BYRON

A highly educated and strictly religious woman, she seemed an unlikely match for the “amoral” and agnostic poet, and their marriage soon ended in acrimony. Lady Byron's reminiscences, published after her death by Harriet Beecher Stowe, revealed her fears about alleged incest between Lord Byron and his half-sister. The scandal about Lady Byron's suspicions accelerated Byron's intentions to leave England and return to the Mediterranean where he had lived in 1810. Their daughter Augusta Ada, Countess of Lovelace, worked as a mathematician with Charles Babbage, the pioneer of computer science. This letter must have been written in the early part of the year 1860, when the famous writer, historian, and feminist Anna Jameson, née Murphy (1794-1860) was ill with pneumonia at her residence, 57 Conduit Street. Lady Byron’s note suggests she is writing at the point in time when Jameson’s sisters Charlotte Murphy (1805-1876) and Eliza Murphy (c.1796-1874) had arrived at Conduit Street to see their sister Anna when she had obviously become very ill, but when a third sister, Mrs Camilla Sherwin, née Murphy (1797-1886), had not yet arrived. All three of these sisters of Anna (Charlotte, Eliza, and Camilla) lived together in Brighton at the time. The brevity of Lady Byron’s letter is in keeping with the gravity of the situation, the brevity likely stemming from Lady Byron’s worry and haste. Anna Jameson died on the 17th of March in 1860, by which time all three of these sisters had arrived at her residence at Conduit Street.