Gossip gets a bad press – unfairly, in my opinion. It’s one of the things I miss from my years of living in a small rural community. And if we want to enter the lives of people who lived in the past, we need to listen in on their gossip when we can.
Nihil humanum a me alienum puto, as the wise Roman remarked. Nothing human is alien to me.
What are they saying? Clearly a good gossip going on here.
These two wonderful old women are clearly relishing a delicious gossip under their outsize Handmaid’s Tale bonnets (perfect for a discreet natter) – and I have the image on display in my workroom.
The back of the postcard says it is based on a cartoon by Robert Cruikshank. I’ve just found the original cartoon – and realise that Sarah Godlee Rickman, whose life I’ve been immersed in, was gossiping in 1827 alongside those two old biddies. Her whole Quaker world was buzzing with the news.
The original cartoon by Robert Cruikshank – a riot of gossip!
William Allen was one of the leading luminaries of their world. He’d been Luke Howard’s partner at Plough Court, a friend to the Hodgkins, an abolitionist who gave up sugar for over 40 years until the slave trade was ended. His portrait shows a wise, kindly figure.
William Allen was a philanthropist and chemist, hugely admired
The news which sent shock waves through the Quaker world, and inspired Cruikshank’s riot of gossipers reached Sarah in Lewes in January 1827. She wrote in her Family Journal:
“1827 Jan 20 A strange report reached us about William Allen – so strange that we do not like to believe it – he is likely to marry Grizell Birkbeck a woman of 70 years of age – & much older than himself – Everyone seems to regret such a step should be taken, especially as there seems just grounds to believe that the love of money is the grand inducement to the match – Grizell Birkbeck having some time ago been seized with paralysis & being now what may be called an infirm old woman – It is a strange infatuation and likely it is feared to lessen the respect bordering on veneration with which William Allen has long been regarded.”
The ‘strange report’ was true. William Allen, 56, married the wealthy widow later that year. She was 16 years older than him.
Sarah was generally tolerant but she disapproved of large age gaps. Also mercenary motives in marriage. She noted waspishly when a man she knew married someone who hadn’t been born when his first wife died. Another time she wrote that “Jacob Boys’s new wife has this day been seen at Lewes – it is said that she is neither young nor handsome and thus the smile is raised against her husband, for having chosen her for her riches.”
But the following year Sarah herself married a man she was certainly not in love with, but whom she had known well for many years. John Rickman was 18 years her senior and able to offer her financial stability, a home and freedom from the drudgery of running a small school. The man she had loved – Thomas – was not available as they were first cousins, and she was not cut out to be a tragic heroine. After some agonising she chose a decent life with a man she liked.
Was there gossip about her too? Almost certainly. She insisted on a small wedding and stage managed it carefully. She’d attracted her share of gossip in the past, and no doubt the bonnets were nodded vigorously once again.
How can we begin to understand the past if we don’t try to eavesdrop on their gossip? It’s as old as humankind.