WOMEN'S AUTOBIOGRAPHIES
from Cambridge University Library

Part 2: Rare printed autobiographies covering twenty-two women's lives, 1780-1889

Women’s autobiographies provide a rich and diverse source of information for social historians, literary scholars, and students studying women and gender issues.

We may wonder what compelled women to write their life histories. Some autobiographies were crafted by experienced writers with the intention of publication. Others were by less experienced writers, and intended only for private reading by family and friends. For some it was to relate a particular personal experience, and for others to retell their involvement in a movement or activity.

From these first hand accounts much information can be learned. For example, recollections of a family history can reveal differing regional cultures. Childhood memories frequently recall the inequalities between brothers and sisters, particularly with relation to education. The different types of work undertaken by women, and the wages they received. The numbers of women involved in voluntary work for which no official records were held. Private thoughts relating to marriage, spinsterhood and romance. These autobiographies also reveal women’s aspirations of life: socially what was expected of them, and privately what they felt they should aspire to.

Women in Context: Two Hundred Years of British Women Autobiographers: A Reference Guide and Reader by Barbara Penny Kanner (G K Hall & Co, 1997) provided students with a structured overview of more than 1,000 women’s autobiographical texts from the 1720’s through two hundred years. Women’s Autobiographies aims to make these resources more widely available by reproducing the original text (filming first or early editions). Part 1 of this publication covered the lives of women who lived between 1713 and 1859. In Part 2 we continue with a selection of autobiographies from women who lived between the years 1780 and 1889.

The twenty-three texts recall the lives and experiences of women from all social classes, involving a wide range of professions and interests. They include an emigrant farmer’s wife, teacher, governess, author, poet, itinerant preacher, artist, journalist, lady-in-waiting, astronomer, scientist, slavery abolitionist, feminist, and reformer for social welfare. The social and cultural traditions of women are also revealed, for example as a clergyman’s daughter, a society woman, a military spouse, and a colonial farmer’s wife in India.

An autobiography written by a woman from the poorer classes is that of Rebecca Burlend (1793-1872). As the wife of a tenant farmer, she travelled with her husband and family to America in 1831 in search of a better life. In her book A True Picture of Emigration (1848) she recalls their life as homesteaders in mid-nineteenth century Illinois. Burlend recounts the legal details of homesteading as well as the practicalities of making their own furniture, soap and candles, along with local methods of fence building and cattle raising. Throughout her book she compares the depressed state of British farming to the modest prosperity achieved by her family in America.

A very different life is revealed by Susan Sibbald (1783-1866) in her autobiography The Memoirs of Susan Sibbald, 1783-1812 (1926). Born into a naval military family Sibbald retells first hand anecdotes of the lives and social customs of the upper military classes during late eighteenth and early nineteenth century Britain, including her acquaintance with Admiral Sidney Smith, who later helped to defeat Napoleon's navy in Egypt. The autobiography includes recollections from her childhood and early married life as the daughter and wife of military men. It is of significant interest that this autobiography was written during Britain’s involvement in the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. Sibbald’s self-history ends in her twenty-ninth year, but extracts from letters included in this book contain contemporary views on the Crimean War, the Fenian Raids in Canada, and the American Civil War.

Nostalgic recollections of a rural childhood are retold by Louisa Potter (c1800-?) in her autobiography, Lancashire Memories (1879). Potter recalls holidays in Riverton, Lancashire "in the age before railroads", and travelling by packet boat on the canal. Whimsical, satirical names are used to disguise identities of people such as "Mrs Ruleit" the headmistress, and Lofty Highway, Esq" the neighbouring squire. However, Potter also reveals a firm grasp of social realities in the early nineteenth century. She discusses such topics as the inequalities in education between boys and girls, the growing unrest among the working classes, and the divisive social class structure.

The autobiography by astronomer-geographer, Mary Somerville (1780-1872), recalls her life over a period of nine decades throughout the Georgian and Victorian periods. In her book Personal Recollections, from Early Life to Old Age of Mary Somerville (1873) she recalls friendships with Sir John Herschel, Michael Faraday, and Joanna Baillie. Somerville reveals that as a woman intellectual in the eighteenth century she met with contemporary prejudice, and was seen as an oddity. Seeking equality for women was an important, continuing issue for Somerville throughout her long life. In recognition of her work as a scientist she received several important awards, including the foundation of Somerville Hall, a new women's college at Oxford University.

Also included in the collection are: Wanderings of a Pilgrim in Search of the Picturesque (1850) by Fanny Parks (1794-1875), which details Indian peoples and customs over a thirty year period; My Own Story, Autobiography of a Child (1849) and An Autobiography (1889) by Mary Howitt (1799-1889), poet, social reformer and abolitionist; Personal Recollections …(1841) by Charlotte Elizabeth Tonna (1790-1846), religious/spiritualist writer, and social reformer; Recollections of a Literary Life: or, Books, Places and People (1870), by Mary Russell Mitford (1787-1855), poet and novelist.

Women’s Autobiographies provides fresh insights into the diversity of women’s lives, and reveals their beliefs, opinions and aspirations. It provides valuable research material for those studying social history, women and gender issues, childhood and education.