Deirdre Marculescu
From 1805 until her death in April 1824, Althea Fanshawe rarely left her home in Brock Street, Bath. Despite most of her activities being curtailed by the effects of epilepsy, she maintained independence and by applying her thoughts to educate young people, she successfully published ’Thoughts on Affection’, as an education in manners. The maintenance of a diary also became important in her determined efforts to stay connected. There she recorded not only familial and local events but also news from family & friends across continents, where their actions were helping to shape our modern world out of war and revolt. To create her methodically structured diary, Althea gathered news from letters, newspapers, periodicals & conversations. With many cousins prominent in public and clerical life, she interlinked their news with that received from her brother, a General in the Imperial Russian Army & her sister, with a family of officers in the British Army & Navy. For the next 200 years, Althea Fanshawe’s Diary passed through the careful hands of several descending nephews & nieces until more recently it was received into the Fanshawe Collection at Valence House Museum. Now, with that opportunity to transcribe & fully research the diary, numerous fascinating stories & personalities have emerged from the entries so that we may view the panorama of early 19th century life ’seen’ by Althea from her window.
