A Comparison of Charlotte Bronte Biographies

Over the years, there have been many biographies written about Charlotte Bronte. Elizabeth Gaskell's The Life of Charlotte Bronte has been regarded as the standard work. Winifred Gerin's biography, Charlotte Bronte: The Evolution of Genius (published in 1967) was the first to include new information on Bronte. Gerin says, "It is paradoxical that the standard work is still Mrs. Gaskell's Life. This remains a great biography, but published two years after its subject's death it suffered from the inevitable limitations thus imposed . . . and was not bettered by immediate followers" (xiv). Gerin felt that "the main contributions to Bronte studies in this century have been on the editorial plane" and sought to write a factual, unbiased biography (xiv). Lyndall Gordon's biography, Charlotte Bronte: A Passionate Life, took a feminist view, which was a different view from that of all previous biographies. Each biographer was affected by the cultural views of women of the time. Since Jane Eyre is seen as a reflection of Bronte’s life, the view of Jane Eyre has also changed with the times. In her biography, Gaskell sought to hide Bronte's excess passion and blamed it on the tragedies she suffered, whereas Gerin recognized Bronte 's passion as a part of her personality that contributed to her writing, and Gordon embraced it as the most important aspect of Bronte 's life. 

In June of 1855, Mrs. Gaskell received a letter from Reverend Patrick Bronte, on behalf of himself and Bronte's husband, Reverend Arthur Bell Nicholls, asking if she would write a biography of Charlotte Bronte. Ellen Nussey, Bronte's friend, had written to Patrick Bronte and Nicholls concerned with her friend's reputation and some speculations made by the press. Ellen Nussey demanded that these speculations be challenged. Had the Bell brothers (Charlotte, Emily and Anne's pseudonyms) been three separate people? Were they male or female? According to Gaskell, people began wondering if the "author [of Jane Eyre] forfeited the right to keep the company of respectable women" (vii) because of her coarseness ("by which Victorians meant vehemence and passion") (Gordon 347)? Ellen suggested that Gaskell, a friend of Bronte’s and an established author, write Charlotte's biography. 

In writing the biography, Gaskell used her own notes and letters describing her meetings with Charlotte Bronte. Patrick Bronte provided a skeleton biographical outline (not always accurate in detail) of himself and his family (Gaskell xiii). Gaskell traveled to Haworth and Cowan Bridge, to Casterton (where the clergy daughter's school located) to Thorton (where Bronte was born), to London to see George Smith and to Brussels to meet Constantin Heger. She spoke to those who had known Bronte and relied heavily on letters Bronte had written to Ellen Nussey, which Ellen had saved (Gaskell xv). 
Gaskell's The Life of Charlotte Bronte was published in 1857. Gaskell then spent some time in Italy and upon her return "found a heap of correspondence waiting for her" most of which were "attacks on grounds of misrepresentation" (Gaskell x). She then wrote a revised edition, which was later revised again and expanded (x). 

Through the biography Gaskell sought to repudiate charges of "coarseness" (brought on by Bronte's bold, passionate writing) by showing that "It was not Bronte's nature but her environment that made her wild" (ix). Gaskell felt that Charlotte's life "was but labour and pain" (457). She attempted to protect her friend by removing all reference to Bronte's love for M. Heger from the biography. Due to the fact that the biography was published only two years after Bronte's death, Gaskell had to omit information that could have damaged the reputations of people who were still living. 

Gaskell's perspective of Bronte's life is one of loss and grief. To this, she attributes the aspects of Bronte's writing and personality that were unacceptable at the time. She writes: 

Miss Bronte never dared to allow herself to look forward with hope; she had no confidence in the future; and I thought, when I heard of the sorrowful years she had passed through, that it had been this pressure of grief which had crushed all buoyancy of expectation out of her. (94) 

This perspective of Bronte also applies to Jane Eyre. After reading Gaskell's biography, one can see how autobiographical aspects of Bronte's life emerge in Jane Eyre. For example, Charlotte Bronte attended Cowan Bridge as a child, a school for the clergy’s daughters, which is represented as "Lowood" and her sister Maria is represented as the character "Helen Burns" (Gaskell 51). It is important to remember that Gaskell was writing for a different time, when women were to be seen and not heard. Bronte's bold behavior was not normal and could only be explained by the misery Bronte endured. Taking this into consideration, one can see Gaskell's view of Bronte's life reflected in Jane: her passion a result of her suffering. 

Winifred Gerin's biography, Charlotte Bronte: Evolution of a Genius, was published in 1967. She used a variety of sources in writing the biography including Bronte's juvenile writings (preserved in manuscript only), and Bronte's letters. Gerin researched the personalities and backgrounds of Bronte's known acquaintances and visited sights from Bronte's life (from Thorton, to Cowan Bridge, to the home in Ireland where she stayed on her honeymoon) (Gerin xv). Gerin received information on Charlotte Bronte's experience in Belgium first hand from the Heger family. All of this was published for the first time in her biography. 

Gerin focused on Bronte's "evolution towards fulfillment" (xv). Gerin viewed Bronte’s grief as an essential part of her character. Gerin revealed the passion that Bronte had felt for M. Heger, which was something Gaskell had not done. Gerin also saw the importance of Bronte's childhood writings and felt that they traced Bronte's development as a writer. She felt that they were the "key to her mature productions" and spent a great deal of time analyzing them (xv). 

Gerin's biography recognized how the events in Bronte's life shaped her character. She recognized that Bronte's love for M. Heger was an important factor in her life and included it in her book. She was as concerned as Gaskell with defending Bronte, rather with presenting facts, and thus she did not omit things or modify them as Gaskell did. One hundred years later, women are viewed differently. What was once considered coarse, is no longer so. Gerin was able to present Bronte's life as it was. 
Read on: 123helpme/view.
wiki/Winifred Gerin

I don’t think there ever was such an apple of discord as that unlucky book. (Elizabeth Gaskell to George Smith, 26 November 1857)

I am curious 

about the backgrounds

of the biography

Elisabeth Gaskell 

made from Charlotte Bronte

I am going to search for background information.

On 16 July 1855, Patrick Brontë wrote to Mrs. Gaskell, acknowledging her as the person “best qualified” to write an account of Charlotte’s life and works, and asking if she would agree to the task (SHB. XV. 190-191).  Within a week, Gaskell arrived at Haworth Parsonage to discuss the biography.  From the beginning, she intended to do much more than  the “brief account of [Charlotte’s] life and . . . some remarks on her works” for which Patrick had asked

(XV. 190).  She wrote to Ellen Nussey:

I told Mr Brontë how much I felt the difficulty of the task I had undertaken, yet how much I wished to do it well, and make his daughter’s most unusual character (as taken separately from her genius,) known to those who from their deep interest and admiration of her writings would naturally, if her life was to be written, expect to be informed as to the circumstances which made her what she was (Letters 361)

Gaskell’s biography was to be a tribute to both the woman and the writer; she also intended it to be an expression of their treasured friendship, as she said in her letters both before and after the book’s publication.  Indeed, before she had even been approached by Patrick Brontë, she had written to Charlotte’s publisher, George Smith, that she longed to “publish what I know of her, and make the world . . . honour the woman as much as they have admired the writer” (345).  And when the “unlucky book” was published, and Gaskell was “in the Hornet’s nest with a vengeance” (453) from those unhappy with their particular portrayals, she stood true to herfriend’s memory, asking Charles Kingsley to “[r]espect & value the memory of Charlotte Brontë as she deserves” (452), and telling Ellen Nussey:

I weighed every line with all my whole power & heart, so that every line should go to it’s [sic] great purpose of making her known & valued, as one who had gone through such a terrible life with a brave & faithful heart. (454)

Gaskell had mourned Charlotte’s passing; indeed, she most likely still mourned her, or at least she expected to: My dear dear friend that I shall never see again on earth! . . . I loved her dearly, more than I think she knew.  I shall never cease to be thankful that I knew

her: or to mourn her loss. (335-336) Thus, as Pollard says, Mrs. Gaskell wrote with a “tender concern” that highlighted the “profound attachment” she had for Charlotte Brontë (Mrs Gaskell 142-143), a woman she considered “truth itself” (Letters 128).  If, indeed, her purpose was to exalt Charlotte’s goodness (Pollard 146), it was also certainly sincere.  Gaskell’s purpose was to write an account of Charlotte just short of hagiography, and she never claimed otherwise: I appeal to that larger and more solemn public, who know how to look with tender humility at faults and errors; how to admire generously extraordinary genius, and how to reverence with warm, full hearts all noble virtue. To that Public I commit the memory of Charlotte Brontë. (Life 429) Wise and Symington state that, though the friendship between Elizabeth and Charlotte was brief, “[n]ever, anywhere, do we find a single jarring note” (SHB. XV. 61).  It is appropriate that the friendship between these two extraordinary women be emphasised, for in the nineteenth century, a friendship like theirs was considered most rare. lang/EG

Here you can read an opinion completely different: guardian/classics.charlottebronte 
Since her death 150 years ago, Charlotte Brontë has been sanitised as a dull, Gothic drudge. Far from it, says Tanya Gold; the author was a filthy, frustrated, sex-obsessed genius.
Elizabeth-Cleghorn-Gaskell

On this day in 1850 Benjamin Herschel Babbage travelled to Haworth to examine the sanitary condition of the village on behalf of the General Board of Health.

Benjamin Herschel Babbage (6 August 1815 – 22 October 1878) was an English engineer, scientist, explorer and politician, best known for his work in the colony of South Australia. He invariably signed his name "B. Herschel Babbage" and was frequently referred to as "Herschel Babbage"
In 1850, Babbage was invited by Patrick Brontë (clergyman and father of the Brontë sisters) to conduct an inspection in the West Yorkshiretown of Haworth, partly brought about by Haworth's high rate of early mortality.^[2] Babbage was horrified by the unsanitary conditions in the town, and The Babbage Report to the General Board of Health into the town's water supply and lack of a sewerage system resulted in the board taking notice and working to improve the town's sanitation.^[3] In 1851, the Colonial Secretary Earl Grey, on the recommendation of the geologist Sir Henry De la Beche, assigned Babbage to perform a geological and mineralogical survey of the colony of South Australia requested by the colony's government. Babbage arrived in South Australia on 27 November on the "Hydaspes",^[4] and over the next few years worked on a number of government projects, first setting up the Government Gold Assay Office in Victoria Square.^[5]

He was appointed Justice of the Peace in 1852.^[6] In January 1853 he was appointed Chief Engineer by the company undertaking the railway from Port Adelaide to the city.^[7] In 1853, Babbage was one of the first five members of the Mitcham District Council, serving as the council's first chairman from 1855. A ward in the City of Mitcham was named after him.^[8] In 1854 he was elected to the Central Road Board.^[9] In 1855, Babbage served as President of the Adelaide Philosophical Society.^[10]

In 1857, Babbage was elected to the South Australian House of Assembly in the inaugural election in 1857, representing the electorate ofEncounter Bay. He resigned late in the year after being appointed to lead an expedition to explore the north of the colony between Lake Torrens and Lake Gairdner.^[11] He was replaced by Henry Strangways in a by-election.^[1]

Babbage began his exploration of South Australia in 1856 when sent to search for gold up to the Flinders Ranges,^[12] during which time he discovered the MacDonnell River, Blanchewater and Mount Hopeful (renamed Mount Babbage after him in 1857 by George Goyder). Babbage also disproved the notion that Lake Torrens was a single horseshoe-shaped lake or inland sea, ascertaining a number of gaps in the lake, which were later traversed other explorers such as Augustus Gregory and Peter Warburton.^[11] On 15 June 1858 near Pernatty Creek he discovered the remains of William Coulthard of Angas Park, Nuriootpa, who had died of thirst around 10 March 1858.^[13] On 22 October 1858 he discovered Emerald Springs.^[14]

Babbage also discovered that Lake Eyre (sighted by Edward John Eyre in 1840) actually consisted of a large northern and a smaller southern lake. A peninsula on Lake Eyre North was named Babbage Peninsula in 1963.^[15]

As Babbage continued his explorations, sometimes accompanied by his son, Charles Whitmore Babbage,^[16] the government grew tired of his slow, methodical pace, and the Commissioner of Crown Lands, Francis Dutton, responded to the controversy by replacing him withPeter Warburton in 1858. Babbage complained of unfair treatment and petitioned the House of Assembly to conduct a parliamentary inquiry into the issue.^[17] A critically acclaimed book of his pen-and-ink sketches from this expedition is held by the Mortlock Library.^[16]

His last years were spent at his home on South Road, St Mary's, where he had an excellent vineyard and was a keen winemaker (nine varieties on 25 acres in 1878^[18]). He announced his candidature for the 1877 Legislative Council elections but refused to participate in any public meetings and did not go to the polls.^[19]

On this day in 1855 Charlotte Bronte died at Haworth

Charlotte married Arthur Bell Nicholls, her father's curate, on June 29th, 1854. By this time she was a successful writer and financially independent. Although she does not appear to have been swept off her feet by this match she seems to have grown fonder of her husband after her marriage. However, by January 1855 she was pregnant and suffering from chronic morning sickness. Her increasing emaciation led to a loss of consciousness. Her friend Elizabeth Gaskell reports: "(Charlotte) saw her husband's woe-worn face, and caught the sound of some murmured words of prayer that God would spare her. 'Oh!' she whispered forth, 'I am not going to die, am I? He will not separate us, we have been so happy..."

Charlotte Bronte died in the early hours of Saturday, 31st March, 1855. Her unborn child died with her. bbck/bradford/culture/words

Black-edged stationery informed friends and relatives of the loss of a loved one.

Victorianweb/letters/condolence.

On this day in 1843 Branwell Bronte wrote his poem "Thorpe Green".

Thorpe Green

I sit, this evening, far away

From all I used to know,

And nought reminds my soul today

Of happy long ago.

Unwelcome cares, unthought-of fears

Around my room arise;

I seek for suns of former years,

But clouds o’ercast my skies.

Yes–Memory, wherefore does thy voice

Bring back old times to view,

As thou would bid me not rejoice

In thoughts and prospects new?

I’ll thank thee, Memory, in the hour

When troubled thoughts are mine—

For thou, like sun’s in April’s shower,

On shadowy scenes will shine.

I’ll thank thee when approaching death

Would quench life’s feeble ember,

For thou wouldst even renew my breath

With thy sweet word “Remember!”
Patrick Branwell Brontë 

March 30th 1843, Thorpe Green

 

Substantial manor house near Little Ouseburn, six miles from Boroughbridge, where Anne went as governess to the Robinson family in 1840, and Branwell followed her as tutor to Edmund, the one son, in 1843. The family had lived there for nearly 50 years, and the Rev. Edmund Robinson seems to have been a country gentleman in his tastes and pursuits. The estate was large and beautiful, and the possibilities for field sports were abundant. The house burnt down early in the twentieth century, but the rooms and their proportions can be found in the advertisements when the house was let after the departure of the Robinsons ( Leeds Intelligencer , 21 Aug 1847 and 8 Dec 1855). Also part of the estate was the Monks’ House, where Branwell apparently lodged. This building still stands. blackwell reference

Like his sisters, Branwell Brontë was tutored at home at Haworth Parsonage. The only brother in a family of sisters, he was the indulged, spoiled darling of the family. But he was also, like his sisters, highly talented. A willing scholar with a ‘precocious intellect’, he translated Horace to critical acclaim, played the organ in his father’s church, and aspired to being a professional portrait painter.

Physically small, he had flaming red hair, was impulsive and quick-witted, and had a “penchant for showing off in company”, according to the Brontë Society’s biography. He also had an erratic and emotional nature that stopped him making the most of his talents, however. York press

On this day in 1839/ Charlotte Bronte wrote her poem "Life".

 

flickriver

LIFE

by: Charlotte Bronte (1816-1855)

LIFE, believe, is not a dream

So dark as sages say;

Oft a little morning rain

Foretells a pleasant day.

Sometimes there are clouds of gloom,

But these are transient all;

If the shower will make the roses bloom,

O why lament its fall?

Rapidly, merrily,

Life's sunny hours flit by,

Gratefully, cheerily

Enjoy them as they fly!

What though Death at times steps in,

And calls our Best away?

What though sorrow seems to win,

O'er hope, a heavy sway?

Yet Hope again elastic springs,

Unconquered, though she fell;

Still buoyant are her golden wings,

Still strong to bear us well.

Manfully, fearlessly,

The day of trial bear,

For gloriously, victoriously,

Can courage quell despair!

"Life" is reprinted

from Poems  by 

Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell. 

Charlotte, Anne, and Emily Bronte.

On this day in 1857 The "Life of Charlotte Bronte" by Elizabeth Gaskell was published.

Charlotte sent copies of Shirley to selected leading authors of the day, including Elizabeth Gaskell. Gaskell and Charlotte subsequently met in August 1850 and began a friendship which, whilst not necessarily close, was significant in that Gaskell would write a biography of Charlotte after Charlotte's death in 1855. The biography, The Life of Charlotte Brontë, was published in 1857 and was unusual at the time in that, rather than analysing its subject's achievements, it instead concentrated on the private details of Charlotte's life, in particular placing emphasis on aspects which countered the accusations of 'coarseness' which had been levelled at Charlotte's writing. Though frank in places, Gaskell was selective about which details she revealed; for example, she suppressed details of Charlotte's love for Heger, a married man, as being too much of an affront to contemporary morals and as a possible source of distress to Charlotte's still-living friends, father and husband. Gaskell also provided doubtful and inaccurate information about Patrick Brontë, claiming, for example, that he did not allow his children to eat meat. This is refuted by one of Emily Brontë's diary papers, in which she describes the preparation of meat and potatoes for dinner at the parsonage, as Juliet Barker points out in her recent biography, The Brontës. It has been argued that the particular approach of The Life of Charlotte Brontë transferred the focus of attention away from the 'difficult' novels of not just Charlotte but all the Brontë sisters, and began a process of sanctification of their private lives. answers/charlotte-bronte


Then came in 1857 the Life of Charlotte Brontë, in two volumes. Miss Bronte, who had enjoyed the friendship of Mrs. Gaskell and had exchanged visits, died in March 1855. Two years earlier she had begged her publishers to postpone the issue of her own novel Villette in order that her friend's Ruth should not suffer. This biography, by its vivid presentation of the sad, melancholy and indeed tragic story of the three Brontë sisters, greatly widened the interest in their writings and gave its author a considerable place among English biographers. But much matter was contained in the first and second editions that was withdrawn from the third. Certain statements made by the writer as to the school of Charlotte Brontë's infancy, an identification of the "Lowood" of Jane Eyre with the existing school, and the acceptance of the story of Bramwell Brontë's ruin having been caused by the woman in whose house he had lived as tutor, brought threats of libel actions. Apologies were published, and the third edition of the book was modified, as Mrs. Gaskell declares, by "another hand." The book in any case remains one of the best biographies in the language  nndb.com/people

Searching for the Bronte Sisters on the Internet/ weblogs

casasugar/Bronte-Sisters-Home-Pictures

fodors/news/

Sarah Whittle/bronte-along

Vagabond language/heroine-emily-bronte-wuthering-heights

 

asni.net/newsletter

Bronte restoration cash boost

 

Bronte Spirit chairman Averil Kenyon, centre with councillors Glen Miller and Rebecca Poulsen 

 

An initiative to restore a historic Haworth building has received a £2,500 boost.
Worth Valley ward councillors have allocated the money from the ward investment fund to support Bronte Spirit, which is campaigning to ensure the long-term future of the Old School Room. The Church Street building, which requires major repairs and renovations, was built by the Reverend Patrick Bronte. 
The money was made available by councillors Glen Miller, Rebecca Poulsen and Russell Brown. Coun Miller said: “We were keen to support this project as it still has a long way to go. We’ve given it some start-up costs.” Averil Kenyon, chairman of Bronte Spirit, said she and her colleagues were delighted with this financial backing. We are overwhelmed, it was just so timely,” she said. She added that the money would help with the costs of drawing up a business plan, needed as part of an application for further funding. Her group has staged a pair of open days to give local business people and community leaders a chance to see what potential the property has as a venue. Keighley News

Visit to Haworth

 

 

The house itself still has the bare, slightly scrubbed look that led Charlotte’s biographer Elizabeth Gaskell to comment, “I don’t know that I ever saw a spot more exquisitely clean.” The present director, Andrew McCarthy, shows me around and points out that he is at pains to keep it from becoming a “Brontë reliquary.” (This intention didn’t keep him from setting off for Sotheby’s right before Christmas with $610,000 to bid on a miniature book of Brontë juvenilia that came up for sale; he was outbid by the French.) The rooms have been decorated in keeping with the period of the Brontës; the original sofa Emily is thought to have died on in the dining room is here, as is Anne’s art box, a pair of Charlotte’s white stockings and several of her almost-child-size dresses. (She stood at under five feet.)

Read more about this visit to Haworth 

nytimes/bronte-country-beckons-a-writer-back

Top Withens

From: Bronte Weather

So, on Sunday I went up to Haworth and walked to Top Withins. It's a well trodden path and as it was a mild, sunny day there were lots of others walking out on the moors too. The birds are getting ready for spring. 


We could hear the eerie call of Curlew in the breeze and the crackle of Red Grouse being flushed from the heather.   

And I saw a couple of bees (a honeybee and a bumble bee). We had a butty at the Bronte Waterfalls by the Bronte Bridge and then continued up to Top Withins.


There's a plaque on the ruin that explains "This farmhouse has been associated with 'Wuthering Heights', the Earnshaw home in the Emily Bronte novel. The buildings, even when complete, bore no resemblance to the house she described, but the situation may have been in her mind when she wrote of the moorland setting of the Heights."

Brontes reunited in bronze for concert

Charlotte, Emily and Anne Bronte will be special guests at a concert in their honour on April 1. 
Life-size sculptures of the three famous writers will greet the audience as they arrive to hear the Bronte Mass.
Diane Lawrenson’s bronze sculptures, entitled Three Sisters, will be at the Victoria Theatre, Halifax, from the previous day. The Bronte Mass, along with other classical pieces, will be performed by Halifax Choral Society, the Black Dyke Band and Sheffield Philharmonic Orchestra. The Bronte Mass was commissioned by Leeds Philharmonic Chorus in memory of its chairman John Brodwell, who was passionate about the Brontes.
Composer Philip Wilby set music to the poetry of the Bronte sisters and their brother Branwell. 
Choir spokesman Tina Matthews promised a thrilling concert with astounding and “simply glorious” music. 
She added: “The sound is expected to be absolutely amazing with upwards of 200 voices on stage.”


Tickets for the concert cost from £8 to £22 by phoning
Keighley News

Old School Rooms

The latest initiative of Brontë Spirit for restoring and safeguarding the Old School Rooms in Haworth: The voluntary group leading a project to restore one of Haworth’s most historic buildings wants to develop links with the business world. Brontë Spirit is working to safeguard the future of the Old School Room, in Church Street, which was built by the Rev Patrick Brontë. The group is staging open days at the premises Friday and on Saturday. It has invited many members of the district’s business sector along with community leaders to see what potential the building offers. Averil Kenyon, chairman of Brontë Spirit, said: “While we are currently discussing with English Heritage how we can restore the building to its former glory we have to consider what kind of sustainable future the building has. “For the two open days we have invited representatives from the commercial estate agency world to come and talk to us about what kind of business or community use might most easily fit into what the building can offer. “We have also invited companies from many sectors which could easily find a use for the building and community organisations looking to expand their operations now that the Government is asking us to embrace localism, or need extra space to house their current operations. “We’re very optimistic that this building will adapt to a modern use and that will ensure this key structure within the Haworth historical footprint will be saved for future generations to appreciate.” The Old School Room currently has serious problems with its roof and needs major external refurbishments. Mrs Kenyon added: “Our discussions with English Heritage are at an advanced stage and they have been very helpful. (Miran Rahman) Keighley news

Governess gown and mourning gown

 

A few shots of my last years working wardobe and the governess gown and mourning gown which was also a suitable governess outfit 

Abigails ateliersgoverness-gowns

William Weightman

 

appleby in westmorland

 

William Weightman MA. was the son of a brewer from Appleby, Westmorland. Appleby-in-Westmorland is a town and civil parish in Cumbria, in North West England.
He went to Appleby Grammar School. He was a Theology and Classical scholar at Durham university. About 19th August 1839, he became curate to Rev Brontë. The girls gave him the nickname Miss Celia Amelia, and Charlotte described him as...bonny, pleasant, careless, fickle, unclerical. On his arrival, he said that he was engaged to Agnes Walton. She was from Crackenthorpe, near his home town of Appleby, and it was assumed he was intending to marry her, though he flirted with other women, including possibly Anne Brontë. Agnes Walton married a well-to-do farmer, John Horn. In August 1840, he applied to the Bishop of Ripon to be ordained. He lectured at Haworth Mechanics Institute. He was interested in Caroline Dury. He died in 1842 at the age of 28 in a cholera epidemic. He may have contracted the disease in his visits to the sick of the village. He was buried in Haworth Church. He had a brother, Robert, who also became a clergyman, but was ejected from his living on account of his frequent drunkenness. William may have been the model for the character Edward Weston. history.rootsweb.ancestry/calderdalecompanion
------------------------------
Patrick’s curate in Haworth 1839–42. He was born in Appleby, the son of a brewer, and at Durham University studied for a Licentiate in Theology, which he attained shortly before being made a deacon and taking the curacy in Haworth. He was ordained a year later in the summer of 1840. He burst on the Haworth scene like a ray of sunshine. He was handsome, engaging, and fun, and the lives of all those at the Parsonage were enriched by his energy and enthusiasm. One gets the impression from Charlotte’s letters of a young man giving a performance – perhaps as the archetypal inconstant lover from some eighteenth-century comedy. From the start and throughout he professed devotion to the girl he left at home, Agnes Walton, but quite soon we learn of the girl he treated badly in Swansea, then the girls he had on a string in Keighley – Caroline Dury, the vicar’s daughter, and Sarah Sugden, rich and generous with money. His relationship with the daughters of his own vicar was flirtatious, confidential, as if he aimed to entertain them with stories of perpetual lovemaking, if not with the actual thing. He sent them valentines, took them to lectures he was giving in Keighley, even saw to it that they involved themselves in such matters as the Church rates controversy. blackwellreference

TO MISS ELLEN NUSSEY 
September 29 th 1840. 

'I know Mrs. Ellen is burning with eagerness to hear something about William Weightman. I think I'll plague her by not telling her a  word. To speak heaven's truth, I have precious little to say, inasmuch as I seldom see him, except on a Sunday, when he looks as handsome, cheery, and good-tempered as usual. I have indeed had the advantage of one long conversation since his return from Westmorland, when he poured out his whole warm fickle soul in fondness and admiration of Agnes Walton. Whether he is in love with her or not I can't say; I can only observe that it sounds very like it. He sent us a prodigious quantity of game while he was away--a brace of wild ducks, a brace of black grouse, a brace of partridges, ditto of snipes, ditto of curlews, and a large salmon. If you were to ask Mr. Weightman's opinion of my character just now, he would say that at first he thought me a cheerful chatty kind of body, but that on farther acquaintance he found me of a capricious changeful temper, never to be reckoned on. He does not know that I have regulated my manner by his--that I was cheerful and chatty so long as he was respectful, and that when he grew almost contemptuously familiar I found it necessary to adopt a degree of reserve which was not 
natural, and therefore was very painful to me. I find this reserve very convenient, and consequently I intend to keep it up.' 
------
During the governess and Brussels episodes in Charlotte's life we lose sight of Mr. Weightman, and the next record is of his death, which took place in September 1842, while Charlotte and Emily were in Brussels. Mr. Bronte preached the funeral sermon, {287} stating by way of introduction that for the twenty years and more that he had been in Haworth he had never before read his sermon. 'This is owing to a conviction in my mind,' he says, 'that in general, for the ordinary run of hearers, extempore preaching, though accompanied with some peculiar disadvantages, is more likely to be of a colloquial nature, and better adapted, on the whole, to the majority.' His departure from the practice on this occasion, he explains, is due to the request that his sermon should be printed. 

Mr. Weightman, he told his hearers, was a native of Westmoreland, educated at the University of Durham. 'While he was there,' continued Mr. Bronte, 'I applied to the justly venerated Apostolical Bishop of this diocese, requesting his Lordship to send me a curate adequate to the wants and wishes of the parishioners. This application was not in vain. Our Diocesan, in the scriptural character of the Overlooker and Head of his clergy, made an admirable choice, which more than answered my expectations, and probably yours. The Church Pastoral Aid Society, intheir pious liberality, lent their pecuniary aid, without which all efforts must have failed.' 'He had classical attainments of the first order, and, above all, his religious principles were sound and orthodox,' concludes Mr. Bronte. Mr. Weightman was twenty-six years of age when he died. His successor was Mr. Peter Augustus Smith, whom Charlotte Bronte has made famous in ""Shirley"" as Mr. Malone, curate of Briarfield. Mr. Smith was Mr. A. B. Nicholls's predecessor at Haworth. fatalsecret/charlotte_bronte_and_her_circle_by_clement_king_shorter_