Anteros

A few weeks ago I posted a note about a seminar at The National Archives on The Chevalier d'Eon: Transgender Diplomat at the Court of George III, 1763-1777. If anyone is interested, a podcast of the seminar there is now available on The National Archives website here. The seminar focuses primarily on the diplomatic scandals the Chevalier provoked rather than on his/her transgender status but it's fascinating never the less, particularly with regard to the French court's fear of the freedom of the British press.



Fencing Match between
Monsieur de Saint-George et Mademoiselle La chevalière d'Éon de Beaumont
at Carlton House on 9 April 1787.

1. Let him have his own way.
2. Allow him the free use of money.
3. Suffer him to rove where he pleases on the Sabbath.
4. Give him free access to wicked companions.
5. Call him to no account for his evenings.
6. Furnish him with no stated employment.
7. Let him go to the theatre.

Pursue any one of these ways and you will experience a remarkable deliverance or you will have to mourn over a debased and ruined child. Thousands have realised the sad result and have gone mourning to the grave.

This stern warning appears in the The Females Advocate (1838) a publication of the London Female Mission, a charity which former Indefatigable midshipman Sir Henry Hart was a supporter of. I presume this book is fairly typical of the genre of 19th century improving texts but it rather fascinated me in a sort of horrified-amazement kind of way. The sections on "Errors in Female Education" and "Fascinating Snares" are particularly edifying. The latter, in case you're wondering, is about the dangers of listening to music. Don't say I didn't warn you!

PS. Is it just me or does that list make you think of Archie?

If any of you happen to be in That London over the next couple of months you might be interested in checking out the Bishopgate Institute's new season of events, Boys & Girls, which "examines the changing nature of gender roles, what gender is, how we interpret our gender identity and gender equality." Lots of the events sound fascinating but the one that caught my eye is a talk by Justin Bengry of Birckbeck College called All Boys Together - Homing in on Homosociality. Blurb as follows:

All boys together? Nudge nudge. The belief that all male institutions are breeding grounds for homosexuality, has been a constant one. But what does go on behind the doors of the executive boardroom or the communal changing room? Is homosexuality the elephant in the room? The serpent in the grass? Or is it all just homosexual wish fulfilment fantasy?

The event is on the 24th of October at 19.00 and costs £7 / £5 concession. You can find further information about Girls & Boys and details of all events here

This extraordinary clip is part of the British Library's history learning resource Sisterhood and After: An oral history of the women's liberation movement". Sadly I can't embed the video but you can view it here and there is a transcript below.

I remember going into the junior school and this woman who was called Miss Savours who I thought was nice ‘cos she looked like my grandmother and she was very Welsh, asked us to write what we would like to be when we grew up, and I remember it so clearly. It was no surprise that all the men in my family had gone to sea and I thought this would be lovely, and what was I, about seven, eight? So I wrote, ‘I would like to be a sailor,’ that’s what I'd like to be when I grow up. And I wrote my little essay and when it came back she’d crossed out, ‘I want to be a sailor,’ and she’d added an apostrophe and added ‘sailor’s wife’. It is so appalling.

Deirdre Beddoe never did become a sailor, or indeed a sailor's wife, but she did become President of The Women’s Archive of Wales and Emeritus Professor of Women’s History at the University of Glamorgan. I wonder what Professor Beddoe would have made of the digital technology and creative industries event I participated in last week that didn't have a single female speaker?

I've done a bit of digging to see what I could find out about the mysterious Amazonian Company of St Barbara that so impressed Cuddy. It appears that the company were a brigade of Irish women, commanded by Lucy Fitzgerald, who fought at the Third Siege of Girona during the Peninsular War from 1808 - 1809. At the start of the siege the town was garrisoned by a division of Irish troops, the 1st Battalion of the Ultonia Regiment, led by Colonel Anthony O'Kelly from Roscommon, who were reinforced by grenadiers from the Hibernia Regiment, commanded by the splendidly named Colonel Juan Sherlock. As was common at the time, many of the officers were accompanied by their wives. Peter Berresford Ellis has written an interesting article about the Ulster regiments in Spain, which includes the following moving account of the bravery of the Company of St Barbara.



Ramon Martí i Alsina, El Gran dia de Girona
( Certainly Girona was that day the abode of heroines )

A couple of events coming up that might to be of interest to folks round these parts. Historian Amanda Vickery (she of At Home with the Georgians and Voices from the Old Bailey) has a new BBC Radio 4 series starting on the 6th of August about men and masculinity.


According to the blurb:

The series explores the history of masculinity through six archetypes of ideal men. The series begins in the Middle Ages and ends in the 1950s. It explores The Knight; The Gentleman; The Lover; The Sailor; The Explorer; and The Suit.

I can't promise to record the whole series but I will certainly try to record and post the episode on The Sailor :)

Also if anyone is lucky enough to be in the vicinity of Portsmouth Historic Dockyard on the 23rd August you might want to catch The Lord Chamberlain's Men who are performing Macbeth alongside HMS Victory as part of a series of Dockyard at Dusk events. The Lord Chamerlain's Men are an:

All male open air theatre company built upon the same principles that Shakespeare himself followed: to present bold, clear and dynamic productions that excite and engage the audience.

And rather splendid they look too :)

"Consider every species of indelicacy in conversation, as shameful in itself, and as highly disgusting to us. All double entendre is of this sort."

This sage advice, which I'm afraid I have sadly neglected, is from Dr John Gregory (1724–1773), Professor of the Practice of Physic at the University of Edinburgh, and it comes from a small volume of advice and guidance he wrote for his daughters in 1761, entitled A Father’s Legacy to his Daughters. You can read some more gems of advice from Dr Gregory on the University of Strathclyde Archives "Item of the Month" page here. I also particularly liked:

Gregory on men and marriage:

Procure from your friends every necessary piece of information concerning him; such as his character for sense, his morals, his temper, fortune, and family; whether it is distinguished for parts and worth, or for folly, knavery, and loathsome hereditary diseases.

Gregory on socialising:

Wit is the most dangerous talent you can possess. It must be guarded with great discretion and good-nature, otherwise it will create you many enemies.

I have no idea if I posses any wit but, as far as double entendres go, I fear Dr Gregory would regard me as a lost cause!

Reading age of sail history and fiction you get used to the almost complete absence of women. You have seek out very specific publications such as Mary Lacey's autobiography The Female Shipwright, Suzanne Stark's Female Tars or David Cordingly's Women Sailors and Sailors' Women to get an impression of the lot of women at sea during the period. While this does rather make me *sigh* I accept it as inevitable feature of the historical narrative of the period. Every so often though you read something where the absence of women that you know were there becomes so obvious that it's startling.

Last month I read David Cordingly's Billy Ruffian, which is a wonderful book, fully deserving of all the praise that has been heaped on it by reviewers. One of the most fascinating chapters comes towards the end, when Bellerophon became the temporary abode of Napoleon on his surrender to the British, prior to his exile on St Helena. Cordingly provides a moving description of the moment Napoleon steps off the French brig Epervier and into the Bellerophon's barge thus handing himself over to his former British enemies.

The sailors helped Countess Bertrand and her three children and Countess Montholon and her child into the barge. General Bertrand and General Savary followed. Napoleon was the last to leave the French brig and step down into the British boat. It was a symbolic moment which was not lost on those present. The Emperor was surrendering to the enemy.

Cordingly illustrates this momentous event with this aquatint by Jean Pierre Marie Jazet from the National Maritime Museum Collection.



It's a lovely illustration but neither hide nor hair can be seen of the countesses or the children. Of course it's unfair to criticise Cordingly for the oversight of a contemporary French artist, but the absence of the countesses and children is striking.

Later Cordingly goes on to describe how Napoleon and his suite were accommodated on board Bellerophon. Captain Maitland had suggested dividing the great after cabin in two, with one half for the Emperor and the other for the women and children. Las Cases, Napoleon's secretary, politely suggested that

"...the Emperor will be better pleased to have the whole of the after-cabin himself, as he is fond of walking about, and will by that means be able to take more exercise."

Maitland agreed to any arrangement that would be most agreeable to Napoleon. Very magnanimous of him to be sure, but it did rather leave me wondering where the women and children went. The wardroom with the officers? The larboard berth with the mids? One can't help wondering, but Cordingly doesn't tell us. Later we discover that Countess Bertrand has been accommodated in the first lieutenant's cabin when Cordingly describes how she attempted to throw herself into the sea from the gun port on hearing that her husband was likely to accompany Napoleon into exile on St Helena.

I hate to criticise David Cordingly as he is one of my favourite naval historians, and one of the few who has actually written about the lives of women at sea, but I couldn't help being struck by these noticeable absences in an otherwise excellent book. So for the record, here are the missing countesses:

Albine de Montholon Albine de Vassal's marriage to Charles Tristan de Montholon in 1812 was initially opposed by Napoleon as she was regarded as a scheming woman of questionable virtue. She accompanied Napoleon and her husband to St Helena and during her time on the island was rumoured to have had several affairs with British officers and with Napoleon himself, who was reputed to have been the father of her daughter Napoléone. Albine left St Helena in 1819, allegedly after becoming infatuated with Lieutenant Basil Jackson.

Élisabeth Françoise (Fanny) Bertrand Daughter of the Irish refugee Colonel William Dillon, and cousin of empress Josephine. Fanny has been described as willful and feisty but also appears to have been a woman of principal. She enlisted Josephine and Napoleon to help her find a husband and in 1808 married General Bertrand at their suggestion. The couple appear to have had a happy marriage and Fanny reluctantly accompanied Bertrand into exile on St Helena with their children Napoleon, Henri and Hortense. She later gave birth to a fourth child, Arthur, on the island. During their time on St Helena, Fanny aroused Napoleon's ire by refusing to live with his household at Longwood. Despite their estrangement Fanny was with the exiled Emperor when he died.

For a fascinating article on Albine and Fanny, and their relationship with Napoleon and each other, I can highly recommend John Tyrell's blog post The Ladies of Longwood: Albine de Montholon & Fanny Betrand.

Came across Charles Demuth today. Demuth was an American avante garde watercolourist born in Pennsylvania in 1883. He was a close associate of Georgia O'Keeffe and when he died in 1935 he left many of his works to O'Keeffe. Many of Demuth's paintings depict the emergent gay scene at the turn of the last century and he seems to have had a bit of a thing about sailors.



Sailors Dancing
( More sailors below the cut, not-particularly-safe-for-work )

BBC Radio 4 are currently broadcasting a second series of Amanda Vickery's excellent Voices from the Old Bailey. In the series Vickery "presents dramatised extracts from gripping Old Bailey court cases from the 18th century and discusses with fellow historians what they reveal about the period." Last weeks' episode focused on riots and civil disturbances including the Gordon Riots and tomorrow it's Sexual Subcultures. The programme blurb reads at follows:

Amanda Vickery uses court cases to explore the lives of gay men and cross-dressers in the 18th century. Lesbians did not appear in court as lesbianism was not against the law - but we find and record an 18th century lesbian love song, as well as the hilarious 'Bumography'.

The 3 court cases in the programme range from the tragic to the hilarious. First, the case of a milkman caught in a raid on a gay brothel - and sentenced to death. His father-in-law appears in court to plead for him - it turns out the milkman is a widower, with a daughter to raise. But to no avail: he hangs for the crime of sodomy.

The second case is blackmail, and reveals the vulnerability of all men at the time to accusations of sodomy. The third stars the hilarious 'Princess Seraphina', a cross-dresser with a bevy of female admirers who turn up in court. It gives a priceless insight into 18th century camp.

Three contributors discuss the cases: leading gay historian Rictor Norton, whose books and website have a cult following; Helen Berry, historian of sexuality, whose book on castrati is published later this year, and Professor Peter King, historian of crime. They open up a debate about how far there was a clearly-defined gay identity in the 18th century.

Recorded on location in Lincoln's Inn, where barristers have been beavering away for centuries. But outside their chambers, this was one of the naughtiest places in London - a notorious gay cruising ground, and site of the 'bog-house', the public toilets which were a place of assignation. The music used in this programme was arranged by David Owen Norris, from original 18th century ballads.

The programme is broadcast tomorrow at 09.00 and Vickery commented on twitter this morning

Queer as folk? Sodomy laws the topic tomorrow on VoicesfromOldBailey @BBCRadio4 I struggled w vocab. 9 a.m. in summer hols after all.

I'll bet she struggled! The programme will be available on the iPlayer following broadcast. The Sexual Subcultures webpage is also worth a look as it includes links to the original trial transcripts and other useful resources on 18th century sexuality.