Intrepid Women: Sarah Bowdich: Artist and Naturalist, Author and Traveler

Susan reports:

We already met Sarah Wallis Bowdich (1791-1856) on Tuesday, with an excerpt from her own Stories of Strange Lands... (1835) that described her handily thwarting a mutiny in 1816. Although there were several excellent guesses as to her reasons for traveling to Africa, the reality was much more unusual – as was her entire life.

As the only daughter of an Essex linen-draper, Sarah was already adventurous as a girl, and enjoyed fishing, riding, and exploring the countryside. She met her future husband, explorer and scholar Thomas Edward Bowdich (1791?-1824), in London, and the two wed in 1813. They were clearly kindred spirits. Their honeymoon was a 800 mile trip through Wales on horseback while teaching one another foreign languages. In 1814 Thomas was employed by the Royal African Company, and Sarah and their infant daughter soon sailed to join him in 1816 - that voyage that included the mutiny.

But when Sarah arrived at Cape Coast Castle in Ghana, she learned that her husband had briefly returned to England. Undaunted, she used the time to begin documenting local natural history, the first European woman to do so. Sadly, her daughter died of a local fever, and her reunion with Thomas was bittersweet. The two then continued their travels and their studies for the next eighteen months, making Sarah the first European woman to explore tropical western Africa.

Shifting to Paris to further their studies, the Bowdichs became friends with the most prominent French naturalists. While Thomas continued his studies, Sarah supported their household by writing and illustrating her first volume, Taxidermy. She also gave birth to several more children. Sarah, Thomas, and their growing family returned to Africa in 1823, but in Gambia Thomas died of fever, leaving Sarah and the three children stranded and penniless.

But Sarah was determined to make a career of her natural history paintings. She sold pictures to support her children while completing Thomas's last book for publication, and also continued her own work, cataloguing new species of fish, plants, and animals. Returning to Paris and London, she was in demand for both her art and her knowledge. Among other projects, she wrote articles for the famed publisher Rudolph Ackermann and for the Magazine of Natural History. She wrote a biography of her mentor, the naturalist George Cuvier. She was forced to put her career aside in 1838 to nurse her dying mother, but then returned with a vengeance, publishing seventeen books and five articles between 1840-1856. Her artwork was so well regarded that she exhibited at the Royal Academy of Art. She also found time to raise her three children. Oh, and she also remarried, to a gentleman named Robert Lee, though she had labored so hard to establish "Mrs. Bowdich" as her author's name that she didn't make her marriage public (or take her new husband's name) until they had been wed for three years.

Perhaps Sarah's greatest single achievement is The Fresh Water Fishes of Great Britain, a project that made the most of her rare gift for artistic, scientific observation. The detail and accuracy of her hand-painted plates – the costly project was limited to fifty copies – are still studied by naturalists today, and prized by rare-book and art collectors as well. (The last copy that came to auction was sold in 1993 for nearly $30,000.) She painted each fish from life, and employed a painstaking technique that employed watercolours and gold and silver foil to replicate the shimmer of the scales.

The project took her ten years (1828-1838) to complete, because, as her daughter later explained, "My mother...having three children to support by her pen and pencil, could not afford to devote all her time to this one work, which accounts for the length of time it was in completion." What twenty-first century mother, likewise stretched between work and family, cannot relate to that?


Above: Rudd, from The Freshwater Fishes of Great Britain, by Sarah Bowdich (Lee), c. 1828

First of September 1827

Loretta reports:

From The Every-day book; or, Everlasting Calendar of Popular Amusements, Vol. II, by William Hone.
~~~
September 1*

Until this day partridges are protected by act of parliament from those who are "privileged to kill."

Application for a License.
In the shooting season of 1821, a fashionably dressed young man applied to sir Robert Baker for a license to kill— not game, but thieves. This curious application was made in the most serious and business-like manner imaginable.

"Can I be permitted to speak a few words to you, sir?" said the applicant.  "Certainly, sir," replied sir Robert. " Then I wish to ask you, sir, whether, if I am attacked by thieves in the streets or roads, I should be justified in using fire-arms against them, and putting them to death ?"  Sir Robert Baker replied, that every man had a right to defend himself from robbers in the best manner he could; but at the same time he would not be justified in using fire-arms, except in cases of the utmost extremity. "Oh! I am very much obliged to you, sir; and I can be furnished at this office with a license to carry arms for that purpose?" The answer, of course, was given in the negative, though not without a good deal of surprise at such a question, and the inquirer bowed and withdrew.

* Feast of St. Giles, patron saint of beggars and blacksmiths, among many others.  The name is familiar to Regency readers as a famously crime-ridden section of London. 

Illustration by Robert Havell, Partridge Shooting at Windsor. 

Happy Birthday to Us!

Loretta and Susan reporting:

Today* we are one! 

That is, not us specifically (even if we are both Geminis), but our blog. When we began the Two Nerdy History Girls last year, we decided to write what we wanted to read, and hope that might be a few others out there who might like to read it, too. Turns out there are a great many of you: we've had over 100,000 page views, and our 250th follower just signed up this week. We're delighted that we've delighted you. Long live Nerdy Girl History, and many, many thanks for your support and your enthusiasm, your interest and your comments!

* We realize that there may be those who will quibble with this birthday, since a few posts in our archive date from earlier in the summer of 2009. These were our trial blogs, shared with a small, trusted, and indulgent audience while we were trying to figure out what the hoo-hah we were actually doing. We went live to the world on September 1, 2009, which is why we decided that was our true birthday. Besides, if the Queen of England can celebrate her birthday in June because the weather's better, we figured we could choose September 1. 

Intrepid Women: Sarah Bowdich Quells a Mutiny, 1816

Susan reporting:

In 1816, not all English ladies were leading a genteel, Austen-esque life in the country. At least one of them was sailingwith her infant daughter to Africa to meet her husband. Sarah Wallis Bowdich (1791-1856) was the only woman, let alone the only lady, on board a small merchant ship full of desperate men. Here's Sarah's own telling of what happened one evening, from her 1835 book Stories of Strange Lands, & Fragments from the Notes of a Traveller:

The surgeon whispered to me his apprehensions that all was not well, and that our people...were irritated and annoyed, and in a most discontented state. The first mate was in command of the vessel; and, though he was an admirable sailor, and a most obliging and excellent person, was very impetuous. The dinner was sent to table very ill-dressed, and the cook was summoned aft to receive a reprimand. He became impertinent, and the mate, seizing a butter-boat, threw it at his head....A general scuffle ensued, and the second mate, running to the chest of arms, loaded a brace of pistols, and stood in the door-way of the cabin, swearing to two men who came aft, that he would blow their brains out if they ventured a step further. I expostulated with him, but he only replied, "You do not know the danger, Ma'am; the men are in a state of mutiny, and if they seize on the small-arms, we may all be murdered." My child happened to be on deck; and, at the word murdered, I crept under the second mate's arm after her. She was perfectly safe, with Antonio [another sailor] beside her, as guard. My fellow-passenger [a convicted slaver!] was on the larboard side, striving by fair words to quell the tumult; but the first mate was nearly overpowered at the opposite gangway. In striving to reach my child, I became mixed up with their party; and, without knowing it, was close by the mate when when the cook made a plunge at him with the large knife with which he cut the meat. To seize the cook's arm, to snatch the knife out of his hand, and throw it into the sea, was an affair of impulse, not reflection; however, it probably saved the mate, for the knife had already cut through his waistcoat. This action, and my presence, seemed to produce a momentary pause, and gave time to those who were well-disposed to rally round their master. The cook was put in irons, and...went away muttering curses and threats; and I had no inclination to eat the offering with which he had tried to propitiate me....I accordingly threw it into the sea, and retired to the cabin, to prevent further identification with this painful concern.

But wait! This is only one tiny slice of this lady's amazing and accomplished life. More, much more, to follow on Thursday....

Above: Loaded pistols were served out to all the sure men by N.C. Wyeth, 1911, illustration for Robert Louis Stevenson's Treasure Island, Collection of Andrew and Betsy Wyeth.

Following Up: Ann Thicknesse to Shine in Cincinnati

Susan reporting:

Earlier this year, we wrote of one of our favorite Intrepid Women, the celebrated musician Ann Ford Thicknesse (1737-1834). Thanks to our friends at the Duchess of Devonshire's Gossip Guide, we've learned that Mrs. Thicknesse's fabulous portrait (left) by Thomas Gainsborough has been newly spruced, and will be the centerpiece of a show this fall at the Cincinnati Art Museum. Thomas Gainsborough and the Modern Woman promises not only extraordinary paintings, but gowns of the Georgian period as well. If you're fortunate enough to be in Ohio this fall (the show runs September 18-January 2), we hope you'll stop by and pay your respects to Mrs. Thicknesse. She is quite deserving.

Above: Mrs. Philip Thicknesse, nee Ann Ford, by Thomas Gainsborough, 1760, Cincinnati Art Museum

Riding Habit 1817

Loretta reports:

I'm always thrilled to find riding habits and court dresses in the fashion magazines, because these are not nearly so common as evening dresses and walking dresses.  This is one very like what I had imagined my heroine Zoe (of Don't Tempt Me) wearing.

I cannot pin down the "Glengary" element, since it doesn't correspond with definitions I've found elsewhere, including Louis Harmuth's 1915 Dictionary of Textiles.  The cap doesn't look like today's idea of a Glengarry cap, and, being made of satin, doesn't fit the "mottled wool" definition below.  Perhaps one of our knowledgeable readers can enlighten us.


From Ackermann's Repository of Arts, Literature, Fashions, Manufactures, &c., The Second Series, Vol. IV. September 1,  1817.  No. XXI
~~~~~

PLATE 16.—THE GLENGARY* HABIT

Is composed of the finest pale blue cloth,** and richly ornamented with frogs and braiding to correspond. The front, which is braided on each side, fastens under the body of the habit, which slopes down on each side in a very novel style, and in such a manner as to form the shape to considerable advantage. The epaulettes and jacket are braided to correspond with the front, as is also the bottom of the sleeve, which is braided nearly half way up the arm. Habit-shirt, composed of cambric, with a high standing collar, trimmed with lace. Cravat of soft muslin, richly worked at the ends, and tied in a full bow. Narrow lace ruffles. Head-dress, the Glengary cap, composed of blue satin, and trimmed with plaited ribbon of various shades of blue, and a superb plume of feathers. Blue kid gloves, and half-boots.

*Glengarry—All-wool, mottled English tweed.  (?????)

**Cloth—1, general term for fulled woolen fabrics; 2, general term for any textile fabric having some body; 3, medieval English worsted made six yards long and two yards wide.

The Noisy Height of Fashion: Slap Sole Shoes

Susan reporting:

We NHG do love shoes, and this pair must have been right on the cutting edge of fashion when they were new, the must-have Louboutins of 17th c. London.

Like many extreme fashions, slap soles evolved from a useful idea. Earlier in the century, gentlemen would slip flat-soled mules over their riding boots to prevent the heels from sinking into the muddy ground of stable yards. Some enterprising shoemaker took the idea a step further, and put the flat sole beneath a pair of lady's high heels, and the slap sole was born. While the sole is connected to the front of the shoe, the part beneath the heel is not, which made for a clacking, slapping sound as the lady walked. I'm guessing the slap sole was also easier to walk in, much as a tall wedge offers more support than a narrow stiletto (first-hand NHG research at work!) But that distinctive clack on the bare floors of the time must have been gratifying indeed to the wearer, letting all around her know that she had the "it" shoes of the season, even if they were hidden beneath her sweeping petticoats.

In addition to the slap soles, these shoes feature an extended square toe that overhangs the sole (much like the current island platforms.) The shoes are made from fine white kid that never would have gone near a muddy stable yard. The heels are very high for the time, much higher than most ladies would dare. The gold braid and bright pink silk ribbon trimming has faded, and the wide pink ribbons through the latchets that would have been tied into extravagant bows are missing. But the magical allure of these shoes remains, and it's easy to imagine them climbing the stairs in Whitehall Palace.

Here are two more examples of slap soles: an Italian pair, trimmed with silver and gold lace, and another English pair said to have been a royal gift from Charles II.

Above: Slap Sole Shoes, c. 1650-1670, English. Bata Shoe Museum, Toronto.