580 ‘he acted as a steward’: on 25 July, 1888
581 ‘had recently met at the house’: see Eileen Bigland, Ouida – the Passionate Victorian, London, Jarrolds, 1950
582 ‘the English public finds it tedious’: quoted in Richard Ellman, Oscar Wilde, London, Hamish Hamilton, 1987
583 ‘her charming little boy’: WC to Andrew Chatto, 26 April 1888, Princeton
584 ‘It will soon become a distinction’: WC to Edward Bok, 15 January 1889, Private
585 ‘Reminiscences of a Story-teller’: Universal Register, 15 June 1888, p.183
586 ‘I pick up the literature’: ‘Books Necessary for a Liberal Education’, Pall Mall Gazette, 11 February 1886
587 ‘a very clever book – of its kind’: WC to Sebastian Schlesinger, 3 January 1888, Houghton
588 ‘reading A Legend of Montrose’: WC to A P Watt, 4 August 1885, Pembroke
589 ‘still possessed of a table’: WC to Hall Caine, 5 February 1888, Manx
590 ‘I cannot honestly suggest topics’: WC to Harriet Bartley, 14 March 1888, Princeton
591 ‘There is no mews’: WC to Tillotson, 30 May 1888, Bolton
592 ‘If you please, sir’: WC to Harry Quilter, 11 April 1888, Huntington
593 ‘You will very likely receive’: WC to Sebastain Schlesinger, 2 May 1889, Houghton.
594 ‘dumb to the utterance of Love’: WC to Sebastian Schlesinger, 27 March 1889, Houghton
595 ‘a woman who is not to be trifled with’: WC to Sebastian Schlesinger, 9 January 1889, Houghton
596 ‘born diplomatist’: WC to A.P. Watt, 7th March 1889, Pembroke
597 ‘grudgingly forced to accept’: WC to Andrew Chatto, 27th March 1889, Reading
598 ‘It is a terrible shock’: Harriet Bartley to Mary Elizabeth Braddon, July 21 1889, Canterbury
599 ‘with all his old warmth’: George Redford to Harriet Bartley, 23 September 1889, Princeton
600 ‘the task fell to Walter Besant’: this was confirmed by Marian, his eldest daughter by Martha, who was acting as his temporary secretary, in a letter to Watt, 26 August 1889
601 ‘forbidding the hy----’: WC to F.C. Beard, 21 September 1889 Princeton. Although this probably meant the hypodermic needle, it could also have referred to hyoscine, which is used as an antimuscarinic or sedative
602 ‘My news is so sad’: Harriet Bartley to Frank Archer, 24 September 1889, Lewis
603 ‘And so our poor dear genial’: NL to Rudolph Lehmann, 25 September 1889, Princeton
604 ‘several of whose theatrical friends’: Morning Post, 28 September 1889
605 ‘a confusion with Wilde’s brother Willie’: Sunday Times, 29 September 1889. Oscar Wilde’s presence was denied by Edmund Yates in the pages of The World
606 ‘one newspaper did refer to Mrs Dawson’: New York World, 29 September 1889
607 ‘remarkable . . . for his independence of character’: Penny Illustrated Paper, 19 October 1889
608 ‘one the kindest’: Pall Mall Gazette, 24 September 1889
609 ‘Mr Hall Caine and I are antipathetic’: Harriet Bartley to A.P. Watt, 4 October 1889, Berg
610 ‘the only monument he cared for’: see ‘The Wilkie Collins Memorial Library’ by Andrew Gasson, Wilkie Collins Society, 2004
611 ‘the mere fact that it is found necessary to “agitate”’: Daily Telegraph, 5 October 1889
612 ‘“other considerations’’’: The Times, 26 March 1890
613 ‘The day was gloomy’: Sydney Morning Herald, 13 December 1889, quoting St James’s Gazette
614 ‘Wilkie’s will was proved’: 11 November 1889
615 ‘When may I expect a cheque?’: Henry Bartley to George Sharf, Director, National Portrait Gallery, 6 September 1894, NPG
616 ‘Caroline who died the following month’: 14 June 1895. She was buried beside Wilkie in Kensal Green
617 For details of Clow and the Hollow family, see The Hollow Log, issue 41, December 2012, p.4 or http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~chollow/news%2041.pdf
618 ‘a messy divorce’: The Argus, 11 August 1899. Joseph Clow married Louisa Maguire in Melbourne on 27 June 1902
619 ‘survived in Willesden until 1927’: although his son predeceased him, his daughter-in-law Ethel lived for a further four decades, before dying in Suffolk in 1969
620 ‘least posé’: Beard, ‘Some Recollections’
I have calculated modern equivalents of Victorian monetary values using the site http://www.measuringworth.com/ppoweruk/
Wilkie as a child, drawn by his father William Collins.
Wilkie and his brother Charles, aged nine and five, painted by their father’s friend, Andrew Geddes, in 1833.
William Collins, Wilkie’s father, painted by his friend John Linnell, who lived near the Collins family in Hampstead and Bayswater.
Self-portrait of Margaret Carpenter, Wilkie’s painter aunt, from 1817.
Harriet Collins, Wilkie’s mother, also painted by John Linnell.
Italian boats at Sorrento, sketched in a pen and black ink drawing by Wilkie, aged thirteen, while he was visiting Italy with his parents and brother in 1837.
The Caves of Ulysses at Sorrento, Naples depicted in an oil painting by William Collins, as recalled by him in 1843.
Charles Allston Collins on the steps of Charles Dickens’s home at Gad’s Hill Place in Kent.
May, in the Regent’s Park, painted by Charles Allston Collins in 1851, showing the view from his studio in the family house at 17 Hanover Terrace.
Wilkie Collins, painted by his friend John Everett Millais in 1850.
Mr Honeywood Introduces the Bailiffs to Miss Richland as his Friends – Act III, Scene 1 from Goldsmith’s play, The Good-Natured Man – painted by William Powell Frith in 1850. It was performed in the ‘Theatre Royal, Back Drawing Room’ at the Collinses’ house in Blandford Square. The bailiff on the right may well portray Wilkie Collins.
Scene from No Thoroughfare at the Adelphi Theatre, 1867, showing the actor Charles Fechter as Obenreizer (fourth from left). Also in the picture (far left), is the actor and manager Benjamin Webster.
Scene from The Lighthouse at Campden House, 10 July 1855, with (left to right) Wilkie Collins as Martin Gurncock, Georgina Hogarth as Lady Grace and Charles Dickens, kneeling, as Aaron Gurncock.
Frontispiece drawing by John Everett Millais for Wilkie’s 1851 Christmas story, Mr Wray’s Cash-Box.
Sketch by John Everett Millais of a young Wilkie Collins (seated right) and Richard Doyle (back to the artist) with three women.
Armadale: the cover and spine of the first edition of Wilkie’s novel, published in two volumes by Smith, Elder in 1866.
John Everett Millais: from the frontispiece to The Life and Letters of Sir John Everett Millais, the biography written by his son, J. G. Millais, in 1899.
Rehearsal for The Frozen Deep at Walham Green, 1857. From left to right: (back row) artist William Telbin, Mr Evans, novelist Shirley Brooks, Mark Lemon Jr., printer W. Jones, publisher Frederick Evans, artist Marcus Stone, musician Francesco Berger, Punch editor Mark Lemon and artist Augustus Egg; (middle row) author Albert Smith, artist Clarkson Frederick Stanfield, Miss Evans, journalist Edward Smyth Pigott, Mrs Francis and artist John Luard; (bottom row) Charles Dickens Jr., Kate Dickens, Miss Hogarth, Mary Dickens, Wilkie Collins, Miss H. Hogarth. Charles Dickens is stretched out at the front of the group.
William Holman Hunt: a self-portrait that appeared in his book, Pre-Raphaelitism and the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, in 1905.
First known photograph of Wilkie Collins, produced in 1857 by Herbert Watkins, who had a studio at 215 Regent Street, London.
Hotel bill for Wilkie and Charles Dickens from the Ship Inn, Allonby – now in Cumbria – dated 9–11 September 1857. The two authors rested here after Wilkie was injured climbing Carrock Fell. They later wrote an account of their travels, The Lazy Tour of Two Idle Apprentices.
Caroline Graves, one of Wilkie’s two mistres
ses, in the early 1870s.
Entry in the register of baptisms from Toddington parish church, Gloucestershire, which records the illegitimate birth of Elizabeth Compton, later Caroline Graves, in November 1829.
Cartoon portrait of Wilkie Collins by Frederick Waddy from 1873. It shows Wilkie in front of Frederick Walker’s famous poster for the production of The Woman in White, which ran at the Olympic Theatre in London from October 1871 to February 1872.
Christmas message from the early 1870s by the English versifier Reverend Frederick Langbridge, which playfully draws on the titles of some of Wilkie’s novels.
Frontispiece by John Everett Millais to Sampson, Low’s single volume edition of No Name from 1864. Wilkie’s novel was originally published in three volumes in 1862.
Front cover to ‘The Fosco Galop’, music inspired by The Woman in White and composed by G. Richardson in 1871.
Wilkie Collins and the other of his two mistresses, Martha Rudd. It is unusual to see Wilkie photographed without glasses.
Martha Rudd in a studio portrait.
Martha Rudd in older age.
Frederick and Nina Lehmann, two of Wilkie’s closest friends.
Wilkie’s close friend, the history artist Edward M. (Ned) Ward.
Harriet Ward, Ned Ward’s wife, also a painter.
Edward Smyth Pigott, Examiner of Plays, pictured in a cartoon by Pal for Vanity Fair, 11 January 1890.
Mrs Katey Collins, Dickens’s daughter, became the wife of Wilkie’s brother Charley in 1860. After Charley’s death in 1873, she married the artist Carlo Perugini.
Locket commissioned from Tessier by Wilkie in 1868: a photographic portrait of his mother adorns one half and a curl of her hair the other. The locket was later gifted to Martha Rudd.
Mary Anderson, an American actress who became a good friend of Wilkie’s in the 1880s.
Letter dated 20 September 1886 from Wilkie to his young friend ‘Nannie’ Wynne. Note his sketch of the patch he wore when suffering from gout.
Doris Beresford (née Bartley), the actress grand-daughter of Caroline Graves.
Harriet Graves, Caroline’s daughter, on her wedding day, 12 March 1878.
Menu from the extravagant dinner at Wilkie’s home, 90 Gloucester Place, after the wedding of Harriet to Harry Bartley.
Martha Rudd and her family, most likely photographed during the First World War. From left to right: (top row) Harriet Dawson, Florence Dawson (née Sugg) and Marian Dawson; (bottom row) ‘Bobbie’ Dawson, Lionel Dawson (both children of William) and Martha Rudd.
Birth certificate of William Charles Collins Dawson, with the only known example of the handwriting of Martha Rudd: her signature.
Martha Rudd’s and Wilkie Collins’s son, William Charles Collins Dawson, in uniform.
Wilkie Collins by photographer Alexander Bassano, c.1880.
Wilkie Collins in a caricature by Adriano Cecciano for Vanity Fair, 3 February 1872.
Wilkie Collins in a painting attributed to Henry Gray, from a photograph by Napoleon Sarony, New York, c.1873/4.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
BOOKS BY WILKIE COLLINS
Memoirs of the Life of William Collins, Esq., R. A., 2 vols, London, Longman, Brown, Green and Longman, 1848
Antonina; or, The Fall of Rome, 3 vols, London, Richard Bentley, 1850
Rambles Beyond Railways; or, Notes in Cornwall Taken A-Foot, 1 vol., London, Richard Bentley, 1851
Mr Wray’s Cash-Box; or, the Mask and the Mystery, 1 vol., London, Richard Bentley, 1851
Basil: A Story of Modern Life, 3 vols, London, Richard Bentley, 1852
Hide and Seek, 3 vols, London, Richard Bentley, 1854
After Dark, 2 vols, London, Smith, Elder and Company, 1856
The Dead Secret, 2 vols, London, Bradbury & Evans, 1857
The Queen of Hearts, 3 vols, London, Hurst and Blackett, 1859
The Woman in White, 3 vols, London, Sampson Low, Son, & Co., 1860
No Name, 3 vols, London, Sampson Low, Son, & Co., 1862
My Miscellanies, 2 vols, London, Sampson Low, Son, & Co., 1863
Armadale, 2 vols, London, Smith, Elder and Co., 1866
The Moonstone: A Romance, 3 vols, London, Tinsley Brothers, 1868
Man and Wife, 3 vols, London, F. S. Ellis, 1870
Poor Miss Finch: A Novel, 3 vols, London, Richard Bentley and Son, 1872
Miss or Mrs? And Other Stories in Outline, 1 vol., London, Richard Bentley and Son, 1873
The New Magdalen, 2 vols, London, Richard Bentley and Son, 1873
The Frozen Deep and Other Stories, 2 vols, London, Richard Bentley and Son, 1874
The Law and the Lady, 3 vols, London, Chatto and Windus, 1875
The Two Destinies: A Romance, 2 vols, London, Chatto and Windus, 1876
A Rogue’s Life: From His Birth to His Marriage, 1 Vol., London, Richard Bentley and Son, 1879
The Fallen Leaves, 3 vols, London, Chatto and Windus, 1879
The Haunted Hotel: A Mystery of Modern Venice to which is added My Lady’s Money, 2 vols, London, Chatto and Windus, 1879
Jezebel’s Daughter, 3 vols, London, Chatto & Windus, 1880
The Black Robe, 3 vols, London, Chatto & Windus, 1881
Heart and Science: A Story of the Present Time, 3 vols, London, Chatto & Windus, 1883
I Say No, 3 vols, London, Chatto & Windus, 1884
The Evil Genius: A Domestic Story, 3 vols, London, Chatto & Windus, 1886
The Guilty River, 1 vol., Bristol, J. W. Arrowsmith, 1886
Little Novels, 3 vols, London, Chatto and Windus, 1887
The Legacy of Cain, 3 vols, London, Chatto & Windus, 1888
Blind Love, 3 vols, completed by Walter Besant after Collins’s death. London, Chatto & Windus, 1890
The Lazy Tour of Two Idle Apprentices,1 vol. (with Charles Dickens), London, Chapman and Hall, 1890
Iolani, or Tahiti as it was. A Romance. Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1999
KEY COLLECTIONS
Baker, William, Andrew Gasson, Graham Law and Paul Lewis (eds): The Public Face of Wilkie Collins: The Collected Letters, 4 vols, London, Pickering & Chatto, 2005. (In addition there are seven booklets of Addenda and Corrigenda, published by the Wilkie Collins Society.)
Baker, William and William M. Clarke (eds): The Letters of Wilkie Collins, Basingstoke, Macmillan Press, 1999
House, Madeline, Graham Storey, Kathleen Tillotson et al. (eds): The Letters of Charles Dickens, Pilgrim edition, 12 vols, Oxford Clarendon Press, 1965–2002
Thompson, Julian: Wilkie Collins: The Complete Shorter Fiction, London, Robinson, 1995
SELECTED REFERENCE WORKS
Ackroyd, Peter: Wilkie Collins, London, Chatto & Windus, 2012
Alpin, John (ed.): The Correspondence and Journals of the Thackeray Family, London, Pickering and Chatto, 2011
Anderson, Mary: A Few Memories, London, Osgood, McIlvaine & Co, 1896
Andres, Sophia: The Pre-Raphaelite Art of the Victorian Novel, Columbus, Ohio, Ohio State University Press, 2005
Antrobus Edmund E.: The Prison and the School, London, Staunton & Sons, 1853
Antrobus Edmund E.: Anarchy and Order, London, Staunton & Sons, 1848
Archer, Frank: An Actor’s Notebooks, London, Sampson Low, Marston, Searle & Rivington, 1882
Ashley, Robert: Wilkie Collins, Arthur Barker, 1952
Ashton, Rosemary: 142 Strand, London, Jonathan Cape, 2007
Ashton, Rosemary: G.H. Lewes: A Life, Oxford, OUP, 1991
Baker, Michael: The Rise of the Victorian Actor, London, Croom Helm, 1978
Baker, William: A Wilkie Collins Chronology, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 2007
Baker, William: Wilkie Collins’ Library: A Reconstruction, Westwood, Ct., Greenwood Press, 2002
Bancroft, Sir Squire and Lady Marie Effie: The Bancrofts: Recollections of Sixty Years, London, John Murray, 1909
Bancroft, Squire: Empty Chairs, London, John Murray, 1925
Barlow, Kate: The Abode of Love, Ed
inburgh, Mainstream, 2006
Beard, Nathaniel: ‘Some Recollections of Yesterday’, Temple Bar, July 1894
Beaton, Richard: ‘The World is Hard on Women’; Women and Marriage in the novels of Wilkie Collins, thesis for Doctorate of Philosophy at University of Wales, 1987
Bonham-Carter, Victor: Authors by Profession (2 vols), Society of Authors, 1978
Bronkhurst, Judith: William Holman Hunt: A Catalogue Raisonée, New Haven and London, Yale University Press, 2006
Caine, Hall: My Story, London, William Heinemann, 1908
Carnell, Jennifer: The Literary Lives of Mary Elizabeth Braddon, Hastings, Sensation Press, 2000
Clarke, Alison Thora: ‘The Other Twin: A Study of the Plays of Wilkie Collins’, PhD thesis, King’s College London, July 2005
Clarke, William: Rambles around Marylebone, Wilkie Collins Society, 1974
Clarke, William: The Secret Life of Wilkie Collins, London, Allison & Busby, 1988
Wilkie Collins: A Life of Sensation Page 45