vrijdag 1 juli 2011

The first part of the honeymoon was far from smooth.

Although Charlotte found some pleasure in the Welsh scenery, which she thought surpassed the English Lakes, the first part of the honeymoon was far from smooth. Her cold get worse and she started to be sufficiently ill.
Later she wrote to Miss Wooler:

""Fatique and excitement had nearly knocked me up. - and my cough was become very bad""

donderdag 30 juni 2011

the Honeymoon 30-06-1854


The tour included Conway, where the couple stayed at " a comfort-able inn". It was evening when Mr. and Mrs. Nicholls arrived at Conway, and they would not see much of the district except the old castle. Wales was an entirely new country to the bride, and its historic associations were sure to interest her. On the Friday morning they started for Bangor, and spent the week-end there. Neither Bangor nor Menai was the popular holiday resort each has since become. They were essentially Welsh, and Welsh was the language spoken. This beautiful spot in North Wales must have appealed to Charlotte Bronte, and it is pleasant to think of the novelist having so complete a holiday, for the honeymoon lasted for more than a month.



In July 1854 Kilkee was little more than a village of no more than 419 houses, ofwhich 314 were occupied, and a total town population of a little over 1,869.17 In summertime when visitors arrived the
population doubled, or trebled at most, depending then, as now, on the weather. On the evening of their wedding day, Charlotte and her husband journeyed to Conway, near Llandudno in Wales, and
stayed overnight.

She wrote: '...

DEAR ELLEN, I scribble one hasty line just to say that after
a pleasant enough journey we have got safely to Conway; the evening is wet and wild, though the day was fair chiefly, with some gleams of sunshine. However, we are sheltered in a comfortable inn. My cold is not worse. If you get this scrawl to-morrow and write by return, direct to me at the post-office,
Bangor, and I may get it on Monday. Say how you and Miss Wooler got home. Give my kindest and most grateful love to Miss Wooler whenever you write. On Monday, I think, we cross the Channel. No more at present. Yours faithfully and
lovingly, C. B. N.' 

Castle Hotel, Conwy, Wales.  Charlotte Bronte spent her honeymoon here.

http://howellhistory.com/Wales.htm
http://www.snowdoniaguide.com/penmaenmawr.html

woensdag 29 juni 2011

She looked like a snowdrop.

 
As the clock struck eight on that dim quiet June morning of 29-06-1854 Charlotte entered the church with Ellen  and Miss Wooler. She was dressed simply in her white muslin dress with delicate green embroidery and matching short veil, a lace mantle and a white bonnet, trimmed with lace and a pale band of small flower and leaves.
 


The service was brief. Mr. Nicoll's friend,  officiated.

Though Charlotte had insisted that there should be no fuss, Martha had raided the village gardens to decorate the house with bouquets and Ellen scattered flowers in the bride's honour at the wedding breakfast.
                                            
It was intended to be an exceedingly quiet affair; the Haworth people were not to know until the bride and bridegroom had set out on their honeymoon. It is not a matter of surprise to find that the news leaked out; the arrival of two of Charlotte Bronte's oldest friends, Miss Wooler and Ellen Nussey, in a coach on the afternoon of 28th June set the villagers guessing. The news of the wedding had slipt abroad before the little party came out of church, and many old and humble friends were there, seeing her look "like a snow-drop," as they say. 


As the little wedding party left the church there was quite a group of the villagers anxious to see the wedding procession, and the remembrance of it was a life-long satisfaction to those privileged to see it. Mr. and Mrs. Grant, from the Haworth Grammar School, joined them at breakfast.
There was a party of eight present, including the old vicar. Martha Brown, in a simple black and white cotton gown a present from her mistress waited at the table, and her recollection was of a very happy time. Mr. Nicholls and his friends kept the conversation going.

When the carriage arrived at the parsonage gate the village was all astir to see the bride and bridegroom drive away, amid the good wishes of their friends. They drove the four miles to Keighley Station en route for Conway and North Wales, afterwards crossing to Ireland.

dinsdag 28 juni 2011

Aunt Branwell


Ellen Nussey describes her as having “lively” conversations around the table with ,Mr Bronte and the children as we find from Ellen Nussys remembrance

“Miss Branwell was a very small, antiquated little lady. She wore caps large enough for half-a-dozen of the present fashion, and a front of light auburn curls over her forehead. She always dressed in silk. She had a horror of the climate so far north, and of the stone floors in the Parsonage. She talked a great deal of her younger days — the gaiety’s of her dear native town Penzance, the soft, warm climate, &c. She gave one the idea that she had been a belle among her own home acquaintance. She took snuff out of a very pretty gold snuff-box, which she sometimes presented to you with a little laugh, as if she enjoyed the slight shock of astonishment visible in your countenance. She would be very lively and intelligent, and tilt arguments against Mr. Bronte without fear.”

Preparations for the wedding II.

Ellen and Miss Wooler were brought over on the afternoon of 28-06-1854, in order to be present for the wedding next day. The long, summer afternoon and evening were spent together in the Parsonage. They packed the trunk with the new dresses from Halifax, laid out the white wedding dress with the veil and bonnet and prepared the wedding breakfast.

Mr. Nicholls and Mr. Sowden were installed in Oxenhope with the curate Mr. Grant and his wife.
Victorian Wedding Customs
wikipedia/Trunk(luggage)

----------------------
The house next to Brookes Meeting Mill was formerly the vicarage for Oxenhope and is one of the few houses in the area to retain its original features. It was originally built in 1840’s for Joseph Brett Grant, Oxenhope’s first vicar. Grant had previously been curate in Haworth, until Patrick Brontë appointed him to establish the new parish. He was a very active man, raising money to build the parish church, the vicarage and the national school. The story goes that he wore out 14 pairs of shoes in his travels seeking subscriptions and even succeeded in getting a donation from Queen Victoria. Brett’s energy, kindliness and dedication made him a popular figure amongst all villagers, not just the Anglicans. The exception however was Charlotte Brontë who rather unkindly portrayed him as the curate Mr Donne, a ‘champion beggar’ in her novel Shirley.

maandag 27 juni 2011

Preparations for the wedding.

The 18 names on Charlotte's weddinglist received cards informing them of the marriage.
Reverend William Morgan, Cousin Joseph branwell, the Wheelwright family, George Smith, Mrs Smith and her children, Mr. Williams, Mrs. Gaskell, Richard Monckton Milnes, Francis Bennoch, six went to local Haworth residents, the Wooler and Nussey family.
The only persons to be present at the ceremony were to be Miss Wooler, Ellen Nussey, Mr Sowden who would marry them and Mr. Bronte.

zondag 26 juni 2011

26-06-1817 Branwell was born.

Patrick Branwell Bronte fourth child of the Bronte family was born in Thornton, near Bradford, Yorkshire

The wedding of Charlotte Bronte was finally determind for 29 june,

Original Jane Eyre movie wedding costumes worn by Michael Fassbender and Mia Wasikowska on display at ArcLight Hollywood

The date of the wedding was finally determind for 29 june.
 
Het wedding clothes were to come from Leeds but she deputed Ellen  to choose the bonnet and dress she would wear- "something that can be turned to decent use and worn after the wedding will be best, I think."

Ellen choose wedding clothes that were both pretty and traditional. The bonnet was covered in white flowers, trimmed with greenery, and over it would go a white lace veil, with a motif of ivy leaves, which matched the border of the white muslin dress.



Charlotte' s own choise of clothing for the honeymoon, a heavy silk dress of brown and mauve, was the result of an expedition to Halifax, where she had some more dresses made up.


Charlotte ordered fifty wedding cards from Ellen, which displeased her on account of the gaudy amount of silver on them. She would have preferred the enveloppe to the perfectly plain with a silver initial. And then she found she should have ordered twice the number because of the Mr Nicolls' string of clerical friends.