The 1825 Post

So, we finally landed back on Planet UK!  I had thought from afar that our re-entry into England's atomosphere might prove a little bumpy - but apart from a little exhaustion and a few aching joints - it has been a breeze (due in large part to my big sis, I have to say) .  As the saying goes though, 'there's no place like home' - and its so true.  I know we have lived abroad for  many years... but even so, it is so wonderful when you can ask the lady in the post office how to top-up your mobile phone and understand the answer!!!!  I daresay there will be things I will miss about our life abroad - but its all far too exciting at the moment to dwell on what they might be.  So if you're interested, here's a first glimpse of our new home..... I can't really believe it's ours.

This beautiful Yorkshire stone Sunday school house, built in 1825 is everything I could have dreamed of. It's going to take a while to unpack and find a place for everything, but I think my quilts and embroideries will be just perfect here. It's so interesting to live in a place that has some stories to tell....I wonder what they are? Emily Bronte lived and taught for a short while in our village, I wonder if she was ever here? Anyhow to set the scene for our new life within these walls, I wanted to find out what was going on in the world when the school was built - here's what I found:

George 1V was King of England and little Princess Victoria was just 6 years old.

John Quincy Adams was elected President of the United States and Charles X becomes King of France.

The Decabrist uprising in Russia gives Tsar Nicholas 1 a taste of things to come.

In December 1825 the first public railway opens between Stockton and Darlington, with a steam locomotive by George Stephenson and the first horse drawn omnibuses were established in London.

Pushkin writes his famous play 'Boris Godunov' and Samuel Pepys Diary is published for the first time. Johann Strauss is born as is Charles Worth, who would become the founder of the famous Paris fashion house.

Charles Dickens is 13 years old and starts his teenage years in a London that overtakes Peking as the world's largest city. However, the 'Panic of 1825, was to be the first stock market crash and showed that 'we never learn!' What started out as a problem at the Bank of England arising from speculative investments in Latin America, including an 'imaginary' country,caused havoc in Europe's financial sector. Six London banks were forced to close and France saved the Bank of England from collapse with an infusion of gold.

Trade Unions are made legal on 1825 and in June the 'cotton mills' Regulation Act, ensures that children can only work a maximum of 12 hours a day!!!

Women's fashions are on the change - the lovely empire line dresses of Empress Josephine, Lady Emma Hamilton and Jane Austen were finding their waistlines lowering, bodices becoming more fitted and sleeves more puffed. It would be another 100 years before women got the vote!

Life was generally hard with dirty streets and poor living conditions for the majority. The scourge of this Industrial Age were killer diseases like typhoid, consummation and cholera. Our near neighbors, the Bronte family were having a dreadful time, but we're fairly typical of the time. Six children, with the mother dead when the youngest was just a year old. She would be followed to the grave in 1825 by the two oldest daughters. Little Charlotte Bronte was just 9 years old when she witnessed this.

I will be writing some more about the house and its story and Yorkshire, as we settle in and I get my sewing room set up.... I hope you'll join me...meanwhile.... welcome to our new adventure....

Ruby xx