Decluttering, I came across a title my mother inherited from her oldest brother: A LONDON GIRL OF THE EIGHTIES by Molly Hughes. The merry, positive tone, read many decades before, did not feel ‘Victorian’ at all.
This time, after a couple of chapters, I started looking for information on Molly Hughes. Back then, the task would have needed a bus ride to the public library before I could even begin. Now, ‘Molly’ simply appeared on my screen.
A LONDON CHILD OF THE SEVENTIES, pub 1934.
Molly wrote her autobiography to show that ‘Victorian children did not have such a dull time as is usually supposed,’ and her own energy and appreciation of life seem the opposite of what the straight-laced term ‘Victorian’ once suggested.
Her parents, Tom and Mary Thomas, and their family led a quiet, respectable middle-class life in a three-storey house in Canonbury Park, North London. 'We were just an ordinary, suburban, Victorian family, undistinguished ourselves and unacquainted with distinguished people,' says Molly.
Tom, her father, is a stockbroker in the City. He and Mary are very aware of the flow of money, and the need to live according to their social class. Tom declares that ‘a settled income has its attractions possibly, but it can never be the fun of an unsettled one,’ letting the family enjoy the spending any windfall that comes their way, while living as cheaply as possible in between.
Tom and Mary clearly took pride in their four sons but, when Mary’s fifth baby proved a daughter, she was so delighted she leapt out of bed to see her, and made to lie down promptly for the sake of her health. Molly, as a result, always felt that, like Beatrice, a 'merry star’ had danced at her birth and, despite being the youngest, always felt loved and encouraged in whatever she wanted to do.
Each of her four brothers had a different character: the oldest, Thomas, was good at his studies, including Latin; the second - Vivian known as Dym - was quick at maths, science and had a secret love of poetry; the third, Charles, was only interested in art, painting and churches, while the youngest, Barnholt, tagged along after his brothers or lived in a world of his own.
The children were given a space of their own: a large third-floor room with a fire, a carpet, an ottoman, pictures that they liked and a window-seat that looked down and across the road junction. With few toys, they made use of a huge box of blocks, books and bits of furniture, and damaged toy soldiers to stage interesting battles and strategy games, along with cloaks, hats and dressing up clothes for acting out dramas and stories. The children had pens and ink for writing, paint & paper for drawing and sketching – a useful skill at a time when cameras were not available – as well as playing cards, all sorts of board games and a collection of much-loved, much-read story books. In addition, each boy had a shelf for their own interests and box of treasures, and Molly would surely have had one herself too.
Molly writes about visits to all sorts of amusements: the Boat Race; the Diving Bell at the Polytechnic, displays at the Agricultural Hall, or tickets to see Irving in ‘The Bells’, re-enacted at home, She also describes the older boys secretly daring each other to roof-high climbing challenges, or taking young Barnholt, disguised as Guy Fawkes, on a street-corner begging venture with a barrel-organ grinder, and other hidden activities. Molly describes many of these trips and incidents as well as if she had been present but she and her mother often stayed at home, whether from choice, because of Molly's youth or because of the cost.
Religious observance is still important or expected. On Sundays the whole family walk almost two miles to St Paul’s Cathedral for the service with its hour-long sermon and then back again, with occasional other churches to add variety. Only the glorious sound of the organs and the beauty of the choral music made the constant church-going bearable, says Molly.
Molly's balance of topics in these books can be slightly idiosyncratic, but that also tells the reader what matters to the writer. For example, one chapter describes all the packing and preparation needed for a family trip to Cornwall, followed by a description of the whole journey by steam trains from St Pancras to Penzance.
Gradually. though, the children get older. The boys are sent to school: Thomas to his father’s old school in Shrewsbury and the three younger boys to the Merchant Taylor School in London. Molly goes to school each day, and for a while all seems settled. Then, suddenly, on the final pages, after a diversion about the dreadful London smogs, tragedy strikes: their father is killed, and Molly's childhood is over.
A LONDON GIRL OF THE EIGHTIES, pub 1936.
After her father’s death, and its financial impact, Molly’s education has even more importance. Along with her friend Winnie, a kindred spirit, she studies for and passes the Oxford Senior Local Examination. This award was not enough to help Molly with her next ambition, that of becoming a pupil at the North London Collegiate School for Ladies. Fortunately, Tony, Molly’s beloved ‘golden aunt’, offers to pay her fees. Molly entrance is barred at the last moment: every pupil, no matter how knowledgeable, must be able to sew a buttonhole. Fortunately, after a weekend of practising, Molly is allowed to take her self-sewn button-hole along, and starts her first term.
The North London Collegiate was the first academic school for girls in London and was led by the famous headmistress Miss Buss who, with Miss Beale, was one of a pair of great protagonists for female education. In addition to the usual subjects, the rigorous timetable included the study of Maths, Science, Latin and Greek, although Molly's descriptions of the classes do not sound as startlingly exciting as she or we would wish. Aware of the prohibitive fees at NLCS, Buss also founded the less exclusive Camden School for Girls in 1871.
Molly was eager to earn her living by teaching, so she took up one of the places at the first teacher-training college in Cambridge, gaining a BA degree. As Molly writes about this first keen, excited but inexperienced cohort, she conveys a sense of the buzz and excitement of the time. Along with Molly, the students are all keen to learn and to help each other with their practice and visits, and talk about the methods of education, including the new European ideas.
Growing up with four brothers had definitely helped Molly become a strong-minded, capable and enthusiastic young woman. At the age of twenty-five, she was invited to take on the role of teacher-educator at Bedford College, London. Her work there, based on all the discussions in Cambridge, led to the inclusion of the history and theory of education, childhood development, classroom practice and other subjects that formed the familiar curriculum in colleges of education during the 20th century.
An aside: Molly’s romping style, and the successful outcome of her story in A LONDON GIRL might have been bitter reading for my mother. Her father, an old soldier, refused to sign the form granting her a place at the local grammar school, possibly because of the cost of the uniform. Instead, she stayed on, up in the top floor of the local authority school, taking a typing course instead. Not so long after, she ha joined the WAAF, and was working as a typist at Bomber Command.
A LONDON HOME OF THE NINETIES, pub 1937.
This last book in the trilogy, is about Molly’s marriage to Arthur Hughes, a barrister, after a ten year engagement. Molly, of course, (pictured below) knew she had to give up her work on marriage, so much of this book is about the work of managing their home in Ladbroke Grove, the birth of their first beloved daughter, and later, the arrival of their three boys. After Arthur's early death, Molly returned to teaching, eventually becoming a schools inspector and writer, living in a cottage in Cuffley.
I discovered that my book was, in fact, the middle title of a trilogy. Molly Hughes had written all three during her retirement, living in a cottage in Cuffley, Hertfordshire. Intrigued, and hoping that Molly’s memories might help with one of my own fictitious characters, I placed an order for the trilogy,
A LONDON FAMILY 1870-1900, the full second-hand trilogy, arrived on the front step,
And then? I read them all.
A LONDON CHILD OF THE SEVENTIES, pub 1934.
Molly wrote her autobiography to show that ‘Victorian children did not have such a dull time as is usually supposed,’ and her own energy and appreciation of life seem the opposite of what the straight-laced term ‘Victorian’ once suggested.
Her parents, Tom and Mary Thomas, and their family led a quiet, respectable middle-class life in a three-storey house in Canonbury Park, North London. 'We were just an ordinary, suburban, Victorian family, undistinguished ourselves and unacquainted with distinguished people,' says Molly.
Tom, her father, is a stockbroker in the City. He and Mary are very aware of the flow of money, and the need to live according to their social class. Tom declares that ‘a settled income has its attractions possibly, but it can never be the fun of an unsettled one,’ letting the family enjoy the spending any windfall that comes their way, while living as cheaply as possible in between.
Despite the optimism, daily life is not without problems. Mary, his wife, seems to manage the home without permanent servants or nursery help, and worries about afternoon visitors who stay until they must be offered food when nothing is left in the pantry. The family willingly manage,avoiding parties and costly social obligations, although Molly describes her mother telling an over-long visitor how lovely she finds sitting in the dark, looking out at the street-lights. The visitor left,unaware Mary was concealing the results of an unpaid gas bill.
Tom and Mary clearly took pride in their four sons but, when Mary’s fifth baby proved a daughter, she was so delighted she leapt out of bed to see her, and made to lie down promptly for the sake of her health. Molly, as a result, always felt that, like Beatrice, a 'merry star’ had danced at her birth and, despite being the youngest, always felt loved and encouraged in whatever she wanted to do.
Each of her four brothers had a different character: the oldest, Thomas, was good at his studies, including Latin; the second - Vivian known as Dym - was quick at maths, science and had a secret love of poetry; the third, Charles, was only interested in art, painting and churches, while the youngest, Barnholt, tagged along after his brothers or lived in a world of his own.
The children were given a space of their own: a large third-floor room with a fire, a carpet, an ottoman, pictures that they liked and a window-seat that looked down and across the road junction. With few toys, they made use of a huge box of blocks, books and bits of furniture, and damaged toy soldiers to stage interesting battles and strategy games, along with cloaks, hats and dressing up clothes for acting out dramas and stories. The children had pens and ink for writing, paint & paper for drawing and sketching – a useful skill at a time when cameras were not available – as well as playing cards, all sorts of board games and a collection of much-loved, much-read story books. In addition, each boy had a shelf for their own interests and box of treasures, and Molly would surely have had one herself too.
Molly writes about visits to all sorts of amusements: the Boat Race; the Diving Bell at the Polytechnic, displays at the Agricultural Hall, or tickets to see Irving in ‘The Bells’, re-enacted at home, She also describes the older boys secretly daring each other to roof-high climbing challenges, or taking young Barnholt, disguised as Guy Fawkes, on a street-corner begging venture with a barrel-organ grinder, and other hidden activities. Molly describes many of these trips and incidents as well as if she had been present but she and her mother often stayed at home, whether from choice, because of Molly's youth or because of the cost.
Occasionally, the boys did include Molly: one afternoon, knowing she longed to take a bus ride, they smuggled her outside, up the ladder on the back of the bus, across the sloping roof and in beside the driver at the front of his horse-drawn bus. The boys also managed to divert their mother’s attention from the mud on their delighted sister’s shoes on their return. The book gives a remarkable picture of the sibling relationships; while Molly herself is eager to learn from her brothers, they in turn are eager she should not grow up as one of those despised ‘silly girls’ with no sense in her head.
Religious observance is still important or expected. On Sundays the whole family walk almost two miles to St Paul’s Cathedral for the service with its hour-long sermon and then back again, with occasional other churches to add variety. Only the glorious sound of the organs and the beauty of the choral music made the constant church-going bearable, says Molly.
Molly's balance of topics in these books can be slightly idiosyncratic, but that also tells the reader what matters to the writer. For example, one chapter describes all the packing and preparation needed for a family trip to Cornwall, followed by a description of the whole journey by steam trains from St Pancras to Penzance.
The Thomas family are visiting Reskadinnick, near Camborne, which Molly describes as ‘more than a mere home or house or farm.’ Built on land owned by her grandfather, who had been a mining-prospector all over the world, the secure and comfortable family home is managed by Tony, his daughter and Molly’s ‘golden aunt’. These chapters give the reader a sense of the whole Cornish coastal setting, before mass tourism hits the landscape. That beauty and the carefree life in and around the house are clearly idyllic moments for Molly, her mother and all the family.
Gradually. though, the children get older. The boys are sent to school: Thomas to his father’s old school in Shrewsbury and the three younger boys to the Merchant Taylor School in London. Molly goes to school each day, and for a while all seems settled. Then, suddenly, on the final pages, after a diversion about the dreadful London smogs, tragedy strikes: their father is killed, and Molly's childhood is over.
A LONDON GIRL OF THE EIGHTIES, pub 1936.
After her father’s death, and its financial impact, Molly’s education has even more importance. Along with her friend Winnie, a kindred spirit, she studies for and passes the Oxford Senior Local Examination. This award was not enough to help Molly with her next ambition, that of becoming a pupil at the North London Collegiate School for Ladies. Fortunately, Tony, Molly’s beloved ‘golden aunt’, offers to pay her fees. Molly entrance is barred at the last moment: every pupil, no matter how knowledgeable, must be able to sew a buttonhole. Fortunately, after a weekend of practising, Molly is allowed to take her self-sewn button-hole along, and starts her first term.
The North London Collegiate was the first academic school for girls in London and was led by the famous headmistress Miss Buss who, with Miss Beale, was one of a pair of great protagonists for female education. In addition to the usual subjects, the rigorous timetable included the study of Maths, Science, Latin and Greek, although Molly's descriptions of the classes do not sound as startlingly exciting as she or we would wish. Aware of the prohibitive fees at NLCS, Buss also founded the less exclusive Camden School for Girls in 1871.
Molly was eager to earn her living by teaching, so she took up one of the places at the first teacher-training college in Cambridge, gaining a BA degree. As Molly writes about this first keen, excited but inexperienced cohort, she conveys a sense of the buzz and excitement of the time. Along with Molly, the students are all keen to learn and to help each other with their practice and visits, and talk about the methods of education, including the new European ideas.
Growing up with four brothers had definitely helped Molly become a strong-minded, capable and enthusiastic young woman. At the age of twenty-five, she was invited to take on the role of teacher-educator at Bedford College, London. Her work there, based on all the discussions in Cambridge, led to the inclusion of the history and theory of education, childhood development, classroom practice and other subjects that formed the familiar curriculum in colleges of education during the 20th century.
An aside: Molly’s romping style, and the successful outcome of her story in A LONDON GIRL might have been bitter reading for my mother. Her father, an old soldier, refused to sign the form granting her a place at the local grammar school, possibly because of the cost of the uniform. Instead, she stayed on, up in the top floor of the local authority school, taking a typing course instead. Not so long after, she ha joined the WAAF, and was working as a typist at Bomber Command.
A LONDON HOME OF THE NINETIES, pub 1937.
This last book in the trilogy, is about Molly’s marriage to Arthur Hughes, a barrister, after a ten year engagement. Molly, of course, (pictured below) knew she had to give up her work on marriage, so much of this book is about the work of managing their home in Ladbroke Grove, the birth of their first beloved daughter, and later, the arrival of their three boys. After Arthur's early death, Molly returned to teaching, eventually becoming a schools inspector and writer, living in a cottage in Cuffley.
As a whole, the LONDON FAMILY trilogy is a touching and complex portrayal of late Victorian family life, and has more in common with the liveliness of Nesbitt’s fictional families than I had expected, as well as revealing societal norms and changes during and since this period.
Copies of A London Child may also be available from Persephone Books, with the charming cover below, titled '1 Canonbury Park North, Islington' and drawn by Ann Usborne.
An additional oddment: the hardback book that arrived here unseen was, to my surprise, a deft example of late century thriftiness. Someone had taken the trouble of rebinding the soft, original and unused Oxford paperback of A LONDON FAMILY, creating a sturdy cloth-covered hardback instead. The front and back covers of the original paperback, with all the illustration and lettering, had been smoothly secured to the grey cloth binding, though they did not have the charm of the Persephone image above. Somehow, the neat practicality of the new binding felt very appropriate for Molly's determined account of her life.
Penny Dolan.
Penny Dolan.
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