Speculation, Fact and Fiction

Under the weather kind of literally: it's been gloomy all damn day for a full week now. I have an unpleasant cold thanks to, I assume, the Squeeze concert outing last week. I have taken public transportation to so many K-pop umpty-thousand-attendees concerts and not caught a thing, but Nostalgia Tour Rock'n'Roll: boom. This is Day 5. I'm so tired of being sick.

To entertain myself I have been reading my ancestor's Civil War diary and still find it extremely interesting. Admittedly most days it's very much classic Army life: up at 4, drill at 6, draw rations (if any) or forage, march 10-20 miles, have diarrhea or some other unpleasant-sounding illness, send money home to the folks in Indiana, write letters, dinner, asleep by 9. Not very eventful.

But then he talks about how horrible it is to be in battle, to see so many disfigured and mangled men, to lose comrades at arms, to despise his superiors or to admire them, to face the fearful sounds of howitzers and rifles. He participates in famous eastern Tennessee and northwest Georgia battles. He also talks about flirting with Union girls they meet as they camp near towns, about how much good the sermons on Sunday do him, how well his brother Levi is doing. He notes what they eat: green apples and blackberries, corn bread and cracked corn, beef and parts of hogs, rarely chicken, even more rarely lamb or mutton. Onions are the only vegetable he has named in two years of campaigning so far.

Yesterday he wrote that he'd ordered a Phonographic Book and was studying it hard. What was it? A book about how to make phonographs? Photos? Music? I just can't tell, he's not gone into any detail.* He likes to read, but I don't know what he's reading. He sews pockets onto his and his company buddies' pants. Did the standard issue not come with pockets or did they wear out like crazy? He frequently buys a dozen apples for $4.00, sells eight of them for $4.00, and saves the rest to eat, or trades his coffee and sugar for flour or something else he wants. He's quite the savvy entrepreneur.

So that keeps me from feeling too sorry for myself as I lay around my own home, buying whatever food I want, sleeping whenever I want, safe enough for the moment. I definitely don't have diarrhea, neuralgia, dysentery, or a fever that needs treating with quinine. Poor old William H.

But he survives. He goes home after the war and prepares his diary for publication, though in the end it was not published until 1971. He marries, has four children, and dies age 36 from pneumonia, his health having never been robust after his Army service. He's a collateral relative, not in my direct line at all (and technically not a blood relative, but I feel very much a Huntzinger in every other respect). He had a shaky relationship with spelling, a very firm belief in God and his duty as a citizen, and a real knack for making the best of things that aren't good at all. I'm really enjoying history through his eyes.

*It is a form of stenography. See The Phonographic Phrase Book by Isaac Pitman, second edition 1840.

If you wish to see the context for this post, please look here. In short, of the three existing Fanch Mysteries - those of Fanny's birth, of Charles's death, and of Daniel's existence - this relates to the first.

Last night, while searching the family papers for something else entirely, I came across a handwritten family tree. The papers include several such, made by different hands at different times, often for different branches, and I've not been through all of them yet in detail. Anyway, on this one I saw the following record of Charles William Butler's marriage:



"Frances Niel ch. of a Frances Giberne b. c. 1740 + a Mr Niel." These are rich (if fragmentary) pickings. Until now, all I knew of Fanny's mother was that she was probably called Frances, going by Fanny's own baptismal record, which records her parents as "Clotworthy and Frances Oneile."



The name "Giberne" unlocks many doors, for it was the maiden name of Charles's own mother, Anne. And, among Anne's numerous siblings, there was indeed a Frances, born in May 1741 - which counts as circa 1740 in my book.

Wait, you may say, surely there are other possibilities - and other Frances Gibernes? Conceivably - but Giberne was an unsual name. They were a Huguenot family, and though they were notably prolific they had only been in the country since the 1680s. More importantly, for Fanny to have been taken in by the Butlers, it makes sense for there to be a close family connection. Being the child of Anne's younger sister (they were three years apart) is very plausible; indeed, it hits the Goldilocks spot. Any more distant and the obligation to look after Fanny might have seemed too weak; any closer and the laws of consanguinity would have prevented Charles and Fanny's later marriage. (As it was, they were first cousins.)

We have a few facts about Frances Giberne. She was married on 6 August 1771 to John Dyer in St George's Hanover Square, with Weeden I officiating. (This was the same church were Fanny would be baptised eight years later.) John Dyer was a native of Wedmore in Somerset, and at some point after 1773 (when their son George was born in London) they moved back to his ancestral turf, which is where both Frances and John later died and were buried.

There's not much else to go on, but living in Somerset does put Frances Dyer within the orbit of Clotworthy O'Neil, then a merchant banker in Bristol. What seems mostly like is that Frances and Clotworthy had an affair, a pregnancy ensued, and Frances was taken to London for the lying in and baptism.

What happened after that? It seems that Frances continued living with John, and Clotworthy with his own wife Mary (nee Arundell). Who knew what, and when, and how did they all feel about it? This of course I cannot tell. It would help if I could find out who brought Fanny up, and where - but there is currently no trace of her between her baptism in 1779 and her appearance in a letter of September 1798, by which time she appears to be quite at home - a fixture, indeed - at the Butler breakfast table in Cheyne Walk.

There are a few possibilities:

a) She went to Weeden and Anne as soon as she was born and spent her entire childhood with them. This is possible, but it's odd there should be no earlier mention of her in that case (not that documents from the period are very plentiful). And, if Charles grew up with her as a kind of younger sister throughout both their childhoods, is it likely that the later romantic attachment between them would have taken place? (Both Mansfield Park and Wuthering Heights assure me in their different ways that it is possible, however...)

b) She stayed with John and Frances Dyer, with John accepting her as his own, until either Frances's death (in 1786) or John's (in April 1798), and at that point moved to her Butler relatives in London. This is certainly plausible, and the fact that John died just a few months before the 1798 letter mentioned above is striking. That was also the year when George Lemon Dyer, Frances and John's son (and Fanny's older half brother, on this theory) got married and perhaps left home. (Side-note: George would include "Weeden" among the names he gave to one of his own sons, which suggests that there were no hard feelings towards the Butlers.)

c) She was taken in by Clotworthy and his wife Mary, and raised as a younger half-sister to their daughter Phyllis, at any rate until Clotworthy's death (date unknown) or Mary's (1793). She certainly seems to have been on very good terms with Phyllis (Mrs Yeo) throughout their lives. And, of course, she used the surname O'Neill.

Other solutions are possible, and of course the truth may involve some combination of the above - Fanny's early life may well have been rather peripatetic.

This discovery also narrows slightly the possible interpretations of the letter quoted at the end of this entry, in which Fanny is discussing her (probable) son Daniel: “There is a letter somewhere, written to my Uncle, which is of consequence, because there in he acknowledges him." There is no one on the Giberne side who would be a plausible candidate for the Uncle referred to here. So, it seems likely that Fanny is referring to Clotworthy's relatives - possibly back in Ireland (for Clotworthy seems have been a second-generation immigrant). Finding that person, however, will probably be like finding an O'Neill in a haystack.

There are still many questions, in short - but at least I've inched forward a little, which I had almost despaired of.

So the TAMU Murderbot event was great and you can watch the video of it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=9j7LLOpHYcI&ra=m

The next day, Murderbot producer Andrew Miano stayed over and we both spoke to a couple of classes (Science Fiction Literature, SF on Film etc) and met with some faculty and the Student SF/F book club group. Then I was leaving the building and walking across campus to go home, and fell, and broke my wrist. (i'm typing one-handed)

It was a pretty bad fall. I couldn't stand up on my own. a student said "I got you, ma'am" and picked me up and set me on my feet. My husband came to get me and took me to the emergency room, where after the x-ray the er doctor thought I should stay overnight and get surgery to put some bones back in the right spot the next morning. The orthopedist consult wanted to wait for the swelling to go down instead so they sent me home with many drugs and a splint and instructions to see the ortho surgeon next week. We did that yesterday, and my surgery is scheduled for early tomorrow morning. They're going to put a plate in my hand and i'm probably looking at a six week recovery.

Also managed to get a flu shot and updated covid shot.

I'm still kind of out of it with the painkillers etc and not sleeping well, so I'll be glad to get to the healing part.

I'm home from the Squeeze/Adam and the Ants/Haircut 100 concert and wow, that was unexpected. I've never been to a nostalgia tour before. Most of the bands are still great musicians. The old hits still make me want to dance. I remember the 80s like it was yesterday, except not really if you ask me details. But we all have silver hair now.

I really liked Haircut 100, though I recognized only two out of six songs. I would say their recent stuff is straight up rock'n'roll, not pop like their 80s hits, and they had great happy energy. I plan to check out their discography and if they tour again I'll go see them.

Next, Adam and the Ants came on and I have to say there's something very off with Mr. Ant. You can tell he's been through some stuff. He sang well, but he could barely summon the energy to interact with the audience. The Ants were fine, though, and I think he was enjoying himself. I didn't recognize many of the eleven songs. There were four bangers, six not too bad, one really terrible.

Squeeze were fantastic. They are superb live performers and I was thrilled to hear their voices in person. Unfortunately, their new album Trixies is a rock opera written when they were 16 and 19 and they performed the whole thing. That was 50% of their set. It really brought the vibe down, too. People had been so happy singing and dancing to the old music and then we all just sat down and endured the Trixies stuff. Happily, the last part of the set hyped everyone up again. And they did an acapella version of I Left My Heart In San Francisco! That redeemed them.

Ratings: Haircut 100 get full marks for attitude and execution. Adam and assorted Ants, alas, a disappointment though not actively bad. Squeeze, well, I loved their first four albums passionately and so I really enjoyed hearing all the early songs, but I knew I'd be hearing some newer stuff. I just hadn't expected to be bored by it. However, their performance was so excellent and their joy at playing for us so palpable that I forgive them.

So it was a bit up and down, but I'm glad I went. My favorite part is that unlike every rock concert I ever went to in the past these guys started right on time. When your performers and their audience are all seniors I guess we all really, really want to be home and in bed by midnight. I know I do. Goodnight!