Queer Places:
All Saints Churchyard
Trull, Taunton Deane Borough, Somerset, England
Juliana
Horatia Ewing (August 3, 1841 - May 13, 1885) was an English writer of
children's stories.[1]
Her writings display a sympathetic insight into children's lives, an
admiration for things military, and a strong religious faith.
Ethel Smyth’s autobiography
discussed her own sexual affairs with women in coded terms but openly
described how her mother,
Emma Struth Smyth, and the children’s author Juliana Ewing “were
attracted to each other at once and eventually became great friends”.
Known as Julie, she was the second of ten children of the
Rev. Alfred Gatty, Vicar of
Ecclesfield in
Yorkshire, and
Margaret Gatty, who was herself a
children's author. Their children were educated mainly by their mother,
but Julie was often the driving force behind their various activities:
drama, botany and so on. Later she was responsible for setting up a village
library in Ecclesfield and helped out in the parish with her three sisters.
Early stories of hers appeared in
Charlotte Yonge's magazine Monthly Packet.
On 1 June 1867, she married Major
Alexander Ewing (1830–1895) of the
Army Pay Corps. He was also a keen churchgoer and shared his wife's
interest in literature. Within a week of their marriage, the Ewings left
England
for
Fredericton,
New Brunswick, Canada, where he had received a new posting. They
remained there for two years, before returning to England in 1869 and
spending eight years in the army town of
Aldershot. Although her husband was sent overseas again, to
Malta in
1879 and
Sri Lanka in 1881, Ewing's poor health precluded her from accompanying
him.
Roger Lancelyn Green calls Ewing's works the "first outstanding
child-novels" in
English literature.[6]
They are notable for their sympathetic insight into child life, for the
admiration shown for things military, and their reflection of Ewing's strong
Anglican faith. They include
Mrs. Overtheway's Remembrances (1869),
A Flat Iron for a Farthing (1873),[7]
Six to Sixteen (1875), Jackanapes (1884), Daddy Darwin's
Dovecot (1884),[8]
and The Story of a Short Life (1885).
The last story inspired
Grace Kimmins to start the
Guild of the Poor Brave Things to help children with disabilities in
London. Grace and later
Ada
Vachell took their motto Laetus sorte mea (Happy in my lot) from
Ewing's book.[9]
Her Madam Liberality (1873) has been taken as autobiographical.[10]
Rudyard Kipling claimed to know her novel Jan of the Windmill
(1872–1873, 1876) almost by heart. He wrote in his autobiography,
Something of Myself: "One [book] I have still, a bound copy of
Aunt Judy's Magazine of the early 'seventies, in which appeared Mrs.
Ewing's Six to Sixteen. I owe more in circuitous ways to that tale
than I can tell. I knew it, as I know it still, almost by heart. Here was a
history of real people and real things."[11]
Her story The Brownies (1865) gave
the Baden-Powells the idea and the name for the
junior level of the
Girl
Guides. Another admirer of her work was
E.
Nesbit.
A talented artist herself, Ewing's works were frequently illustrated by
such notables as
George Cruikshank and
Randolph Caldecott. She was also the editor of a number of magazines
which published
short stories for children, such as the
Nursery Magazines from 1856 onwards, the
Monthly Packet, and the monthly Aunt Judy's Magazine from
1866.
On her husband return in 1883, the Ewings moved to Trull,
Somerset,
and then in 1885, to
Bath, in the hopes that the change of air would do her good. However,
her health continued to decline, and after two operations, she died in Bath
on 13 May 1885.
She was given a military funeral at Trull three days later.
Her sister Horatia Katharine Frances Gatty (1846–1945) published a
memorial of Julie's life and works, which includes a publication history of
her stories.[3]
A later selection includes some of Julie's letters and drawings about
Canada.[4]
A biography by
Gillian Avery appeared in 1961.[5]
My published books:
BBACK TO HOME PAGE
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juliana_Horatia_Ewing
- Marcus, Sharon. Between Women (p.55). Princeton University Press.
Edizione del Kindle.