Brighton

Brighton was another place Fanny went to several times. The Thrales had a house there and seemed to go to it quite frequently especially when the London season was over. May 26, 1779, Fanny writes to Susan:

Lord, thou has pointed out my Life

In length much like a span;

My Age was nothing unto thee,

So vain is every man.

-One of the Epitaphs Fanny had been copying

“The Road from Streatham hither is beautiful: Mr, Mrs, Miss Thrale, and Miss Susan Thrale and I travelled in the Coach with 4 Horses, and 2 of the servants in a chaise, besides two men on Horseback: so we were obliged to stop for some Time at 3 places on the Road…”

The last stop was at Cuckfield – 14 miles from Brighton.

“It is a clean and pretty Town, and we passed all the Time we rescued from Eating in the Church Yard, where I copied 4 Epitaphs... The view of the South Downs from Cuckfield to this place is very curious and singular.”

They arrived in Brighton at 9pm.

“Mr. Thrale’s house is in West Street, which is the Court end of the town…Tis a neat, small house, and I have a snug comfortable room to myself. The sea is not many yards from our windows…this house is exactly opposite to the Inn in which Charles the 2nd hid himself, after the Battle of Worcester…and his black Wig’d majesty has from the time of the Restoration, been its sign” George Inn” afterwards renamed The King’s Head.”

Fanny complains to Susan that she has had no time for writing

“for we have been perpetually engaged either with sights or Company….”

On Sunday they went to church (St Nicholas, the old parish church of Brighton 158 feet above sea level – see View of Brighthelmstone below)

“entering, from the Carriage, a Door at the Top of a Hill, I was not a little surprised to find myself already in the Gallery, without ascending one step: but the Church is built by the side of a declivity…” and afterwards, “Miss Thrale and I proceeded to the Steyn ( see map below – a fine lawn on the Eastern part of the town), which is the great public Walk: – the Parade, where the folks stroll, is pretty enough; open to the sea at one side, and bounded by high Hills on the other. She then took me to the Cliff, which has the best view of the sea, and sauntered about the Town with me till the heat drove us home” … “The Sussex militia, of which the Duke of Richmond is Colonel, is now here. Mr Fuller, a very intimate young friend of Mr Thrale, who is Captain of a Company belonging to it dined with us. He is a Young man of a very large Fortune, remarkably handsome, and very gay, sensible, unaffected and agreeable…”

”They took us to the Parade before Tea, to see the soldiers mustered, a ceremony the officers are obliged to go through every night…”

Captain Fuller features many times in her account of this visit, always favourably. On another occasion she gives a marvellous picture of the soldiers of the light infantry

“We afterwards went on the parade, where the soldiers were mustering, and found Captain Fuller’s men all half intoxicated, and laughing so violently as we passed by them, that they could hardly stand upright. The captain stormed at them most angrily; but turning to us, said, ‘These poor fellows have just been paid their arrears, and it is so unusual to them to have a sixpence in their pockets, that they know not how to keep it there.’ The wind being extremely high, our caps and gowns were blown about most abominably; and this increased the risibility of the merry light infantry. Captain Fuller’s desire to keep order made me laugh as much as the men’s incapacity to obey him…”

Copperplate engraving published by Alex Hogg, 1780, and included in G.A. Walpole’s New British Traveller. The print shows an early view of Church Hill from the sea.

A view of Brighthelmstone

On Saturday May 29, she records:

“After breakfast, Mrs. and Miss Thrale took me to Widget’s, the milliner and library-woman on the Steyn. After a little dawdling conversation, Captain Fuller came in to have a little chat. He said he had just gone through a great operation – ‘I have been,’ he said, ‘cutting off the hair of all my men’. ‘And why?’ ‘Why, the Duke of Richmond ordered that it should be done, and the fellows swore that they would not submit to it; so I was forced to be the operator myself…”

They left Brighton shortly after this and returned to London. On June 15 Fanny writes to Susan from Streatham that Mr Thrale had had a “dreadful and terrifying attack” which was a paralytic stroke, (it was later thought that the stroke was brought on in part by learning of a liability for the repayment of a bond of £220,000 he had co-signed for a friend who had recently died).

64 West Street – bow-fronted house

“Mrs Thrale and Fanny Burney come to the rooms to ‘comment upon others!’” remarked the Master of Ceremonies of the Brighton Assembly.”

October 10 1779

They are back in Brighthelmstone (Brighton). Mr Thrale had been extremely ill. There was concern about his travelling but they set off and Mr Thrale seemed better especially as they stopped at Sevenoaks. To Fanny’s delight, she was taken to visit Knoll, home of the Duke of Dorset, which she describes with great enthusiasm – the Park 7 miles in circumference, the House with the appearance of an Antique Chapel, or Cathedral, pictures, state rooms, every piece of furniture are described. Mr Thrale was deeply infatuated with Sophie Streatfield so they had arranged to visit her at Mount Ephraim, Tunbridge Wells to try to cheer up Mr Thrale. They stayed for 3 days at the Sussex Hotel at the side of the Pantiles, or Public Walk. They were in Brighton until 23 November having a busy social time, going to Teas, Assemblies, Plays, trips on the Downs and even to a ship launch at Shoreham. Evelina had been published the preceding year and Fanny was now a much-feted authoress.

“It has been,’ said Mrs. Thrale warmly, ‘all I could do not to affront Mr. Cumberland to-night!’
“‘Oh, I hope not!’ cried I; ‘I would not have you for the world!’
“‘Why, I have refrained; but with great difficulty!’
“And then she told me the conversation she had just had with him. As soon as I made off, he said, with a spiteful tone of voice:
“‘Oh, that young lady is an author, I hear!’
“‘Yes,’ answered Mrs. Thrale, ‘author of Evelina!’
“‘Humph—I am told it has some humour!’
“‘Ay, indeed! Johnson says nothing like it has appeared for years!’
“‘So,’ cried he, biting his lips, and waving uneasily in his chair, ‘so, so!’
“‘Yes,’ continued she; ‘and Sir Joshua Reynolds told Mr. Thrale he would give fifty pounds to know the author!’
“‘So, so—oh, vastly well!’ cried he, putting his hand on his forehead.
“‘Nay,’ added she, ‘Burke himself sat up all night to finish it!’
“This seemed quite too much for him; he put both his hands to his face, and waving backwards and forwards, said:
“‘Oh, vastly well!—this will do for anything!’ with a tone as much as to say, Pray, no more!”

June 1780

It was to Brighton that they fled from Bath after the Gordon Riots. Fanny was impatient to get home to her father so was relieved when the news from London reassured them that it was safe to return to London.

October 1782

Mr. Thrale died on April 4 1781. Mrs Thrale went with her daughter Queeny to Brighton “to escape officious friends in London”. Fanny was working on a new novel, Cecilia, which was published on July 12 1782. In the autumn of 1782 Mrs Thrale went, with her daughters and Dr. Johnson, to Brighthelmstone where Fanny joined them.

“My journey was incidentless – but the moment I came into Brighthelmstone I was met by Mrs Thrale, who had most eagerly been waiting for me a long while, and therefore I dismounted, and walked home with her… Dr. Johnson received me, too, with his usual goodness…Oh, but let me not forget that a fine note came from Mr Pepys, who is here with his family, saying he was pressed de vivre, and entreating to see Mrs. And Miss T., Dr. Johnson and Cecilia at his house the next day. I hate mightily this method of naming me from my heroines, of whose honour I think I am more jealous than of my own.”

Mr Pepys persuaded them to go to “the Rooms” though he alarmed Fanny by asking if she had the courage to venture there. The warning was correct and Fanny was alarmed by the violent staring and whispering as she passed. “That’s she!” “That’s the famous Miss Burney.”

My Trip to Brighton

After the Isle of Wight our next stop was Brighton. We had booked a hotel in Regency Square in the vicinity of West Street. It was close to the beach and as the weather was pleasant there were groups of people walking or playing on the sand. But clearly this was an area being gentrified. Enormous development of old buildings and new buildings replacing areas pulled down.

But it was still close to the fashionable “Court end of town”. A short walk from West Street is the magnificent Royal Pavilion at the centre of the Cultural Sector with the Museum and Art Gallery and The Brighton Dome, containing the Concert Hall, the Corn Exchange and the Studio Theatre. They are all linked by a tunnel to the Royal Pavilion in the glorious Pavilion Gardens.

The Royal Pavilion was not begun until 1787, when the Thrales and Fanny no longer visited. Nowadays, tourism and the arts sector which have been so vital to Brighton’s prosperity have been badly affected by Covid. But the wonderful buildings and framework are still there so will be revived once the worst of Covid has passed.

St. Nicholas, where the Thrales had a pew and where there is a tablet recording that Samuel Johnson used to worship there.

We drove back through Cuckfield and visited the church in which Fanny had discovered the epitaphs. Beautifully maintained and looking lovely in the sunshine, we found many epitaphs inside the church

64 West Street – the house with bow windows

Opposite 64 West Street – no longer the Kings Head Inn. The church, St. Paul’s was built in 1848