Ladies from Llangollen

The ladies of Llangollen were Eleanor Charlotte Butler (born May 11, 1739 in Kilkenny ; † June 2, 1829 in Llangollen ) and Sarah Ponsonby (* 1755 ; † December 9, 1831 in Llangollen) , who came from aristocratic circles in Ireland . They achieved lasting fame for their unconventional way of life when, contrary to the conventions of their time, they left their families in 1778 and settled together in Wales . In the following decades her house was the destination of numerous nobles, politicians and writers of their time.

Living in Ireland

Sarah Ponsonby was the daughter of Chambre Brabazon Ponsonby and his second wife Louisa Lyons, daughter of Henry Lyons of Belmont, whom he married on October 23, 1752. When Sarah Ponsonby's stepmother died in 1768 - after the death of her mother in 1758 and her father on February 20, 1762 - she was adopted as their daughter by her aunt Lady Betty (actually Elizabeth) Fownes, daughter of the first Lord Bessborough, and her husband Sir William , always encouraged, and lived with them in Woodstock, County Kilkenny, and during parliamentary sessions also in Dublin at 40 Dominick Street. She was highly educated, fluent, mastered French and Italian, and was a good draftsman.

Eleanor Charlotte Butler was the youngest daughter of Walter Butler, 16th Earl of Ormond, and Ellen (Eleanor) Morris of Tipperary . She grew up with her sisters in the Butler family home, Kilkenny Castle . She received part of her training in a convent in France.

When 13-year-old Sarah and 29-year-old Eleanor got to know each other, despite the age difference, a long-term friendship developed in which they regularly exchanged letters. From around 1778 they tried to realize the idea of ​​spending the rest of their lives together in self-determination and seclusion. The domestic situation was also difficult. Sarah Ponsonby withheld from her aunt the constant stalking of her stepfather Sir William Fownes so as not to offend him, while Eleanor Butler threatened a life in the monastery determined by her brother. The first attempt to escape failed because Sarah Ponsonby injured her leg while trying to climb a wall. At the end of March 1778 they made a second attempt, but were discovered again in Waterford . Sarah Ponsonby was brought back to Lady Betty Fownes, while Eleanor Butler was sent to her sister Elizabeth, Mrs. Kavanagh, of Borris. After the death of Sir William Fownes, and after the families realized that both women were sticking to their common future plans, they reluctantly allowed them to leave on May 16, 1778.

Life in Llangollen

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  Plas Newydd, 1840

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  Plas Newydd, around 1875

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  Entrance door, around 1875

One of the first places they crossed after arriving from Holyhead Ferry Terminal to London was Llangollen, Welsh . They were accompanied by Mary Carryl, who was Sarah Ponsonby's servant in Ireland. They toured Wales for a few months before renting a country house (Pen-y-Maes) southeast of the town, which they later bought and named Plas Newydd .

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  Paneled walls

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  Temple in the park

Over the years they bought the surrounding land, added one room to the five rooms, and decorated the cottage with wood paneling, wood carvings and colored windows that they wished for as gifts from visitors, as well as paintings, graphics and sculptures. They kept a dairy cow, brewed their own beer, laid out a kitchen garden and grew peaches, nectarines and melons in a greenhouse. They lavishly designed the surrounding area with Gothic archways, a temple and bridges over a stream.

After settling in Llangollen, they switched to a style of clothing that they maintained for the rest of their lives. This included powdered hair, a kind of beaver cap, starched scarves, and long men's coats reminiscent of riding clothes. Because of their origins and way of life, newspapers reported on their coexistence, such as the St. James Chronicle, the London Chronicle or the General Evening Post, which despite their protests under the title Extraordinary Female Affection, raised the question of the sexual orientation of women.

The ladies kept their own library of works by English, French and Italian authors, and engaged in gardening, reading, embroidery and music, and Sarah Ponsonby painted landscapes and wrote verse and prose. They soon received regular visits from artists, noblemen and politicians of their time or were in regular correspondence. Contemporaries described them as cultivated, benevolent, highly interested in world events and hospitable despite their secluded life, and the perfection of their romantic friendship was emphasized. Visitors included Félicité de Genlis , Wilhelm Friedrich, Duke of Gloucester , the Duke of York, Caroline Lamb , the Duchess of St. Albans, Edmund Burke , William Wilberforce , Thomas De Quincey , Percy Bysshe Shelley , Sir Walter Scott , Lord Byron , Robert Southey , Louisa Stuart , Sarah Siddons , Hermann von Pückler-Muskau and William Wordsworth .

She took care of the numerous guests and the household with the help of a gardener and a few servants. Sarah Ponsonby's account books for 1791 and 1800 show annual consumption of £ 500 to £ 600. The Duke of Wellington was her longtime friend and made sure the ladies received an annual pension of £ 200. Sophie Charlotte von Mecklenburg-Strelitz persuaded her husband, Georg III. , also to grant a pension. When her longtime housekeeper and friend Mary Carryl died on November 22nd, 1809, she bequeathed her £ 500 savings to the Ladies.

After a bad cold in the winter of 1828, Eleanor Butler did not recover and died the following June. After Sarah Ponsonby's death in 1831, the furniture and possessions were sold by auction. After several changes of ownership, the house and the park were taken over by the Llangollen Urban District Council in 1932 and opened to the public as a museum from 1933.

tomb

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  Memorial plaque in St. Collen's Church

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  Memorial stone in the St. Collen cemetery

Mary Carryl was buried in the churchyard of St. Collen's parish church in 1809. The ladies had a three-sided, Gothic-style memorial stone erected for her in 1810 with an inscription written by Sarah Ponsonby. Her attachment to Mary Carryl "patient, hardworking, loyal, generous, kind-hearted, with virtues that raised her above her humble birth ... this tomb testifies to that of two friends who lament her". It is bordered by a lattice that encompassed the grave of Mary Carryl and later also the graves of Eleanor Butler and Sarah Ponsonby, who had decided that all of their graves should be located together. The Carrara marble plaques for Eleanor Butler and Sarah Ponsonby, whose inscriptions were also written by her, were replaced by replicas in 2010 due to severe erosion. In the parish church of St. Collen, a relief plaque commemorates Eleanor Charlotte Butler and Sarah Ponsonby.

Inscription Eleanor Charlotte Butler on the memorial stone

Inscription Sarah Ponsonby on the memorial stone

Inscription Mary Carryl on the memorial stone

Inscription Eleanor Charlotte Butler
Sacred to the Memory of The Right Honorable Lady Eleanor Charlotte Butler
Late of Plas Newydd in this Parish Deceased 2nd June 1829 Aged Ninety Years
Daughter of the Sixteenth, Sister of the Seventeenth Earls of Ormonde and Ossory Aunt to the Late and to the Present Marquess of Ormonde.
Endeared to Her many Friends by an almost unequalled excellence of Heart and by Manners worthy of Her Illustrious Birth the Admiration and Delight of a very numerous Acquaintance From a Brilliant Vivacity of Mind undiminished to the latest period of a prolonged existence. Her amiable Condescensian and Benevolence secured the Grateful attachment of those by whom they had been so long and so extensively experienced. Her various Perfections crowned by the most pious and cheerful submission to the Divine Will, can only be appreciated Where it is humbly believed They are Now enjoying their Eternal Reward and by Her of whom for more than Fifty Years they constituted that Happiness Which, through Our Blessed Redeemer She trusts will be renewed When THIS TOMB Shall have closed Over Its Latest Tenant
Sorrow not as Others who have no hope
1 Thess., Chap 4, v 13.

Inscription Sarah Ponsonby
Sarah Ponsonby, departed this Life on the 9th December 1831, aged 76.
She did not long survive her beloved companion LADY ELEANOR BUTLER, with whom she had lived in this valley for more than half a century of uninterrupted friendship - but they shall no more return to their house neither shall their place know them any more.
Job. Chap 7.V.10.
Reader pause for a moment and reflect not on the uncertainty of human life, but upon the certainty of its termination and take comfort from the assurance that - as it is appointed unto all men to die but after that the judgment: so Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many: and unto them that look for him, he shall appear a second time without sin unto salvation.
Heb. Chap. 9, V.27.28

Inscription Mary Carryl
On Memory of Mrs Mary Carryl Deceased 22 November
This Monument is erected by Eleanor Butler, and Sarah Ponsonby, of Plasnewydd in this Parish. Released from Earth and all its transient woes, She whose remains beneath this stone repose, Stedfast in Faith resigned her parting breath, Looked up with Christian joy, and smiled in Death! Patient, Industrious, Faithful, Generous, Kind, Her Conduet left the proudest far behind, Her Virtues dignified her humble birth. And raised her mind above this sordid earth. Attachment (Sacred bond of grateful breasts) Extinguished but with life, this Tomb attests, Reared by Two Friends who will her lofs bemoan, Till with Her Ashes .... Here shall rest, Their own. File: Eglwys Sant Collen, Llangollen, Cymru St. Collen's Parish Church, Llangollen, Denbighshire, Wales. 25.JPG

literature

• Julia Grosse: The ladies from Llangollen . In: Merian Wales , issue 10/2012, pp. 88–91.
• Ladies of Llangollen: Letters and Journals of Lady Eleanor Butler (1739-1829) and Sarah Ponsonby (1755-1831) from the National Library of Wales . Adam Matthew Publications, 1997, ISBN 978-1-85711-118-7
• Elizabeth Mavor: The Ladies of Llangollen. A study of romantic friendship . Daphne Verlag, 1994, ISBN 3-89137-016-4 .
• Mary Louisa Gordon, John Jones: The Llangollen ladies: the story of Lady Eleanor Butler and Miss Sarah Ponsonby, known as the Ladies of Llangollen . Hogarth Press, London 1936
• Arthur Ponsonby, 1st Baron Ponsonby of Shulbrede : English Diaries: A Review of English Diaries from the Sixteenth to the Twentieth Century with an Introduction on Diary Writing . Menthuen, London 1922
• Marion Harland: Where Ghosts Walk: The Haunts of Familiar Characters in History and Literature . GP Putnam's Sons, London 1913
• Edward Verrall Lucas: A Swan and Her Friends . Menthuen, London 1907
• Catherine Jane Hamilton: Notable Irishwomen . Sealy, Bryers & Walker, Dublin 1904
• Elizabeth Owens Blackburne: Illustrious Irishwomen, being Memoirs of some of the Most Noted Irishwomen from the Earliest Ages to the Present Century . Tinsley Bros., London 1877
• The ladies of Llangollen . In: Die Zeit , No. 10/1985

Web links

Commons : Ladies of Llangollen  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• An extraordinary affair . RTÉ Radio 1 , April 30, 2011, radio documentation

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Hamilton: Notable Irishwomen . ladiesofllangollen.wordpress.com; accessed on August 31, 2014
2. ^ Wales: A tale of two ladies ahead of their time . The Telegraph, May 4, 2002
3. ^ A Plas Newydd Time Line 1790-1794 . ladiesofllangollen.wordpress.com; accessed on August 31, 2014
4. ↑ Angela Bourke (Ed.): The Field Day Anthology of Literature Vols. IV and V: Irish Women's Writing and Traditions . New York University Press, 2002, ISBN 978-0-8147-9908-6 , pp. 1092-1993 .
5. ^ Ponsonby: English Diaries . ladiesofllangollen.wordpress.com; accessed on September 2, 2014
6. ↑ Harland: Where Ghosts Walk . ladiesofllangollen.wordpress.com; accessed on September 2, 2014
7. ^ Sarah Ponsonby Collection, 1801-1822: Finding Aid . (PDF) Princeton University Library; Retrieved September 5, 2014
8. ↑ Lucas: A Swan & Her Friends . ladiesofllangollen.wordpress.com; accessed on September 2, 2014
9. ↑ Blackburne: Illustrious Irish Women . ladiesofllangollen.wordpress.com; accessed on August 31, 2014
10. ^ Plas Newydd, Llangollen, Denbighshire, Wales . Parks & Gardens UK; accessed on September 2, 2014
11. ↑ Monument to Mary Carryl & The Ladies of Llangollen . ( Memento of the original from September 12, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Llangollen Chamber of Trade and Tourism; accessed on June 23, 2014