Author: Duncombe, Anne
Biography:
DUNCOMBE, Anne (fl 1808-25)
It has not yet been possible to establish dates of her baptism, marriage, or death. Nothing is known about her other than what she stated in her appeal to the Royal Literary Fund for assistance on 2 May 1825, when she informed them that in 1789 on the recommendation of Drs. Pitcairn and Jebb who were resident in Paris, she became an English Teacher “at the Famille Royale, under the Patronage of Madame de Tourzelle, who was governess to the Dauphin, where I lived till the latter end of December 1792, the most dreadful Epogue of the French Revolution at which crisis I fortunately escaped to England.” Back in England, she worked as a governess “in several Families of the highest distinction, the last of which was that of the Earl of Albemarle’s.” She dedicated her novel The Village Gentleman, and the Attorney at Law (1808) to the Countess of Albemarle, and the subscribers’ list contained almost twenty members of the royal family and aristocracy and about 150 people from London or the military. It’s possible that further analysis of the subscribers’ list may yield clues to her identity. The work listed here, A Search after Happiness; or The Vision of Worldly Hope, An Allegorical Poem (1809) was printed but not published and exists in a single copy at Bodley. With the cessation of hostilities, she returned to France and taught English again for about ten years. With the onset of age and failing eyesight, she returned to England in Nov. 1824, but her connections and resources were much diminished. Writing from South Street, Manchester Square, Marylebone, London, as a widow (husband not known) with no income, she applied to the RLF and received £10. Thereafter there is no obvious trace of her and she may have died shortly after her 1825 application but financial help from a previous aristocratic employer cannot be entirely ruled out--as was the case with Anne Bannerman (q.v.)--and might have made her final years easier. (RLF #540; Bodley G. Pamph. 1491 [20]) AA
Other Names:
- Mrs. A. Duncombe