January 1866, p. 11; 26 January 1866, p. 11 .
30 LMA, A/FH/A8/1/3/26, 3 January 1819 (no number); A/FH/A8/1/3/57/1, 9 February 1850,
Petition #14; Barret-Ducrocq, Love in the Time of Victoria, p. 65.
31 R. McMullen, Victorian Outsider: A Biography of J. A. M. Whistler (New York: E. P.
Dutton, 1973), pp. 90–152; 164–86; 242–4; S. Weintraub, Whistler: A Biography (New York:
Weybright and Talley, 1974), pp. 68–122; 154–327; G. H. Fleming, James Abbott McNeill
Whistler: A Life (New York: St Martin’s Press, 1991), pp. 88–120; 170–255; Holyroyd,
Augustus John, I, 101.
32 S. Mumm, ‘“Not worse than other girls”’, 529–30; E. F. Payne, The Charity of Charles
Dickens: His Interest in the Home for Fal en Women and A History of the Strange Case of
Caroline Maynard Thompson (Boston, MA: The Bibliophile Society, 1929), pp. 52–8. See
also Mayhew, Life and Labour of the People of London, IV, 243–4; Bartley, Prostitution,
pp. 6–12.
33 Hall v. Palmer (1844), 67 English Reports 491–4; The Times, 8 May 1844, p. 8; 9 May 1844,
p. 6; In re Val ance – Val ance v. Blagden (1884), 48 Justice of the Peace 598.
34 T. Carver, Friedrich Engels: His Life and Thought (New York: St Martin’s Press, 1990), pp.
150–61; S. Marcus, Engels, Manchester and the Working Class (New York: Random House,
1974), pp. 98–101 (quote from p. 99); G. Mayer, Friedrich Engels: A Biography (London:
Chapman & Hall Ltd, 1936), pp. 43, 69, 124–48, 171–4, 190–6, 226.
35 S. Herstein, A Mid-Victorian Feminist: Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon (New Haven, CT:
Yale University Press, 1985), pp. 1–10; P. Hirsch, Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon, 1827–1891:
Feminist, Artist and Rebel (London: Chatto & Windus, 1998), pp. 8–15; 96–8; Clarke, The
Secret Life of Wilkie Col ins, pp. 107–22; 169–85.
36 A. Noakes, Wil iam Frith: Extraordinary Victorian Painter (London: Jupiter, 1978), p.
134. For other examples, see R. L. Patten, George Cruikshank’s Life, Times and Art 2 vols
(London: Lutterworth Press, 1996), II, 286–8; 391; 491–6; 513–17; and C. Tomalin, The
Invisible Woman: The Story of Nel y Ternan and Charles Dickens (New York: Penguin
Books, 1990), pp. 96–149; 167–96.
37 Mayer, Friedrich Engels, p. 226; W. O. Henderson, The Life of Friedrich Engels 2 vols
(London: Frank Cass, 1976), I, 104 (for quote), 220–1; Marcus, Engels, Manchester, and
Copyright © 2008. Manchester University Press. All rights reserved.
the Working Class, pp. 100–1; Carver, Friedrich Engels, pp. 150–8. Engels did marry Lizzie
Burns on her deathbed.
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cross-class cohabitation
38 Carver, Friedrich Engels, p. 159; Marcus, Engels, Manchester, and the Working Class,
pp. 100–1.
39 Peters, The King of Inventors, pp. 196–9; 295–9; 415–16; W. Baker and W. Clarke (eds), The
Letters of Wilkie Col ins 2 vols (London: Macmil an, 1999), I, xxxiii (for quote); II, 368,
376; W. Collins, ‘Bold words by a bachelor’, Household Words 14 (1856), 505–7.
40 Tosh, A Man’s Place, pp. 170–94; Brady, Masculinity and Male Homosexuality, pp. 25–49.
41 Tosh, Manliness and Masculinities, p. 76.
42 Mayer, Friedrich Engels, pp. 191–6; 226, quote from p. 226; T. Newman and R. Watkinson,
Ford Madox Brown and the Pre-Raphaelite Circle (London: Chatto and Windus, 1991),
pp. 120–3, quote from p. 121.
43 Hirsch, Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon, p. 97; Clarke, The Secret Life of Wilkie Col ins,
p. 186; D. Petre, The Secret Orchard of Roger Ackerley (New York: George Braziller,
1975), pp. 62–3.
44 D. Du Maurier (ed.), The Young George Du Maurier: A Selection of his Letters, 1860–67
(London: Peter Davies, 1951), p. 227; McMullen, Victorian Outsider, p. 120; Weintraub,
Whistler: A Biography, pp. 89–90.
45 Hirsch, Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon, pp. 10–13, 97; quote from p. 10.
46 Holman-Hunt, My Grandfather, p. 174.
47 Croden v. Brimble, ASSI 22/42; Bristol Mercury, 4 July 1896, p. 3.
48 Blum v. Reeve, Oxfordshire, Buckinghamshire, and Northamptonshire Telegraph, 16 July
1873, p. 3.
49 Newman and Watkinson, Ford Madox Brown, pp. 45–6.
50 Ibid. , pp. 54–64, quote from p. 64; J. Marsh, Pre-Raphaelite Sisterhood (London: Quartet
Books, 1985), pp. 37–43.
51 V. Surtees (ed.), The Diary of Ford Madox Brown (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press,
1981), pp. 79–80; 139; 182; Newman and Watkinson, Ford Madox Brown, pp. 72–96; Marsh,
Pre-Raphaelite Sisterhood, pp. 104–6, 240–1.
52 J. Marsh, The Legend of Lizzie Siddal (London: Quartet Books, 1989), pp. 149–65; Pre-
Raphaelite Sisterhood, pp. 15–36; D. Cherry and G. Pollock, ‘Woman as sign in Pre-
Raphaelite literature: A study of the representation of Elizabeth Siddal ’, Art History 7
(1984), 207–11; B. Bauer, ‘Rescuing Ophelia: Gendered Interpretations of the Life and Work of
Elizabeth Siddal ’ (BA thesis, Smith Col ege, Northampton, MA 1995), pp. 39–44.
53 D. Cherry, Painting Women: Victorian Women Artists (New York: Routledge,
1993), p. 189; Bauer, ‘Rescuing Ophelia’, p. 45; Herstein, A Mid-Victorian Feminist,
pp. 95–7; 100–1; S. Weintraub, Four Rosettis, pp. 74–8; W. Rosetti (ed.), Pre-Raphaelite
Diaries and Letters (London: Hurst and Blackett, Ltd, 1900), pp. 43–7; Marsh, The Legend
of Lizzie Siddal, pp. 42–6; 147–8; Pre-Raphaelite Sisterhood, pp. 47–50, 88–90.
54 Weintraub, Four Rosettis, pp. 86–98; Cherry, Painting Women, pp. 99–100.
55 Weintraub, Four Rosettis, pp. 108–25; Newman and Watkinson, Ford Madox Brown,
pp. 132; 138–9; Marsh, Pre-Raphaelite Sisterhood, pp. 115–17; 130–5; 177–85, 197–203; 210–23.
56 Clark Amor, William Holman Hunt, pp. 102–59; Marsh, Pre-Raphaelite Sisterhood,
pp. 58–66; 107–9.
57 Clark Amor, William Holman Hunt, pp. 159–79; Marsh, Pre-Raphaelite Sisterhood,
pp. 223–8.
58 Newman and Watkinson, Ford Madox Brown, pp. 178–89, quote from p. 179.
Copyright © 2008. Manchester University Press. All rights reserved.
59 Weintraub, Four Rosettis, pp. 127–8; 135; 161; 201–2; Marsh, Pre-Raphaelite Sisterhood,
pp. 141–59; 233–40.
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living in sin
60 Weintraub, Four Rosettis, pp. 219–20; Marsh, Pre-Raphaelite Sisterhood, pp. 227–8; 306–
28; 353–4, quote from p. 325.
61 Halperin, Gissing, pp. 16–19; 26–37; Selig, George Gissing, pp. 8–9; P. Coustil as, London
and the Life of Literature, pp. 22–3; M. Roberts, The Private Life of Henry Maitland
(London: The Richards Press, 1958), pp. 28–33; 40–3; 49–57; 75–6; 109; quote from p. 75.
62 Halperin, Gissing, pp. 41–5, 102–4.
1911), pp. 181; 197–8.
64 T. Ransom, The Mysterious Marie Corel i: Queen of the Victorian Bestsel ers (Stroud:
Sutton Publishing, 1999), pp. 9–14, quote from p. 11; E. Bigland, Marie Corel i: The Woman
and the Legend (London: Jarrolds Publishers Ltd, 1953), pp. 12–19.
Copyright © 2008. Manchester University Press. All rights reserved.
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8
Radical couples, 1790–1850
From the 1790s to the early twentieth century, some couples
consciously dissented from the marriage ceremony because of
its indissolubility, the influence of the state or the church on it, or
the disabilities that it gave to women. Often the dissent from marriage
was a part of a larger critique – for example, by anarchists, socialists, or
feminists. At times, too, those who disliked marriage did so from bitter
experience, radicalised by their own marital failures. Whatever the cause,
these unions diverged by gender. Because of the economic weakness of
women, they seldom wholeheartedly supported experimentation, and
power relationships existed even in supposedly free unions. In addition,
marital dissent brought a raft of complications with wider kin and society.
What differentiated many radicals was not necessarily their
behaviour, since so many non-radical people cohabited. The public nature
of the dissent, and the couples’ broad analyses of marriage, set them apart.
Radicals felt duty-bound to explain their actions in order to make their
society into a better place. In the final two chapters, I first explore how and
why free unions either did or did not work in particular couples and radical
groups. Second, I emphasise the continuity of the critiques of marriage.
Many of the complaints about the institution were long-lived, stretching
back to the early modern period. Most groups, then, diagnosed the il s of
marriage similarly, though they differed on the suggested cures.
Marital dissenters throughout the century insisted they were more
moral and equitable than those who supported legal marriage, and few
supported ‘free love’, i.e., promiscuity. Instead, they wanted to make unions
between men and women as ‘real’ as possible. The majority did not want
to abolish marriage, but to reform it by focusing on the relationship as
the barometer of a genuine marriage. A ‘true’ marriage was one of hearts
Copyright © 2008. Manchester University Press. All rights reserved.
and minds, whatever its legal status. Thus, their suggestions were for
monogamous partnerships, but with flexibility about divorce and equal
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living in sin
rights for women. Indeed, for marriage to be an equal ‘contract’, the rights
and duties would have to be the same for both partners, and both should
have a say in the terms. Unsurprisingly, then, cal s for divorce reform and
equality for women recurred again and again. In addition, the view of
marriage as a contract sat uneasily with a belief in marriage as a sacrament,
so resistance to the church also threaded through these critiques.
Though these ideas seem mild to modern ears, they alarmed most
people in the nineteenth century. Opponents of reform feared that
without strict laws of marriage and divorce, society would disintegrate.
In particular, they feared that men would not behave responsibly towards
women or children, a concern for many women’s advocates as wel . In
addition, religious leaders fought against secularising marriage, insisting
that marriage was a sacred rite. Though Parliament had undermined this
view in 1753, conservatives fought a rearguard action against any more
change for the rest of the century. Those who wanted to challenge marriage,
then, faced a daunting task.
Pioneers and revolutionaries
The roots of marital dissent go back at least to the seventeenth century. In
particular, the period of the Civil Wars saw an outpouring of criticism for
the church and traditional marriage practices. Puritans had long advocated
marriage as a love relationship, but other groups went even further in the
1640s and 1650s. Quakers, for instance, promoted women’s equality by
eliminating the vow of obedience, and other groups pressed for divorce
on equal grounds. The government of the Interregnum even passed a
civil marriage statute. In some ways, these arguments prefigured later
critiques, but, as John Gillis has pointed out, many were backward-looking
and just as patriarchal as the system they disdained. Nor did they survive
the restoration of order in 1660; Parliament repealed civil marriage, and
the church and state marriage system returned in full force for the next
century.1
Sustained public debate about marriage only returned at the end
of the eighteenth century. The 1790s was a fervent decade for change in
England. Reformers drew inspiration from the French Revolution and
agitated for a more representative Britain. Though most of the energy of
the movement went into the public sphere, the fight against despotism
turned to the home as wel . After al , if one believed that all humans were
born with reason, then women had reason as well as men. And if they did,
Copyright © 2008. Manchester University Press. All rights reserved.
the restrictions of their lives within marriage were unjust. Furthermore,
many of these reformers had a rational approach to religion, so did not
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radical couples, 1790–1850
regard marriage as a sacrament and had no horror of divorce. Tom Paine,
Robert Burns, and Thomas Spence all had heterodox views about marriage,
arguing for married women’s equality within marriage and that divorce
should be more available. As Spence put it, ‘“what signifies Reforms of
Government or Redress of Public Grievances, if people cannot have their
domestic grievances redressed?”’2
All the same, few of these writers practiced free unions in their own
lives, and most of those who cohabited did so because they had no choice.
For instance, Mary Robinson, a former actress, was a fervent supporter of
Charles James Fox and an early feminist, but her cohabitation with Banastre
Ta
rleton was unmarried because she was already married to someone else.3
Two writers in this period were exceptions to this rule – William Godwin
and Mary Wol stonecraft. Both stressed the centrality of human reason, but
their approaches to marital problems differed. Godwin saw the issue as one
of personal liberty, while Wol stonecraft centred on women’s difficulties.
Both influenced later radicals, but also had uneven personal lives. In spite
of – in fact, because of – their pioneering behaviour, their reputations
posed problems for future cohabitees.
Godwin expressed his opinion of marriage in his work, Enquiry
Concerning Political Justice, in 1793. He was influenced in his views of
marriage by Thomas Holcroft, his friend and col aborator. Holcroft argued
that ‘All individual property is an evil – Marriage makes woman individual
property – Therefore marriage is evil’.4 Godwin adopted this logic in his
work, calling marriage ‘the worst of monopolies’ for both sexes. Anything
that shackled the human mind – law, property, militarism – was wrong,
and he included marriage on this list. The whole process was irrational
to Godwin: ‘The method is, for a thoughtless and romantic youth of
each sex, to come together, to see each other, for a few times, and under
circumstances full of delusion, and then to vow eternal attachment.’
Marriage only worked, then, when both partners lied to themselves and
pretended to have the same opinions of each other no matter how much
changed. He suggested abolishing it in favour of a system in which ‘each
man would select for himself a partner, to whom he will adhere, as long
as that adherence shall continue to be the choice of both parties.’ He did
not ignore women’s problems but argued that a rational economic system
would support them.5
Godwin’s first point, in particular, resonated throughout the nineteenth
century. How could anyone promise to feel the same way forever? And
how could marriage be moral if it lacked emotional and physical unity? On
Copyright © 2008. Manchester University Press. All rights reserved.
the other hand, Godwin’s second point, and his suggestion for replacing
marriage, appealed more to men than women. He assumed the major
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