The Ladies of Llangollen
Painting of a person in a suit walking up steps surrounded by forest.
“Lady Eleanor Butler and Miss Ponsonby who have resided there 42 years, ever since 1778 in the course of the time having slept out of it but very few nights, they are now old women, the former being near 80 and the latter about ten years younger.”
– The Goslings of Roehampton
Eleanor Butler and Sarah Ponsonby, the Ladies of Llangollen, were two Irish women who fell in love. Renowned international oddities, these women lived together and slept in the same bed. Together with their maid and their succession of dogs named Sappho, the two collected gothic art and lived happily ever after.
It starts with Eleanor Butler, the daughter of an earl born on May 11, 1739, meeting Sarah Ponsonby, sixteen years younger in 1768, and the two quickly become friends. Eleanor Butler was a member of a wealthy family and was allowed to remain in a relatively quiet life enjoying reading and satire as her siblings were married off. Sarah was an orphan under the care of a guardian and close friends with his wife. So the two came from very different places, but both were women, so one thing was expected of them both; marriage.
Eleanor had managed to avoid this fate most of her life and had been perfectly pleased to stay in her family’s home and explore the library. Her older brother disapproved of that plan and, unable to marry her off, set to work to send her to become a nun for the Protestant church, which he had just recently become a member of. Only three kilometres away, Sarah was facing her own trouble. With her guardian’s wife dying, Sarah was being groomed to be his new bride. Neither woman was about to allow these things to happen to themselves or the other.
While it most likely would have been easier for both of them to have left separately, escaping in opposite directions and leaving at least one of them with less chance of being caught, they were not willing to abandon each other. So they hatched a plan.
Unfortunately, it was not a very good plan, both of them running off in the middle of the night dressed as men with only their dog and a pistol. They ran to a ferry that wasn’t due to leave until the next day and hid from their families in a barn. With little protection from the elements, Sarah, who was twenty-three at the time, fell ill. Soon after, the two were discovered and brought back to their respective houses.
So they hatched a second plan. Though Sarah was too sick to run away and had a brief reprieve from the looming marriage to recuperate, Eleanor was being readied for her time at the nunnery. Again, it would have been much simpler for Eleanor to leave Sarah behind and run as far as she could as fast as she could. But when she ran, she ran to Sarah.
She planned to hide in Sarah’s bedroom until she got well again so they could attempt their daring escape again, together. Unfortunately, that plan did not work either. Though they had the cooperation of a maid who would bring Eleanor food and water when she could, she was eventually discovered. Sarah’s guardian sent out for her family to pick Eleanor up, but they never did, deciding that she was too much trouble and cutting their losses. Soon after, Sarah’s guardian, too, gave up and allowed the two to leave, deciding that it was simply easier.
Sarah, Eleanor, and Mary, the maid who had helped the two, went to Wales, buying a gothic home there where they spent the rest of their lives.
Now is where the “happily-ever-after” portion of the story begins. In their five-bedroom home, Sarah and Eleanor shared a room, sleeping in the same bed and over their lifetimes worked to perfect their home in relative solitude. They renovated the home, adding a library, and collecting many odds and ends, including a lock of Mary Queen of Scots hair.
While the two were happy, their lives were not perfect. They often spent beyond their means but never seemed to take that into account when working on a budget.
Luckily for them, a support system grew. People around Europe, fascinated by the way the two lived their lives, visited, including Sir Walter Scott, the Duke of Wellington, Josiah Wedgwood, and many others who often brought donations to help the two manage. They also corresponded with Queen Charlotte, Lord Byron, and Shelley, and with the support of the Queen, had a royal allowance granted to them.
But this additional income was mostly spent on their home; otherwise, they were almost self-sufficient, growing vegetables and fruit and building a dairy. They were also generous people, giving 10% of their money to charity and treating their servants extremely well. When Mary died, they built a large stone monument, one they joined her in when they died.
When Eleanor died in 1829, Sarah followed only two years later.
Throughout history, queer people faced with the worst the world has to offer, and have come back with love stories. Queer people come back with passion, with connections, with friendships, with love, with a sense of belonging, with homes, with communities. Two women, faced with an unacceptable fate, made a space in the world for themselves. Against all the odds, they stayed together and managed to make the beautiful life they craved. A quintessentially queer accomplishment.
[Disclaimer: some of the sources may contain triggering material]
Carradice, P. (2010, July 6). The Ladies of Llangollen. BBC. Retrieved from http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/wales/entries/9caacbfe-a7ac-3286-ada5-4fd0e9496478
Mullally, U. (2012, June 22). The Ladies Of Llangollen: Runaway Romantics In 18th Century Ireland. Autostraddle. Retrieved from http://www.autostraddle.com/the-ladies-of-llangollen-runaway-lesbians-in-18th-century-ireland-140085/
Wales: A tale of two ladies ahead of their time. (2002, May 4). Telegraph. Retrieved from http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/destinations/europe/uk/wales/724170/Wales-A-tale-of-two-ladies-ahead-of-their-time.html
