In 1846, Anna Jameson and her niece Gerardine [sic] had formed part of the elopement party that accompanied the newly-wed and fled Elizabeth Barrett and Robert Browning from Paris to Pisa. Living abroad, Mrs Jameson relied upon Lady Byron to invest the substantial income she was accruing back in England, the fruits of her successful career both as art historian and travel writer. Annabella’s financial acumen was becoming legendary. Anna Jameson’s investments grew. Her letters of gratitude were heartfelt.
Seeking financial aid at a time when she did not dare ask her mother to produce more than a meagre £50 travel fund for her autumn tour, Ada bethought herself of the indebted and always friendly Mrs Jameson. On 9 February 1850, Anna was summoned for a visit to Horsley Towers. Ada’s note was imperious. She herself was just off to see little Ralph at Southampton, where Lady Byron was supervising her younger grandson’s schooling at Drew’s Academy. Mrs Jameson was instructed to send her response to William, who ‘is anxious to know as soon as possible. He hopes you will not say us Nay . . .’
Sitting in Horsley Towers’ newly furnished Great Hall beneath Phillips’s celebrated portrait of Lord Byron in Albanian dress (the poet stood between Mrs Carpenter’s painting of Ada as a bride and Hoppner’s painting of his wife as a child), Mrs Jameson might have wondered why the owners of such a splendid home and such fine possessions were short of money. Nevertheless, perhaps at this initial point – and certainly later on – Anna agreed to help out with a loan, while promising to say nothing to her appointed soulmate, Lady Byron. That recklessly given assurance of secrecy was to have devastating consequences for a treasured friendship.
Money continued to leak away. In May 1850, Ada evinced her first flicker of real interest in a sport that offered the possibility of raising a fortune by the use of her mathematical skills. Lady Byron, meanwhile, had just paid a visit to Horsley with the objective of meeting one particular fellow guest. Lord Clare, now stoutly middle-aged, had been Lord Byron’s first great love. Sadly, no record survives of what thoughts were shared, perhaps because of an anxious grandmother’s greater concern about young Annabella, who had just had her first period. It was at precisely this stage and at the same age (thirteen) that Ada had been struck down by the paralysis that crippled her for almost three years. Writing to reassure a worried Lady Byron on 30 May, Ada promised that every care would be taken of her granddaughter’s health. Only the quietest forms of exertion would be permitted; nothing reckless. These comforting words were an afterthought, tacked on to the end of a letter that was largely devoted to Ada’s latest interest.
Voltigeur was a three-year-old Yorkshire-bred colt belonging to Thomas Dundas, 2nd Earl of Zetland. The Zetlands had been friends of the Milbanke family since Annabella’s childhood at Seaham. Paying a March visit to Aske Hall, the Zetlands’ Yorkshire home, Lovelace heard little beyond his host’s high expectations for their exceptional horse.
Lord Zetland’s hopes had been confirmed on 29 May, when his colt won the Derby, the world’s greatest flat horse race, historically held on the downs at Epsom. Merrily, Ada’s letter of the following day warned her mother to look out for reports of Lord Lovelace’s imminent destitution, due to the reckless gambling of his wife. To write in this way to a mother who loathed all forms of speculation – Lady Byron had even distributed anti-gaming posters in the casino-rich town of Wiesbaden, back in 1838 – was typical provocation by a saucy daughter who loved to tease her mother. Lady Byron was not amused to hear that her giddy darling was ‘in danger of becoming a sporting character’. Her silence had its usual effect. The subject was dropped.
The year 1850 was one of vigorous social activity for the Lovelaces. In March, the earl had visited both Aske and Floors Castle, the Duke of Roxburghe’s enormous Scottish residence. Early in May, plans were hatched to welcome an eminent American historian to their own new London home. (Ada was a keen admirer of William Prescott’s 1843 masterpiece, The History of the Conquest of Mexico.) Robert Noel, paying a rare visit to England from Dresden, was invited to join a gathering of scientific luminaries at Great Cumberland Place at the end of that month. At the opera, William and Ada weighed the merits of ‘the Swedish nightingale’ Jenny Lind against her rival, Henriette Sontag, and found in favour of the sweettoned German soprano. Dutifully attending two royal balls, Lady Lovelace was still angling for the post of unofficial scientific advisor to the queen’s husband. Instead, to her annoyance, she learned from Woronzow Greig that her name had once again become the subject of scandalous gossip. A certain gentleman had been identified – but Greig refused to divulge his name.
The haughty tone of Ada’s response contrasted oddly with the fervency of her denials. Such stories were pitifully out of date, she wrote. Did Greig (Ada wrote to him, as she did to Babbage and Wheatstone, man to man, using his surname alone) not know that the mere fact that she was Byron’s daughter meant that she was saddled with a new lover every three years – and would be until she was too old for such silly tales to carry conviction? No need for Greig to mention the gossip to her mother, who was well used to hearing such foolish gossip. Lovelace, however, must be informed. The name of this mystery lover had better be supplied to her at once.
Ada’s tone was both defensive and aggressive. Was she afraid that John Crosse had been identified by a sharp-eyed friend? It’s hard to tell. Sophia De Morgan was mentioned as a prime culprit in the spreading of injurious tales. But Ada expressed no guilt. She acknowledged nothing. As before, Greig was reminded of a line
