On this day in 1837/ Meeting held in the Sunday School rooms and chaired by Patrick Bronte to repeal the Poor Law Amendment Act of 1834.

The Poor Law Amendment Act 1834, sometimes abbreviated to PLAA,^[1] was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom passed by the Whig government of Lord Melbourne that reformed the country's poverty relief system (with the exception of Scotland, which reformed their poor law in 1845). It was an Amendment Act that completely replaced earlier legislation based on the Poor Law of 1601. With reference to this earlier Act the 1834 Act is also known as the New Poor Law.^[2]

Read more on: wikipedia

Patrick Brontë (1777–1861)

Born into poverty in Ireland, he won a scholarship to St John’s College, Cambridge, and was ordained into the Church of England. He was perpetual curate of Haworth in Yorkshire for forty-one years, bringing up four children, founding a school and campaigning for a proper water supply.
Although often portrayed as a somewhat fobidding figure, he was an opponent of capital punishment and the Poor Law Amendment Act, a supporter of limited Catholic emancipation and a writer of poetry.
.kleurrijkbrontesisters/1834-poor-law-amendment-act

In February 1837 Patrick chaired a meeting in Haworth so large it eventually had to take place in the open, calling for the Act to be repealed. Two months later he wrote a powerful letter to the Leeds Intelligencer pleading that the Act could not be tinkered with but must be repealed:

“It is a monster of iniquity, a horrid and cruel deformity”

 he wrote, and followed Dickens in his indignation at the starvation diet prescribed for paupers:

 “ We will not live on their water gruel, and on their two ounces of cheese, and their fourteen ounces of bread per day”

 He imagined them saying. blackwellreference
 

Branwell Bronte's wallet

Branwell Brontë's wallet

Source: Brontë Parsonage Museum

bronteblog/branwells-wallet

Short-sighted Decision Makers

 

Bronte birthplace, Thornton Village

In Market Street is the birthplace of the Bronte sisters (and their wayward brother). The datestone above the door reads 'A J S 1802'.

geograph.org.uk

 

 (FROM): Bronte blog has received the following article from last night's Telegraph and Argus from the Brontë Birthplace Trust chairman, Steve Stanworth. It's appalling.

A Bradford councillor broke down in tears as she tried to respond to the news that Bradford Council has declined to save the Thornton birthplace of the Brontës.
Thornton& Allerton Conservative Councillor Valerie Binney wrote the original letter appealing to the Council for financial support to help Brontë Birthplace Trust buy the property and preserve it as part of Bradford's cultural heritage.
"I felt extreme disappointment.I could have cried. We worked so hard," she said and then did, briefly, break down in tears.
The Council said if it had made an offer for the doublefronted house in Market Street it might have jeopardised the Trust's bid for £239,000 of lottery cash.
Steve Stanworth, chairman of the Brontë Birthplace Trust said: "I received a phone call from Sheilagh O'Neill from the Council's regeneration department. The official line is they cannot justify lending or giving us the money for the Brontë Birthplace. This is due to a political decision.
"They say the property wouldn't be of interest to them and they don't believe it could be a going concern. I am extremely disappointed and frustrated, when we see the amount of wasted money on speed bumps, cycle races and events that are fleeting.
"This sums up the Council's attitude and goes against the Big Society the Government is trying to foster. We are now left in a bad position once again."
Coun Binney said: "The tourism department doesn't think a Brontë museum in Thornton is viable because everybody goes to Haworth. People we meet seem to think the Brontë sisters were born in Haworth.
"If I had the money I would buy the house myself. Somebody wants to buy it to turn it into a bistro. It used to be a restaurant and that didn't work."
The decision was taken by three executive committee members of the council: Council leader David Green, Councillor Susan Hinchcliffe and Councillor Andrew Thornton.
Coun Thornton, who holds the portfolio for environment, sport and sustainability, said: "We explored a number of ways in which we might offer assistance for the Brontë Birthplace Trust to make an offer for the property.
"However, as the Council has no interest in acquiring the building for itself we were not satisfied that this was a justifiable use of public money or a reasonable intervention for us to make in competition with any private individual seeking to purchase the property.
"Government cuts to the Council's budget together with a national and local contraction in public grant aid continues to put severe pressure on our existing cultural estate. Adding to those pressures with an open ended commitment to an unquantified scheme cannot be justified.
"We will continue to offer support to the Brontë Birthplace Trust as it pursues its Heritage Lottery Fund bid for its project."
The Trust, which meets tomorrow at the Blue Boar pub in Thornton, near St James's Church, at 7pm, will have to think again.
Mr Stanworth said: "Perhaps our best bet is to try to fast-track our Heritage Lottery Fund bid. This usually takes six months. "If we do get someone to buy the property, we have to be careful how this affects the funding status. I was hoping to bring good news to the meeting, but this puts a different light on it. We are back at square one." (Jim Greenhalf)

Steve asks readers to 'please feel free to vent your displeasure via the link to the letters page of the Telegraph and Argus'. And rightly so. We expect letters to the council, etc., would also be welcome. A pat on the back to these short-sighted decision-makers. Hopefully the members of the Trust will come up with something that allows them to save the birthplace.

WHAT HAPPENED IN THE TIME OF THE BRONTES IN THIS HOUSE?: 

Although, according to Miss Firth's diary, Mrs. Bronte 
appears to have had some social enjoyment and exchanged 
visits with her neighbours, in company with her husband and 
her sister, Miss Elizabeth Branwell, she must have had a very 
busy life with her young family. Her second child was only 
a few months old when she went to Thornton, and before she 
left, five years afterwards, the family had increased to six. 
There was not a room in the house that could well be spared 
for a nursery. Miss Branwell, who was with Mrs. Bronte 
when Charlotte was born, and for some months afterwards, 
needed accommodation, and, with the general servant and 
nursemaid, there was a household of eleven in this little 
parsonage. Mrs. Bronte must have been a very capable 
manager for her husband to be able to say that his happiest
days were spent at Thornton. 

It was during his stay here that he published a small volume

The Cottage in the Wood, 
or the Art of becoming rich and happy and he has also been 
credited with a story which formed another volume The 
Maid of Killarney, or Albion and Flora, a tale, in which are 
interwoven some cursory remarks on religion and politics. 
No author's name is attached to the book. Altogether Patrick 
Bronte could now claim to be the writer of four small volumes ; 
they were, however, such that literature would not have been 
much the poorer if he had never published them, but they 
show evidence of a thoughtful mind, and if too didactic they 
are artless and sincere. In a small house filled with children, 
with a husband busy with writing and preparing sermons, 
Mrs. Bronte's task must have been by no means an easy one. 
It is noticeable that Mr. Bronte did not publish any 
poems after he lived at Thornton ; the muse from this point 
appears to have left him. 

The old servants of the Thornton Vicarage Nancy and 
Sarah Garrs had nothing but kind remembrances of Mr. and 
Mrs. Bronte. Shortly after the family went to reside at 
Thornton, Mrs. Bronte felt it necessary to engage a second 
servant, and Mr. Bronte applied to the Bradford School of 
Industry. It was thus that Nancy Garrs became nurse in 
the Bronte family, and she was with Mrs. Bronte when Charlotte 
Emily Jane, Patrick Branwell, and Anne were born. 

Nancy Garrs married a Patrick Wainwright, and the old 
nurse was proud in after years to tell how Patrick Bronte 
entered the kitchen one day at Haworth, saying : " Nancy 
is it true, what I have heard, that you are going to marry a 
Pat?"" It is," replied Nancy,"and if he prove but a tenth 
part as kind a husband to me as you have been to Mrs. Bronte, 
I shall think myself very happy in having made a Pat my 
choice." 

In the footsteps of the Brontes. 

you 
can read more of this period 

Patrick Bronte called

" My happiest days were spent there." 

The Lion, The Spectacles and the Bracelet

 

What can three simple objects tell us about the Brontës? Education Officer Sue Newby shows three very different objects from the Brontë collection, then leads a short walk to the churchyard, to discover a little about life and death in Haworth in the Brontës' day. Read more on: the-lion-the-spectacles-and-the-bracelet

Bronte heritage put before green energy in key wind turbine ruling

 

These turbines at Ovenden Moor Wind Farm in Yorkshire are due to be replaced by ones twice the height of Nelson's Column Photo: ALAMY

 

The brooding West Yorkshire countryside that inspired classics such as Wuthering Heights has been protected from plans for more turbines because of the importance of the famous sister writers.

It is believed to be the first time the literary significance of an area has been put before the need for green energy.

It comes as the High Court will this week hear a separate case brought by leading heritage groups hoping to protect historic sites from wind farm development.

Bradford Council has rejected plans for a 15m turbine at Hardnaze Farm, Oxenhope, Keighley, less than two miles from Haworth, where Emily, Charlotte and Anne Bronte grew up.

Councillors ruled the scheme would do little to boost renewable energy – while creating a blot on Bronte Country. Read more on: .telegraph/Bronte-heritage-put-before-green-energy-in-key-wind-turbine-ruling  /Moors-inspired-Wuthering-Heights-saved-wind-turbines-planners-consideration-literary-significance-area

On this day in 1855 Tabitha Aykroyd "Tabby" faithful servant of the Bronte family died aged 85.

Almost nothing is known of Tabitha's life before she entered the Parsonage in 1824 aged 53. She was almost certainly a native of Haworth, and we know of two sisters; Rose, who married a Bingley man called Bower, and Susannah, who married a Haworth man called Wood. Tabitha never married, and while there is no record of her life before she entered the Parsonage, it is thought that she had worked in domestic service and on farms.

Living at the Parsonage 'Tabby' was the Cook/Housekeeper and for the first 15 of her 31 years at the Parsonage, she was the only servant living in, although the Brontë sisters themselves also cooked, cleaned and washed clothes. In December 1836 Tabby slipped on ice in Haworth's main street, badly breaking her leg. Aunt Branwell suggested that she leave the Parsonage to be nursed by her sister Susannah, but the Brontë children objected, even going on hunger strike, and Tabby stayed in the Parsonage nursed by the children. The leg never fully healed however, and over the next 3 years many of Tabby's duties were taken up by Emily.

In 1839 Tabby seems to have retired temporarily, moving into a house in Newell Hill that she had bought with her now-widowed sister Susannah. Mr. Brontë engaged Martha Brown, the 11 year old daughter of his Sexton, John Brown, but the greater part of the skilled and the heavy work fell upon the Brontë girls, with Emily becoming Housekeeper. In 1842, Tabby moved back into the Parsonage where she stayed, sharing the little servants' bedroom with young Martha, for the next 13 years. Tabby died in February 1855 and she is buried with her sister Susannah, and a George Aykroyd who may be a brother, just over the wall from the Parsonage garden.

Personality; Influence According to Mrs. Gaskell, Tabby "abounded in strong practical sense and shrewdness. Her words were far from flattery; but she would spare no deeds in the cause of those whom she kindly regarded"(The Life of Charlotte Brontë 1857). Mrs. Brontë had been dead for 3 years when Tabby came to the Parsonage and the children were looked after by their mother's sister, Elizabeth Branwell. A year after Tabby's arrival, the two eldest children, Maria and Elizabeth, died of consumption. Charlotte and Emily were only nine and seven years old at the time, and as they at least had only a formal relationship with their Aunt Branwell, they found physical and emotional warmth in the kitchen. Tabby was fond of her "childers" and they were fond of her. As Charlotte later wrote, "she was like one of our own family". Tabby took the girls for their walks on the moors, and, with her old-fashioned ways and broad Haworth accent, she was sometimes the butt of their boisterous games.

Tabby was a great storyteller. She knew all the local families, all their complex inter-relationships and disputes, and, despite her belief in the Christian teachings of divine reward and retribution, she held also to the ancient anthropomorphic traditions of the countryside, claiming (according to Mrs. Gaskell) to have known people who had seen the fairies. Emily, who spent more time working in the kitchen than either of her sisters, was particularly close to Tabby, and Tabby's influence permeates the landscape of Wuthering Heights. Tabby has also been identified as the model for Nelly Dean in Wuthering Heights, and for the housekeeper Martha in Charlotte's novel Shirley.
bronteparsonage/tabitha-aykroyd

Ellen “Nelly” Dean

Ellen, or Nelly Dean, is the housekeeper of Thrushcross Grange as the novel begins and is the servant of both Catherines. Intelligent and compassionate, she is often more of a friend or relative to the characters in the book than a servant. Consequently, she knows more of the story than anyone else so is able to fill Mr Lockwood in on events.
wuthering-heights.

Quotes

(Childhood) … I was almost always at Wuthering Heights; because my mother had nursed Mr. Hindley Earnshaw … and I got used to playing with the children: I ran errands too, and helped to make hay, and hung about the farm ready for anything that anybody would set me to.

(1801, aged 43) At this diabolical violence I [Ellen] rushed on him furiously. 'You villain!' I began to cry, 'you villain!' A touch on the chest silenced me: I am stout, and soon put out of breath; and, what with that and the rage, I staggered dizzily back and felt ready to suffocate, or to burst a blood-vessel.

(1801, aged 44) ' … you [Ellen], my good friend, are a striking evidence against that assertion. Excepting a few provincialisms of slight consequence, you have no marks of the manners which I am habituated to consider as peculiar to your class. I am sure you have thought a great deal more than the generality of servants think. You have been compelled to cultivate your reflective faculties for want of occasions for frittering your life away in silly trifles.'

' … but I [said Ellen] have undergone sharp discipline, which has taught me wisdom; and then, I have read more than you would fancy, Mr. Lockwood. You could not open a book in this library that I have not looked into, and got something out of also … '’

 

Sarah Lancashire who plays Nelly Dean

Sarah, 44, describes Nelly as the go-between for Cathy and Heathcliff. “She feels terribly protective of them. What we don’t see in our adaptation, but is written in the book, is that Nelly grew up with Cathy. It was Nelly’s mother who was in service at Wuthering Heights, so the two of them almost have a sibling relationship separated by their status.
“Nelly also raised Heathcliff so she has maternal feelings towards them both. Nelly’s life is undoubtedly Cathy, because she herself has never married or had children of her own. She’s very much a woman in service bound to the family.”
Despite her role as carer, Sarah says Nelly is helpless when it comes to Cathy and Heathcliff’s relationship.
“I don’t think Nelly has any influence or control over how they feel for each other,” she says. “Brutally bound by her status in life, Nelly is incapable of intervening to prevent their relationship. All she can do is stand back from it all.”
Wuthering Heights was filmed last year in areas of West Yorkshire, on vast areas of moorland and stone-built manor houses including East Riddlesden Hall, near Keighley, and Oakwell Hall at Birstall. Did the rugged Yorkshire landscape help Sarah identify with the story?
bronteblog/wuthering-heights