Further on Patrick Brontë's letter

Dr Richard Palmer, Librarian and Archivist at the Lambeth Palace Library, where Patrick Brontë's letter recently turned up has got in touch with us with some more information regarding this letter. You can see an image of the letter here.

The letter from Patrick Bronte to Charles Thomas Longley following the death of Charlotte, which recently featured in the press, is part of the permanent collections of Lambeth Palace Library (MS. 4545, ff.208-209). The Library is freely open for public use.
Your readers may also like to know that the Longley papers also include letters from Longley to his wife, 1851-53 , concerning Patrick and Charlotte Bronte and Longley's visit to Haworth in 1853 (MS.4547, ff.235-236, 247-251) . Longley comments on the bare landscape as the "acme of desolation", and on the parish where "every single man of influence... is a violent dissenter".Longley was struck by Charlotte's modesty and the absence of any "stamp of genius" or "inward inspiration" in her appearance:
"She looks like a clever little boy,well-mannered, ready in conversation, just and sensible in her remarks which indicate thought and reflexion, active in her household duties, an excellent daughter as her father assures me,without any of the abstraction of genius.Without any fuss she was exceedingly attentive to my comfort, would go up to my room and stir the fire before I went up for my morning's writing after breakfast..."
Lambeth Palace Library also holds the applications made by Patrick Bronte in 1830 and 1846 to the Incorporated Church Building Society for the repair of Haworth Church and for new bells (ICBS 01236 and 02849).
Also accessible in the Library's reading room (by prior arrangement) are the records held by the Church of England Record Centre. Included are Patrick Bronte's application to the National Society in 1843 to expand the School, with his comments on the parish:
"I do not hesitate to say, that the populace in general are either ignorant or wicked, and in most cases where they have a little learning, it is either of a scismatical variety, vainly philosophical, or treacherously political [in] nature". (NS/1/6011). Also included are two letters from Patrick Bronte dated 1825 amongst the records of Queen Anne's Bounty. Here he bewails the circumstances "rendering the salary inadequate to support my family, even with the most rigorous economy" and his difficult relations with local trustees who held some of the church funds
(QAB/7/3/F2149).
I hope this is of interest to your readers.

Indeed we think it is. Not least the description of Charlotte Brontë going about her hostess's functions and the intriguing description of her as a 'clever little boy'.

We sincerely thank Dr Richard Palmer for this information, and encourage any readers in the area to pay a visit to Lambeth Palace Library!

Categories: Patrick Brontë, Brontëana