Mrs. Austen writes glowingly about their stay at STONELEIGH ABBEY:

In 1806, the recently widowed Mrs. Austen visited Adlestrop Rectory in Gloucestershire with her two daughters, where they stayed with her cousins Rev. Thomas Leigh and his sister Elizabeth.  During their visit,  Rev. Thomas Leigh learned that the Hon. Mary Leigh of Stoneleigh Abbey had died and that he would inherit the great house, whose origins go back to 1154. The Austen women traveled with Rev. Leigh to Warwickshire. In the following letter, Mrs. Austen writes glowingly about their stay at the mansion:

“STONELEIGH ABBEY,

“August 13, 1806. 

 “MY DEAR MARY, – The very day after I wrote you my last letter, Mr. Hill wrote his intention of being at Adlestrop with Mrs. Hill on Monday, the 4th, and his wish that Mr. Leigh and family should return with him to Stoneleigh the following day, as there was much business for the executors awaiting them at the Abbey, and he was hurried for time. All this accordingly took place, and here we found ourselves on Tuesday (that is yesterday se’nnight) eating fish, venison, and all manner of good things, in a large and noble parlour, hung round with family portraits. The house is larger than I could have supposed. We cannot find our way about it – I mean the best part; as to the offices, which were the Abbey, Mr. Leigh almost despairs of ever finding his way about them. I have proposed his setting up direction posts at the angles. I had expected to find everything about the place very fine and all that, but I had no idea of its being so beautiful. I had pictured to myself long avenues, dark rookeries, and dismal yew trees, but here are no such dismal things. The Avon runs near the house, amidst green meadows, bounded by large and beautiful woods, full of delightful walks. “At nine in the morning we say our prayers in a handsome chapel, of which the pulpit, &c. &c., is now hung with black. Then follows breakfast, consisting of chocolate, coffee, and tea, plum cake, pound cake, hot rolls, cold rolls, bread and butter, and dry toast for me. The house steward, a fine, large, respectable-looking man, orders all these matters. Mr. Leigh and Mr. Hill are busy a great part of the morning. We walk a good deal, for the woods are impenetrable to the sun, even in the middle of an August day. I do not fail to spend some part of every day in the kitchen garden, where the quantity of small fruit exceeds anything you can form an idea of. This large family, with the assistance of a great many blackbirds and thrushes, cannot prevent it from rotting on the trees. The gardens contain four acres and a half. The ponds supply excellent fish, the park excellent venison; there is great quantity of rabbits, pigeons, and all sorts of poultry. There is a delightful dairy, where is made butter, good Warwickshire cheese and cream ditto. One manservant is called the baker, and does nothing but brew and bake.

The number of casks in the strong-beer cellar is beyond imagination; those in the small-beer cellar bear no proportion, though, by the bye, the small beer might be called ale without misnomer. This is an odd sort of letter. I write just as things come into my head, a bit now and a bit then. “Now I wish to give you some idea of the inside of this vast house – first premising that there are forty-five windows in front, which is quite straight, with a flat roof, fifteen in a row. You go up a considerable flight of steps to the door, for some of the offices are underground, and enter a large hall. On the right hand is the dining-room and within that the breakfast-room, where we generally sit; and reason good, ’tis the only room besides the chapel, which looks towards the view. On the left hand of the hall is the best drawing-room and within a smaller one. These rooms are rather gloomy with brown wainscot and dark crimson furniture, so we never use them except to walk through to the old picture gallery. Behind the smaller drawing-room is the state-bedchamber – an alarming apartment, with its high, dark crimson velvet bed, just fit for an heroine. The old gallery opens into it. Behind the hall and parlours there is a passage all across the house, three staircases and two small sitting-rooms. There are twenty-six bedchambers in the new part of the house and a great many, some very good ones, in the old. There is also another gallery, fitted up with modern prints on a buff paper, and a large billiard-room. Every part of the house and offices is kept so clean, that were you to cut your finger I do not think you could find a cobweb to wrap it up in. I need not have written this long letter, for I have a presentiment that if these good people live until next year you will see it all with your own eyes. “Our visit has been a most pleasant one. We all seem in good humour, disposed to be pleased and endeavouring to be agreeable, and I hope we succeed. Poor Lady Saye and Sele, to be sure, is rather tormenting, though sometimes amusing, and affords Jane many a good laugh, but she fatigues me sadly on the whole. To-morrow we depart. We have seen the remains of Kenilworth, which afforded us much entertainment, and I expect still more from the sight of Warwick Castle, which we are going to see to-day. The Hills are gone, and my cousin, George Cook, is come. A Mr. Holt Leigh was here yesterday and gave us all franks. He is member for, and lives at, Wigan in Lancashire, and is a great friend of young Mr. Leigh’s, and I believe a distant cousin. He is a single man on the wrong side of forty, chatty and well-bred and has a large estate. There are so many legacies to pay and so many demands that I do not think Mr. Leigh will find that he has more money than he knows what to do with this year, whatever he may do next. The funeral expenses, proving the will, and putting the servants in both houses in mourning must come to a considerable sum; there were eighteen men servants.” – Letter, Hill, Jane Austen: Her Homes and Her Friends
stoneleigh-abbey 

Jane Austen’s mother, Cassandra Leigh, was related to an aristocratic family.

Sir Thomas Leigh was Lord Mayor of London when Elizabeth I became Queen and in the following century, another Leigh was made a baron for helping the Royalists against Cromwell. The family became huge landowners, with estates mainly in the Midlands of England. Cassandra Leigh, the daughter of a clergyman, was a comparatively poor relation but kept in touch with some of her more wealthy family members.

After Jane’s father died in Bath in 1806, her mother took her daughters to Gloucestershire to stay with her cousins the Reverend Thomas Leigh and his sister Elizabeth at Adlestrop Rectory in the Cotswolds, near Moreton-in-Marsh and Stow-on-the-Wold.

These Leighs were godparents to Jane’s sister and one of her brothers. Another more distant cousin, James Henry Leigh, lived in the nearby manor house.

The Leighs were making great changes to the village and grounds on the advice of Humphry Repton (see photo on the left), a fashionable landscape designer, and the remodelled settings of Adlestrop may have influenced Henry Crawford’s description of Thornton Lacy in the novel Mansfield Park.

While the Austen women were staying with him, the Rev Thomas Leigh learned of the death of  a relative, the wealthy Honourable Mary Leigh of Stoneleigh Abbey in Warwickshire, and that he was possibly in line to inherit. He and the Austens set off immediately  to stake a claim.

 

This was the ‘best drawing room’,

which Mrs Austen found ‘rather gloomy’,

and has been re-designed as a really lovely library.

 Photo: Stoneleigh Abbey

 

Jane’s mother, writing to her daughter-in-law from Stoneleigh, gave a detailed description of the stately home. “I had no idea of its being so beautiful,” she wrote.“The Avon runs near the house, amidst green meadows, bounded by large and beautiful woods, full of delightful walks.” The house was so large that they could not find their way about it, she went on.

Mrs Austen mentioned a visit to nearby Kenilworth Castle and plans for an excursion to Warwick.

After 10 days, the Austen women moved on and never revisited; however the Abbey and Stoneleigh are believed to have been the inspirations for Sotherton Court and the nearby village in the novel Mansfield Park.

 

Jane Austen's manuscripts

Ancestors of Jane Austen

 Capel Manor, it was eventually demolished in 1966 horsmonden

 

At the end of the sixteenth century there was living at Horsmonden--a small village in the Weald of Kent--a certain John Austen. From his will it is evident that he was a man of considerable means, owning property in Kent and Sussex and elsewhere; he also held a lease of certain lands from Sir Henry Whetenhall, including in all probability the manor house of Broadford in Horsmonden. What wealth he had was doubtless derived from the clothing trade. John Austen died in 1620, his fifth son, Francis died in 1687. Francis left a son, John, whose son was another John. This last John settled at Broadford (while his father remained at Grovehurst), and, when quite young, married Elizabeth Weller.

Elizabeth Weller, a woman happily cast in a different mould from her husband, was an ancestress of Jane Austen who deserves commemoration. Thrifty, energetic, a careful mother, and a prudent housewife, she managed, though receiving only grudging assistance from the Austen family, to pay off her husband's debts, and to give to all her younger children a decent education at a school at Sevenoaks; the eldest boy (the future squire) being taken off her hands by his grandfather.[6] Elizabeth left behind her not only elaborately kept accounts but also a minute description of her actions through many years and of the motives which governed them.

Her son Francis became a solicitor. Setting up at Sevenoaks 'with eight hundred pounds and a bundle of pens,' he contrived to amass a very large fortune, living most hospitably, and yet buying up all the valuable land round the town which he could secure, and enlarging his means by marrying two wealthy wives. But his first marriage did not take place till he was nearer fifty than forty; and he had as a bachelor been a most generous benefactor to the sons of his two next brothers, Thomas and William.
William, the surgeon, Jane Austen's grandfather married Rebecca, daughter of Sir George Hampson, a physician of Gloucester, and widow of another medical man, James Walter. By her first husband she had a son, William Hampson Walter, born in 1721; by her second she had three daughters, and one son, George, born in 1731. Philadelphia--the only daughter who grew up and married. Rebecca Austen died in 1733

Portrait: Francis Austen (1697-1791)  portrait by Ozias Humphrey. Philadelphia

However, all that we know of William' s childhood is that his uncle Francis befriended him, and sent him to Tonbridge School, and that from Tonbridge he obtained a Scholarship (and subsequently a Fellowship) at St. John's College, Oxford--the College at which, later on, through George's own marriage, his descendants were to be 'founder's kin.' He returned to teach at his old school, occupying the post of second master there in 1758, and in the next year he was again in residence at Oxford, where his good looks gained for him the name of 'the handsome proctor.' In 1760 he took Orders, and in 1761 was presented by Mr. Knight of Godmersham--who had married a descendant of his great-aunt, Jane Stringer--to the living of Steventon, near Overton in Hampshire. It was a time of laxity in the Church, and George Austen (though he afterwards became an excellent parish-priest) does not seem to have resided or done duty at Steventon before the year 1764, when his marriage to Cassandra Leigh must have made the rectory appear a desirable home to which to bring his bride.

The wife that George Austen chose belonged to the somewhat large clan of the Leighs of Adlestrop in Gloucestershire, of which family the Leighs[7] of Stoneleigh were a younger branch. Her father was the Rev. Thomas Leigh, elected Fellow of All Souls at so early an age that he was ever after called 'Chick Leigh,' and afterwards Rector of Harpsden, near Henley.

Cassandra Leigh's youth was spent in the quiet rectory of Harpsden, for her father was one of the more conscientious of the gently born clergy of that day, living entirely on his benefice, and greatly beloved in his neighbourhood as an exemplary parish-priest. 'He was one of the most contented, quiet, sweet-tempered, generous, cheerful men I ever knew,' so says the chronicler of the Leigh family, 'and his wife was his counterpart. Towards the end of his life he removed to Bath, being severely afflicted with the gout, and here he died in 1763.

George Austen perhaps met his future wife at the house of her uncle, the Master of Balliol, but no particulars of the courtship have survived. The marriage took place at Walcot Church, Bath, on April 26, 1764, the bride's father having died at Bath only a short time before. Two circumstances connected with their brief honeymoon--which consisted only of a journey from Bath to Steventon, broken by one day's halt at Andover--may be mentioned. The bride's 'going-away' dress seems to have been a scarlet riding-habit. reveriesunderthesignofausten
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The village Horsmonden was home to Jane Austen's grandfather and several other of her relatives, many of whom lived at Capel Manor House. Many of the family's graves can be seen in the churchyard of St. Margaret's Church.^{[2] Horsmonden}
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Henry Austen was a grandson of Elizabeth Weller and a cousin of Jane's father George. Born in 1726, he was educated at Tonbridge School, being Head Boy when his cousin George was lower in the school, so they must have known each other. Like George he became a clergyman, serving in several parishes, the last of which was West Wickham, where his clerical career ended in some controversy when he adopted Unitarian views. Among his various homes was one in Tonbridge High Street called Fosse Bank (No. 182, now replaced with an office block.) His wife was the daughter of John Hooker, Lord of the Manor of Tonbridge.

Portrait of Elizabeth Matilda Harrison, with a lock of her hair. (THS)

Henry Austen's daughter Elizabeth Matilda married a Mr Harrison of Southampton, and was known to Jane Austen and her mother and sister when they lived in that city from 1806-9. A small portrait of this lady, shown here, was presented to Tonbridge Historical Society by one of her descendants.
If Jane Austen ever paid a visit to Tonbridge it is likely to have been to Henry's house when Jane was young. There are memorials to Henry, his wife and two sons in the parish church.

Philadelphia Hancock

Philadelphia Hancock was a popular aunt of Jane Austen, one of her father’s sisters. She was born in Tonbridge in 1730 but lived with relations after her parents died. A spirited girl, she travelled to India at the age of 20 to find a husband. The man she married was Tysoe Hancock, a surgeon in the East India Company. She and their only child, Eliza, returned to England where the two of them saw much of Jane and her family. Mother and daughter were helped financially by the famous Warren Hastings, a friend of Mr Hancock. Philadelphia died in London at the age of sixty.

Portrait: austenfamilyalbumquilt

 

/the-Austens   

janeaustenriceportrait

Godmersham Park and Tonbridge

Godmersham was inherited by Jane's brother Edward from the childless Knights. Jane and Cassandra were frequent visitors to both houses, and Jane worked on several of her novels while staying at Godmersham. She drew on her experiences in Kent for her descriptions of her fictional grand houses. When the Reverend George Austen died, Edward offered a choice of houses to his mother and sisters. One was in Wye, and the other was Chawton Cottage.   

Tonbridge

The Austen family originated in the Horsmonden area, and the Reverend George Austen was born in Tonbridge, attended Tonbridge School, and returned for a time as a master.

The Upper School at Tonbridge School, where George Austen taught tonbridgehistory

His widowed and penniless grandmother, Elizabeth Weller, showed great resourcefulness in taking up a place as a matron and housekeeper at Sevenoaks School to ensure that all her sons received a good education.

Jane's brother Edward was adopted by the Knight family as a child and grew up on Godmersham Park Estate. He inherited Godmersham Park and with his wife Elizabeth, made it his family home. Jane was a frequent visitor to Edward's home and the inspirational surroundings and social environment it had to offer. She was particularly fond of Edward and Elizabeth's eldest daughter, her much loved niece Fanny with whom she exchanged intimate correspondence. Copies of some of Jane's letters to Fanny are on display at The Godmersham Park Heritage Centre, along with other interesting treasures which have been collected and conserved for the Parishes of Godmersham and Crundale, which the Centre has been established to serve. (Visits to the Heritage Centre can be made by arrangement with the Administrator as follows: Rebecca Lilley tel: 01227 732272
Email: heritagecentre@btconnect.com) 

Some of Jane’s letters written from Godmersham give the flavour of the place as it was in those days:

""We live in the Library except at Meals & have a fire every Eveng … I am now alone in the Library, Mistress of all I survey – at least I may say so & repeat the whole poem if I like it, without offence to anybody … At this present time I have five Tables, Eight and twenty chairs & two fires all to myself … Yesterday passed quite à la Godmersham … James and Mary are much struck with the beauty of the place … The Comfort of the Billiard Table here is very great. – It draws all the Gentlemen to it whenever they are within, especially after Dinner, so that my Br Fanny & I have the Library to ourselves in delightful quiet … Half an hour before breakfast – (very snug, in my own room, lovely morng, excellent fire, fancy me) … In another week I shall be at home – & then, my having been at Godmersham will seem like a Dream … But in the meantime for Elegance & Ease & Luxury.” jasna.

tonbridgehistory
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Edward (1767-1852) was was adopted in the early 1780′s by rich childless cousins of the Austens, Thomas and Catherine Knight. He was sent by them on the “grand tour” of continental Europe in 1786-1788, and eventually inherited their estate of Godmersham, Kent, and took the last name of “Knight”. In 1791, he married Elizabeth Bridges. Two years later the couple welcomed their first child, Fanny. Unfortunately for the happy couple, Elizabeth died when Fanny was not yet sixteen (shortly after her 11th confinement). Fanny’s aunts, Cassandra and Jane, who had once been occasional visitors, now took on a much more involved and motherly role in the lives of their nieces and nephews. Cassandra, especially, spent months at a time at the family estate, Godmersham, tending to the needs of her young charges, while her brother grieved the loss of his wife.
For Jane, the plight of young Fanny was especially worrisome, as she considered her new role in the family:

Soon after his wife’s death, Edward inherited a house and property in Chawton and was able to offer the nearby cottage to his mother and sisters. This close proximity to the family they loved so much must have only deepend the intimacy of the two. fanny-austen-knight-knatchbull

Jane Austen's Life

Jane Austen Country

What did Jane Austen earn with her books?

Om als een Engelse heer of dame comfortabel te kunnen leven was het wenselijk om ten minste £ 300 per jaar hebben voor iedere persoon binnen de familie, wat neerkomt op ongeveer £ 6000.

 

 

Aangezien het aantal lezers dat zich een boek kon veroorloven zeer beperkt was, denk ik dat rond 1800 niemand van schrijven alleen kon leven; in haar hele leven heeft Jane 631 pond verdient met haar romans. Een hele prestatie, maar niet genoeg om van rond te komen. Pas toen het drukken van boeken goedkoper werd en daarmee het lezerspubliek groter, kwamen er schrijvers die van hun werk konden leven (denk aan Dickens).
janeausten.nl/forum

England's privately owned pleasure gardens

In the eighteenth century, England's privately owned pleasure gardens hosted royalty, nobility and famous people of the day who promenaded through exquisite, classical vistas and artfully contrived ruins in a fairyland of tinkling fountains and glittering lights. They showcased the finest musicians and artists of the day, hosting Mozart's English debut, and exhibited fine art in a public setting for the first time. At a time when the city streets were unlit and impassable (as they perceived them) except by sedan chair, pleasure gardens offered well-to-do ladies a thrilling opportunity to meet people from beyond their proscribed circle of friends. The gardens were also the first truly egalitarian venue, where anyone was granted admission for the price of a ticket, regardless of class. In an age almost as celebrity-orientated as our own, with nobles replacing TV stars, the gardens were the place to see and be seen. They began to appear as England fell in love with fun again at the Restoration, and reached their height in the 1740s and 50s. In the halcyon days of the mid to late 18th century, the gardens were the backdrop to an endless parade of concerts, balls, public breakfasts, masquerades and firework displays.

For those who worked, holidays really were only single days, and before the railways made travel to the coast or countryside viable, a day at a pleasure garden on the outskirts of the city was the perfect way to unwind. By the Victorian era most pleasure gardens had lost their Arcadian chic. Offering family entertainments, balloon ascents, animal exhibits and ice-cream, they were the forerunners of the seaside or amusement park.

Tragically, little is left of such an important part of our history. Of the great London gardens, Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens was entirely lost to Victorian property development until the blitz cleared a portion of the site, which was redefined as a park after the second world war. Now restored to the original name of Spring Gardens, it remains a public park off Kennington Lane in Lambeth, with part of the site on Tyers Street dedicated to Vauxhall City Farm and the Riding Therapy Centre. Ranelagh also all but disappeared, save for a small area where the Chelsea Flower Show is now held (Royal Hospital Road, Chelsea). The fate of the provincial gardens was generally more severe. Victims of civic and industrial expansion, almost all were gone by 1860, leaving only a district or street name to mark their passing.

On the photo: An entertainment in Vauxhall Gardens in c.1779 by Thomas Rowlandson. The two women in the centre are Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire and her sister Lady Duncannon. The man seated at the table on the left is Samuel Johnson, with James Boswell to his left and Oliver Goldsmith to his right. To the right the actress and author Mary Darby Robinson stands next to the Prince of Wales, later George IV
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Sydney Gardens Vauxhall in Bath was possibly the greatest pleasure garden outside London. It boasted a labyrinth, where Jane Austen walked every day when she lived in Bath, as well as a picturesque folly of a ruined castle. Once Brunel's railway bisected the site, popularity began to wane, and by the end of the 19th century it was little more than a public park with concerts. Suffering further decline in the 20th century, there is little left apart from a bowling green and tennis courts to entertain visitors (Pulteney Road). However the space is set to return to its former glory with the current redevelopment of the Holburne Museum (bath.ac.uk/holburne) on Great Pulteney Street, once the Sydney Hotel and gateway to the gardens, and further plans to restore Sydney Gardens (Sydney Place).
• Sarah Jane Downing is the author of The English Pleasure Garden 1660-1860, published by Shire Publications, £5.99 pleasure-sydney-gardens-vauxhall-bath

On the photo: Sketch of the Fancy Fair at Sydney Gardens, Bath for the Relief of Distressed Seamen. Painted around 1836 by an unknown artist
In her letter to Cassandra dated 19^th June 1799 , written while Jane Austen was staying in Bath with her brother Edward and his family in Queen’s Square, she recorded her impressions of one such event:
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Last night we were in Sidney Gardens (sic) again as there was a repetition of the Gala which went off so ill on the 4^th-  We did not go till nine and then were in very good time for the Fire-Works which were  really beautiful and surpassing my expectations- the illuminations too were very pretty.

She appears to have disliked the music played there, for she made this caustic comment in her letter to Cassandra of the 2nd June 1799, when writing of the planned visit to the original gala:

There is to be a grand gala on Tuesday evening in Sydney Gardens-A concert with Illuminations and Fireworks; to the latter Elizabeth and I look forward with pleasure, and even the concert will have more than its usual charm with me, as the Gardens are large enough for me to get pretty well beyond the reach of its sound.

wiki/Vauxhall_Gardens

The Jane Austen Centre in Bath has unveiled an accurate likeness of the world-famous author.

The Jane Austen Centre in Bath has unveiled what experts believe is an accurate likeness of the world-famous author. The model is the culmination of forensic research, eye-witness accounts, and a costume designer.

Vandaag is in Bath een wassen beeld onthuld van Jane Austen waar drie jaar aan is gewerkt. De BBC schrijft: Melissa Dring, FBI trained forensic artist, said she used the small pencil and watercolour sketch that Cassandra made, as a "starting point" for her pastel portrait, which was then developed into the waxwork.....we know from all accounts of her that she was very lively, very great fun to be with and a mischievous and witty person." Jane Austen is thought to have share...d the Austen family traits of long nose, bright sparkly brown eyes and curly brown hair. jane-austens-face-revealed-after-extensive-research/
 

Jane Austen Walking Tour (Bath) Part Two

Jane Austen Walking Tour (Bath) Part One

St Swithin’s Church and Paragon nr 1. The house of the uncle and aunt of Jane Austen

Jane’s mother, Cassandra Leigh was living in Bath at the time of her marriage to George Austen in 1764. Her father had retired to Bath in the early 1760s,  and had died there in January 1764, and was then buried in the subject of our post today, St Swithin’s Church. The Austens married on the 26^th April 1764 by special license at St. Swithin’s

 

This is a copy of the register recording their marriage

 

In a characteristically practical manner, Mrs Austen did not appear at church arrayed in any special wedding dress of fine embroidered silk. Instead she wore  a typical mid 18^th century travelling dress -a habit-of red worsted wool.

Her dress must have been very similar to this one held by the Victoria and Albert Museum in their collection. If you go here you can see a 360 degree view of the dress and a short description of it.

 

 

On January 21, 1805 the Reverend George Austen died at the age of 73, and was buried St. Swithin’s Church. Originally George Austen’s tombstone was in the crypt, but it was moved outside in 1968, and the memorial plaque was added in 2000.
 

teaandsconehop
 

Jane Austen’s aunt and uncle  James Leigh Perrott and his wife lived during the winter season, at Number 1, the Paragon. Jane Austen stayed with them there in 1797 and also in 1801 when the Austen’s first left Steventon upon Mr Austens retirement, so that they could have a base while they were house hunting for a suitable place to live in Bath. It has to be admitted that Jane Austen was not in a good fame of mind when she stayed there in 1801. She had been rather forced to leave her beloved Steventon home, their friends and neighbours and the surrounding countryside, against her will. She was a self confessed “Desperate Walker” and being hemmed in, in a town,  by houses and buildings, however grand , must have felt oppressive to her.
 

 

 

 

The Paragon is a delightfully quirky 4-bedroom Georgian townhouse in the fashionable and bustling centre of the World Heritage City of Bath. The property has been given a special Gold award for 'exceptional quality of accommodation and customer service' by VistEngland for 2014.

theparagonbath

Home of Jane Austen and her family during their stay, 4 Sydneystreet Bath.

For the Austens the first floor was the most important. Here they received their quests and were living a great part of the day. The view through the three windows is pretty much the same as Jane saw.

The first floor is bought in 2011 by Bath Boutique Stays.   They restored it in a beautiful way.  bath-boutique-stays

austen/Bath

melbourniangirl

Pride and Prejudice: Having a Ball HD

The Dean Gate Inn

The Dean Gate Inn is an old coaching inn and postal receiving house.

The position of the Steventon Rectory is marked by the arrow marked with number “3″ and the position of the Ashe Rectory, home of Jane Austen’s great friend, Mrs Lefroy, is marked by the arrow numbered “2″. Jane Austen mentions Dean Gate in her letter to Cassandra Austen, her sister, written on the 9th January 1796: We left Warren at Dean Gate in our way home last night and he is now on his road to town. Warren, was John Willing Warren (1771-1831) who was one of the Reverend George Austen’s pupils at Steventon Rectory. He was a life long friend of the Austens and Deirdre le Faye describes him in her book,

Jane Austen: A Family Record as follows:
When Jane and Cassandra returned home from school in the autumn of 1786 their daily companions were therefore…the good natured, ugly John Willing Warren, son of Mr Peter Warren of Mildred Court, Cornhill, London who had come some time in the 1780s and who also went up to Oxford in 1786 ,remained a friend for life and is mentioned in several of Jane’s letters.

So, as a place to catch and be dropped off by coaches,  this inn would have been a very familiar place for the Austens, travelling to family, university, and naval college. Their pupils, friends and family would have used it on the way to and from Steventon, and no doubt the Austens used it too. Jane Austen almost certainly used it when she travelled to Andover to meet with Mrs Poore and her mother, the wife of Phillip Henry Poore, the apothecary, surgeon and man-midwife, while changing coaches on the way to visit Martha Lloyd at Ibthrope:

My Journey was safe and not unpleasant. I spent an hour at Andover of which Messrs Painter and Redding had the larger part; twenty minutes however fell to the lot of Mrs Poore and her mother, whom I was glad to see in good looks and spirits.
(See Letter to Cassandra Austen dated 30th November 1800)

Constance Hill in her book, Jane Austen Her Homes and her Friends, published in 1923, describes her joy at being able to stay at the Dean Gate Inn on her first excursion into what she termed “Austenland”:

After a short halt we again resumed our journey, and finally, as darkness was closing in, we drew up triumphantly at the solitary inn of Clarken Green. But our triumph was of short duration. Within doors all was confusion – rooms dismantled, packing-cases choking up the entries, and furniture piled up against the walls. The innkeeper and his family, we found, were on the eve of a departure. It was impossible, he said, to receive us, but he offered us the use of a chaise and a fresh horse to take us on to Deane – a place a few miles farther west – where he thought it possible we might find shelter in a small inn. The name struck our ears, for Deane has its associations with the Austen family. There Jane’s father and mother spent the first seven years of their married life. By all means let us go to Deane! So bidding farewell to our charioteer, the blacksmith’s wife, as she led her sturdy pony into the stable, we drove off cheerily along the  darkening roads. Before long a light appeared between the trees, and in a few minutes we were stopping in front of a low, rambling, whitewashed building – the small wayside inn of Deane Gate. Our troubles were now over, and much we enjoyed our cosy supper, which we ate in a tiny parlour of spotless cleanliness. A chat with our landlady gave us the welcome intelligence that we were within two miles of Steventon. Our small tavern and Gatehouse (as it was formerly) stood, she said, where the lane for Steventon joins the main road to the west. This, no doubt, would give it importance for the Austens and their country neighbours; and we recalled the words of Jane in one of her letters, when speaking of a drive from Basingstoke to Steventon she says: “We left Warren at Dean Gate on our way home.” So we fell asleep that night with the happy consciousness that we were really in Austen-land. austenonly