Inquiring Readers, Tony Grant has been contributing articles to Jane Austen Today for several months. Recently, Tony and his family traveled to Bath and the West Country. This is one of many posts he has written about his journey. Tony also has published several posts about his trip on this blog: Going to Bath With Jane Austen and The Servant’s Entrance to Regency Townhouses, for which he supplied the photographs. He has already contributed a post about Milsom Street for Jane Austen Today. This post about his tour through Bath was first published on Jane Austen Today, but the images caused the sidebar to be pushed out of sight, so I placed it here.
Here are some of the places that Janes characters lived in and when you go to Bath you can see them for yourself.
- Anne Elliot and her father lived in Camden Place up the hill at the top of the town.
- Lady Russel lived in Rivers Street just north of The Circus.
- Rich, Mrs Wallis lived in Marlborough Gardens on the hill leading down from the north end of The Royal Crescent.
- Catherine Moreland lived in Pultney Street, which is now called Great Pultney Street, very close to Sydney Street. I wonder if Jane saw somebody in Pultney Street that she thought, “ah, that’s Catherine Moreland.”
- The Dowager Viscountess Dalrymple lived in Laura Place at the end of Great Pultney Street and at the start of Pultney Bridge.
The meeting places and places central to both novels are Milsom Street where everybody shops. Shopping, the bain of my life. My wife and three daughters love shopping. Shopping could be their lives. In Jane’s time tooapparently. It makes me come out in a cold sweat thinking about it. The amount of standing in shops and outside of shops I’ve done.
God, I’ve suffered for shopping over the years.
Ah, that’s better. I needed that rant.
Also the Pump room. What a glorious place it is. I felt a tingle down my spine as I my wife, Abigail and myself were shown to our seats by the headwaiter and we were graciously handed the menus. A trio of musicians, cello, pianist and violinist, played sedately at one end of the room. People lined up at the water pump to imbibe Baths greatest commodity, water from the spring and we ordered tea and cakes.
I could almost see Catherine Morland pop in to see if she could find Henry Tilney and of course take a few turns of the room to see and be seen. I knew nobody in The Pump Room just as Catherine knew nobody.
Then we had a look inside Bath Abbey. Jane seems to have not attended services at the abbey. She preferred The Octagon. This was a newly built chapel in Jane’s day. She seems to have preferred churches where the incumbent vicar had new and fresh ideas to deliver in his sermons.
We walked on up Milson Street to George Street where Edgar Buildings are situated. Edgar Buildings are where the Thorpes stayed.
From George Street we went into Gay Street and walked past number 25 where the Austens stayed for a while.
From The Circus we turned down Brock Street and arrived at The Crescent at the top of the hill.
This was the place where the elite lived. These were the largest and most expensive houses. Lords, Dukes and the very wealthy lived up here. It was also a good place to walk to get fresh air.
In the Crescent , about half way round, is a house with plaque that relates a very dramatic story. In 1755 Richard Brinsley Sheridan, who was a great playwright in the 18th century and wrote The Rivals and School for Scandal and who was also the owner of the Covent Garden Theatre, absconded with a young lady from the house. Her father chased them all over Europe. When they were found the father made Sheridan marry his daughter. However soon after Richard Brinsley left her in the lurch. The chase was the thing. The excitement of the chase had gone. What a cad and bounder!!!!!
Now, a story about myself. As we walked up Gay Street towards The Circus we obviously stopped outside number 25 to look at it and photograph ourselves outside. An irate and very upset looking lady marched out of the front door next to number 25 with a bowl full of water and threw it all over my legs. I must add this does not normally happen to me. The circumstances were, that some juvenile idiot had drawn rude graffiti over the side of her white van parked outside. She was trying to clean the words off. She was obviously upset and came out to wash the side of her vehicle. Unfortunately for me, she missed. She was SO sorry. Luckily it was a warm day and my trousers dried quickly in the walk up the hill.
One fact before I finish. Did you know that the houses in The Crescent and in The Circus are all different? They all look the same because they are the same on the outside. The builder built the fronts and sold just the fronts. The new owners had to build their own backs to their houses. Hence, if you go round behind the houses in The Crescent they all look different.
Tony, THANK YOU for the lovely photos and sharing your Bath travels. I have never been to England and one day hope to travel there and experience it myself. Your detailed descriptions and photos truly helped me imagine what it was like to be there. Michelle,
The Twiggery
Loved seeing pics of Bath, a most beloved city. I was a little disappointed though that there were no pictures of the Weir, but then thought that maybe the weir wasn’t there is Jane’s time and that’s why it wasn’t included.
Another item I found fascinating in Bath were the rather creepy angels that were climbing downward on the Jacob’s Ladder on the front of the Abbey.
Thank you so much for this wonderful article and for including photographs. The photographs made my memories of “Persuasion” and “Northanger Abbey” come to life. More of the same, if you have it. Pleassseeeee!
Cenya, I have a got a picture of the weir next to Pultney Bridge. However, I presume that it was a Victorian addition to keep one part of the river at the right depth for canal boats.I didn’t include it in the post because it isn’t connected with Jane’s time.
All the best,
Tony
Awesome! This was just awesome! I was just there 3 weeks ago and took pictures of most of the same sites but the ones I didn’t think to get, you did! What a pleasure to revisit the trip of a lifetime for me. I also felt that same thrill you described. Thank you for doing this!
Oh, those assembly rooms. How could you not feel like a princess when you were in them? Tony, I was going to ask you to go into every shop in Bath and look for a particular tea cup and saucer set that I saw there about twenty years ago. I was going to send you a very detailed description, and then I find out you don’t like to shop! Oh darn! LOL Great pictures, as usual.
Thank you everyone for your lovely comments.
Mary, don’t tell anyone, I DID feel like a princess in the assembly rooms.
Thank you for understanding about the shopping thing.
Tony
Enjoyed the lovely pics of Bath. I’ve made a couple of literary pilgrimages there myself. I’m sure I’ve read somewhere that Austen wasn’t fond of Bath which I find odd as it is so beautiful.
Hi Nicola.
I wrote another post for, Jane Austen’s World, called,
“Going To Bath With Jane Austen.”
I used quotes from her letters to help me make a few points about Jane and Bath. You might get a sense and idea of what she felt about Bath from that post.
All the best,
Tony
Tony, you’ve some wonderful photos of Bath, thanks! Your London Calling blog is great! I too have the chance to revisit Bath recently and this time I went looking for places mentioned in Persuasion. Much gratified to find some of them like Camden Crescent (older days Camden Place), The Assembly Rooms, and some tidbit about the chandeliers in the Ball Room nearly fell on Gainsborough… etc. Just posted. Vic, thanks for these most interesting posts!
What a thorough post on Bath! Thanks for sharing this.
It never crossed my mind how dark and different Bath must have looked, with black soot covering the limestone. Another reason, perhaps, to add to Jane’s dislike of Bath…