joseph and Napoleon left for France in 1779, the three youngest Bonaparte siblings Pauline, Caroline and Jérôme had not even been born yet. And Carlo died a short time after Jérôme's birth. I'm pretty sure the two older brothers felt more like father figures with regards to these siblings.

So, Eugène and Jérôme both had Napoleon as the not-quite-father in their life.

Françoise de Bernardy in her biography of Eugène cites a long letter from Jérôme to Eugène from 26 December 1796, that shows him in best spirits, mentions Eugène's sister Hortense and seems to indicate that the teenagers all got along quite well. Among other things, Jérôme mentions yet another quarrel between the Talliens, informs Eugène that Barras and Carnot expect both Jérôme and Eugène to dine with them despite Madame Campan giving a ball that day, and then goes on bragging about how he had been given a laurel crown by generals and politicians, was put on a table and embraced and applauded by everyone. (And if this happened at Barras', I'm not quite sure how I feel about it.)

According to Bernardy, Jérôme is already "the genuine rascal" that he would later be. Though I would like to put this in perspective, because Eugène at the time also seems to have had everything in mind but school lessons and homework, and according to the memoirs of Arnault, he even was a particularly bad and "stupid" student who drove his teachers to despair. It seems that, at this time, they both were two very charming and very spoilt brats, mostly concerned with girls, hunting trips and being flattered by people who wanted to get in the good graces of general Bonaparte. Jérôme, despite being so much younger, also already comes across as more confident and assertive than docile, polite and often insecure Eugène.

This may already be the main difference between them: Eugène, due to his innate desire to please and to gain the recognition of his new stepfather, will change his ways as soon as he becomes Napoleon's aide de camp and joins him in Italy (July 1797). Jérôme will always only do what Jérôme wants. (And to be honest, I kinda love him for that. Jérôme will always find a way to be a pain in Napoleon's imperial ass.)

I remember hearing about Jerôme being jealous of Eugène for what he perceived as "receiving special treatment" and being prioritized over him by Napoleon

I do not really remember anything about that (but then again, I've only read up on Eugène; this may be the same story from Jérôme's perspective). The closest thing I could find is a remark in the memoirs of Laure Junot about how the Bonaparte brothers would always hold Eugène - despite the fact they could not stand him - up as a shining example to Jérôme, causing the latter to despise his former friend. There also is an anecdote (the source of which I cannot remember atm) about Jérôme being furious because unlike Eugène he was not allowed to join the second Italian campaign (battle of Marengo, 1800), and later demanding Napoleon's sabre from that campaign as a gift in compensation.

Could I imagine that Jérôme was jealous of Eugène? Absolutely. This probably needs to be seen in the context of the Bonaparte-Beauharnais rivalry. The Bonaparte always regarded the Beauharnais as intruders and feared Napoleon might grant them too much money or influence. - Did Jérôme have any reason to? I'm not sure. Jérôme simply was a lot younger than Eugène, so of course Eugène was a step ahead of him in his career. It is also true that Eugène rose in rank very quickly and owed this solely to his stepfather. But in all fairness: so did Jérôme. And while Eugène at some point seems to have started to put in a lot of work and effort, even giving up his comfortable post as Napoleon's aide in order to remain in the military, and while he later as viceroy of Italy often worked from morning until midnight (much to his wife's chagrin), Jérôme seems to have seen his naval career as something of a pleasure cruise trip. Desertion from his post and month-long vacation in the United States included. As to his rule as king of Westphalia, I do not want to judge him because I have not read much about it, and in any case he was given very little leeway from his brother. But fact is: Jérôme was made a king. Eugène was not. So who had reason to be jealous?

I am not aware of much contact between the two of them later during the Empire. Eugène was in Italy since 1805. They may have met when Jérôme came to Italy for an interview with Napoleon, at the time when he gave up on his wife Betsy Patterson. But I am unaware of any reaction from Eugène to that. And later, when Eugène goes to Paris for the first time in almost five years, for his mother's "divorce" proceedings, he finds his house already occupied by - Jérôme. 😁

But the funniest (or saddest?) thing is that, while Jérôme was forced to join the navy very much against his will (as a disciplinary measure after the ill-fated duel with Davout's younger brother), Eugène for his part during his finale exile in Bavaria admitted: "I would have loved to be a sailor."

Thank you for the Ask! and sorry for the long rambling. Asking me about Eugène is a dangerous thing to do because I won't stop blabbering...

#napoleon's family #eugene de beauharnais #jerome bonaparte #ask #@flowwochair

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whencyclopedia · 3 months ago

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John Adams

John Adams (1735-1826) was an American lawyer, statesman, and diplomat who was a prominent leader of the American Revolution (1765-1789) before going on to serve as the first Vice President (1789-1797) and second President of the United States (1797-1801). He is considered a Founding Father of the United States, having helped lead the push for independence.

Early Life

John Adams was born on 30 October 1735 in Braintree, Massachusetts. His father, John Adams Sr., was a farmer, shoemaker, church deacon, and selectman for the town of Braintree, who was well-liked in his 2,000-person community. The younger John greatly admired his father, later writing of him that "in wisdom, piety, benevolence, and charity…I have never known his superior" (McCullough, 33). John's mother, Susanna Boylston Adams, came from one of the most prominent medical families in New England; her uncle Zabdiel Boylston was the first American physician to perform smallpox inoculations. John had two younger brothers, Peter and Elihu, and spent his childhood "making and sailing boats…swimming, skating, flying kites and shooting marbles…running about to quiltings and frolics and dances among boys and girls". As Adams would later recall, his childhood "went off like a fairytale" (McCullough, 31).

In 1751, at the age of 16, John Adams enrolled in Harvard College with the encouragement of his father, who had hoped that his son would become a minister. Yet, Adams realized he was better suited for a career in law. After graduating from Harvard in 1755, he took a job as a schoolteacher in Worcester, Massachusetts, to sustain himself while he studied law under James Putnam, one of the most prominent lawyers in Worcester. He was admitted to the bar on 6 November 1759 and began practicing law in Braintree and Boston. He lost his first case on a technicality, which temporarily shook his self-confidence, but he continued to dedicate himself to the study of law. By 1762, his practice had taken off, and he was soon riding the circuit of Massachusetts courts with the royal judges.

In 1759, Adams was introduced to 15-year-old Abigail Smith, a shy, delicate-looking girl who had been frequently ill in her childhood. At first, Adams took little interest in Abigail, writing that she and her sisters were neither "fond, nor frank, nor candid" (McCullough, 52). But the pair became closer in the following years, bonding over their shared love of books. In 1761, upon the death of his father, Adams inherited nine acres of land and a farmhouse in Braintree; he and Abigail lived there after their marriage on 25 October 1764. The couple would ultimately have four children who survived childhood: Abigail ‘Nabby' Adams (1765-1813), John Quincy Adams (1767-1848), Charles Adams (1770-1800), and Thomas Boylston Adams (1772-1832). Another daughter, Susanna (b. 1768) died before her second birthday while the couple's final child, Elizabeth, was stillborn in 1777.

Abigail Adams

Benjamin Blyth (Public Domain)

#History #JohnAdams #BostonMassacre #AbigailAdams

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the-crow-binary · 10 months ago

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"Overbearing, he bends to no one's will"

So Dracula is a bratty bottom?

Deep inhale

Year 1094: Mathias Cronqvist loses his wife. In his rage and grief, he goes on to "betray God" by hurting everyone around him and achieve eternal life. He then asks, pretty much plead with Leon to understand and join him. Bratty Bottom behavior.

Somewhere before 1476: Mathias meets Lisa with who he falls in love, to the point it momentarily brings his humanity back. Bottom. Lisa dies and he gets angry, change his name into Dracula, and plot revenge against mankind this time, like he did against God so many years ago. Bratty.

Year 1476: His behavior leads Hector to betray him. He gets hurt and even more angry (even before being 100% sure it's a betrayal), sending Isaac after him, ordering him to bring him back if he is alive so he can basically torture him because he just can't bear being betrayed. Bratty but also Bottom because he seemed to care a big lot about Hector. Like. A big big lot. 🙂 Trevor and friends arrive and kick his ass, so he curse the land in return. Bratty.

Year 1479: He comes back to life and immediately goes "Hector! Why did you betray me ? ):< Humans suck and you should know it already. ):<". Then he gets defeated again and goes "I don't care my curse wille still destroy the stupid humans ):<". Then Hector goes "Nuh-huh! I can reverse it!", and he proceeds to die in a scream. Bratty Bottom.

Year 1576 to 1591: He comes back to life again wich is already very bratty of him. Fights Christopher a first time, makes him believe he died when not really, waits for the perfect moment to strike again, then years later, kidnaps his son. He then proceed to make father and son fight against each other. Bratty. And also Bottom because I bet he wanted to become Soleil's second dad.

Year 1691 to 1698: Comes back to life, sees Simon wich would turn any man into a bottom, and not only does he cast a curse on the land AGAIN upon being defeated, but he curses Simon, SPECIFICALLY, as well. What a brat. Then Simon accidentally brought him back again and killed him again. Bottom.

Year 1748: Bro did not even actually resurrect and he still managed to be an ass a menace through his wraith. Bratty. He then talks about drinking Juste's blood to make himself "whole again", literally saying he needs to fill himself with a Belmont('s life) to live, like bro. Bottom. 😏

Year 1792: "Blablabla it's not MY fault I came back to life, it's the HUMANS' " How can you be brattier and bottomer than by having a whole philosophical conversation with your sworn ennemy about how you have no control over your resurrections it's just that people are asses. 🙄 (Dracula even has Richter dolls all around his castle for Marie to collect like bro just marry the clan already)

Year 1797: He starts as bratty as usual but then Alucard reminds him of the bottomness Lisa woke up in him, and he calms down. Less Bratty as he dies with regrets, but still very Bottom of him.

19th century: He comes back to life more corrupted than ever. Proceeds to flirt with Shanoa, then underestimate and kinda mock her, only for her to defeat him with his own power. The balance between Brattiness and Bottomness has been corrupted as well in favor of the Brattiness, but his inner Bottom is never too far.

Year 1897: Comes back to life. Gets killed by Quich Morris, but mortally wounds him as well. Bratty Bottom.

Year 1917: You have to be the biggest of Brats if it takes a whole world war to resurrect you. And yet, a big Bottom if it doesn't even prevent you from immediately getting killed again lol.

Year 1944: Came back to life not at full power. Fought alongside his eternal hubby, even fusing with him (so fighting with Death inside him 😏), and still lost to two kids. Got killed by the sun, after musing that he will regain his full power one day and that they'll see who will have the last laugh. Bratty Bottom.

Year 1999: Julius topped that man so hard he never recovered from it again. The end of the Bratty Bottom millenia-long terror.

It took Death using books about how much of a Bratty Bottom his dead husband has been to bring him back again in GoS. So, of course, he was still a Brat who wanted to play with his ennemies by fighting them, and a Bottom who let Death penetrate fuse with him to use his powers like they did back in 1944.

So, to answer your question... yes. Dracula is a Bratty Bottom. Always has been. I'd say that his whole job is to be a pain in the ass of everyone, but he's too much of a Bottom for that. 🤭

#bratty bottom dracula manifesto #i love him and how annoying he is lmao #listen I am just making logic conclusions based on canon here #(not to take too seriously lmao)#castlevania #akumajou dracula #vlad dracula tepes

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blackswaneuroparedux · 2 years ago

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Franz Schubert: the enigma of the man and the musician

If I were to identify the distinctive emotion that pervades Schubert's music, I would say that it is a tragic but reconciled love: love not only for people in all their many predicaments, but also love for music, and especially for the music that was brought to him by his muse....When I think of Schubert's death, and lament that he did not live to the age of Mozart, I think of the love that he longed for and never obtained, and wonder yet more at a musical legacy that contains more consolation for our loneliness than any other human creation.

- Sir Roger Scruton on Franz Schubert (1797-1828)

The story of Austrian composer Franz Schubert (1797–1828) was one of the most tragic in classical music. Schubert died young. Really young. Younger than almost any other famous composer - younger than Mozart, Chopin, or Mendelssohn. He contracted syphilis at 25 and died at 31, which limited his life in many ways but also drove him to be an incredibly prolific composer. His personal life is shrouded in mystery and yet it greatly influenced his music. 2022 marks the 225th anniversary of his birth and perhaps then it’s good time to discuss the man and his music. Can unveiling his life bring into light the tortured genius of his musical compositions? Let us see.

Schubert wasn’t very keen on marriage for many possible reasons, perhaps because he didn’t have enough money, or because he was gay, or because he thought marriage was a bourgeois institution created to force conformity - or none of those things. In any case, he was a bachelor who lived a life of his own choosing. Schubert’s 20s were a lot like many artists’ and other urban dwellers’ 20s today: he was broke most of the time and lived with roommates, he hung out in pubs and drank heavily, he flirted with leftist political movements, and, most importantly, he had a close but ever changing group of friends to explore art, politics, religion, literature, and, of course, music.

Born in 1797 in Vienna, Schubert grew up with a strict schoolteacher father who encouraged his musical pursuits. Schubert first left home at the age of 11 to serve as a choirboy in the imperial court chapel, a position that included a scholarship to an elite school (“the principal Viennese boarding school for non-aristocrats” according to Grove Music Online). During Schubert’s five years there, he met the first members of what would become his adult circle of friends. Their help later proved instrumental in getting him out of his father’s house and off the path to becoming a schoolteacher, a low-level civil servant job, like his father.

Schubert didn’t just come from a strict family, he also lived in a rather strict society. In the aftermath of two successive defeats by Napoleon during Schubert’s childhood, Austria reverted back to a repressive political regime. He spent his entire adult life in a society with strict government censorship and powerful secret police, and he chafed under the limits of his freedom at various times. In 1816, a year after the passage of a law that barred men of lower social classes from marrying unless they had sufficient income, Schubert wrote a tortured diary entry disparaging marriage and the monarchy.

In 1820, Schubert attended a party that was raided by the police. He spent the night in jail, and his friend the political activist Johann Senn was jailed for over a year and then exiled to his native Austrian Tyrol. Later on, Schubert worked on the opera Der Graf von Gleichen even though he knew its plot about bigamy had no chance of making it past the censors.

Schubert was subject to strong controlling forces during his lifetime so perhaps it was natural that of his many friends, the closest was Franz von Schober, a gregarious nobleman who had a reputation as a sort-of self-indulgent pleasure seeker. It seems that everyone who knew Schober either loved or hated him.

Many thought he was a bad influence on Schubert, and various mutual friends left negative characterisations of him. According to one, “Schober surpasses us all in mind, and even more so in speech! Yet there is much about him that is artificial, and his best powers threaten to be suffocated by idleness.” Schubert was much more dedicated to his creative work than Schober but he was irresistibly attracted to Schober’s uninhibited way of living. When Schubert first moved out of his father’s home to try to make his living as a musician, he moved into the Schober family flat in central Vienna, and Schober later took credit for liberating Schubert from the life of a schoolteacher.

Given that Schubert was something of a non-conformist, it’s ironic that he was most popular in his lifetime for domestic music. Written for amateurs, music for the home was part of the culture of cozy domesticity in Biedermeier Vienna. And like many Viennese, Schubert avidly participated in home music making throughout his life. He wrote and published many songs and short pieces for piano solo or duo (two people playing one piano). Schubert’s first big hit was Erlkönig. He wrote it in 1815 and it was performed five years later at a private home and then publicly soon after. It promptly exploded in popularity and was published as his Op. 1. A song about death pursuing a child, it features a vivid accompaniment portraying a horse trying to outrun death. The song is both totally genius and clearly written by a melodramatic 18-year-old.

In early 1821, around the time Erlkönig was starting to get noticed, Schubert’s circle of friends began to have their first official Schubertiads, a clever name they came up with to describe evenings devoted to Schubert’s music. Schober was one of the primary participants and they often took place at his home. These performances of Schubert’s music and the encouragement of his friends were major catalysts to his career.

Like most children growing up, I learned to play the piano and so from an early age I was always a fan of piano sonatas. With solo piano, there is nowhere to hide. Without the cover of an orchestra, the details of every part - melody, counterpoint, harmony, and rhythm - are all exposed. The genius of the work is thus revealed, as well as the personality of the composer.

Every note is a clue to who the writer is. Schubert may have been a shy and retiring gentleman, but he was full of mischief, mystery, and wonder. His piano sonatas are an incredible contribution to our heritage and reveal him as a man with a limitless interior landscape of emotion. There is enough polite, baroque gaiety to enjoy, but on closer examination, Schubert’s sonatas reveal sensitively expressed romance, pathos, and yearning.

The Fantasy in C, Op. 15, more commonly known as The ‘Wanderer’ Fantasy, was written for solo piano in 1822, and is one of Schubert’s most well-known and frequently performed works. It is considered one of the greatest compositions in the entire piano repertoire. This four-movement fantasy is linked by a unifying theme with each movement flowing into the next, starting with a variation of the opening phrase from a former composition ‘Der Wanderer.’ This lied (poem set to music) was originally composed in 1816 for piano and voice with lyrics and title derived from a poem by Georg Philipp Schmidt von Lübeck.

The ‘Wanderer’ Fantasy is considered his most challenging work; he is quoted to have barely the ability to play it himself. Composed during the post-Enlightenment, the fantasy alludes to the onset of changing tastes - the complexity, the sense of searching, and his contemporary time itself. Musically it is incredible; as a cultural reference, it is absolutely magnetic. In the song, the wanderer seeks a distant paradise but cannot find it anywhere among men: “Where are you, my dear land? Sought and brought to mind, yet never known. …” Searching for happiness, the wanderer asks, “where?” and a ghostly breath answers, “There, where you are not, there is your happiness.”

The ‘Wanderer’ Fantasy broke away from the classical form in that it was created to be performed without a break between the movements. Both the virtuosity and structure captivated other Romantic era composers, most intently the Hungarian composer Franz Liszt, who transcribed it for piano and orchestra. Editing Schubert’s original score, Liszt rearranged the final movement and added alternative passages into the fantasy.

There are over 900 works by Schubert to explore, ranging from traditional Viennese waltzes like the dreamscape ‘Serenade’ for full orchestra, viola, or cello to his poetic lieder. ‘Erlkönig’ (translated as ‘king of the fairies’) is one of Schubert’s more preeminent lieder. Set to Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s poem of the same name, it is a dramatic and challenging composition that is widely regarded as a masterpiece of the early Romantic era.

The lied tells the story of a father who swiftly rides home on horseback, holding his anxious and feverish son. As the story unfolds, the child experiences “hallucinations” of the malevolent spirit of the Erlking (personification of death) that tries to lure the boy. As they race through the forest, the frightened father tries to console his child by defining the supernatural experiences as mere natural causes: a streak of fog, rustling leaves, and the shimmering willows. When they reach home, the father discovers that his son has died.

Schubert was only 18 years of age when he created this evocative and theatrical composition in 1815. Composed for vocals and piano accompaniment, the song features four characters - narrator, father, son, and the Erlking - all sung by a single vocalist. All characters are sung in the minor key except the Erlking, whose character is sung in the major key.

‘Erlkönig’ is an extremely unusual composition in several ways. There are features that, taken abstractly, would seem to demonstrate a lack of familiarity with the musical conventions of the early 19th century. And while there are many possible poetic interpretations of these moments, they often fall short of explaining why Schubert departed so far from the style of his time. The accompaniment, with its incessant vibrations, is strange piano writing. The resulting music could be taken as an illustration of the horse’s clopping hooves - at least an abstract illustration, since a horse has (obviously) four legs, not three or six, as the triplet motion would suggest. (The song ‘Gretchen at the Spinning Wheel,’ for example, sounds far more ‘realistic.’)

In the setting of the line “My son, it’s a wisp of fog,” the dissonance, on the word “son,” is so irregularly composed as to be provocative. A naked major second is resolved upwards (wrong!) to a unison (wrong!!!!). In the musical language of the early 19th century, it was impossible to treat a dissonance more incorrectly.

The ending is unusually abrupt. The boy’s suffering is portrayed vividly in music, but his death itself is not illustrated. There’s a brief phrase, quasi recitativo, a pair of piano chords, and nothing more. The chords are long, not staccato, and there is no fermata.

In Schubert’s time, death was conventionally illustrated by a grand pause in all the instruments. It is extremely unlikely that he wasn’t aware of this - even if he had never explicitly learned the rhetorical device, he would certainly have had enough experience of this convention as listener. A grand pause would have been the obvious choice for this moment, and it’s striking that Schubert didn’t make that choice. The key to the interpretation of the work lies in this decision.

To understand Schubert’s compositional choices, let’s return to the original poem. What is the text really about? There is strong evidence that the poem is describing the rape of a child - from the perspective of the perpetrator.

Goethe gives the most space in his poem to the emotions of the Erlkönig, who is responsible for the child’s death. The pain of the father, who holds his expiring son in his arms, is also explored thoroughly. Yet the suffering of the child himself seems barely worth mentioning to Goethe. He devotes little space to the boy’s pain, and when he does speak, his words feel strangely artificial - he says, “Erlkönig has done me harm.” This oddly formal phrase sounds hollow coming out of a child’s mouth.

Erlkönig says to the boy, “I love you, I’m charmed by your beautiful form.” (Charmed, in German, is reizen, which can also mean excited or even aroused.) Erlkönig has a crown and a symbolic, phallic tail.

Erlkönig then threatens, “If you’re not willing, I’ll have to use force.” (Force is Gewalt, which can also mean violence, and which forms the centre of the word for rape, Vergewaltigung.) This line is abhorrent to our contemporary ears, trained as we are in the inviolability of sexual consent.

But it’s worth remembering that this would have sounded different - even routine - in Goethe’s time. Rape within marriage was legal and socially acceptable; the distinction between seducing and forcing someone to do something was far more blurred; weaker groups in society had little recourse to justice. Goethe himself wrote a line saying “I loved boys, but prefer to love girls / If I’ve had my fill of them as girls, I’ll avail myself of them as boys,” without fear of censure. We must assume that these girls, if they were unwilling to be used anally, were taken for this purpose by force.

Schubert’s setting of ‘Erlkönig’ is mostly free, associative. Besides the return of the introductory triplet motive, there are few formal connections or structures to be found. That makes the harmonic and melodic parallels between the lines “He holds him secure, he holds him warm” and “Erlkönig has done me harm” impossible to overlook. The harmonies are exactly the same - they haven’t even been transposed - and only a single chord is left out.

Here, the melodic material that kept the boy secure and warm becomes the cry of the dying - or arguably, raped - child. Schubert is perhaps telling us who the perpetrator is. The secure, warm touch of the father becomes the suffering he inflicts on his son. And the strange dissonance set to the word “son” takes on a new meaning. Clearly, something is not right. This father-son relationship is distorted, perverted.

There is a sexual image in the accompanying right-hand triplet figure. Imagine the right hand, playing the constant up-and-down vibrations of Schubert’s triplets, taken away from the keyboard and rotated 90 degrees so that the thumb is facing away from the body; now imagine this same motion performed on the penis. It is the motion of masturbation. Here, Schubert pushes his naturalism to its limits. If we assume that the perpetrator was right-handed, which he very likely was (85% of people are), then he would have masturbated with his right hand. And the way Schubert builds his song to its climax is analogous to the male orgasm.

The ending is direct and illustrative. Instead of the grand pause that would appropriately depict the child’s death, we get music and words that are analogous to the end of a rape. Excuse the blunt language: in “He reaches the farmhouse with effort and urgency,” the father ejaculates; in “In his arms the child,” he pulls his pants up; and finally, in “was dead,” he zips up his fly, completing the act.

It seems improbable that Schubert used this song to directly process childhood trauma. But it’s obvious that he is, at least unconsciously, reporting from a harrowing experience. In his famous short story “My Dream,” he writes the following: “…My father took me once again into his favourite garden. He asked me if I liked it. But the garden was wholly repellent to me and I dared not say so. Then, flushing, he asked me a second time: did the garden please me? Trembling, I denied it. Then my father struck me and I fled.”

Could it be that the garden his father was so fond of, that was so abhorrent to little Franz, was the genital region of his father, with an overgrowth of pubic hair? In “My Dream,” a heartrending passage follows the story of the garden. “When I would sing of love, it turned to pain. And again, when I would sing of pain, it turned to love. Thus love and pain divided me,” Schubert wrote. If Schubert did suffer abuse as a child, this would take on an entirely new meaning. Instead of alluding to some diffuse sense of romantic melancholy, it would be a document of the abuse he suffered; and, moreover, of the stunted emotional life to which he was condemned. That’s just one interpretation that I’ve come to mull over after being provoked by other more musically qualified friends versed in classical music and in particular the life and works of Schubert himself.

Another of my favourite pieces by Schubert has been String Quartet No. 14, also known as ‘Death and the Maiden’. This was composed in 1824 after Schubert learned of his imminent death. In 1822, the now-successful, well-received Schubert contracted syphilis, which would go on to destroy his health, his good spirits, and ultimately his life. It was during this period of decline that he created his String Quartet No. 14, slotting ‘Death and the Maiden’ into the quartet’s second movement. He was in a much gloomier place in life, he confessed in a March 1824 letter to his friend, Leopold Kupelwieser.

“I find myself to be the most unhappy and wretched creature in the world. Imagine a man whose health will never be right again, and who in sheer despair continually makes things worse and worse instead of better; imagine a man, I say, whose most brilliant hopes have perished, to whom the felicity of love and friendship have nothing to offer but pain at best, whom enthusiasm (at least of the stimulating variety) for all things beautiful threatens to forsake, and I ask you, is he not a miserable, unhappy being? ‘My peace is gone, my heart is sore, I shall find it nevermore,’ I might as well sing every day now, for upon retiring to bed each night I hope that I may not wake again, and each morning only recalls yesterday’s grief.”

The quartet was inspired by one of his earlier lieder, using the same title, and was originally set to a poem by German poet Matthias Claudius. The theme of the quartet is a death toll about the terror of dying and the hopeful anticipation of the comfort and peace that follows. In the dialogue between the maiden and death, the young woman fearfully casts death away, crying out: “Go, savage man of bone! I am still young - go!”

The verse sung by “Death” in Schubert’s lied reads:

“Give me your hand, you fair and tender creature; I am a friend and do not come to punish you. Be of good cheer! I am not savage, Gently you will sleep in my arms.”

And yet, his Quartet No. 14, ‘Death and the Maiden,’ came from that place. Which, to me, explains how, and why, the quartet has such power. And, as you’ll come to hear, it’s a world apart from his 1817 song.

The second movement of the quartet is nuanced, mysterious, heartbreaking, and, curiously, utterly seductive, with its two distinct voices. And, surely, far more personal to Schubert than the song had been. Because now, battling illness, depression, the realities of an illness that gets treated with mercury, whereby you either die or syphilis or mercury poisoning, Schubert gets it. It’s not just the maiden that Death is after. It’s Schubert.

Here’s the Borromeo Quartet (Nicholas Kitchen and Kristopher Tong, violins; Mai Motobuchi, viola; Yeesun Kim, cello) in a fabulous rendition:

youtube

Despite Schubert’s illness and depression, he continued to write tuneful, light music that evoked warmth and comfort. The String Quartet No. 14 was first played privately in 1826 and not published until 1831, three years after his death.

To make time to write The ‘Wanderer’ Fantasy for the wealthy patron Carl Emanuel Liebenberg von Zsittin, Schubert stopped writing what would come to be known as the ‘Unfinished Symphony.’ Unfortunately, the ‘Unfinished Symphony’ remained unfinished, and The ‘Wanderer’ Fantasy wasn’t performed in public until 1832, long after the composer’s death.

If there was any doubt about Schubert’s pure emotionality, the drama of the ‘Unfinished Symphony,’ also known as Symphony No. 8, will quickly dispel all doubts. Although the symphony is missing its finale, which would complete the musical form, it is not lacking in any other sense. Due to the lyrical drive of the dramatic structure, the unfinished Symphony No. 8 is often referred to as the very first Romantic symphony, which cements Schubert’s place in the annals of music history. The bold symphonic scope of Schubert’s music as well as its dramatic power and emotional tension celebrate him as a “romantic” who influenced the next group of musical legends such as Franz Liszt and Richard Strauss.

Yet, even at the height of the Schubertiads, when his songs and piano pieces were selling, Schubert wanted to make his name outside the publications that fueled the home music market. In addition to composing nine symphonies, working on a handful of operas that he left in various stages of completeness, and writing string quartets and piano trios, he also worked to bring the smaller genres that he was famous for into the concert hall. He made them longer, more ambitious, and more virtuosic. One such example is “Lebensstürme,” a movement for piano duo. It may have been intended as the first movement of a four-movement work (the name ‘Lebensstürme’ - Storms of Life - was added after Schubert’s death).

Over all then, Schubert is difficult to characterise. Schubert disdained many aspects of traditional bourgeois life, particularly regular employment, institutional religion, conformist thinking, and marriage. Freedom - political, personal, professional, and creative - was extremely important to the way Schubert sought to live his life. And yet he held strong anti-establishment views while profiting from the celebration of “hearth, heart, and home” that was Biedermeier Vienna. He composed tirelessly and still found time for a very active social life.

It’s also hard to get a sense of his personality from his friends’ reminiscences of him. Many who knew him described him as having a dual nature. One example, and probably the harshest, was by Josef Kenner, who said that Schubert’s “body, strong as it was, succumbed to the cleavage in his - souls - as I would put it, of which one pressed heavenwards and the other bathed in slime.” Quotes like that raise more questions than they answer but they point to the fact that Schubert lived a marginal existence in a society that celebrated loyalty to the family and the state.

If Schubert the man was hard to fathom, there is no doubt about Schubert the musician composer. t’s easy to see why his work is considered in the same league as the works of Mozart, Bach, or Beethoven. Schubert’s compositions are still being discovered by audiences that appreciate its depth and emotive expression.

I just wish he had known that we would still know his name almost 200 years later. Nearly 200 years after his death, he remains an enigma.

#schubert #franz schubert #quote #music #scruton #roger scruton #composer #musician #austria #austrian #society #piano #symphony #goethe #poem #song #arts #culture #biography

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yr-obedt-cicero · 2 years ago

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you’re the only one I can think of that would know most about this, but is it true William S. Hamilton was gay? or what started the rumors?

The speculation of William's sexuality rose to question because William - unlike the rest of his family - never married and remained a bachelor throughout his life. With that being said, the whole discussion boils down to nothing but mere speculation. There's no actual evidence, or anything notable that could slightly confirm it.

Theodore Rodolf, a political rival of William's, wrote that; “He was a confirmed bachelor, and did not seem to care much for female society.” [x] Although Rodolf's account should be taken with a grain of salt due his evident bias against William as a political competitor. And historian A. K. Fielding tells a different perspective of William's regard to women, claiming;

Multiple accounts indicate that William had a soft spot for the ladies. Considering the rough frontier society he lived in, it is possible that he was involved in a tryst or two himself. Yet it is difficult to ascertain whether any such interludes left him yearning for matrimony, because he left no records on the subject. Did he prefer his freedom? Was he spurned by someone? Did he recall his father's adultery and the shame it had brought on the whole family? Without concrete evidence, it is difficult to prove any given theory. One can only conclude that if there was a special romance, William chose not to pursue it and remained a bachelor all his life.

Source — FIELDING, A. K. Rough Diamond: The Life of Colonel William Stephen Hamilton, Alexander Hamilton’s Forgotten Son. Indiana University Press, 2021.

I think if anything, Rodolf may have been referring to William's lack of special or flattering attitude to women, that he didn't alter his character or appearance for them. William led a very rugged and shameless life; chances where higher-class women would not fancy his lifestyle. When William moved from Illinois to Wisconsin in the late 1820s, he had established a mine known as Hamilton's Diggings, to which he later renamed Woita. In the March of 1831, Juliette Kinzie described the conditions as “shabby” and “unpromising”, [x] she was also appalled by the foul language of the miners and described them as; “roughest-looking set of men I ever beheld.” [x] Although William's closest family members were some of the only women in his family, like his mother and youngest sister. Both had traveled west to see him, and he had one day hoped to have them as part of his household.

Sylvan Muldoon makes a bold claim in his biography about William with the statement that apparently there were rumors of an affair between William and a family member of the opposite sex. Even going as far as to claim that his brother's believed such, and resented him for it;

It is true that many writers have expressed their opinions concerning Hamilton's morals in a critical manner, some even going so far as to accuse him of living too intimately with a certain member of the opposite sex, who was married to one of his relatives.

There I believe, an alienation between William Stephen and a couple of his own brothers on this score which we will not enter into here, for the simple reason that the charges brought against him were preposterous and based upon nothing more than supposition. Suffice it to say that Mrs. Alexander Hamilton, his mother; Mrs. Holly, his sister; James Hamilton, his brother; and several other of his relatives were entirely in sympathy with his action in allowing the wife of one of his nephews to keep house for him during a time when she was estranged from her husband.

Source — Alexander Hamilton's pioneer son; the life and times of Colonel William Stephen Hamilton; 1797-1850. Early New York, Missouri, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, Iowa and California, by Sylvan J. Muldoon

Then goes on to say he; “lived and died without ever marrying, and, so far as is known, he never participated in a love-affair.” I've found no evidence of any unpleasant feelings between the brothers concerning this particular matter, but William does seem to have been a bit alienated from them—Although it is more likely due to their differing political beliefs (A similar aspect in James's feud with Alexander Jr). Most of Hamilton's sons were Jacksonian Democrats, while William was a Whig. Additionally, William did not find himself comfortable in the wealthy aristocratic class that his family were associated with. Also, because William decided to move half across the country, so it would have been hard to contact him or see him. Some have speculated that William may have distanced himself from his family due to their unaccepting nature had he truly been gay, but all the priorly mentioned reasons are the solidly confirmed ones.

One event that did contribute to some friction between John Church and William was concerning the female family member Muldoon references as being rumored to have had a love affair with him. Although it wasn't due to the supposed allegations that Muldoon mentions (That I'm not even sure existed), JCH's third child, John Cornelius Adrian Hamilton, was becoming more and more estranged from his family due to his disapproving actions and soon William took him in, only angering John C. more. I delve more into this here, but basically after Cornelius went against his father's wishes and married Angeline Romer, John was likely too embarrassed to introduce his new daughter-in-law to his friends in the New York elite society, so he sent Cornelius and Angeline out West with promises of giving them property there. And so, the newly wedded couple traveled from New York to Springfield, Illinois, where Cornelius worked as an engineer until August 19, 1839. It is there, the two likely met their uncle William. Sometime in 1839-1840, William took in Cornelius and his family in Woita at Hamilton's Diggings, after the birth their firstborn son, named after William Stephen Hamilton in 1839. Cornelius only became more defiant against his father, to which John faulted William's influence for. In 1844, Cornelius followed his father's orders and left his wife and children, after he and Angeline had become strained with time. Angeline and her children stayed with William, and she was likely the woman many had rumored to have been William's “mistress”.

Angeline seemed to enjoy her time living with her children, her uncle, and his slave. Edgar Hamilton wrote that “his kindness to them, especially to my mother was a theme she never tired to tell to my brother and myself when young” and he “always looked upon my father and mother and we babies as his special heirs and expected to educate us and leave his property to us.” [x] Even when Cornelius had abandoned his family, William's generosity and protection never left Angeline and her children. She looked after his house, even sewing suits and linen shirts for him to wear to legislative sessions in Madison, Wisconsin. Loss of a child, marital strife, and news of an ailing father all prompted Angeline to consider returning to New York by 1843. William at the time was running for elected office and hoped to become the new governor of the territory, he asked Angeline to postpone her travels until after the election. But she took her children and went home to be with her father. Even until the end of her life, Angeline held the deepest respect for William and never remarried. She considered him her; “truest friend in the family.” [x] and William had wished to invite her back to his household, alongside his mother and sister had he won the election. [x] Fielding makes the remark that; “If any romantic involvement between William and Angeline may have caused a strain between William and his brothers, no such evidence exists in primary sources.” Angeline's son, Edgar Hamilton - who grew up in William's cabin - continuously praised his great-uncle and worked in favor of preserving his memory and memorial.

Although, it is also likely William's only intent and nature with Angeline was to help her. Later Edgar describes his great-uncle as; “ever espoused the weaker party and his feelings always were quickened in behalf of the poor and distressed.” [x] Which we can see is evident in other events through William's life that weren't with romantic intention at all; William was once passing through the country in a sleigh with several friends, when he saw a Native American man riding on horseback alongside a native woman making her way laboriously on injured foot. William interfered when he saw the man take a whip and beat the woman; “cruelly with it while he uttered curses at her for not hurrying.” [x] He then took the woman in his sleigh and tried to remove her from immediate danger, the man followed William and tried to shoot him but missed. Before the man had time to reload his rifle and fire again, William turned around and fought with him, before he took hold of the horse whip and tremendously thrashed him and then took off in his sleigh.

Like Fielding initially suggested, if William truly had romantic feelings for another, it is likely he refused to commit to them. He was restless, and constantly moving, making it hard for him to maintain relationships and friendships—And being born at the same time as the Reynolds Pamphlet release, to losing his father at six years old and witnessing all that it had put his mother through, likely distorted his vision of love or romantic relationships. But it is not the first historians, or even people from the time period, assume bachelor men to be of homosexual inclinations. Not that it isn't ever true, for instance Baron Von Steuben was a gay man who never married. But I'd argue there is more substantial evidence surrounding his sexuality. John Gilbert McCurdy, who often writes about the revolutionary period in America, says;

Although this conclusion yields considerable insight into the evolution of sexual identity, it underestimates the complexities of the bachelor's masculinity and sexuality. It is certainly true that some colonists saw the bachelor as effeminate and morally depraved in a way that implied homosexuality, but the bachelor could also be the manliest of men and heterosexual to a fault. The bachelor's gender identification certainly could be problematic, although sometimes it was because he was too manly and at other times it was because he was not manly enough. As a result, we have to be careful about asserting that the bachelor was a proxy for the homosexual in early America. Beginning with Michel Foucault, historians of sexuality have largely accepted the social constructionist view that while some men in the ancient, medieval, and carly modern world had sex with other men, they were not homosexuals.

[...]

Sexuality was undergoing tremendous change in the century before the Revolution. Americans had begun to decouple sex and procreation but Freud had yet to formulate an understanding of desire as being determinative of sexual identity. The early American bachelor's sexuality straddled this divide and often created as much confusion as it did clarity. It had long been considered problematic by moralists and lawmakers who demanded total abstinence for all unmarried people. However, as the bachelor emerged as a unique identity, Americans reconsidered single sex and asked if one variation was more depraved than another. They did worry that bachelors were sodomites, but they also worried about bachelor fornicators. Indeed, far more ink was spilled by moralists agonizing over a new breed of bastards bankrupting taxpayers than was invested in innuendos about effeminate men. In time Americans would conclude that heterosexual bachelor behavior was preferable to homosexuality, but in 1800 this was far from assured.

Early American bachelor sexuality thus cannot be confined to a simple homosex ual/heterosexual dichotomy because it often contravened and confused this anachronistic division. Instead, we have to consider bachelor sexuality as a whole and understand how the perception of different sexual acts evolved over time. At the same time, the unsettled sexuality of the early American bachelor may offer some insight into the evolution of the modern-day homosexual. Historians seeking a gay American history have often looked to sodomy trials, curiously affectionate correspondence, and attacks on effeminate men to find the roots of the modern gay identity. Yet being a homosexual is not simply about sex acts and gender inversion. It is also about the disavowal of traditional marriage, the building of a subculture made up almost entirely of other men, and the assertion of a greater degree of sexual license. In this, the emergence of the bachelor is integral to the history of gay men.

Source — McCurdy, J. G. (2011). Citizen Bachelors: Manhood and the Creation of the United States. United States: Cornell University Press.

When regarding queer history, I would also advise being open-minded about aromantic or asexual figures. Undoubtedly, if a person did not marry it did not mean the only single cause had to be because they were gay but could have also been aromantic. In many cases, people tend to limit it down to so few options, it plays an effective role in queer erasure. In any case, I don't have any substantial opinions regarding the debate, it's all purely supposition and there is scarcely preserved material to call evidence or come to any true settlement outside of carefree head cannons. While William did live in the West, of predominantly male dominated areas, and did not marry—That is the only evidence we have in regards to this speculation. In the end, it's just another mystery surrounding William that we'll never know for certain about. I think William is an interesting individual on his own, and the need to try and determine a hypothesis that is so trivial in the wider picture due to its lack of standing ground seems fruitless. Especially when William has so many other complexities and intriguing characteristics outside of his love or sex life. I understand the desire to explore the censored field of queer history that is often ignored by historians, especially in the search for representation, but William isn't your best choice for that. I would suggest looking to several other queer figures with more opportunities for research and more solid confirmation.

#amrev #american history #jackson era #queer history #william s hamilton #william stephen hamilton #angeline romer hamilton #edgar augustus hamilton #history #hamilchildren #hamilton family #hamilton children #hamilton kids #hamilkids #queries #sincerely anonymous #cicero's history lessons

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little-orphan-ant · 1 year ago

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hello tell me about gainsborough dupont

YESYESYYES HES MY GUY EVER

he is the guy in my profile picture !! that portrait was painted by his uncle thomas gainsborough

gainsborough was born in 1754 in england, the 3rd of 5 kids. his father was a carpenter i believe, but since he was young he lived with his uncle, Thomas Gainsborough (who our gainsborough is named after. presumably)

thomas gainsborough was a well known painter - he was like. THE oainter. everyone wanted him to paint them like. royalty and famous people n etc

our gainsborough (who i’m going to be referring to as gainsy bc it’s confusing everyone has the same name) officially becomes thomas’s apprentice at age 17. he was thomas’s only assistant he ever had, which people mention all the time for some reason idk

gainsy’s only job was to imitate his uncle; he basically did commissions for anyone who couldn’t afford his uncle and help his uncle around the studio

after his uncle died at. at some point. 1778 mayhaps? or thereabouts. gainsy took over his studio. however, he was apparently too shy and nervous to garner as much attention as his uncle did (he’s just like me fr)

he did get a job working for king george the 3rd which. proud of you gainsy <333

he died unmarried in 1797 relatively young (he was only 42) and was buried next to his uncle and aunt

idk. i just go feral over how he’ll always be in his uncles shadow. he does have a wikipedia page but it’s like. 3 oaragraphs. but i love him :3 my beloved

also he was hot

(i wish he was named something other than gainsborough bc like. how tf am i supposed to nickname him. gainsy is the best i can get i can’t exactly call him gains lmao. dupont is fun tho. i use that as my surname online bc of him)

#hiiii ty i always love talking abt my beloved #gainsborough dupont #ant rambles

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madamlaydebug · 2 years ago

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In honor of Black History Month...

Today, we honor the life and legacy of Sojourner Truth.

Sojourner Truth (1797 – November 26, 1883) was an African-American abolitionist and women's rights activist.

Truth was born into slavery in Swartekill, Ulster County, New York. She was one of ten children born to James and Elizabeth Baumfree. James Baumfree was an African captured from the Gold Coast in modern-day Ghana. Elizabeth Baumfree was the daughter of enslaved Africans from the Coast of Guinea.

When her first owner died in 1806, nine-year-old Truth (known as Belle), was sold at an auction with a flock of sheep for $100 to John Neely, near Kingston, New York. Until that time, Truth spoke only Dutch.

Around 1815, Truth met and fell in love with a slave named Robert from a neighboring farm. Robert's owner forbade the relationship; he did not want his slave to have children with a slave he did not own, because he would not own the children. Robert was savagely beaten and Truth never saw him again, learning later he died from those injuries. She was then forced to marry an older slave named Thomas. She bore five children: Diana (1815), fathered by Robert; and Thomas who died shortly after birth; Peter (1821); Elizabeth (1825); and Sophia (ca. 1826), fathered by Thomas.

The state of New York began, in 1799, to legislate the abolition of slavery, although the process of emancipating New York slaves was not complete until July 4, 1827. Dumont had promised to grant Truth her freedom a year before the state emancipation, "if she would do well and be faithful." However, he changed his mind, claiming a hand injury had made her less productive. She was infuriated but continued working, spinning 100 pounds of wool, to satisfy her sense of obligation to him.

Late in 1826, Truth escaped to freedom with her infant daughter, Sophia. She had to leave her other children behind because they were not legally freed in the emancipation order until they had served as bound servants into their twenties. She later said: “I did not run off, for I thought that wicked, but I walked off, believing that to be all right.”

Truth later learned that her son Peter, then five years old, had been sold illegally by Dumont to an owner in Alabama. With the help of abolitionist, she took the issue to court and, after months of legal proceedings, got her son back, who had been abused by his new owner. Truth became one of the first black women to go to court against a white man and win the case.

On June 1, 1843, Truth changed her name to Sojourner Truth and told her friends: "The Spirit calls me, and I must go." She left her home to make her way traveling and preaching about the abolition of slavery and the rights of women. Of all her speeches and orations, she is most famous for “Ain’t I a Woman?”, delivered at Ohio Women's Rights Convention in Akron, Ohio.

Her service to uplift all women and to free African-Americans will not be forgotten.

A Queen salute to Sojourner Truth!

#blackhistory #blackhistorymonth

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opera-ghosts · 1 year ago

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OTD in Music History: Groundbreaking musicologist and writer George Grove (1820 – 1900), creator of the eponymous “Grove’s Dictionary of Music and Musicians,” dies in Britain. Trained as a civil engineer (and quite successful in that profession), Grove’s deep love of music ultimately drew him into music. After assuming responsibility for organizing a concert series at the famed “Crystal Palace,” Grove wrote a series of program notes which eventually grew into the first iteration of the musical dictionary that is still known and beloved today. Nor was his impact on musical history purely a passive one: His deep interest in Franz Schubert (1797 – 1828) led him and his close friend, composer Arthur Sullivan (1842 – 1900), to travel to Vienna in the 1860s in search of undiscovered Schubert manuscripts -- and it was they who actually (re)discovered the lost incidental music to “Rosamunde” (1823), as well as several of Schubert’s earlier symphonies. As Grove later recounted: "I found, at the bottom of a cupboard... a bundle of music-books... black with the undisturbed dust of nearly half-a-century. These were the part-books of the whole of the music in ‘Rosamunde,’ tied up after the second performance... and probably never disturbed since. [Schubert's nephew]... gave us permission to take away with us and copy what we wanted...." In addition, Grove also served capably as the first director of the Royal College of Music from its foundation in 1883 until his retirement in 1894. He successfully recruited leading British musicians of the day -- including Hubert Parry (1848 – 1918) and Charles Villiers Stanford (1852 – 1924) -- to join the College faculty, and he also established a close working relationship with London's older music conservatory, the Royal Academy of Music. PICTURED: A cabinet photo showing the elderly Grove, which he signed in the bottom left corner.

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gravemakamura · 10 days ago

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Let Me Tell Ya Something: Gothic Fiction and the Three Edgy Writers

Gothic Fiction

For all those interested in hot goth latinas and wanna have one (me included)

This one here’s for you (maybe).

Today/tonight, I’ll be talking about Gothic Fiction, and three figures that contributed to this genre.

But let’s put a pin on that one and explain briefly what Gothic Fiction is.

(You can correct me if I’m wrong)

What Is Gothic Fiction?

Gothic Fiction is a genre and a predecessor of modern horror fiction. The genre came into fruition in the UK. A novel written by Horace Walpole, entitled “The Castle of Otronto”. Considered to be the first gothic novel of english literature.

The genre mostly features any mental and physical horror or madness, especially— mad women. A haunted, gothic house. And a haunted house isn’t complete without its mysteries and supernatural activities. And it’s not mysterious if it does not contain secrets, sprinkled with some hereditary curses. And persecuted maidens, who often than not, faint allat. So in summary, this genre is basically edgy. Like the clothes I wish I had but cannot afford, I’m Broke Bruh.

Gothic Fiction is also Anti-Catholic, especially about Inquisition (a judicial procedure and institution created by the Catholic Church so they can punish people who spread hearsay and such)

The Origins of Gothic Fiction

The word “Gothic” was a term that was only applied to a style of art and architecture back in medieval times. There’s also this word, “Gothick” It has the same meaning as “Gothic” just with an added ‘T’ that makes me think of an entirely different thing.

The genre is generally linked with the joys of extreme emotions. The genre is known for the thrill and fear of the sublime, and a thirst for atmosphere.

The genre was mostly inspired by the abandoned gothic buildings, which sparked an emotion that nothing lasts forever, no matter how big or grand a human creation is, the inevitable will eventually happen, and only its skeleton will remain, the rest shall crumble into dust, its history will turn into breadcrumbs, leaving few clues as to what happened to it.

That was kinda… deep.

Ahem. It became a genre as it dealt with emotional extremes and grim themes. And also, gothic architecture, that shit’s cool af.

The first ever writer of Gothic Fiction, Horace Walpole. Claimed that his novel was an old medieval romance and that he republished it, which was a lie. And because of him, gothic literature was associated with fake documentation. And in my opinion, Walpole would have LOVED analog horror. Just saying. What. An. ICON.

Basic Plot

A gothic novel must contain the following (if you want to write one, you don’t have to include every element into your work, experimentation doesn’t hurt…. maybe);

- Threatening mystery

- Ancestral curse

- Booby traps (boobas)

- Hidden passages

- Heroines that faint a lot… like, allat

Writers Of Gothic Fiction

(They got badassatron names, forgive me for using that… word? I like Bee, okay?)

- Horace Walpole

- Ann Radcliffe

- Mary Wollstonecraft Shelly (Sad her last name isn’t Wollstonecraft anymore)

Horace Walpole

For some reason, his name reminds me of the north pole and some artic sea creature?

Let me get straight to the point. (btw the information I am giving ya’ll may be lacking on this one, and with the other two writers)

The man, the myth, the legend and virgin, Horace Walpole. Born on September 24, 1717-March 2, 1797. He was born in and died in London, England. He was a writer, collector and a CONNOISEURE, he is a FOODIE.

Ahem— ahem. He attended Eton and King’s College, Cambrigde. He was the youngest son of Prime Minister, Robert Walpole. His novel, “The Castle of Otronto” is considered the first ever gothic novel, and revived romance to contemporary fiction. He even claimed that it was a romance novel, people disagreed.

And a reason why he’s such an icon. His house, Strawberry Hill. Despite it’s adorable name. Walpole had it built in a Gothic Architecture style. Same man, same…

How he died? Me don’t know. I mean, I could research it. But it’s dark outside— like my soul, I must rest after writing this.

Ann Radcliffe

Born on July 9, 1764- February 17, 1833 in London, England.

Nothing is mentioned where she went to college, (If she went to college at all, which… maybe she didn’t).

Radcliffe created the standard form of gothic novels. And infused terror and suspense with romantic sensibility. And is a pioneer of the expansion of terror. She also created the menacing (in appearance) gothic villain which later evolved into the Byronic hero, A hero who wants to accomplish his task, but does not know how to do so. You and me, Byronic hero, you and me.

In 1787, she married a man named William Radcliffe. Who encouraged her in her literary pursuits (JIZSDGFUHSKRGJBDUFHGUDHFHDRGHJRTFHKUDYOSEGHTUYGRTIMGONNADIEJFGBLJBGLDHRG).

She also never went where her novels took place, and only visited two countries; Germany and Holland. She was sheepish when referred to as an author. And only realized her stature as a writer when she published her novel in 1797 entitled “The Italian” But what made her popular was because of her novel back in 1794, “The Mysteries of Udolpho”

Her first novels were;

- The Castle of Athlin and Dunbayne (1789)

- A Sicilian Romance (1790)

- The Romance of the Forest (1791), to which she recieved fame from

She writes so damn fast. What the fu-

In the last 20 years of her life, she mostly wrote poetry. Her poetry and posthumous novel “Gaston de Bolndeville” were largely not well received.

How she died? Same reason with Horace Walpole… Me dunno.

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

Born August 30, 1997 - February 1, 1851

She lived and died in London. She’s also the only daughter of William Godwin (what a chad name) and Mary Wollstonecraft. She eloped with Percy Bysshe and married him RIGHT AFTER HIS FIRST WIFE DIED IN 1882. Not long after the fact, her husband died. And she published his work and taught their only son alone. Her best known book, “Frankenstein” part gothic, part philosophical. “Frankenstein” is considered an example of sci-fi. She also dedicated the book to her father after he disowned her. He did so because of her husband. Like, he left his pregnant wife and young child for another woman, and INVITED HER TO GO ON AN ADVENTURE WITH THE WOMAN HE WAS CHEATING WITH. I may not know what caused Mary’s death. But I do know what caused Harriet’s death— suicide. No wonder why Godwin disowned her. Feelings aside. She died.

Moral of the Story

If your surname is cool, so are your novels. Maybe your decisions aren’t cool, but nobody cares about that. Nobody, but me.

#writeblr #writing #writers and poets #writers on tumblr #Let me tell ya something #gothic #goth #gothic fiction

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aethelflaedladyofmercia · 1 year ago

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Since people might not know these things about Jane Austen…

Jane Austen was born in 1775. Her family were gentry but never especially well off, 200-500 pounds per year when the typical family of their class earned 1000-5000. This only grew worse after her father died in 1805, after which Jane, her sister, and her mother were almost entirely supported by her brothers. They didn’t even have a permanent home again until 1809.

She actually started writing very early. The Juvenilia is a collection of stories she wrote as a child and carefully preserved in a set of bound notebooks. The earliest stories date to 1987, when she was about 11 or 12.

She wrote her first novel in 1790 at age 14, Love and Freindship, and the next year The History of England, which I actually have a copy of. Both of these were satires/parodies, written for her family, though by this age she was already thinking about becoming a professional writer.

At 18 she started writing Lady Susan, which more-or-less marks her transition to mature novels (or epistolary novellas in this case), though it’s still considered one of the Juvenilia. This one she finished in 1795, at age 20.

In the winter of 1795, she had a brief but apparently quite intense romance with a man named Tom Lefroy. She wrote about him in several letters to her sister, but marriage would have been impossible for financial reasons. Their romance lasted less than 2 months, and she never saw him again.

About the same time, she started a novel (Elinor and Marianne) that would eventually become Sense and Sensibility. It was closely followed by First Impressions (later Pride and Prejudice) and Susan (Northanger Abbey).

In 1797, her father attempted to have First Impressions published, but it was rejected and returned.

In 1802, Jane was briefly (VERY briefly) engaged to an old friend named Harris Bigg-Wither, who had the wealth and land to ensure her family lived comfortably indefinitely. She broke off the engagement the next day.

In 1803, she sold Susan for 10 pounds to a publisher who… never did anything with it. In 1809 she wrote demanding he publish it or return it, but he did not. Her brother helped her buy it back in 1816, also for 10 pounds.

Her four novels were all published anonymously between 1811 (S & S) and 1815 (Emma). She is identified on them as “A Lady” or as “The Author of Sense and Sensibility.”

Two more novels (Northanger Abbey and Persuasion) were published after her death in 1816. They included a biographic note/eulogy by her brother, who identified her by name.

The Clerkenwell Diamond Robbery was so hushed up I can’t even find a reference to it online. 😔 Or perhaps she was just so good, they still haven’t realized the diamonds are missing??

Anyway, I’m sure we can ALL get some interesting fanfic from this…

Jane Austen began her novel writing in 1795, which implies that she was already a writer and trying to be published before masterminding the Clerkenwell Diamond Robbery of 1810, and somehow Crowley was still not aware of this fact.

#good omens #good omens season 2 #good omens spoilers #crowley #jane austen #anthony j crowley

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pub-lius · 2 years ago

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The Schuyler Sisters (Peggy, Angelica, Eliza) for @thereallvrboy

aaaaaaa

this post is a couple weeks late because the research took longer than normal for some reason, so i’m typing it all out on the same day im researching for the next post so you’ll probably see that tomorrow if not next week. a lot of the information for this post comes from this website, and cross referenced with my usual favorites (britannica especially) and Alexander Hamilton by Ron Chernow because i hate myself. but i love @thereallvrb0y so its fine

Margarita Schuyler Van Rensselaer

Margarita Schuyler was born on September 24, 1758 in Albany, and was referred to as Meggy or Peggy, but I’ll be calling her Peggy because that is how she is widely known. She was the THIRD OF ELEVEN children to General Philip Schuyler and Catharine Van Rensselaer Schuyler, which is why I am refusing to do all the Schuyler kids (don’t love you that much, richie /j). She was closest with her sisters Angelica and Elizabeth (who I will refer to as Betsey). She was known for being smart, beautiful, witty, and fiesty.

On August 7, 1781, the Schuyler home was threatened by a Tory mob. There’s this one story that when they sieged upon the house, Peggy came out of hiding to get her younger sister Catherine who was just fucking abandoned, and they threw a tomahawk at her which sliced her gown and was embedded in the staircase. That didn’t happen, Catherine made it up because she didn’t like Indigenous people (probably).

Peggy married Stephen Van Rensselaer III when he was 19 and she was 25. At this time, men were shamed for their mommy kinks, and Stephen’s dad was disappointed that he married an older woman, so they eloped. They would go on to have three children, one of which would survive to adulthood, Stephen Van Rensselaer IV.

More about Stephen, his mom was a Livingston (these three families constantly married each other it was lowkey highkey weird) and his dad was the ninth patroon of Rensselaerwyck which means he was a really really rich dude who owned a big ass piece of land. Stephen was entitled to assume responsibility as lord of Van Rensselaer Manor when he turned 21.

The Schuylers were wealthy, Dutch American, landowning families in New York. Peggy and Stephen’s parents were third generation immigrants, and it was likely that Dutch was a common family language. They all belonged to the Dutch Reformed Church in Albany, New York.

Peggy was unfortunately affected by an illness in 1799, and died on March 14, 1801. She was really close with Alexander Hamilton, and was with her when she died.

“On Saturday, my dear Eliza, your sister took leave of her sufferings and friends, I trust to find repose and happiness in a better country.” -Alexander Hamilton to Elizabeth Hamilton

She was initially buried in the family plot at the Van Rensselaer estate, and was later reinterred at Albany Rural Cemetery.

Angelica Schuyler Church

Angelica Schuyler was born on February 20, 1756, and Ron Chernow shat himself. She was described as educated, intelligent, attractive, and more sociable than Betsey because that is a character trait apparently (solid notes, Henry). She was the eldest daughter so she totally had some kind of complex going on.

She eloped with John Church in 1777 before Alexander Hamilton had time to get into her pants. She was afraid her father wouldn’t approve of Church because he was suspicious as fuck. He came to America to avoid bankruptcy, and was secretly (and suspiciously) supplying the French and American armies, and eventually became Washington’s Commissary General, which is slay, but like you didn’t need to be that suspicious.

Angelica left for Europe in 1783 with her family and didn’t return until 1797 (once again before Hamilton could engage in Amorous Congress with her). She held frequent parties, and was an absolute bad bitch in European social circles. For example, between 1783 and 1785, John was a US envoy to the French government, and Angelica became besties with Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson (she kinda bullied him but besties nonetheless) and the Marquis de Lafayette. Also, Jefferson’s daughter attended the same school as Angelica’s daughter, and I think that’s cool.

In 1785, she made a visit to New York, but again, left before Hamilton could make whoopee with her. She also went to Washington’s inauguration in 1789, but I don’t know if that was the same or a different trip.

She moved to London after that and became friends with the fucking royal family, specifically the Prince of Wales. Also, Church was elected to serve on the British Parliament in 1790, but this isn’t about him.

She was reunited with her family in New York in 1797 and that was cool. The US wasn’t able to pay Church back for his efforts during the war which is homophobic so they gave him 100,000 acres of land in Western NY (Genesee and Allegany counties) in order to retain their status as allies. They laid out a town with designs reminiscent of Paris, and their son Philip named it after Angelica. The layout is still the same which is really cool!

FINE I’LL TALK ABOUT HER AND HAMILTON.

So Angelica was very close with her brother-in-law Bitchbaby Ham a ton. She told Betsey she loved Hamilton “very much, and if you were as generous as the old Romans, you would lend him to me for a little while.”

“I am sensible how much trouble I give you, but you will have the goodness to excuse it, when you know that it proceeded from a persuasion that I was asking from one who promised me his love and attention if I returned to America.” -Angelica to Hamilton, February 19, 1796

Did they have an affair? Was Hamilton the little slutty man that Angelica makes him out to be in the first quote?

No. *roll credits*

Okay, I’m gonna say this once and never again (jk I probably will), but the idea that they had an affair is bullshit (in my opinion, this is all my opinion, my educated opinion, but my opinion nonetheless). There is like. more proof that they didn’t have an affair than that they did.

The biggest “evidence” there is for the relationship is the flirtatious comments they made in their letters to one another. I think there’s two reasonable explanations to this than just assuming they were fucking or in love: they were joking, or they were just being affectionate. Angelica refers to Hamilton as “brother” in literally every letter we have from her to him, and the two of them, along with Angelica’s sister and Hamilton’s wife, Betsey, had extremely affectionate relationships. The affection in the second quote is a great example of how they all talked to each other.

Now for the actual flirtatious comments, you can tell they are joking. Like in all the examples, they have a lighthearted, joking tone, that doesn’t really come across as actual flirting.

Okay, but let’s say you’re insistent that they were actually flirting. It still doesn’t make sense. Angelica loved her husband (she had to to stay with that fuckhead for that long), and Hamilton was working constantly to balance his job, his family, and the other affair SLFHSKJFH Additionally, they were apart for a large part of their lives, and honestly, I don’t think there would have been any kind of opportunity for romantic feelings to grow between them.

Also, I’m just going to say it, most of the people who argue for this (historians mostly) are homophobic and misogynistic. First of all, if you assume that a man and a woman are automatically romantically or sexually involved because they have an affectionate relationship and make flirtatious jokes, it gives thinking that women are inherently unable to form platonic relationships with men. Especially if you think that same sex friends can make flirtatious jokes and not be in a romantic/sexual relationship, but it’s impossible for opposite sex friendships (that’s also pretty homophobic).

But most of the homophobia comes from the people who will die on the hill that Angelica and Hamilton had a romantic and/or sexual relationship, but refuse to accept the idea that Hamilton and Laurens had feelings for each other. Their letters displayed legitimate jealousy and anger over each others’ marriages, which doesn’t exist with Hamilton and Angelica. Their letters lack the flirtatious humor, but contain legitimate evidence of a romantic relationship. The logic that backs up Hamilton and Angelica’s “relationship” provides basically double the amount of evidence for Hamilton and Laurens’ relationship.

Anyway... she died on March 13, 1814.

Elizabeth Schuyler Hamilton

Elizabeth Schuyler was born on August 9, 1757 in Albany. She was called Eliza or Betsey. Hamilton called her Eliza later in life, but before that he called her Betsey.

She stayed with her aunt in Morristown, New Jersey in 1780 where she met Alexander Hamilton, who was serving as Washington’s aide-de-camp at headquarters which had been set up there for the winter encampment. Their relationship grew quickly, even after he left a month after she arrived. They became officially engaged in early April with her father’s blessing. This was very important to General Schuyler, because his two other daughters had eloped and he was starting to get sad.

They were married on December 14, 1780 at the Schuyler Mansion in Albany. The only person to attend the wedding on Hamilton’s side, James McHenry, a fellow aide-de-camp, wrote them a cute little poem that i don’t feel like looking for, but it definitely exists.

They moved around a lot during the early part of their marriage, but settled in New York City in late 1783. They had an active social life, and became well known. Betsey was very important to Hamilton, helping him often with his work, but had the biggest impact on his domestic life. His traumatic past caused him to really not have much of a comfortable, safe space to come home to, and he often thought of a familial environment (ie Washington’s staff) almost like he was being coddled. Until he married her ofc. She helped him mature and move past, what I call, his “I hate Dad” phase. More on that later, but he had a major change in personality after she met him.

Then there was the uh... the affair. I’ll go into more detail about Maria Reynolds in Hamilton’s post, but I’ll talk a little about what we know of Betsey’s experience. She didn’t believe the rumors at first, until Hamilton owned up to it. It put a strain on the relationship for a little while, but they eventually reconciled. That’s all we know pretty much.

Then he died. Whoops!

This is when Betsey turned on the girlboss and kicked absolute fucking ass. She became a co-founder of the Society for the relief of poor widows with small children. She became the co-founder of the Orphan Asylum Society, of which she was appointed second directress, then first directress in 1821 and served for 27 years until she left New York in 1848.

She was required to pay substantial debts after Hamilton’s death, and sold her 35 acre estate in upper Manhattan, and was later able to buy it back because executors decided she couldn’t be publicly dispossessed. She sold it again and moved into a townhouse owned by her son, the Hamilton-Holly House. She lived there for 9 years with her kids. She left for Washington DC in 1848 where she lived until 1854 with her daughter.

She, along with her children, remained dedicated to preserving Hamilton’s legacy. She re-organized all of his letters, papers, and writing with John, C. Hamilton, and ensured his biography was published. She also helped Dolly Madison raise money for the Washington Monument.

She died in Washington DC on November 9, 1854. She was buried by her husband and son in Trinity Church.

#elizabeth hamilton #elizabeth schuyler #elizabeth schuyler hamilton #peggy schuyler #peggy schuyler van rensselear #angelica schuyler #angelica church #angelica schuyler church #history #amrev #amrev history #american history #dutch american history #had some hot takes in this post #ik this isn't supposed to be about my opinions but i think the angelica/hamilton affair theory is deeply problematic for reasons stated #if i get proven wrong thats great #but i think people's reasons for believing it with the evidence we currently have is gross #also i didn't mention philip or william stephen's deaths because i discussed those in the hamilkids post #i'll discuss the miscarriage in hamilton's post #which actually might have to be multiple posts #because i have by far the most information about him and it's going to take me several weeks to compile it all #so look forward to that #also the next post is john and henry laurens #so prepare yourself for that lol #do it for richie 💪

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nellygwyn · 4 years ago

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I thought I would share some portraits/info about notable black men and women who worked and lived in Georgian Britain. This is not an extensive list by any means, and for some figures, portraits are unavailable:

1. Olaudah Equiano (1745-1797) was a writer, abolitionist and former slave. Born into what would become southern Nigeria, he was initially sold into slavery and taken to the Caribbean as a child, but would be sold at least twice more before he bought his freedom in 1766. He decided to settle in London and became involved in the British abolitionist movement in the 1780s. His first-hand account of the horrors of slavery 'The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano' was published in 1789 and it really drove home the horrors of slavery to the general British public. He also worked tirelessly to support freed slaves like himself who experienced racism and inequality living in Britain's cities. He was a leading member of the Sons of Africa, an abolitionist group, whose members were primarily freed black men (the Sons of Africa has been called the first black political organisation in British history). He married an English woman, Susannah, and when he died in 1797, he left his fortune of roughly £73,000 to his daughter, Joanna. Equiano's World is a great online resource for those interested in his life, his work, and his writings.

2. Ignatius Sancho (1729-1780) was a bit of a jack-of-all-trades (he's described as an actor, composer, writer, abolitionist, man-of-letters, and socialite - truly the perfect 18th century gentleman). He was born in the Middle Passage on a slave ship. His mother died not long after they arrived in Venezuela and his father apparently took his own life rather than become a slave. Sancho's owner gave the boy to three sisters living in London c. 1730s (presumably as a sort of pet/servant) but whilst living with them, his wit and intellect impressed the 2nd Duke of Montagu who decided to finance his education. This was the start of Sancho's literary and intellectual career and his association with the elite of London society saw him ascend. He struck up a correspondence with the writer, Laurence Sterne, in the 1760s: Sancho wrote to press Sterne to throw his intellecrual weight behind the cause of abolition. He became active in the early British abolitionist movement and be counted many well-known Georgians amongst his acquaintance. He was also the first black man known to have voted in a British election. He married a West Indian woman and in 1774, opened a grocer's shop in London, that attempted to sell goods that were not produced by slave labour. Despite his popularity in Georgian society, he still recounts many instances of racist abuse he faced on the streets of London in his diaries. He reflected that, although Britain was undoubtedly his home and he had done a lot for the country, he was 'only a lodger and hardly that' in London. His letters, which include discussions of domestic subjects as well as political issues, can be read here.

3. Francis 'Frank' Barber (1742-1801) was born a slave on a sugar plantation in Jamaica. His owner, Richard Bathurst, brought Frank to England when Frank turned 15 and decided to send him to school. The Bathursts knew the writer, Samuel Johnson, and this is how Barber and the famous writer first met (Barber briefly worked as Johnson's valet and found him an outspoken opponent of the slave trade). Richard Bathurst gave Frank his freedom when he died and Frank immediately signed up for the navy (where he apparently developed a taste for smoking pipes). In 1760, he returned permanently to England and decided to work as Samuel Johnson's servant. Johnson paid for Frank to have an expensive education and this meant Frank was able to help Johnson revise his most famous work, 'Dictionary of the English Language.' When Johnson died in 1784, he made Frank his residual heir, bequeathing him around £9000 a year (for which Johnson was criticised in the press - it was thought to be far too much), an expensive gold watch, and most of Johnson's books and papers. Johnson also encouraged Frank to move to Lichfield (where Johnson had been born) after he died: Frank duly did this and opened a draper's shop and a school with his new wife. There, he spent his time 'in fishing, cultivating a few potatoes, and a little reading' until his death in 1801. His descendants still live at a farm in Litchfield today. A biography of Frank can be purchased here. Moreover, here is a plaque erected on the railings outside of Samuel Johnson's house in Gough Square, London, to commemorate Johnson and Barber's friendship.

4. Dido Elizabeth Belle (1764-1801) was born to Maria Belle, a slave living in the West Indies. Her father was Sir John Lindsay, a British naval officer. After Dido's mother's death, Sir John took Dido to England and left her in the care of his uncle, Lord Mansfield. Dido was raised by Lord Mansfield and his wife alongside her cousin, Elizabeth Murray (the two became as close as sisters) and was, more or less, a member of the family. Mansfield was unfortunately criticised for the care and love he evidently felt for his niece - she was educated in most of the accomplishments expected of a young lady at the time, and in later life, she would use this education to act as Lord Mansfield's literary assistant. Mansfield was Lord Chief Justice of England during this period and, in 1772, it was he who ruled that slavery had no precedent in common law in England and had never been authorised. This was a significant win for the abolitionists, and was brought about no doubt in part because of Mansfield's closeness with his great-niece. Before Mansfield died in 1793, he reiterated Dido's freedom (and her right to be free) in his will and made her an heiress by leaving her an annuity. Here is a link to purchase Paula Byrne's biography of Dido, as well as a link to the film about her life (starring Gugu Mbatha-Raw as Dido).

5. Ottobah Cugoano (1757-sometime after 1791) was born in present-day Ghana and sold into slavery at the age of thirteen. He worked on a plantation in Grenada until 1772, when he was purchased by a British merchant who took him to England, freed him, and paid for his education. Ottobah was employed as a servant by the artists Maria and Richard Cosway in 1784, and his intellect and charisma appealed to their high-society friends. Along with Olaudah Equiano, Ottobah was one of the leading members of the Sons of Africa and a staunch abolitionist. In 1786, he was able to rescue Henry Devane, a free black man living in London who had been kidnapped with the intention of being returned to slavery in the West Indies. In 1787, Ottobah wrote 'Thoughts And Sentiments On The Evil & Wicked Traffic Of The Slavery & Commerce Of The Human Species,' attacking slavery from a moral and Christian stand-point. It became a key text in the British abolition movement, and Ottobah sent a copy to many of England's most influential people. You can read the text here.

6. Ann Duck (1717-1744) was a sex worker, thief and highwaywoman. Her father, John Duck, was black and a teacher of swordmanship in Cheam, Surrey. He married a white woman, Ann Brough, in London c. 1717. One of Ann's brothers, John, was a crew-member of the ill-fated HMS Wager and was apparently sold into slavery after the ship wrecked off the coast of Chile on account of his race. Ann, meanwhile, would be arrested and brought to trial at least nineteen times over the course of her lifetime for various crimes, including petty theft and highway robbery. She was an established member of the Black Boy Alley Gang in Clerkenwell by 1742, and also quite frequently engaged in sex work. In 1744, she was given a guilty verdict at the Old Bailey after being arrested for a robbery: her trial probably wasn't fair as a man named John Forfar was paid off for assisting in her arrest and punishment. She was hanged at Tyburn in 1744. Some have argued that her race appears to have been irrelevant and she experienced no prejudice, but I am inclined to disagree. You can read the transcript of one of Ann Duck's trials (one that resulted in a Not Guilty verdict) here. Also worth noting that Ann Duck is the inspiration behind the character Violet Cross in the TV show 'Harlots.'

7. Bill Richmond (1763-1829) was a prize winning bare-knuckle boxer of the late 18th and early 19th century. He was born a slave in New York (then part of British America) but moved permanently to England in 1777 where he was most likely freed and received an education. His career as a boxer really took of in the early 19th century, and he took on all the prize fighters of the time, including Tom Cribb and the African American fighter, Tom Molineaux. Richmond was a sporting hero, as well as fashionable in his style and incredibly intelligent, making him something of a celebrity and a pseudo-gentleman in his time. He also opened a boxing academy and gave boxing lessons to gentlemen and aristocrats. He would ultimately settle in York to apprentice as a cabinet-maker. Unfortunately, in Yorkshire, he was subject to a lot of racism and insults based on the fact he had married a white woman. You can watch a Channel 4 documentary on Richmond here: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

8. William Davidson (1781-1820) was the illegitimate son of the Attorney General of Jamaica and a slave woman. He was sent to Glasgow in Scotland to study law at the age of 14 and from this period until 1819, he moved around Britain and had a number of careers. Following the Peterloo Massacre in 1819, Davidson began to take a serious interest in radical politics, joining several societies in order to read radical and republican texts. He also became a Spencean (radical political group) through his friendship with Arthur Thistlewood and would quickly rise to become a leading member of the group. In 1820, a government provocateur tricked Davidson and other Spenceans, into being drawn into a plot to kill the Earl of Harrowby and other government cabinet officers as they dined at Harrowby's house on the 23rd February. This plot would become known as the Cato Street Conspiracy (named thus because Davidson and the other Spenceans hid in a hayloft in Cato Street whilst they waited to launch their plan). Unfortunately, this was a government set up and eleven men, including Davidson, were arrested and charged with treason. Davidson was one of five of the conspirators to not have his sentence commuted to transportation and was instead sentenced to death. He was hanged and beheaded outside of Newgate Prison in 1820. There is a book about the Cato Street Conspiracy here.

9. Ukawsaw Gronniosaw (1705-1775) was born in the Kingdom of Bornu, now in modern day Nigeria. As the favourite grandson of the king of Zaara, he was a prince. Unfortunately, at the age of 15, he was sold into slavery, passing first to a Dutch captain, then to an American, and then finally to a Calvinist minister named Theodorus Frelinghuysen living in New Jersey. Frelinghuysen educated Gronniosaw and would eventually free him on his deathbed but Gronniosaw later recounted that when he had pleaded with Frelinghuysen to let him return to his family in Bornu, Frelinghuysen refused. Gronniosaw also remembered that he had attempted suicide in his depression. After being freed, Gronniosaw set his sights on travelling to Britain, mainly to meet others who shared his new-found Christian faith. He enlisted in the British army in the West Indies to raise money for his trip, and once he had obtained his discharge, he travelled to England, specifically Portsmouth. For most of his time in England, his financial situation was up and down and he would move from city to city depending on circumstances. He married an English weaver named Betty, and the pair were often helped out financially by Quakers. He began to write his life-story in early 1772 and it would be published later that year (under his adopted anglicised name, James Albert), the first ever work written by an African man to be published in Britain. It was an instant bestseller, no doubt contributing to a rising anti-slavery mood. He is buried in St Oswald's Church, Chester: his grave can still be visited today. His autobiography, A Narrative of the Most Remarkable Particulars in the Life of James Albert Ukawsaw Gronniosaw, an African Prince, as Related by Himself, can be read here.

10. Mary Prince (1788-sometime after 1833) was born into slavery in Bermuda. She was passed between several owners, all of whom very severely mistreated her. Her final owner, John Adams Wood, took Mary to England in 1828, after she requested to be able to travel as the family's servant. Mary knew that it was illegal to transport slaves out of England and thus refused to accompany Adams Wood and his family back to the West Indies. Her main issue, however, was that her husband was still in Antigua: if she returned, she would be back in enslavement, but if she did not, she might never see her husband again. She contacted the Anti-Slavery Society who attempted to help her in any way they could. They found her work (so she could support herself), tried tirelessly to convince Adams Wood to free her, and petitioned parliament to bring her husband to England. Mary successfully remained in England but it is not known whether she was ever reunited with her husband. In 1831, Mary published The History of Mary Prince, an autobiographical account of her experiences as a slave and the first work written by a black woman to be published in England. Unlike other slave narratives, that had been popular and successful in stoking some anti-slavery sentiment, it is believed that Mary's narrative ultimately clinched the goal of convincing the general British population of the necessity of abolishing slavery. Liverpool's Museum of Slavery credits Mary as playing a crucial role in abolition. You can read her narrative here. It is an incredibly powerful read. Mary writes that hearing slavers talk about her and other men and women at a slave market in Bermuda 'felt like cayenne pepper into the fresh wounds of our hearts.'

#18th century history #georgian britain #black history #olaudah equiano #ignatius sancho #francis barber #dido elizabeth belle #ottonah cugoano #ann duck #bill richmond #william davidson #uksawsaw gronniosaw #mary prince

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