My Top Five Picks

 

Gallop over to the BOOKDNA website where you'll find the Top Five books I recommend for understanding the history of Jane Austen's England!

Image from the author's collection - Fashions of 1797. 

Porcelain and Pots

My series on Jane Austen and the Industrial Revolution is still ongoing, although I haven't had time to update this blog! 

My feature in the March/April issue looked at 'canal mania', and 'Our Wedgwood Ware' is in the current issue of Jane Austen's Regency World. 

'The Prettiest English China' is coming up in the July/August issue, and looks at the manufacture of English porcelain in places like Worcester, Bristol and London. 

Image: Etruria. Engraving by Henry Warren, G. Greatbach, Staffordshire and Warwickshire Past and Present, Vol. III, William Mackenzie, London, c.1870. 

Muslins and Mule-Spinning

Full dress for December 1798.

My latest feature for Jane Austen's Regency World (January issue) - on mule-spinning - marks the beginning of my new series on the growing mechanization of Britain's industries during Austen's era. 

The Industrial Revolution affected not just the workers who were the 'shock troops' of the Revolution, but also the way that Jane and her family - and the characters in her novels - lived.  I'm really enjoying writing this series, and I hope that you enjoy it, too! 

Illustrations 

Above:

‘Full dress for December 1798’. The Lady’s Monthly Museum, Vol.1, Vernor & Hood, London, December 1798. Author’s collection. 

Right:

‘Mule’ for spinning cotton. Child workers ‘pieced’ together broken threads, and cleaned cotton waste from under the machine. Charles Knight, Knight’s Pictorial Gallery of Arts, Vol. 1, London Printing and Publishing Co., c.1858. Author’s collection.

'A Tale of Manchester Life'

84 Plymouth Grove 

Next April, a new exhibition will open at Mrs Gaskell's House. The exhibition will explore how Gaskell depicted Manchester and its workers in her novels and short stories. 

Gaskell's writing desk. 

'Mary Barton', her first published novel, was subtitled 'A Tale of Manchester Life', and the crisis it explored in contemporary relations between mill-owners and mill-workers, and the people's terrible living conditions, made a huge impact. It roused the conscience of a nation. 

I am very much looking forward to visiting the new exhibition at 84 Plymouth Road, Manchester, next year, with its recently-opened Bronte room. (All images courtesy Elizabeth Gaskell's House). 

I hope you all have a good Christmas and New Year!

The 'Palace of Puffs'

My latest feature for Discover Your Ancestors magazine (digital edition, June) is on the 1862 International Exhibition. 

The landmark 1851 International Exhibition - with its glittering Crystal Palace -  was the envy of the world. Events like these became a matter of national pride. Four years later, the French held an International Exposition at Paris. 

In 1857, the arts were represented in Manchester's Art Treasures Exhibition, which was also an unqualified success. 

So public expectations ran high for the opening of 1862 'World's Fair' at South Kensington, London. But the project was dogged by difficulties from the beginning. And the exhibition building's design, by Captain Fowke, proved highly controversial...

NFReads Interview

Do pop over to the NFReads website where you can read an interview with me (and lots of other authors!).

Obviously I would have loved to have been dressed like this for the interview - 'Carriage Dress', Ackermann's Repository, March 1816. 

Robert Burns' Mauchline

Burns House Museum

 Scotland's national bard, Robert Burns, lived in Mauchline with his long-time sweetheart Jean Armour from the spring until the autumn of 1788. His farm, which he shared with his brother Gilbert, was at nearby Mossgiel. 

While at Mossgiel, Burns wrote some of his most famous poems, including To A Mouse, The Twa Dogs, The Holy Fair, and The Cotter's Saturday Night. 

Jean, the daughter of a local stone-mason, was pregnant with twins for the second time. (One of her first twins had sadly died). She had been thrown out by her parents, who were furious when they found that Burns had got her pregnant again.

For her confinement, Robert found her a room in Mauchline (on the upper floor of the Burns House Museum, left). At this date, Burns believed that the couple were no longer married, as Jean's family had destroyed a piece of paper which showed they had wed informally.

Statue of Jean Armour, Mauchline.

Unfortunately, Jean lost both her twins shortly after their birth. Shortly afterwards, Jean and Robert were formally married by the local justice, Gavin Hamilton. 

Meanwhile, Burns was on the look-out for a new farm, as Mossgiel was not proving profitable. He settled on Ellisland Farm. However, its house was not habitable, so Robert set about building his family a new home. Burns, Jean, and their young son Robert, moved to Ellisland in December 1788. 

Mauchline is a bustling small town, and you can still see many of the buildings that Burns and Jean knew (see below). 

The 'Sma' Inn' which belonged to Nanse Tinnock ('Poosie Nansie') in Castle Street is part of the Burns House Museum site.

Another inn owned by Nanse Tinnock (pictured with Burns on the left) is on the corner of Loudon Street and Cowgate (photo, below right).  

Mauchline church is not the same building as the one known by Burns, as it was replaced in 1829. 

However, there are several interesting memorials of Mauchline folk who Burns was acquainted with, some of whom are mentioned in his poems. 

Armour Monument. 

Several relatives are also buried in the kirkyard - his brother John, and four of Robert's children by Jean Armour. 

Daddy Auld's Monument.

 

Title page of a volume of Burns' poems, 1813.