Escaping suspicion: women in Brasenose before 1974
In 1924 a correspondent to The Brazen Nose wrote 'Of recent years we have all of us met the gloomy pessimist who has told us that we shall soon have women in Brasenose', and the editor recounted that he had been 'quite seriously asked by a busy medical practitioner whether Brasenose had yet got any women in College, who appeared quite sceptical when told that our attics had not yet been turned into nurseries'. The suggestion that the admission of women to the community of Brasenose would bring babies into the College also appears in the Ale Verses of 1884 when the poet, after looking back on the shock occasioned by the marriage of dons, goes on:
But now that's nothing; sure, 'tis stranger far -
Bursars and Tutors hailed as "dear Papa"!
Soon shall perambulators, all the go,
Race round our Quad, a "Paternoster" row!
It next behoves us men to agitate
For marriage for the undergraduate:
Let each one vow to scorn the charge of "dreamer!"
And plan a college like unto Thelema!
To start with: who denies that the old Bursary
Would make a "quite too utterly sweet" nursery?
Such sentiments conjure up an image of an exclusively male community, as envisaged in the 1522 Statutes which governed the College until the nineteenth century. These even included the proviso that all the College servants for ever were to be male, except the laundress, who was to collect and return the linen at the College gates only and was to be of such an age and condition as to escape suspicion. However, there is ample evidence that women were closely connected with the College, a part of its daily life, and indeed within its walls, long before the twentieth century.
One of the many advantages of becoming Principal of the College, certainly by the seventeenth century, was that he, alone of the dons, was permitted to marry. The Principal's Lodgings frequently housed a wife, children and domestic household, with occasional visits from female relatives. Indeed some of these are still within the walls; at least seven women are buried in the College, all of them relatives of Principals. Sometimes we just have the names of a Principal's family, as with the stones in the Ante Chapel marking the graves of Richard Harington's wife Cecilia, who died aged thirty four in June 1844, and their only daughter Margaret, who died nearly seven years later at the age of eleven. However, sometimes we are able to learn a little more about the women of the Lodgings.
Daniel Greenwood, Principal 1648-1660, was a presbyterian and 'old antagonist of Laud', so it is not surprising that the Parliamentary Commissioners chose him as Principal in 1648. Thomas Yate, chosen by the Fellows in defiance of the Commissioners, had to wait until the Restoration in 1660 to take up the office. Just after this reinstatement a letter was written to him by John Houghton, one of the Fellows. It appears that Yate had been willing to allow Daniel Greenwood to live close at hand in Staple Hall, a property rented by Brasenose from Lincoln College on land now occupied by the Radcliffe Camera. Houghton wrote: 'Men wonder at your easy condescention & at dr Greenwood povertie of spiritt ... in his desiring a chamber in Staple Hall, and putting out from there two fellowes of the Coll: to make way for him & his mistresse ... what doe you conceive may be the doctors ayme in this? is it ... to be seated in such a convenient place that he may have an Eye, and an eare, to heare and see, what ever is spoken or done in the college, that soe hee, his mistresse & his Presbyterian gang may att theire gossopping conventicles pass theire censures uppon you, and all under your government. Sr every look, or action of yours of your Ladies shall undergoe severe censures.''
This from a man who had managed to survive both Commonwealth and Restoration expulsions and who had been working closely with Greenwood in the College for twelve years. His use of the term 'mistress' is probably a description of Greenwood's wife, whom Anthony Wood identifies as Grisill Hill of Kent, but the juxtaposition of the term with the reference to Yate's wife as 'lady' feels malicious. Whatever the lady's status, she and Greenwood did not end up in Staple Hall and Thomas Yate continued as Principal undisturbed until his death in 1681, when he was buried in the Cloisters. He had married Elizabeth Bartlet or Butler, widow of Sir Richard Cave, who outlived her second husband by nearly nine years. She died in 1688/9 'in the house of Walt. Combes, Barber, in St John Baptist's street ... and was buried near Dr Yate her husband, aged 80 or more'. Her sister and niece are also buried in the College, both having died in the Principal's Lodgings, although whether they were residents or visitors is not clear: 'Letitia, daughter of Sir Allen Butler of Glocestershire, knight, by his wife Catherine Bartlet, died in Brasnose Coll. in the principall's lodgings [c.1714] ... and was buried in the cloister there ... She had married before two husbands, viz., Sir John Mules, a Portegese and Sir Francis de Sylva ... The said lady Catherine Bartlet, widdow of Sir Allen Butler, died also in the said principall's lodgings 22 Feb. about 11 of the clock at night [1681]; and was buried by her daughter Mules in the south cloyster of Brasnose College.'
The stone marking Lady Katherine's grave, bearing the inscription DKB 1681 can still be seen just inside the entrance to what remains of the Chapel cloister, although it appears to have been moved; on a mid eighteenth century plan of the graves it is marked as being three stones to the left of this point. Lady Letitia's grave is not marked on this plan, but Wood records that it was 'neare to the monument of John Middleton', which lay to the east of Lady Katherine's, under what is now the Hulme Common Room.
Yate was succeeded as Principal by John Meare, who eventually died insane. Wood tells us that Meare married soon after his election and 'had two children at a birth'. An infant daughter named Elizabeth Meare, possibly one of these twins, died and was buried in the Ante Chapel on 15th September 1685. John Meare's wife, Mrs. Heath Meare, died on 2nd April 1704 and may also have been buried in the College. John Meare became Vice Chancellor in 1697 and kept a diary for the first three months of his term of office. Although this does not mention his wife specifically there are occasions recorded in which we can be reasonably sure she was involved, if only in supervising the provision of refreshment. On the day of his installation Meare entertained five Heads of Houses and the Keeper of the Archives at his Lodgings ('they stayd till about 4 or 5 of the Clock'), and on 2nd December 1697, being 'The Thanksgiving day for the Peace', the Dean of Christ Church, the Warden of All Souls, the Master of University and the Orator 'went home with me to drink the Kings health'. This was probably the Peace of Ryswick, in which Louis XIV of France first recognized William III.
Much of our information about the next Principal, Robert Shippen, comes from the pen of Thomas Hearne (1678-1735). He records every possible scandal he can find about Shippen with considerable malice, describing him, for example, as 'a most lecherous man' and 'a strange lover of Women'. He records that Shippen used 'to go often to' the wife of the President of Trinity and that he 'debauched a very pretty Woman, one Mrs. Churchill, the wife and afterwards the widow of one Churchill, a bookbinder in Oxford, one of the prettiest Women in England. He poxed her, of which she died in a sad Condition. The thing is so notorious that 'tis frequently talked of to this day.'
Shippen married Frances, the widow of Sir Gilbert Clarke, as her fourth husband and brought her home to the College on 24th October 1710, within five months of his election as Principal. She was apparently some seventeen years Shippen's senior and seems to have retained the title of Lady Clarke. In typical eighteenth century style Hearne recorded on their marriage that she brought the Principal an annual rent charge of £500 'besides a great Sum of Money' and when she died he noted ' Dr Shippen looses by her death five hundred libs per an'. He reports her death on 29th September 1728 'as she came from Bath', where she had been for her health. 'She was brought to town yesterday, about five Clock in the afternoon, & buried immediately in Brazennose Coll. Chappel. She was a very proud Woman, given much to drinking & gaming, and did no good.'
When Ralph Cawley became Principal in 1770 he had been married for over two years to Ann Cooper, described in one source as 'stiff mannered'. He had resigned his Fellowship in 1760, following his appointment to the Rectory of St. Dunstan's, Stepney, and now returned to the College. At first Ralph and Ann Cawley would have lived in the Principal's Lodgings in the Old Quadrangle, but in Michaelmas 1771 they moved to a new purpose built house on the High Street, which stood in the area bounded by the present JCR and Law Library. Only once do we find a definite record of the Principal's wife at a College event. One of Ralph Cawley's surviving notebooks records the following:
'1771 St. Thomas's Day Dinner at 2 o'Clock: 15 sat down, viz, 10 Fellows, 1 Gentleman Commoner, Mrs Huddesford, Rawlins, myself & Mrs Cawley. Prayers were put off till 5 o'Clock: none of the Company, except the Vice-Principal attended them, who read Prayers. We drank Tea & Coffee about 6 o'Clock, & then sat down to Cards: there were two Tables. We continu'd at them 'till 9 o'Clock, when we sat down to Supper; a Barrel of Oisters, & a plentiful cold Collation. Much more was provided for Supper than necessary. The Company stay'd 'till ½ after 11 o'Clock.' It is hardly surprising that the company could not manage the supper of oysters, fowls, lamb, lobsters, tongue, potted beef, brawn, tarts, cheese cakes, stewed pears, stewed apples, blancmange, bread, beer, port, madeira and lisbon. At dinner they had already consumed six of these alternatives, together with a choice of eight main dishes and a variety of sweetmeats.
When Ralph Cawley died in 1777 his widow would have had to vacate the Lodgings. Under the terms of her husband's will she received his chariot, three horses and all his household furniture and goods, excepting his books, bookcases and manuscripts. There were no children, and Ralph Cawley's money went to a sister, brother, and nephews and nieces.
Ann Cawley's main claim to fame is that for some months she taught Jane Austen. Her brother was married to one of Jane's aunts and in the spring of 1783 seven year old Jane came to Oxford with her cousin Jane Cooper and her sister Cassandra Austen to be taught by Mrs. Cawley. Later that year Mrs. Cawley took the girls down to Southampton, where Jane and Cassandra went down with a 'putrid fever'; Jane is supposed to have been in grave danger. Mrs. Cawley did not notify the Austens or the Coopers, but Jane Cooper did, and Mrs. Austen and Mrs. Cooper went down to Southampton to take the girls home. Mrs. Cooper caught the infection and died in October 1783.
Ann Cawley taught a famous novelist, but the wife of Principal Edward Cradock, who married late in life, was a successful novelist herself. Born the Honourable Harriet Lister, her most famous book was Anne Grey, published in 1834. In his reminiscences of the College 1864-1872 Thomas Humphry Ward brings Harriet Cradock vividly to life, describing 'a bright elf-like figure' who had been a Maid of Honour to Queen Victoria: 'The charming little courtier and aristocrat could not but regard Oxford as a sort of honourable exile, but she faced her lot with an amusing courage, did a short 'off season' in London every year, and consoled herself with her garden in Holywell, her cottage at West Malvern, and a little house on the fell above Grasmere. Elf-like I have called her; and she saw elves, and drew pictures of them, which she published in a queer little book, while for the rest she loved her flowers and the great world, and any one who could bring a breath of it to remind her of Windsor and Lord John.'
The little book in question, Views in Elf land, was published in 1878. 'The Hon. Mrs. Cradock' is named as the editor and the book is credited to 'William Weird phrenologist'. who 'lived for many years a solitary life in a lonely house on Breaksmoor'; the Preface states that 'these fantastic Sketches were found in the house after his death'. However, the Bodleian catalogue identifies Mrs. Cradock as the author and the Bodleian's copy was presented by her husband. The book consists of eighteen drawings of various imps with descriptions of the characteristics of each. The drawing for 'No. 3', for example, shows a round headed creature with long ears and talons looking out from a half opened drawer. The description runs: 'You sometimes think it strange you can't shut to your drawer. But look here, and you'll wonder no more. Jerry Jowl is a merry fellow, and he'll pop into your drawer when he sees you in great haste, and he'll move from one end to the other like lightning, and the more you push at one end, the more he'll push against you with his wicked little round head wedged in between. It is good fun for him, and it will be so for you, now I've told you what it is.'
It is tempting to wonder what Mrs. Cradock made of Alice in Wonderland, for it is likely that she met the original Alice and two of her sisters some four years after the famous expedition to Godstow which inspired that book. On 4th December 1866 the Visitors' book of the Principal's Lodgings has the signatures of 'Lorina C. Liddell, Edith Mary Liddell, Alice Pleasance Liddell and Schnee' (possibly a dog?), together with that of Pleasance Susan Fellowes, Alice's great aunt. Over eighty years later another well known woman signed her name in the Principal's Visitors' Book. The single word 'Elizabeth' records the fact that the present Queen lunched in Hall on 25th May 1948 as the guest of the then Vice Chancellor W.T.S. Stallybrass. Her namesake and predecessor Elizabeth I is also supposed to have visited Brasenose, during her visit to Oxford in September 1592.
The domestic requirements of the married Principals will have brought female servants within the College walls. In honour of Robert Shippen's marriage in 1710 the Fellows allowed him to extend the Principal's Lodgings (then very much where they are now) by annexing the rooms which lay between them and the new Library (the south east corner of Old Quad). Between 1719 and 1722 the Bursars' Account Books suggest that the household in the Lodgings was a first maid, a second maid, a man and a boy; between 1723 and 1730 a coachman, a groom and a scullion were added. After the death of the Principal's wife the household was reduced to a maid, a man and a groom. When R.W. Jeffery (Fellow 1922-1935) was researching the life of Shippen he concluded that 'the servants quarters must have been very restricted', although the male servants probably lived out (the residence of one is known), and that 'there was no back entrance into the Principal's house and everyone coming in must have done so through the Old Lodge'. By contrast the new Lodgings into which Ralph and Ann Cawley moved in 1771 clearly had space for male and female domestic staff. The bills for the work in preparing them mention a Butler's Pantry, back stairs, garrets, wash house and a kitchen fitted out with cupboards, dressers, stoves and an ironing board.
In 1887 this house was demolished and extensive new Principal's Lodgings built on the site. At the beginning of this century, when C.B. Heberden was Principal, Beatrice Farn was a parlour maid in the Lodgings and she later spoke with pride and affection of her time at the College. She had particularly proud memories of Thursday 26th June 1919, when Earl Haig, then Sir Douglas Haig, lunched in the College before receiving the honorary freedom of the City. Beatie laid the table for the meal and preserved a photograph of the table setting, with other memorabilia, to the end of her long life. She seems to have taken an active part in the social events of the College servants, for there is also a photograph of her dressed as her great great grandmother, labelled 'first prize Brasenose College'.
Although the original statutes restricted the Laundress to the College gates, there is evidence that by the mid seventeenth century the laundresses had much greater access to the College. At this period the students did not handle their own finances, their money and debts being controlled by their tutors. We have a book of pupils' accounts kept by Ralph Eaton, who was a Fellow between 1656 and 1663, which records payments to 'Goody' (goodwife) Ward and Goody Gye for various domestic duties. Susan Ward mended linen and stockings and did a great deal of washing; she is actually referred to as 'Landress' at one point. In 1661 she purchased ' Bellow fire shovel etc' for Robert Hyde, one of the wealthier students, and delivered a box of candles. She also appears to have been employed by the young men on errands, reclaiming the money she had spent from Ralph Eaton afterwards. The entry in Philip Chetwode's account in July 1658 is typical: 'pd Goody Ward what she had laid out for him 0-2-10'. All these services could have been performed without going further than the College gate, but this cannot be said of the £1 15s 6d she was paid by Eaton on 27th June 1659 'for bedmaking and washing for my selfe and Schollars'. There are repeated payments for bedmaking, both to Susan Ward and to Goody Gye, and in 1661 Susan Ward was paid 15s for attending John Podmore when he was sick. It may have been usual to employ a woman to nurse the sick in College. After the death of Fellow Gabriel Richardson, probably in Brasenose, on 1st January 1642/3, the College paid 3s 4d to 'Goody Daniel for her paines in his sicknesse and death'.
In Principal Shippen's time a gratuity of a shilling was sometimes paid to the Principal's maid for sweeping the staircase from the Lodge to the Tower (this now exists only above the second floor) and for dusting the rooms at the top of the Tower. These were occasional payments, but there are slight indications that women may have been employed on a more regular basis. On 1st September 1739 Frances Smith put her mark on a receipt for 16s ' being my Wages'. This implies something more than a one-off payment, but no further details are given. In the same year four receipts for the four quarters of the financial year show Mrs. Hannah Simpson being paid 19s 10d for 'washing sweeping etc & whetting knives'. The washing and whetting could have been done elsewhere, but sweeping implies a service on the premises.
These accounts and others make it clear that the Senior Bursar, an office which changed hands among the Fellows almost annually, had to deal with the opposite sex on a regular basis, for women were involved in business in the town. Sometimes the accounts presented for payment were for the sort of outside work one might expect, like Mary Strickland's bill for 10s 6d in 1719 'for making & marking 4 dozin of napkins' and 'for making 10 [table] cloths and mending the old'. However, the Bursars also had to deal with business women like Elizabeth Williams and Lucy Mason, whose names appear on the extensive bills for painting and blacksmith's work in the new Principal's Lodgings in 1770. And from at least 1732 until her death in 1748 Elizabeth Bradgate of the Three Tuns was the College's main supplier of wine.
The College officials were also applied to by beggars seeking charity. Principal Meare's diary records a visit on 8th Sep 1697 from 'a poor woman who was in a very weak condicion by reason of a Diabetes to wm I gave 2s'. One of the College account books records extensive charitable giving by one of the Bursars, including 5s to 'a poore distressed Gentlewoman (whose husband is a prisoner at the King's Bench)', 6d to the woman 'that makes clean the Gentlew: seats at S. Marys' and 2s to 'a poore minister's widdow with 8 children in Town', all in 1659.
There have been several female benefactors to the College. Four years after Joyce Frankland was widowed for the second time, her only child, William Saxie, was killed in a fall from a horse. Seeking to comfort her Alexander Nowell, later Principal of Brasenose, urged her to found university scholarships in order to 'have twenty good sonnes to comfort you'. He paints a vivid picture of Joyce Frankland's grief at her son's death: she 'fell into sorrowes uncomfortable ... crying, "Oh my sonne! my sonne!" ... and tearinge ... her haire'. In 1586 she gave property to Brasenose, declaring that 'in liewe of her moste loving sonne' she intended 'to rayse and begett unto her selfe in vertue and learnyng manye Children'. When she died her will left the residue of her estate to Brasenose, and the money was invested in property, mostly to fund a fellowship and four scholarships. There were also gifts of plate, although some of this was stolen from the Treasury in the early seventeenth century and the rest was taken by the King's mint in 1642. The College has three portraits of Joyce Frankland, one of which was painted by Gilbert Jackson in 1629. She holds a watch, and it has been suggested that she was 'the first lady in England to wear a watch'. College historian Ralph Churton says that it is 'a hunting watch, I am told' and wonders 'whether any hint or allusion were intended by it, other than that we should seize the moments as they pass'.
It is possible that the desire for some form of offspring to remember her was a motive of Sarah, Duchess of Somerset, whose three marriages left her with no children. Her first was short and tragic, as her husband died within three years and their two sons died as babies. It seems likely that the Duchess' benefactions to Brasenose were made because this first husband had been a member of the College; George Grimston was admitted in 1649 and made a benefaction of Plate in that year. He does not seem to have taken a degree and the Buttery Books suggest that he left Brasenose at the beginning of 1652. Sarah's second husband became Duke of Somerset on the death of his nephew. Their marriage was stormy, strained by extensive money problems, including gaming debts. Within a year of his inheriting the title it was recorded that 'the Duke of Somersett and his lady are parted and (as 'tis feared) irreconcileably'. She was clearly a woman of independent spirit. Three months before marrying her third husband, a Baron, she obtained for herself the precedence of a Duchess 'notwithstanding any marriage she may hereafter contract'. She remained the Duchess of Somerset. In 1680 she conveyed to Brasenose lands in Iver, Buckinghamshire, for the benefit of four scholars, nominating the first four herself. When she died in 1692 she left lands in Thornhill, Wiltshire, to provide additional scholarships, including some to enable poor men to enter the ministry.
Two women gave benefactions in memory of brothers. In 1842 the Misses Elizabeth, Lucy and Susannah Colquitt founded three exhibitions in memory of their brother Scrope Milner Colquitt; these were for the benefit of undergraduates studying for Holy Orders. Their brother had been an undergraduate at Brasenose, and was elected a Fellow in November 1824. Five months later he died. His father gave a silver inkstand as a memorial, and the Fellows assured him that 'this Society will long cherish a recollection of the moral and academic virtues' of his son. One of the Fellows who sent that message was John Watson, who was himself to be commemorated by a scholarship. He resigned his Fellowship in 1832, after holding it for nineteen years. When he died in 1875 the classical scholarship in his name was founded by his last surviving sister, Mrs. Jane Ann Robinson.
In time of war the College has always housed outsiders within the walls, and sometimes these have been women. A letter of one Thomas Heath records a story about Thomas Coke of Gray's Inn, who in 1651 was in hiding with a price of £500 on his head: 'he was betrayed by his concubine in this manner. She was heretofore kept by the Lord Keeper Littleton and lodged in Brasenose College until his death, after which this Mr. Cook tooke her and for many years allowed her a plentiful revenue and by whom she had three children. But it seems, intending to marry with a lady of good position, he thought to have shakt her off, withdrew his pension, and offered a composition of £1000, which she refused and in revenge impeached him before the Councell of State of haveing receaved a commission from the King of Scotts.'
In the Junior Bursars' account book for 1644 there appears a list of 'Battels received for strangers' in the first quarter of the year. This includes 'Received of Mris Littleton herMr Cokes Battles', with a sum paid for the first three weeks; for the next four weeks entries appear under Coke's own name. As Sir Edward Littleton died at Oxford on 27th August 1645 this does not entirely support Thomas Heath's claims but it is evident that the lady was paying the College for somebody's residence. The same accounts include entries for 'Mistress Payton', and a list of unpaid battels in the Senior Bursar's account book for 1645 has entries for 'Mistress G', the 'Dutchess of Buckingham' and ' Mistress Stroud' as well as 'Mrs Littleton'.
During World War II the College was requisitioned for military purposes, a Junior Staff School being in residence from 1941-1942 and a Senior Officers' School 1942-1944. The latter certainly included women in the shape of cooks, drivers and clerical staff. For many years afterwards a story circulated that one lady after washing her underwear hung it out to dry from her window, to the outrage of the Senior Fellow, W.N. Stocker, then in his nineties. The tale passed unsubstantiated into legend until 1974, when the lady was identified as a Miss Crawford and the story confirmed.
Towards the end of the nineteenth century women began to appear as permitted guests within the College walls, particularly during Eights Week. The earliest record of a Commemoration Ball in the Archives is for 1887, when three quarters of the dances were waltzes and the generous supper included twenty one choices of dessert. Ladies began to be admitted to lectures in men's colleges, although they sat apart from the men and a chaperone was required to placate both unhappy lecturers and parents anxious to preserve their daughters' marriage prospects. One undergraduate who was at St. Hilda's between 1902 and 1905 later recalled that the Principal of her college, Mrs. Burrows, 'came to a whole law course at B.N.C. with me'. Some twenty years later when an undergraduate at Brasenose invited a St. Hugh's student to tea she brought her tutor as chaperone. At that time visiting hours for female guests were strictly limited and a man who was found to have had a girl staying in his rooms all night was sent down.
There was still the fear of scandal and the desire to 'escape suspicion', and this led to some practical joking. legend recording at least one attempt to expose a Fellow to suspicion. When the eccentric F.W. Bussell was Vice Principal (1896-1913) an undergraduate arrived at the Lodge dressed as a woman and announced that 'she' was there to take tea with the Vice Principal. Once escorted to and left at the appropriate staircase, 'she' disappeared upstairs and changed back into a man. Come late evening the Head Porter, worried about possible scandal, reported to Principal Heberden and his sister that the young lady had not reappeared and it was some time before the truth dawned.
Nor is this the only recorded instance of undergraduates assuming female dress. The Rev. W.K.R. Bedford, who matriculated in 1844, recalled that in his day the men of Brasenose 'were reckoned excellent hands at inventing new kinds of diversion ... Our latest performance in the way of relieving the tedium of the Lent term had been the institution of a fancy-dress ball in college, all the guests being of the sterner sex, but sundry ludicrous assumptions of female attire furnishing a semblance of the other element in ordinary reunions.' The Ale Verse for 1845 proclaimed:
The era of Polka has beamed forth its light,
And many a heart has thrill'd with delight ...
'Twas glorious to see the "Ocean's child,
The Spaniard and Turk, and the Indian wild,"
A footnote added a quotation from the Morning Post of 31st January 1845: 'Last night a Fancy Dress and Polka Ball was given at Brasenose College, Oxford, which was numerously and fashionably attended'. Could this have been the dance remembered by Mr. Bedford, or is it an early example of a truly mixed dance? Whatever the answer such fancy dress balls as he recalled certainly took place in the 1890s, and two hand coloured photographs in the Archives show a mixed collection of costumes, including several not unconvincing ladies.
The Ale Verses are always a guide to current concerns. In the years before the admission of women the prospect was considered by several poets and songwriters including, in 1973:
Will rugby club dinners now echo
With voices as shrill as a bell?
Will verses like this one we're singing
Be sung by sopranos as well?
A true prophet. Two years later an Ale Verse was set for 'sopranos only'.