Georgette Heyer's Regency World (9 page)

Making a Come-out

By seventeen, and sometimes earlier, a girl was able to begin spreading her social wings and might attend certain sorts of smaller parties, family dinners and minor assemblies in places such as the resort towns of Bath or Harrogate. She was precluded from attending London assemblies or any sizeable occasion until she had made her debut, and grand social events hosted by royalty, such as the Prince Regent’s magnificent fête at Carlton House, were out of the question unless she had been formally presented at Court. In spite of her experiences as a society hostess while living overseas with her diplomat father, Sophy Stanton-Lacy in
The Grand Sophy
was ineligible to attend this grand affair because she had not yet been presented at one of the Queen’s Drawing-Rooms. This centuries-old tradition was available to daughters of the aristocracy and to those who had married into the upper class, and a young woman was not considered to be fully ‘out’ in society until she had been presented. A strict protocol was enforced prior to presentation, requiring the lady’s name to be put forward and approved before a date for presentation could be set. A woman attended a drawing-room in full Court dress in the form of a
grande toilette
consisting of a magnificently embroidered or ornamented silk, satin or lace dress over a hooped skirt, her finest jewels, and a headdress with as many as eight ostrich feathers. In
Cotillion
, Meg, Lady Buckhaven, bought a magnificent satin dress with a lace overskirt to wear to Court but had to persuade her loving husband to pay the £300 bill for it sent by the dressmaker.

Presentations took place at St James’s Palace and a debutante was always escorted by her mother or other female sponsor—often a member of the aristocracy whose connections or influence at Court might see her protégée favoured by royal attention for slightly longer than the minute or so it took to be introduced and to make her curtsy to the Queen. The haughty but elegant Lady Nassington of
A Civil Contract
kindly chaperoned Jenny Chawleigh to her presentation and enabled Jenny to feel more confident about meeting the Queen and the Princesses. Most girls came out into society by eighteen and hoped to be married within their first Season, or at least receive an offer as Letty proudly told her cousin John she had done in
The Toll-Gate
.

Mothers, Wives, Widows and Daughters

From the moment of birth, an upper-class Regency child would be shared to varying degrees between parents and servants. Although a mother might choose to breast-feed her baby, as Jenny Chawleigh did in
A Civil Contract
, it was not uncommon for well-born ladies to engage a wet-nurse to attend the infant. Some mothers were more actively involved in their children’s upbringing, taking an interest in their lessons and helping to nurse them in times of illness, but their greatest involvement in their children’s lives was when they entered society. An upper-class mother’s first duty was as a marriage-broker; she was responsible for finding eligible partners for her offspring and for a mother of several daughters (such as Lady Bugle in
Charity Girl
) this could become the main focus of her life.

A good upper-class mother would ensure that her daughter had at least one London Season with a presentation at Court, and that she was exquisitely gowned and thoroughly schooled in the ways of the world. Once in London it was imperative to be seen in all the right places and hopeful mothers would make visits of ceremony and leave calling cards at the homes of influential women in the hope of reciprocal visits or an invitation to their next ball or party. Lady Bridlington in
Arabella
considered how best to bring her protégée to the notice of the most powerful and well-disposed ladies of the
ton
, and spent a great deal of time planning her ball and thinking of who to invite in order to ensure that Arabella had the opportunity to meet the cream of London society. If possible, vouchers for Almack’s were obtained and a mother would escort her daughter to evenings in the hallowed rooms as well as to every other acceptable social event to which they had been invited. It was not unknown for ambitious mothers to plot ways in which their daughters could attract the attention of an eligible bachelor, or to devise a lavish ball or daring alfresco breakfast in order to entice the London elite into their homes and bring their daughters into direct contact with the
ton’s
most attractive men. Lady Laleham in
Bath Tangle
was a well-known social climber who contrived to visit the Spenborough home when she knew the rich and eligible Marquis of Rotherham was also visiting.

In the early nineteenth century marriage meant that in a legal as well as a practical sense a woman, and any money or assets she might own, including jewels, personal possessions, household items and clothing, came under her husband’s control the moment the knot was tied. Even betrothal meant she had to have her fiancé’s permission to dispose of her own property. In the case of Tiffany Wield, the spendthrift heiress of
The Nonesuch
, this was held to be a good thing but for many women the loss of autonomy was unpalatable. As a wife she was viewed by the law as being one with her husband, and consequently she lost her legal status as a separate individual and with it the considerable legal rights available to her as a single woman. Her real property, including land, houses, livestock, chattels and church livings could become his if he claimed them but by the time of the Regency it had become increasingly common in upper-class circles for these holdings and any income derived from them to be placed in a separate trust for a wife’s use and benefit. If a husband predeceased his wife her property reverted to her and if she died childless it would revert to her heirs. If her husband was alive and she died leaving children, he held her property until his death when it passed to her heirs. Any children born during a marriage (whether his or not) were legally his and in the event of a divorce or separation a husband could take the children, his wife’s money and personal property (unless it had been set apart legally) and refuse her access to them.

The only offset to the injustices meted out to wives under Common Law was the provision of another type of law known as Equity. For those who could afford to implement its benefits, the court of Equity could enforce trusts and legal arrangements (often included in the marriage settlement) made to safeguard women’s property; it could also secure property left to her for her own use and it could enable her to sue where she had a right to do so—a right she was denied as a wife under Common Law. A wife’s loss of legal rights carried a few advantages, however, for on marriage a husband became responsible for all of her debts, including those incurred before their wedding. In
Friday’s Child
Hero’s mounting debts forced her husband to sell some of his investments in order to meet the costs and Nell Cardross of
April Lady
fretted over a sizeable dressmaker’s bill which she dared not reveal after her husband had paid her other debts. A husband was legally bound to support his wife so long as they shared a bed and board and if she committed a crime (other than murder or high treason) while her husband was present, under the law he was held to have coerced her and she was automatically deemed innocent.

On becoming a widow a woman regained the legal rights she had enjoyed as a single female and, in some cases, benefited greatly from her husband’s death. Lady Barbara Childe revelled in her freedom as a dashing young widow and, in
An Infamous Army
, vowed never to remarry. If she had owned property prior to her marriage, on her husband’s death it reverted to her; if her husband died intestate (without a will) she was entitled to a third of his personal property; if no arrangements for a property settlement or jointure had been made at the time of marriage she had an automatic right to claim support from one third of his estates for life. In some cases a widow was also provided with a dower house, usually set at a small distance from the main house on the principal estate. Elinor Rochdale in
The Reluctant Widow
was entitled to an income from her deceased husband’s estate and the young and beautiful Lady Spenborough of
Bath Tangle
moved to the dower house on the edge of the family estate several weeks after her husband’s death. By the time of the Regency a widow with property and an independent income was in a better position to protect her assets from the possibility of them being dissipated by a second husband in the event of a remarriage. The freedom enjoyed by those financially independent widows meant that they were often cautious about re-entering the marriage state.

Upper-class daughters were thoroughly schooled in what was owed to their family and the family name, and love was not considered an essential requirement for a good match. In some families, if the parents were able to arrange an eligible match, they hoped that the girl might feel affection for the chosen bridegroom; but if not, she was expected to swallow any aversion and marry him anyway. Some parents, such as Lady Ombersley in
The Grand Sophy
, held in abhorrence the notion of compelling a loved daughter to marry against her will; on the other hand, a girl who found herself in love would be able to contemplate marriage with a man only if he were of good birth or had a substantial estate or fortune. Love alone was not enough within the upper class. Isabella Milborne, the ‘Incomparable’ of
Friday’s Child
, clearly understood what was expected of a woman with her looks and breeding and dutifully encouraged the attentions of the Duke of Severn instead of those of the rakish but handsome George, Lord Wrotham. Obedience, decorous behaviour and an avoidance of any action that might make her appear ‘fast’ or forward were essential for social acceptance, and a well-bred daughter knew that any untoward behaviour would likely see her whisked off to the family’s country estate to rusticate and reconsider her feelings or to wait for scandal or rumour to recede. In
Sylvester
, Phoebe Marlow’s grandmother was convinced that Paris was the ideal place to take her granddaughter while her friends endeavoured to quash the rumours about Phoebe that had set the
ton
on its ears.

On the Marriage Mart

Marriage was a vital issue for upper-class Regency women. It offered the possibility of a degree of freedom and independence that was not generally available to them as single women and could also save them from the stigma of spinsterhood. Once they had made their debut, most girls expected to be married or at least betrothed in their first Season and certainly by the second or third. After that a family’s hopes of suitably disposing of a daughter (considered to be no longer in her first bloom of youth) began to fade and by their late twenties most women despaired of finding a suitable husband. At twenty-nine Annis Wychwood in
Lady of Quality
was unusual in having decided she had no wish to be married and rejecting every eligible offer made to her since her come-out.

In upper-class circles the main marriage mart was London during the Season, where the constant round of social events and activities provided ample opportunity to mingle with eligible men and find a suitable partner for an unmarried daughter. Entry to the exclusive Almack’s club was considered the height of social attainment, with admission obtainable only by a voucher bestowed on a young woman by one of its seven powerful patronesses, two of whom discussed whether or not to bestow the coveted vouchers on Judith Taverner in
Regency Buck
. Known during the Regency as the ‘Marriage Mart’, Almack’s was
the
place for the new debutante to be seen and to meet the cream of eligible Regency bachelors, many of whom made obligatory appearances at the rooms in King Street despite finding both the entertainment and the refreshment rather dull. One of the main aims of the London Season was for families of the same class to interact in a range of social settings and for their children to contract suitable alliances. For women, a creditable marriage was the great aim, a brilliant marriage was the great hope.

To Gretna Green

The tiny village of Gretna Green was situated just over the English–Scottish border on the main road from Carlisle. The village was made famous after 1754 when Lord Hardwicke’s Marriage Act took effect, precluding anyone in England from being married under the age of twenty-one without parental consent and also compelling couples to marry in a parish church building before an ordained minister. Scottish law, however, made no such demands and Hardwicke’s edict had little effect over the border where a man and woman could be married without notice. Sixteen was the legal age to marry in Scotland and parental consent was not needed. For those in love and below marriageable age, for older men seeking a younger bride or for a rake or fortune-hunter dangling after a rich young heiress, Gretna Green was the obvious destination.