The Real Beatrix Potter

by Nadia Cohen

  She completely lacked vanity, and was fond of retelling a story about a tramp who met her trudging up a lane to check on her sheep during a storm, dressed in her usual jumble of ill-fitting clothes, with a sack thrown over her head, to add an extra layer of warmth. To Beatrix’s great amusement the tramp coming towards her automatically assumed she was homeless just like him, and apparently called out to her: ‘It’s sad weather for the likes o’ thee and me!’

  She also took it as a great compliment when she met gypsy travellers and they too made the assumption that she was one of them, judging by her unusual appearance and name – gypsies in the Lake District were sometimes known as tinkers or potters. They too warmed to her quickly and would invite Beatrix to join their select inner auction rings at country fairs, usually closed to outsiders, allowing her to indulge her surprising taste for buying up old iron knick-knacks. Beatrix would stomp around in her heavy clogs, carrying her stick, and made it abundantly clear that she knew exactly what she was talking about before anybody could dare to try and overcharge or short change her.

  Beatrix was a formidable opponent at these auctions, confidently outbidding any man without a hint of shyness or awkwardness, and she would not let anybody take advantage of her simply because she was female. She may have been considered a member of the weaker sex, but when Beatrix was marching between the sheep pens judging and criticising the livestock on offer, she was just as formidable as any of her male peers.

  Often she was joined at the auctions and fairs by one of the trusted shepherds she employed – Tom Storey worked for her at Hill Top, George Walker and Anthony Benson tended the flock at Troutbeck, and Tilberthwaite was run by Tom Stoddart. She relied on all of them to give her straightforward, honest advice whenever she needed. Gaining the grudging respect of the shepherds may have been a hard-won battle, but it was all that mattered to Beatrix – she was not interested in her reputation among the other locals who generally tended to view her with amusement or curiosity. Once Beatrix had proved that she was serious, she was granted the great honour of being invited to join the ranks of Herdwick Sheep Breeders Association, and over time the farmers – some of whom had been members for many years – came to accept her as something of an authority figure.

  The demand for Herdwick’s hardwearing wool was starting to dry up in the 1950s and 1960s, when cheap and easy-to-clean linoleum flooring became popular and carpets started to go out of fashion. Beatrix was determined to find another use for the wool, as the farmers had no choice but to shear their sheep in the summer and she could not bear to see it go to waste after their flocks had thrived in the area for centuries.

  Her work with the sheep may not have gained her anything approaching the widespread recognition and acclaim that she received from her great literary legacy, but it won Beatrix the respect of the people who mattered most to her: shepherds and farmers. Her fellow breeders learnt to value her opinion, and when she spoke at Herdwick Breeders Association meetings they listened quietly and respectfully.

  She was overwhelmed to be told that she had impressed them so much at the regular meetings she attended that she was elected as chair of the committee. It was the first time in the history of the association that a woman had been allowed such an esteemed position. Beatrix was first astonished, then proud and really rather amused to be asked, especially as most of the male members tended to gather in local pubs to discuss the pressing issues which affected them in particular – such as the harshness of the climate and the terrain which affected the softness of the wool as well as the quality of the meat. She disapproved strongly of pubs and these gatherings were the only times she could be persuaded to set foot inside one.

  She wrote to her American friend Miss Mahoney, sharing her enormous satisfaction at the result of the election, even though by that time the market for tough blue Hardwick wool was already dwindling fast: ‘I am in the chair at Herdwick Breeders Association meetings. You would laugh to see me, amongst the other old farmers, usually in a tavern, after a sheep fair. Briefly, our Herdwick sheep with their hard waterproof jackets are the only sort that can thrive on the high fells.’

  Beatrix was still President Elect when she died and although she never quite managed to find a lucrative market for the sheep or their wool, Herdwicks still survive in small numbers in the Lake District to this day.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Beatrix had not particularly enjoyed much of her youth. She had felt awkward, shy and isolated, but relaxing into middle age suited her. She no longer had to pretend to be interested in what anyone but her beloved husband William thought of her. Free of the clutches of her interfering and overbearing parents, she had found meaning to her life and spent thirty years living peacefully in the Lakeland countryside, enjoying an unpretentious, rustic lifestyle that could not have been further from her well-heeled urban upbringing.

  Beatrix felt that she finally had what she had always longed for – a real purpose to her life.

  Although she and William preferred to keep themselves to themselves up at Castle Cottage, it was a serene isolation, and nothing like the sorrowful reclusiveness Beatrix had endured in the nursery in Bolton Gardens.

  Their peace had been shattered by the First World War and the arrival of the indomitable Helen Potter in the Lake District. When war had been looming across Europe some years earlier, and Beatrix’s elderly widowed mother was alarmed at facing the prospect alone in London, she had pleaded with Beatrix to return to Kensington to take care of her. Beatrix had no intention of leaving either William or abandoning the farm without knowing how long it might be before she could return. Eventually she suggested that Helen should move to a neighbouring cottage in Sawrey, accompanied by her sister-in-law until the war was over and it was safe to go home, and her mother reluctantly agreed.

  ‘It is the best plan,’ Beatrix explained to Millie Warne. ‘And I tell William it is highly complimentary to him that these old ladies take refuge in the neighbourhood; but it does keep me on the trot. I have had rather a hard summer.’

  The outbreak of the First World War had meant Beatrix needed to shift her priorities anyway. They were tough years for the farming community, since the war meant almost all the young men from the villages – including most of her shepherds, labourers and farm hands – had been called up to join military campaigns across Europe, leaving rural areas desperately short handed. It was a setback for Beatrix, but instead of letting her land fall into ruins she rolled up her sleeves and set about doing much of the manual labour herself.

  The changes suited Beatrix perfectly since they gave her a good reason to be fully focused on the demands of new government directives, which insisted that most farming land was required to grow food to help the war effort.

  Most of the men working on her farms had been called up for active military service, so Beatrix mucked in with whatever needed doing, and even when food was in short supply, her priority was always her animals. She would trudge out to them in all weathers to ensure they were fed, according to the wife of a forester on a nearby estate who later shared her husband’s fond memories of their eccentric neighbour:

  When food was scarce during the First World War he came upon her one wet cold November day gathering acorns in the woods for her pigs. She had a shovel and a wheelbarrow for the job, and was fit up to brave the weather in a short thick wool skirt, a man’s jacket and cap and a sack over her shoulders. She would have to wheel that heavy barrow up a long steep hill home just to give the animals she loved a treat.

  Beatrix did not mind the hard work, except when she briefly lost the precious gold engagement ring which Norman had given her when he proposed years earlier and she had never taken off, even after marrying William.

  ‘This might have been a sorry and ashamed letter,’ Beatrix wrote to his sister Millie,

  I lost Norman’s ring in the cornfield – pulled off while lifting wet sheaves with my fingers slipped under the bands; but it turned up amongst the remains of some wet stuff thro
wn down for the hens. I had untied many on the threshing floor in the hopes of finding it.

  I am glad I was spared that one last crowning distress. I should have had just one consolation, it was a pretty, quiet, sheltered field to lie in, if it had not been found. My hand felt very strange and uncomfortable without it.

  Even after peace was declared across Europe after four long years of bitter fighting, with millions of soldiers lost, life among these remote rural communities did not return to normal. The war had changed everybody, and families were torn apart as many men never came home. It was the first time family had felt like something precious to Beatrix, and she wanted to keep her elderly mother close for what would remain of her life. They had lost both Rupert and Bertram, and even though Helen was in her eighties and resistant to change, she had to agree that there was nothing much left for her in London. These two women who had been at loggerheads for decades surprised each other by agreeing that Helen should find a permanent home close to her daughter in the Lake District, and sell the house in Bolton Gardens.

  With Beatrix’s help, Helen found a house that met her exacting standards and moved her entire household from Kensington to Linden How, a large and imposing property on the other side of Lake Windermere from Sawrey. The Potters had rented the same place several times in the past for their previous family holidays and it held happy memories for Helen.

  Beatrix arranged for a number of her mother’s servants to be installed in the new house to help take care of her, and had her furniture sent up from London, as well as her menagerie of caged canaries. Although Beatrix was not particularly well herself at the time, suffering from a severe bout of bronchitis, she supervised every aspect of the move to ensure the upheaval went smoothly for Helen, including making the journey up and down to London to help with the sale of their former family home, and then being on hand to oversee the unpacking of all her mother’s belongings when they arrived in Windermere.

  It was an arduous process since Helen did not want to be parted from any of her treasured possessions, or indeed many items that had belonged to Rupert. In the end it took a month to get Helen fully settled, and Beatrix found herself searching endlessly for possessions her mother was sure had been lost in the move.

  Beatrix did her best to keep her temper, even when it came to meeting some of her mother’s more challenging demands which even included hauling a grand piano upstairs: ‘I am about sick of that furniture – what with my mother asking for things I never saw, and various disappointments,’ Beatrix wrote. ‘My mother still searching at present for title deeds and several sets of old teeth and a black bag and a book of Braille writing and various other things.’

  Once she was finally settled at Linden How, Helen lived happily there for many years, fighting fit and healthy, and sticking to the exact same punctual routine she always had. Life went on almost as if she had never left Kensington. She worked on her embroidery every morning, was served lunch by a servant on the dot of one o’clock and took a trip out with the coachman each afternoon. When she died in 1932 at the age of 93, Beatrix wrote to her old friend Edith Rawnsley, saying:

  My mother’s long life was a link with times that are passed away, though still vivid in our memory – the old leisurely pleasant days of stately carriage horses, and of the Keswick coach.

  Latterly she has lived so retired that modern changes have not much affected her. Her chief interests were her canaries, he needlework and her little dog. She was wonderfully clear in mind but I am glad she is at rest.

  Helen died before her beloved former home at Bolton Gardens was destroyed in the sustained bombing of the Blitz during the Second World War. A commemorative blue plaque testifies to Beatrix having been born on the site, which is now home to Bousfield Primary School. Beatrix inherited the entire Potter fortune.

  As she reached her seventies, Beatrix was more cheerful than perhaps she had ever been. She was not afraid of old age, or particularly worried about the thought of dying, but she did at least start wearing a white frilled cap on more formal occasions, as was deemed appropriate for women of her age.

  She wrote to her cousin Caroline:

  I do not resent older age if it brings slowness it brings experience and weight. It is a pity the wisdom and experience of old age are largely wasted.

  I mind it little – with one or two reservations. For one thing (to quote a friend) ‘Thank God I have the seeing eye’ – that is to say, as I lie in bed I can walk step by step on the fell and rough lands, seeing every stone and flower and patch of bog and cotton-grass where my old legs will never take me again.

  Also do you not feel it is rather pleasing to be so much wiser than quantities of young idiots? I begin to assert myself at seventy.

  In another letter Beatrix made it perfectly clear she had no intention of retiring and planned to keep up her work on the farms as long as she could:

  I would rather keep going till I drop – early or late – never mind what the work is, so long as it is useful and well done.

  I am sometimes surprised at myself, being contented. I lift my eyes to the hills, and I am content to look at them from below. I did dream of getting an old pony (or a donkey) but I think I am safer pottering about on my own old legs.

  With old age came a lack of patience, and Beatrix was getting something of a reputation for her short temper and ferocious outbursts, sometimes speaking bluntly to the point of rudeness. She also became known for her formidable, unblinking silent stares, but none of them were ever directed at her beloved Willie. The couple were devoted to each other until the end. With William by her side, Beatrix seemed to face her failing health with a calm sense of acceptance. She was weaker now and struggling to climb from the village up the lane to Hill Top. Her breathlessness did not concern her, but what saddened her most was the thought of William being left alone.

  Having waited so long to be married, she found the companionship he brought so much more rewarding. After enduring the heartbreak of losing Norman, Beatrix treasured her rich relationship with William dearly. ‘I married very happily,’ she wrote. ‘What are the words in The Tempest? Spring come to you at the farthest, in the very end of harvest?’

  Beatrix consulted Willie about every decision she made, and certainly every time she acquired land or property they would discuss all aspects of the purchase together. She was satisfied by her quiet marriage; she knew that William loved her, they agreed on most things and very rarely argued. Although she was a notoriously practical and unsentimental woman in all other aspects of her life, with William she was quite different. Beatrix was respectful and deferential to her husband, and valued his views. As they aged together, the couple grew closer, more gentle and intimate as they relished the gentle tranquility they shared.

  Recalling one particularly romantic evening, Beatrix wrote: ‘Today, Tuesday, is a hot and windy day again, we shall soon be hay making if this intends to last. Yesterday evening was the first really warm night. William and I fished (and least I rowed) till darkness; coming down the lane about eleven. It was lovely on the tarn, not a breath of wind. I see the first rose is coming out at Hill Top.’

  She and William had made Castle Cottage their marital home after their wedding. It was the place where they ate their meals together and where Willie sometimes worked on his law books and property deeds when he was not required in the office, but Beatrix still retreated to Hill Top to work in peace and to answer her scores of letters. They occasionally spent nights apart as from time to time she would sleep at Hill Top too, and it was a mutually convenient arrangement that suited them both perfectly.

  Beatrix would drop into Hill Top as often as she could, perhaps to write or to tend to her beloved kitchen garden, opening the windows and keeping the place well maintained. All her old furniture and china was still there, treasures she had accumulated over the years, many of which appeared in the pages of her books. She could not bring herself to part with some of the more sentimental treasures that had meant so much to her,
dating back years before she met William or even Norman. She also kept the trays of insect specimens which she and Bertram had collected and carefully preserved together as children, many of her father’s photographs, and she still kept Norman’s bellows by the fire at Hill Top.

  Over the years she had fully transformed into a native Westmoreland woman, and her friends and neighbours in the dales no longer regarded her as an outsider. The elocution lessons she received from her governesses at Bolton Gardens were a thing of the past; she spoke in the native northern dialect, and slipped into it when she wrote to farmers or tenants.

  Some of her last letters include local idioms such as ‘the heifers have calved easy’, or ‘the last potatoes took up a disgrace.’ She joined parties and celebrations, and was delighted when the local children taught her their songs and rhymes around the piano at Christmas, or invited her to join in their skipping games and country dances. Even when she could no longer keep up with the dance steps herself, she still enthusiastically helped audition the teams for competitions and generously paid for their costumes when they appeared in festivals and performances. She would smile fondly at the children and reward them with shillings.

  William, who had been very athletic in his younger years, was still a nimble dancer and Beatrix would sit and watch him for hours, laughing and beating time in her lap. When the evenings grew dark she and William would return home to one of their many shared projects, which included genealogy, and they spent several long winter nights researching her mother’s Crompton family tree together.