further crossposting: the Strafford family
I'm much more concerned about my meta than my fic, tbh.
But Tumblr drama aside, one of my favourite Austen details is this:
“Mr Wentworth was nobody, I remember; quite unconnected; nothing to do with the Strafford family.”
This is Sir Walter Elliot’s dismissal of the Wentworths’ claim to genteel status, but also so much more. See, “the Strafford family” were 100% real.
They were, as might be expected, a branch of the RL Wentworth family—the senior branch, according to them. Previously, the Wentworths had accumulated vast wealth through various events (including marriage to an heiress named Emma Woodhouse). But the perennial problem of primogeniture reared its head: the head of the Wentworth family had no children.
He did have a ton of personal wealth and property, though. And all that land and money? Not entailed. So he left his estate of Wentworth Woodhouse and everything attached to it to his sister’s family, the previously somewhat minor Watsons (coincidentally, I’m sure, that is the name of a family Austen started to write about in an unfinished piece).
But! he actually did have some male-line relations who would have inherited, if he hadn’t … uh, understandably preferred his own family? Anyway. He couldn’t leave the title to his sister’s family, so the cousins became the less-wealthy-than-anticipated Earls of Strafford.
The Watson nephew, meanwhile, honoured his uncle by tacking his mother’s name onto his father’s, while also gaining the Watsons’ title of Lord Rockingham (the exact rank changed over time). So you ended up with the Strafford Wentworths—the people that Sir Walter is talking about—and the Rockingham Wentworths.
There was a certain amount of tension between the two branches, who were constantly trying to out-do each other and generally at odds. This extended and very public family drama was intensified by one significant detail: the Strafford Wentworths were Tories and the Rockingham Wentworths were Whigs.
The Rockingham Wentworths weren’t ordinary Whigs, though. They were political powerhouses. An entire wing of the party was named after them. By the time Austen was born, Lord Rockingham was the most powerful Whig alive.
Buuuuut the old problem came back. He didn’t have a son. However, his sister Anne did. He left everything he could, including a ton of political sway, to his nephew, just as had happened before.
And that nephew? William Wentworth Fitzwilliam, Earl Fitzwilliam.
This was a celebrity-level melodrama. All these people were major public figures. Lord Fitzwilliam, despite a certain level of social ineptness and some major mistakes, became one of the most popular men in Britain. The Strafford vs Rockingham-Fitzwilliam feud was well-known.
So.
Darcy and his relatives turning out to be the family of a cautiously unnamed Fitzwilliam earl* would not make for an obscure reference to contemporary audiences. When Emma indignantly recalls that the Woodhouses are a junior branch of an ancient family (by contrast to the Eltons), contemporaries probably would not need to be pointed at the Wentworths and Fitzwilliams at Wentworth Woodhouse.
And when Sir Walter sneers over the disconnection between the Persuasion Wentworths and “the Strafford family,” audiences would know he’s complaining that they’re ordinary people and not Tory aristocrats.Truly, I weep for him.
I don’t know all that’s going on with this, but I do think it’s very persistent and very interesting.
*It wasn't uncommon for contemporary writers to use the dash of plausible deniability in fiction (for verisimilitude), esp with regard to aristocrats like Lord ___. But Austen herself almost invariably invents fake titles for her noble characters, so it's notable where she dances around it.
In any case, none of this is new in Austen scholarship, but it's still not clear why she was so preoccupied with the Wentworths et al. I think the theory that it taps into useful stereotypes for the characters is partly true; the Fitzwilliams are obvious stereotypes of Whig aristocrats embodied in Lady Catherine and partly Darcy. Sir Walter makes perfect sense as a Tory asshole. But I don't think it quite explains why she kept going back to the Wentworths specifically.
But Tumblr drama aside, one of my favourite Austen details is this:
“Mr Wentworth was nobody, I remember; quite unconnected; nothing to do with the Strafford family.”
This is Sir Walter Elliot’s dismissal of the Wentworths’ claim to genteel status, but also so much more. See, “the Strafford family” were 100% real.
They were, as might be expected, a branch of the RL Wentworth family—the senior branch, according to them. Previously, the Wentworths had accumulated vast wealth through various events (including marriage to an heiress named Emma Woodhouse). But the perennial problem of primogeniture reared its head: the head of the Wentworth family had no children.
He did have a ton of personal wealth and property, though. And all that land and money? Not entailed. So he left his estate of Wentworth Woodhouse and everything attached to it to his sister’s family, the previously somewhat minor Watsons (coincidentally, I’m sure, that is the name of a family Austen started to write about in an unfinished piece).
But! he actually did have some male-line relations who would have inherited, if he hadn’t … uh, understandably preferred his own family? Anyway. He couldn’t leave the title to his sister’s family, so the cousins became the less-wealthy-than-anticipated Earls of Strafford.
The Watson nephew, meanwhile, honoured his uncle by tacking his mother’s name onto his father’s, while also gaining the Watsons’ title of Lord Rockingham (the exact rank changed over time). So you ended up with the Strafford Wentworths—the people that Sir Walter is talking about—and the Rockingham Wentworths.
There was a certain amount of tension between the two branches, who were constantly trying to out-do each other and generally at odds. This extended and very public family drama was intensified by one significant detail: the Strafford Wentworths were Tories and the Rockingham Wentworths were Whigs.
The Rockingham Wentworths weren’t ordinary Whigs, though. They were political powerhouses. An entire wing of the party was named after them. By the time Austen was born, Lord Rockingham was the most powerful Whig alive.
Buuuuut the old problem came back. He didn’t have a son. However, his sister Anne did. He left everything he could, including a ton of political sway, to his nephew, just as had happened before.
And that nephew? William Wentworth Fitzwilliam, Earl Fitzwilliam.
This was a celebrity-level melodrama. All these people were major public figures. Lord Fitzwilliam, despite a certain level of social ineptness and some major mistakes, became one of the most popular men in Britain. The Strafford vs Rockingham-Fitzwilliam feud was well-known.
So.
Darcy and his relatives turning out to be the family of a cautiously unnamed Fitzwilliam earl* would not make for an obscure reference to contemporary audiences. When Emma indignantly recalls that the Woodhouses are a junior branch of an ancient family (by contrast to the Eltons), contemporaries probably would not need to be pointed at the Wentworths and Fitzwilliams at Wentworth Woodhouse.
And when Sir Walter sneers over the disconnection between the Persuasion Wentworths and “the Strafford family,” audiences would know he’s complaining that they’re ordinary people and not Tory aristocrats.
I don’t know all that’s going on with this, but I do think it’s very persistent and very interesting.
*It wasn't uncommon for contemporary writers to use the dash of plausible deniability in fiction (for verisimilitude), esp with regard to aristocrats like Lord ___. But Austen herself almost invariably invents fake titles for her noble characters, so it's notable where she dances around it.
In any case, none of this is new in Austen scholarship, but it's still not clear why she was so preoccupied with the Wentworths et al. I think the theory that it taps into useful stereotypes for the characters is partly true; the Fitzwilliams are obvious stereotypes of Whig aristocrats embodied in Lady Catherine and partly Darcy. Sir Walter makes perfect sense as a Tory asshole. But I don't think it quite explains why she kept going back to the Wentworths specifically.
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