Elizabeth Hagglund, ‘Cassandra Willoughby’s visits to country houses’, The Georgian Group Journal, Vol. XI, 2001, pp. 185–202 TEXT © THE AUTHORS 2001 CASSANDRA WILLOUGHBY’S VISITS TO COUNTRY HOUSES ELIZABETH HAGGLUND n , Cassandra Willoughby, a young woman of father and her late marriage, enabling her to travel I , began a series of journeys with her younger more widely than the majority of her contemporaries. brother Thomas. She recorded the details of her travels in a small notebook and continued to do so until , although after her marriage in her diary entries were largely restricted to a record of EARLY LIFE AND FAMILY moves between her husband’s estate in Edgware and Cassandra Willoughby was born at Middleton, their home in London. Warwickshire on April , the second child and The keeping of diaries and travel journals was only daughter of Francis Willoughby, by his wife, becoming fashionable at the time, and it was common formerly Emma Barnard. Her elder brother, Francis, for anyone travelling to record their impressions, had been born in ; her younger brother, even if they did so only for their own future Thomas, was born in . Middleton is near recollection. Books of instruction to travellers Tamworth, and the manor of Middleton had been in emphasised the importance of keeping records. The the family since . Middleton Hall, ‘a delicate and traveller ‘must alwayes have a Diary about him,’ wrote a delightful house’, according to Dugdale, is a James Howell, ‘when he is in motion of Iourneys ... medieval house, thinly classicised, and was the For the Penne maketh the deepest furrowes, and doth Willoughbys’ principal seat, although considerably fertilize, and enrich the memory more than anything less imposing than their secondary seat at Wollaton. else.’ Cassandra’s father, the famous naturalist Her father died in when Cassandra was only Francis Willoughby, had travelled extensively both in two years old and the naturalist John Ray was made England and on the Continent. It is likely that responsible by Francis Willoughby’s will for carrying Cassandra Willoughby read accounts of her father’s out his educational plans for the children. From an travels as she grew up, and there may have been other early age Cassandra and her brothers were taught travel books in the substantial family library at Latin and given lists of Latin names for flowers, birds Wollaton Hall in Nottinghamshire. and fish to learn. Ray continued to teach the But Cassandra was a woman. It is impossible to children until when Emma Willoughby married know just how unusual it was for a woman to be her second husband, Sir Josiah Child, Governor of travelling. Little travel writing by Englishwomen of the East India Company. the late seventeenth century has survived other than Soon after the marriage, the family moved to Celia Fiennes’s journals. Thus in the present state of Child’s house in Wanstead, Essex. Sir Josiah took knowledge Cassandra Willoughby’s notebook is an over the Willoughby possessions and took £ , extremely rare document. Its rarity may be due to her out of the estate. He is reported as having been ‘mean’, unusual independence, created by a particular set of and as having rewarded himself ‘handsomely’ for circumstances – birth, education, the early loss of her looking after the inheritance as well as charging board THE GEORGIAN GROUP JOURNAL VOLUME XI CASSANDRA WILLOUGHBY ’ S VISITS TO COUNTRY HOUSES and lodging for the Willoughby children. east and south sides had been affected, including the Cassandra’s elder brother, Francis, was created a Long Gallery, the Dining Parlour and the Painted baronet in , at the age of , in recognition of his Chambers. Cassandra writes of the ‘heaps of father’s scientific work. He was deeply resentful of rubbish ... occasioned by [the] fire’ and of the Sir Josiah Child, believing Child to be robbing him crumbled chimneypieces and burnt wainscotting that of his rightful estate. In , aged , Sir Francis left she and her brothers had found. Wanstead and went to live with his aunt, Lettice Cassandra’s Account contains a detailed Wendy, at Haslingfield in Cambridgeshire, description of the daily routine followed at Wollaton. subsequently arranging for his brother Thomas to Each morning Cassandra, Sir Thomas, and Dr. Man join him. He continued to be unhappy with his step- would rise at a.m. Sir Thomas would then spend father’s handling of his financial matters and in three hours with his tutor in the library. Between he commenced legal proceedings against Child. and a.m. prayers were held for the whole household. ‘Such of the servants as were not at prayers and could not give a just reason for their absence were to fast till dinner’, wrote Cassandra. WOLLATON HALL After breakfast Cassandra, Sir Thomas and Dr. Man In , at the age of nineteen, Sir Francis decided to went out to oversee the workmen who were repairing settle at Wollaton, and asked Cassandra, then the building and restoring the gardens. With the help seventeen years of age, to join him, and to help of Mr. Prat[t], formerly of the Chelsea Physick manage his household affairs. ‘This proposall I was Garden, Sir Thomas redesigned the gardens – much delighted with,’ she wrote, ‘thinking it would previously ‘but a little piece of ground, in which was be no small pleasure for me to be Mrs of Wollaton, the plan of the house planted with box trees’ – in and to doe whatever I had a mind to, believing that accordance with current fashion. Paintings of such a government must make me perfectly happy.’ Wollaton in the late seventeenth century show formal Wollaton was in disrepair, having been empty since parterres, a sizeable greenhouse, a ‘wilderness’, a ha- , apart from a short time during the Civil War ha and a bowling green. Sir Thomas also oversaw when a small garrison had been billeted there. the planting of a physic garden which provided Damage from a fire in was still evident and there medicinal plants for use both in the family and in the was little furniture. The gardens were overgrown and surrounding neighbourhood. Following the visits to uncared for. Barred by Sir Josiah from removing the workmen, Cassandra records that she would anything from Middleton, the two young people work ‘upon such furniture as needed to be altered started from scratch to repair Wollaton. But Sir and mended’ while Sir Thomas read aloud to her. Francis died in September at the age of twenty. Evenings were spent in visiting neighbours, receiving Thomas, aged sixteen, inherited the baronetcy by guests, walking, bowling, fishing or riding. special remainder. He was then at Cambridge, but As mistress of Wollaton Hall, yet unmarried, left to take his brother’s place at Wollaton, bringing Cassandra had a freedom unusual for women of her with him his tutor, Dr. Man. Again Cassandra was day. Perhaps just as importantly, she was able to asked to help; again she consented with enthusiasm. develop intellectually. Her father had left a library of The rebuilding now began in earnest. The approximately , volumes. He had also left his damage caused by the fire of turned out to be collections, as Cassandra explained: relatively superficial. The structure of the building There were also a fine collection of valuable meddalls, remained intact, although most of the rooms on the and other rarities which my father had collected THE GEORGIAN GROUP JOURNAL VOLUME XI CASSANDRA WILLOUGHBY ’ S VISITS TO COUNTRY HOUSES together of dryed birds, fish, insects, shells, seeds, TRAVEL minerals and plants and other rarities which had lain In March Cassandra and her brother began the neglected at Middleton from the time that my mother series of journeys recorded in her Account of the had married Sir J.C. and left the house. All these we removed, and when we had them at Wollaton it was a journeys I have taken & where I have been since vast business for us to clean, label, and put them in March . Over the next years Cassandra order, which we were fain to doe our selves, fearing the travelled extensively through England. Her trips took servants might make mistakes, and pull such tender her through most of the south-east and central curiosities to pieces. counties of England and as far north as Yorkshire. She never went to Scotland and only ventured into Apart from Sir Thomas’s lessons with his tutor, Wales as far as Monmouth. Although Sir Thomas Cassandra was involved in virtually all of the was her most frequent travelling companion, she also activities and decision-making at Wollaton, and was mentions journeys taken with her mother, a cousin able to participate in a world of books and ideas and various of her step-brothers. Some of the which was generally closed to young women. Had travelling was for business purposes. In June , she remained at home with her mother her activities for example, Cassandra records visits to tenants in would have been far more circumscribed; had she Muskham and Gainsborough. Visits to spas were married earlier, she would have had to give her made for medicinal reasons. The majority of the attention to her husband’s and children’s interests trips, however, seem to have been taken purely for rather than her own. As Alice Friedman suggested, pleasure. Cassandra’s peculiar status as the young mistress of Tourism in Britain was still relatively new. From her brother’s household at Wollaton gave her the the sixteenth century foreign tourists had begun to opportunity to furnish and decorate a major country come to Britain. These were predominantly the sons house at a very young age and left her time not only for of European noblemen, who followed a set pattern of needlework and ordinary household duties but also to visits to royal palaces and historic institutions – the read, to write letters, to catalogue her father’s Tower of London, Westminster Abbey, Hampton collection, to entertain friends, and to visit other country houses throughout England.