WOMEN'S LANGUAGE AND EXPERIENCE, 1500-1940
Women's Diaries and Related Sources

Part 1: Sources from the Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire County Record Offices

Part 1 is based on sources from the Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire County Record Offices. In all it comprises nearly 100 volumes describing the lives of 25 women for the period from 1670 to 1922.

The earliest sequence of diaries (in 7 volumes, with 7 further volumes of commonplace books) describe the life of Dame Sarah Cowper between 1670 and 1715. She pours forth her views on almost every subject, especially on marriage and fidelity:

“Sunday, going early to Church, I chanced to be present at a wedding, the most melancholy sight one can see, and affects me strangely. ...

To hear a simple woman promise to love without cause, and obey without Reason, is amazing....” (Volume I, p268)

The 18th Century is particularly well covered. No fewer than 13 volumes describe the lives of Mary, Harriet, Charlotte and Anne Orlebar in the period from 1751 to 1830. As well as their daily observations on their households, their children and their social lives, there is much of literary interest - including the poetry of Mary, their unofficial poet laureate, who commemorated important family events in verse.

Another volume of great poetical interest is the Commonplace book of Lady Anne Blount, marked on the spine as “Stella’s works”. It contains 35 lyrics including “To Lady Blount - a panegyrick on the friendship of a modern Pilades and Orestes of my acquaintance”, a song entitled “how great is that ruin, when pleasure pursuing, we passion obey” and “To Sir Harry Blount, on his saying he wou’d not have a fiddle on his lady’s birthday” (the later is marked “Pope” at the top).

Further 18th Century diaries include those of Mary, Countess Cowper (covering 1714-1720), Catherine Talbot the noted author (for 1745), Elizabeth Wheeler (for 1778, an excellent diary with outspoken political comments and notes on her reading) and an anonymous volume for 1720.

The manuscript autobiography of Frances Stackhouse covers her life from 1794 to 1881 and is especially valuable for her comments on her schooling, the birth of her daughter, and on the visits of Humphry, Joseph Banks, Madame Le Brun, Davy and Sidney Smith.

Equally wide-ranging in subject matter are the diaries and travel journals of Frederica St John Rouse-Boughton (covering 1859-1864). Many are gloriously illustrated. We also cover her devotional volume which witnesses the changes in her spiritual beliefs. At one point she remarks:

“I for my own part I think an immense deal of nastiness often lurks behind the ‘respectability’ of us ‘ladies’....”

Two long diary sequences are those of Jane Johnston (in 23 volumes, 1817-1840, with notes on the living conditions of labourers and servants, charity work, gambling and contemporary amusements) and Louisa Arrowsmith (in 17 volumes, 1792-1837, with much about her garden and visits to the theatre).

The diaries of Adela Capel, aged 14, and Eliza Stevens, aged 9 (by her governess) describe the education and upbringing of girls in the first half of the 19th Century. Both texts illuminate the construction of gender roles and the socialization of girls.

Women’s diaries have fulfilled the roles of friend, confessional, scrapbook and analyst. Now they are offered as a revealing historical record.