Sunday 28 October 2007

Historical Research

My bookcases, the piles of books I stagger home with from the library and my sore feet after visiting places of interest all testify to the thoroughness of my research.

When writing my historical novels I do my best to recreate their life and times.

When I wrote the following articles about Princess Anne, the future Queen, my eyes filled with tears. Poor little mite, I thought.

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My novel, Tangled Hearts, is set in the reign of Queen Anne a ‘Cinderella’ princess of little importance during her childhood.

At her birth, neither her uncle, Charles II, nor her father, James, Duke of York, imagined she would become the last of the Stuart monarchs. After all, Charles’ seven bastards proved his virility and there was every reason to believe he and his queen of three years would have legitimate heirs to the throne. And in the unlikely event of their not producing one, his brother and sister-in-law, James and Anne, had produced an elder brother and sister for the latest addition to their nursery, Baby Anne.

In those days infant mortality was high. The son ‘Cinderella’s’ mother carried when she married only lived for six months. But Anne and her older sister, Mary, survived the Great Plague which broke out in the year of her birth. The little princesses grew up in their nursery but their brother James, another brother and two little sisters died. One can imagine the effects of these deaths on ‘Cinderella’, a small girl with poor health whose weak eyes watered constantly.

Doubtless, it was with the best of intentions that with the consent of ‘Cinderella’s’ uncle, the king, her parents sent the four year old to her grandmother, widow of the executed Charles I, who now lived in France.

As I write, I have before me a portrait of Anne as a small girl painted by an unknown artist at the French Court. She is plump and adorable, dressed in brocade and playing with a King Charles spaniel. Her eyes are wary set in an oval face with a mouth shaped in a perfect cupid’s bow.

In 1699, after Anne’s grandmother died, the little girl passed into the care of her father’s sister, Henrietta Maria, Duchess of Orleans, whom Anne’s uncle, the King of England doted on. In 1670 five year old Anne had to cope with yet another death, this time that of her aunt, whose husband, younger brother of the French king, was suspected of poisoning her.

Anne returned to England, her eyes only slightly improved, to be reunited with her parents. By then her mother was unpopular because she had converted to the Church of Rome and her father, who in 1699, gave serious consideration to his salvation took Holy Communion from a papist priest. Her parents’ decisions would have a long term effect on the young princess Anne’s future.

Rosemary Morris
www.rosemarymorris.co.uk
Tangled Hearts set in the reign of Queen Anne the last Stuart monarch.
Available from www.enspirenpress.com

Ham House

I research my romantic historicals intensively, reading, using the website and visiting places of interest. Recently, I visited Ham House, near Richmond in Surrey, England.

Built in 1610 for Sir Thomas Vavasour, Knight Marshal to James 1st,and subsequently owned by the Duke and Duchess of Lauderdale, Ham House is now owned by the National Trust.

Of particular interest to me were the closets, small rooms which are more intimate than the larger rooms such as the North Drawing room.

I imagined the hero, Chesney, and the heroine, Richelda, of my novel Tangled Hearts, taking the air in the magnificent grounds and treading the floors of Ham House.

Of particular interest to me were the closets, small rooms which are more intimate than the larger rooms such as the North Drawing room.

There are six closets at Ham House. Two of which are of particular interest to me because closets or clossets as the word would have been spelt in times past are used by the heroine in my new novel also set in the reign of Queen Anne, the last Stuart monarch.

The first was the Green Closet hung with green damask where cabinet pcitures and miniatures were displayed.

The second was the Duchess's Private Closet. Where the Duchess of Lauderdale, who inherited Ham House, kept books, tea and valuables. It is furnished with lacquered furniture and hung with pictures.

During my visit, I enjoyed imagining the Duchess in her 'Bathing Roome'. When bathing, her bath was surrounded by a canopy that created the steam laden atmosphere of a Turkish Bath. After she stepped out of the bath, I visualised her entering the adjacent room. There warmed by a fire, her maid massaged her with oil and wrapped her in towels.

You can share my experience by visiting:www.nationaltrust.org.uk/hamhouse

All the best,

Rosemary Morris
rosemarymorris@hotmail.co.uk
Tangled Hearts available now from www.enspirenpress.com