Nonconformist and Dissenting Studies, 1650-1850

Chronological Calendar of the Benjamin Flower-Eliza Gould Correspondence

National Library of Wales

Benjamin Flower-Eliza Gould Correspondence

1794-1808

NLW MS. 13587F, National Library of Wales, Aberystwyth

The letters below are linked on this site under "Nonconformist Letters -- Particular Baptists" and then under "Flower, Benjamin" and "Flower, Eliza Gould." Links to these letters can also be found in the Chronological Calendar. The texts of the letters with full notes and historical background can be found in Timothy Whelan, Politics, Religion, and Romance: The Letters of Benjamin Flower and Eliza Gould Flower, 1794-1808 (Aberystwyth: National Library of Wales, 2008).

Timeline of the Flower-Gould Correspondence

Eliza Gould (1770-1810) opened a school for young girls in South Molton in 1794. Previously she has served as a governess to the Dennys family in Tiverton. At some point she met John Feltham, to whom she became engaged. During her time in South Molton she experienced tremendous persecution as a result of her support and distribution of Benjamin Flower’s Cambridge Intelligencer. These difficulties led to the closing of her school in the summer of 1795. After living for several months with the Quartleys, near Wellington, Eliza returned home to Bampton to assist her bankrupt father in satisfying his creditors so that he could be freed and return to his family (he had engaged as well in financial improprieties as a deacon of the Baptist church in Bampton). In the fall of 1797, Eliza removed to London to live with Feltham’s friends, the Ortons, during which time her relations with Feltham became increasingly strained. In 1797 she left the Ortons and moved in with her new London friends, the Gurneys. In late summer 1798 she accepted a position as governess with the Squire family of Kempston, Bedfordshire, where she remained for one year, after which she returned to London to live once again with the Gurneys. Shortly before she laft Kempston, however, she broke off her engagement with Feltham, who had, by all appearances, abandoned her for some time.

Upon her return from Kempston to live with the Gurneys in Walworth, she learned that Benjamin Flower wsa serving a six-month sentence in Newgate prison for libeling the Bishop of Llandaff in one of his editorials in the Intelligencer. Moved by his plight and curious to meet the man with whom she had once corresponded and whose controversial paper had led to her own removal from South Molton in 1795, she accompanied the Gurneys on 16 July 1799 to Newgate to visit Flower. The two political radicals were immediately attracted to each other and their visits grew frequent. Within a month they began an almost daily correspondence. Within two months they were engaged. Concerned by her poor health, largely a result of her experience at Kempston, her doctor prescribed a trip to the West Country to see her family and friends; in early October she departed on a two-month excursion. During her trip, she met with Mr. Haskins, Feltham’s former benefactor, who now became, much to her surprise, her benefactor too.

During Eliza’s excursion to the West Country, Benjamin was released from Newgate. He returned to Cambridge, where he boarded with Mrs. Jennings, to continue his work with the Intelligencer (he managed to write editorials for his paper during his imprisonment) and send three to four letters a week to Eliza. He cherished every letter from her, often reading them aloud to his friends as she wrote about her daily concerns and their mutual friends in Devon and London. At times the letters revealed Eliza’s fragile state of health, prompting Benjamin to warn her about exerting herself too much, even when writing letters. Above all, their letters reveaedl their growing feelings for each other and anticipation of their coming wedding and residence in a house in Bridge Street, Cambridge. After her return to London at the end of November, Eliza embarked on another short excursion, this time to Bedford to see her friends and revive the Sunday school she had started the year before in Kempston. Concerning his wedding day, Benjamin wrote to Eliza that he would cherish as “the most important day of our lives.” They were married on 1 January 1800, an event noted by Flower in his newspaper on 4 January 1800: “On Wednesday last was married at St. Mary’s, Newington, Surrey, by Doctor Warner, Mr. Benjamin Flower, Printer of this paper, to Miss Gould, eldest daughter of John Gould, Dodbrook, Devonshire.”

After their marriage, the Flowers settled into their new house in Cambridge, where Benjamin operated his printshop, bookshop, and newspaper. Eliza quickly became his partner, managing all aspects of the business when he is gone. His work required him to make frequent trips to London, and she traveled there as well at times to visit her friends, the Gurneys and the Haweses. Eliza’s youngest sister, Mary, lived with them during most of their time in Cambridge, assisting Eliza around the house and in the shop. Eliza devoted much of her free time to her work with the Cambridge Benevolent Society, which she helped establish in September 1801. When they were apart, Benjamin and Eliza always corresponded, their letters revealing a deep level of emotional commitment as well as intellectual compatibility. They wrote about business, friends, politics, religion, and family matters, most frequently involving problems with Benjamin’s in-laws, the Claytons, with whom Benjamin had had difficulties since the early 1780s. By late 1802, Benjamin had become disenchanted with his paper and ceased publication in July 1803. Their first child, Eliza, was born in the spring of 1803, and in December of that year the Flowers decided to leave Cambridge.

In August 1804 the Flowers moved to Harlow, Essex. Eliza was already pregnant with their second daughter, Sarah, who was born in February 1805. Benjamin opened a print shop and reentered the public arena with his periodical, The Political Review and Monthly Register. Eliza continude her benevolent work and Benjamin served as a lay preacher in nearby towns. Within a year of moving to Harlow, both his mother and older brother died, causing him considerable grief as well as complicating his already strained relations with his in-laws, especially his brother-in-law, the Revd John Clayton. He finally took Clayton to court in 1808 in an effort to clear his name and save his reputation. Problems also developed over a loan from his wealthy cousin, Sarah Fuller, an issue not resolved with her heirs until 1812. The Flowers doted on their two daughters, their letters revealing a deep level of attachment and some unorthodox parenting. Eliza’s youngest brother, John, after a brief stay in London and Harlow, returned to Devon to open a business, taking his sister, Mary, with him. Eliza continued to show signs of consumption. In July 1806, she made her final visit to Devon to see her relations. In August 1808, she went to London in search of a new doctor, the signs of consumption now more evident than ever.

Eliza Gould Flower died on 11 April 1810, after giving premature birth to a son (who also dies), a labor complicated by her consumptive condition. Benjamin Flower never remarried; instead, he raised his daughters alone, educating them himself in their home. Eliza and Sarah became well known literary and musical figures in London. In 1819, Flower and his two daughters removed from Harlow to Dalston, in the parish of Hackney, London, where he spent the final decade of his life in a pleasant retirement, writing occasionally for Unitarian periodicals. He is buried in the Flower vault in the Baptist cemetery, Harlow, alongside Eliza and their children.

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