Fanny Brawne’s letter to Fanny Keats, Wednesday 16 June 1824
Before he parted from Fanny Brawne and left Wentworth Place, Keats asked her to write to his sister, Fanny Keats. They began a correspondence of 31 letters over a four-year period.
Keats House are publishing the letters from Fanny Brawne to Fanny Keats online on the 200th anniversary of them being written. This project reveals the lives of two women living in London in the 1820s. See ‘Related links’ to read other letters and an article on how these came to be in the Keats House collection.
The letter
In this last letter, Fanny Brawne replies to a letter she has just received from Fanny Keats. She gives her advice about how to behave towards her guardian, Richard Abbey, now that she has come of age. She also reassures her that despite the losses to his business, he is still considered to be a very rich man. Now that she has her liberty and ‘may do as you like’, she hopes Fanny Keats will come and visit her.
She lets her know that she is planning to visit Hampton again, but has also been invited to Cambridge. She ends by giving her the names of the sets of quadrilles that she likes.
This was the thirty-first and last letter that Fanny Brawne sent to Fanny Keats. The letters probably ended because Fanny Keats could now visit Fanny Brawne whenever she wished to.
After these letters ended, Fanny Keats continued her correspondence with her brother George in America. She probably stayed with the Abbeys at first, but married Valentin Llanos in 1826 and in 1828 moved into Wentworth Place next door to the Brawnes. Fanny Keats and her husband had four children. In 1831 they left Wentworth Place and moved to Spain. Valentin died in 1885 and Fanny Keats in 1889, aged 86.
Fanny Brawne’s brother Samuel died in 1828, and her mother in 1829. In 1830 she moved into Fanny Keats’s half of Wentworth Place to briefly live with her, before leaving with her sister for France, where she met her husband Louis Lindo, who later changed his name to Lindon. They married in 1833 and spent much of their time in Europe. They had three children. After they returned to England, they lived in London. She died in 1865 and Louis died in 1872. They are buried together in Brompton Cemetery.
My dear Fanny
I have this instant received your letter. I intended writing to you before thursday as I shall then go to town for two or three days, not that I had any thing particular to say for I had only mentioned the subject to my brother, who thought you had not the slightest reason to alarm yourself as Mr A. is considered beyond all dispute as a man of large property – The losses you mentioned are well known in the city but he is considered very rich in spite of them. As to your own affairs he thought you could at present do only what I told you, ask for an explanation, but as you have now done that I need not say any more about it, nor shall I now recommend all the patience and conciliation with Mr A. I had intended, as you seem to consider, with me, that he has acted to the best of his judgement. You are now at liberty and may do as you like and I hope one of the first things you do will be to come and see me, you must fix your own time and I leave it to you because you will know what to do so as not to offend Mr or Mrs Abbey who having been used so long to have their own way, may like you to act for yourself with as much civility to them as you can make it convenient to show. – I shall return home on Saturday and I have no engagement till after the first two or three days in July, then I expect to go to Hampton but the time is not yet fixed nor can I exactly tell when I can go, as I have been invited to go to Cambridge in July and I must know the time for that expedition before I can determine on the other. If you well can come and see me now, do, I am very impatient to see you but do not like to press you too much least I should persuade you to do what you do not think right, this much I must say that nothing would give me so much pleasure. I cannot send this note till I can see my cousins to enquire whether there is any more particular name for the quadrilles than I am acquainted with. This letter has been kept back a whole day because, though I wrote immediately to my cousin to know the set of quadrilles and she came here purposely to tell me we each forgot to mention the subject. ‘Musard’s 17th Set from the Gazza Ladra’ is the one I like, and after that Hart’s 7th Set from Pietro L’Eremite but it is not necessary to do more than to mention the numbers of the set, I give you the name of the Opera to make you more certain
I remain my dear Fanny
Yours very sincerely
F B–
Finished wednesday night.
Postmark: Fenchurch St. 17 June. 1824.
Address: For Miss Keats / at Richard Abbey’s Esq. / Marsh Street / Walthamstow.
Further information
‘‘Musard’s 17th Set from the Gazza Ladra’ is the one I like, and after that Hart’s 7th Set from Pietro L’Eremite’
'La Gazza Ladra' (‘The Thieving Magpie’) is a comic opera, with music by Rossini. It was first produced in London on 10 March 1821. 'Pietro l’Eremita', better known as 'Moses in Egypt', is an opera, also with music by Rossini. It was first produced in London on 23 April 1822. Both sets of quadrilles are available on the Internet Archive.
Musard, P. Seventeenth Set of Quadrilles, The Subjects from “La Gazza Ladra”. London. Power, 1822.
George Keats’s letters to Fanny Keats
Fanny Keats continued to write to her brother George in America. In this letter from him, written in February 1825, he was still hoping that she would come and live with his family. He mentions John, and also Fanny Brawne:
‘Mrs K has been confined with her fourth Girl, we hoped for a Boy to name him after poor John, who altho’ so long gone from us is constantly in our minds; his miniature over our mantel peice is partly hidden by a hyacynth in bloom […] The most lively recollection I have of you relates to times which I expect you have almost forgotten, when we lived with our Grandmother at Edmonton, and John, Tom and myself were always devising plans to amuse you, jealous lest you should prefer either of us to the others […] I am very much gratified to hear that Miss Brawne is an amiable Girl and that eccentricity has deceived my informants into the beleif that she is unworthy, few things could give me more pleasure than to hear that the Lady of my dear Friend and Brother John’s choice should be worthy of him. I trust I shall never forget Mrs & Miss B.’s devoted attention to him during his sickness, their kindness to you encreases my debt.’
In his letter of June 1825 he again mentioned Fanny Brawne:
‘Present my respects to Mrs & Miss Brawne, and say I should be most happy to hear from the latter if it is only to give me a description of her present self, and you, when I saw her last I remember a young artist complimented her on her having revived a tasty headdress of the age of Charles the 2nd. I presume her sister is now a full blown Beauty.'
In his letter of 12 July 1828 he mentions Wentworth Place (Fanny had moved in with her husband) and also the Brawnes:
'I am glad you are at Wentworth place – I can reallise the scene that surrounds you, I can see you walking about the garden, feeling a satisfaction that your jerusalems and peas, and Pinks and roses are more flourishing or productive or beautiful than your friend & neighbour Mrs B. – present my respects to that Family, I remember the ripe as well as the growing beauty, and poor Sam – I remember the chairs and the curtains and the cats, and the twelvth cake. – I desire much to hear about Miss Brawne.’
Books about Fanny Keats and Fanny Brawne