Parenting gets more relaxed: the Restoration and the Georgians

'Ann desires her love and thanks you for the little wax doll, which, I am sorry to say she soon made share the like fate of the King and Queen of France.'
(Geraldine Mozeley, Letters to Jane from Jamaica, 1788-1796)

In the late 17th century, after the Restoration in 1660, childhood began to be seen not only as preparation for adult life but also time to enjoy.  In Britain it is possible that the overturn of the political order in the Civil War (1642-51) also shook up the social order allowing new concepts to emerge. Lord Clarendon (1609-1674) attributed the change to many families going abroad during the troubles, some to France, having their children educated at French academies, exposed to French fashions, cookery, Catholicism, and manners.  'Children have lost reverence for their parents; parents have neither authority nor any sense of responsibility for their children...' he lamented
(The life of Edward, Earl of Clarendon...written by himself, Oxford edition, 1759 Edward Hyde was chief minister to Charles II)

Charles II dancing at the Hague, c.16670. Gonzalez Coques,
National Maritime Museum

Since the French aristocracy lived by rules still more formal than those of the English court, Lord Clarendon's views are possibly coloured by prejudice.  However it is possible that British exiles were also affected by contact with the far more informal small courts of the Netherlands and Germany, and with the households of the Dutch merchant middle classes where, wealthy though they were, rigid formal manners had never been the fashion.  The difference in attitude between the Dutch and British before the Civil War can easily be seen by comparing the many delightfully informal paintings of Dutch and Flemish interiors with British 17th century equivalents.  Perhaps the charm of that way of life was not lost on the British exiles.

Like Lord Clarendon, Roger North (1651-1734) deplored Restoration laxity and approvingly described his own mother's strictness in his memoirs:
'We had, as I say'd, stubborn spirits, and which was more grievous, (she) would force us to leave crying and condiscend to the abject pitch of thanking the Good Rail, which, she say'd, was to break our spirits, which it did effectively.'
(Autobiography of the Hon. Roger North, ed. A. Jessopp, 1887)

John Aubrey's well known comparison of family life before and after the Restoration was written about 1660:
'...In those days fathers were not acquainted with their children...for whereas one's child should be one's nearest Friend, and the time of growing-up should be most indulged, they were as severe to their children as their schoolmaster; and their Schoolmasters as masters of the House of Correction.  The child perfectly loathed the sight of his parents as the slave his Torturer.  Gentlemen of 30 and 40 years old, fitt for any employment in the commonwealth, were to stand like great mutes and fools, bare headed before their Parents; and the Daughters (grown women) were to stand at the Cupboards side during the whole time of the proud mothers visitt, unless (as the fashion was) 'was desired there leave (forsooth) should be given them to kneele upon cushions...'
(John Aubrey, Brief lives, ed. from the original manuscripts...ed. Oliver Dick, 1949 edition)
Although Aubrey condemned any form of indulgence, he felt that the selfishness and bad habits caused by over-indulgence was preferable to breaking their spirits with over-strictness

John Locke in his very influential Thoughts on Education,  upholds strict discipline, but the changing attitude to relationships between parents and children is evident in this passage:
'Would you have your Son obedient to you when past a Child; be sure to establish the Authority of a Father as soon as he is capable of Submission, and can understand in whose Power he is...as he approaches more to a Man, admit him nearer to your Familiarity; so shall you have him your obedient Subject (as is fit) whilst he is a Child, and your affectionate Friend when he is a Man.'
(John Locke, Some thoughts concerning education, 1693)

Title page of the first edition (Wikipedia)

However, relationships through the 18th century remained frequently quite formal by later 19th century standards.  The well-know writer Mrs. Sherwood, born in 1775, never sat down in her mother's presence, (The life of Mrs Sherwood,  1857)
The title page is from Mrs. Sherwood's History of the Sherwood Family, one of her best known improving stories for children.  It includes the famous account of Mr. Fairchild taking his children to see the dead body of a man, a murderer, hanging on a gibbet till it should rot away, as a lesson on what can happen to disobedient children who grow up to be wicked, passionate people who do wrong to others and break the law.

History of the Fairchild Family,
(Wikipedia)

The novelist Elizabeth Gaskell, writing in the mid-19th century, was struck by an old Shropshire lady's account of her childhood which interestingly resembles the quotation from John Aubrey.  She wrote it up for Sartain's Union Magazine, 1849 as The Last Generation in England, and later re-used the material in Cranford:
'Although an only child she had never sat down in her parents' presence without leave until she was married; and spoke with infinite disgust of the modern familiarity with which children treated their parents.
' "In my days," said she, "when we wrote to our fathers and mothers we began 'Honoured Sir', or 'Honoured Madam', none of your 'Dear Mamas', or 'Dear Papas' would have been permitted.'' 'Elizabeth Gaskell, Cranford, OUP 1972 Appendix)

A few children's letters which have been preserved from the 18th century show that not all families were so strict.  Lord Femanagh's eldest son John wrote to him from school in 1722:
'Dear Papa, I desire you to send for me home on Wednesday night, for to be at home on Thursday for to see the Duke of Marlborough buried.'   and: 'Dear Papa, George brought me some Gingerbread which you were so kind as to send me, as also a couple of Handkerchiefs.
(Verney letters, ed. Lady Verney, 1930, Vol. 2)
John's cousin Betty, aged nine, writes more formally: 'Honoured Sir, I was mightily pleased with your kind letter...My Mama desires if it had not beeen for me to a been in the Contrey before now, all well there, my Grandfather was so kind as to give me a guinie (guinea)...'She had been taken to London to be touched for the King's Evil by Queen Anne.(Verney letters, Vol. 1)

On the other hand, many autobiographical accounts show that although relationships between children and their parents were now often fairly informal, parents were still generally extremely strict:
'We were exceedingly fond of our Father.  t the same time his word was Law.  It never entered our minds, I believe, to disobey him, and I am reputed to have been in the habit of informing visitors that papa required implicit obedience.'  (Augustus Hare, The Gurneys of Earlham, 1895, Vol. 2)  This is an extract from Anna Gurney's reminiscences of her father, John Joseph Gurney, around 1824, and strict obedience was probably more commonly the rule in religious middle class families where, however, it was generally combined with loving concern.

Lord Shaftesbury(1801-1885) on the other hand, scarcely saw his parents when a boy, and said of them:'I and my sisters...were brought up with great severity, moral and physical, in respect of both mind and body, the opinion of our parents being that, to render a child obedient, it should be in constant fear of its father and mother.'
(Edwin Hodder, The life and work of the Seventh Earl of Shaftesbury, 1886, Vol. 1)

The increasing informality of family relationships from the Restoration to the early 19th century is shown not only by children's letters and accounts of their parents, but also in relatives' accounts of their children.  The change is evident in the long series of Verney letters, and is even more striking if these are compared with the extremely formal tone of the15th century Paston letters.  In these and the early Verney letters the children are scarcely mentioned, but by the mid 17th century their affairs are beginning to occupy a considerable amount of space.  Ralph Verney's great grandmother, Lady Denton, who was extremely severe with her own daughters, interceded  at length for her grandson in 1632:
'I heare he is disliked, he is so strange (shy) Sonn, you did see he was not soe, nor is not soe, to any where he is a quanted (acquainted), andhe must be woone with fair menes.  Let me begge of you and his mother that nobody whip him but Mr. Parrye, yf you doe goe a violent waye with him, you will be the first that will rue it, for i veryly beleve he will reserve ingery by it.' ((Verney letters op.cit, Vol. 2)

Another grandmother, Lady Anne North, whose severity to her own children was described by her son (see above) sent her son this particularly charming account of the ceremony of putting little Frank into his first long trousers, aged about eight:
'You cannot beleeve the great concerne that was in the whole family here last Wednesday, it being the day that the taylor was to help to dress little Frank in his breeches...Never had any bride that was to be drest upon her weding night more hands about her, some the legs and some the armes, the Taylor butt'ning and others putting on the sword, and so many lookers on that had I not a finger amongst them I could not have seen him.....But this was not all, for there were great contrivings while he was dressing who should have the first salute (kiss), but he sayd if old Land (his nurse?) had been here she should, but he gave it to me to quiett them all.  They are very fitt, everything, and he looks taler and prettyer than in his coats.  Little Charles rejoyced as much as he did, for he jumpt all the while about him...PS When he was drest he asked Buckle whether muffs were out of fashion because they had not sent him one.'
(Roger North, op.cit. Appendix 1, letters from Anne, Lady North, 10 Oct. 1679)

Among all the alarms and disorders of the Civil War Sir John Oglander, who had been called to London and put under open arrest still wrote home in 1643 '...I play you write me word whether my letters be broken up, and whether you received little Jack's coral...' (Corals were often used for teething)
(Cecil Aspinall-Oglander, Nunwell symphony, 1945)

Parents from the mid 17th century on seem to be able to express far more freely their grief at losing children, which is indication that it has become socially more acceptable to express affection freely and openly.  Although it has often been said that parents in earlier times did not care deeply for their children, because their feelings were rarely publicly expressed, it is more probable that they were acting according to the conventions of an extremely formal society.  John Evelyn's obituary for his five year old son Richard is probably the best known expression of this new freedom:
'...died my dear son Richard to our inexpressible grief and affliction; five years and three days old only but at that tender age a prodigy for wit and understanding; for beauty of body a very angel; for endowment of mind of incredible and rare hopes....(Diary of John Evelyn, Vol. 1, 1658. Edited by W. Bray, 1879)

The Rev. Ralph Josselin wrote in the 1640s, pathetically balancing human grief with correct religious feelings: 'My little sonne in all peoples eyes is a dying child, Lord thy will be done, thou art better to mee than sonnes and daughters, though I value them above gold and jewells.' (Diary of the Rev. Ralph Josselin, 1616-1683, ed. E. Hockliffe, Camden Soc. 3rd series, no. 15 1908)

Another diary entry which shows a parent trying to moderate his feelings in view of the immensely high infant mortality rates is the Rev. Philip Henry's.  While expressing his unbounded delight at the birth of his wife's first child, he writes apprehensively: 'I am bid to expect to see him often at Death's door and must moderate my love for him lest overloving end in overgrieving.'  Five years later it did: 'At sunsett this day hee dy'd our first born...a forward child, manly, loving, patient under correction, oh that I could now bee so under the correction of my heavenly father...'
( Diaries and letters of Philip Henry MA, 1631-1696 ed. Matthew Leu. 1882)

In the 18th century Verney letters the children are frequently referred to by affectionate epithets such as 'Our young Flock' and 'Young Hopeful branches.'  Detailed accounts of their health and doings were constantly passed between members of the family:
'All the three pretty children have had bad coughs that make them look thin.', 'My little girl is very brisk and well, but goes not perfectly Alone.'  'Your Godson is grown a brisk boy...he is the life of this house...he can say most of his Catechise and his prayers, and is so far the Christian you engaged he should be.'
(Verney letters of the 18th century, Vol. 1 op.cit)

Such accounts in family letters are not at all uncommon from the later half of the 17th century on, and give  tantalising glimpses of family life nearly three hundred years ago:
'Charles (aged 3) sed att diner he would call for a glas of Claret as Papa did; and not drink water.'
(Elizabeth Hamilton, The Mordaunts, an eighteenth century family, 1965, based on a collection of family letters and documents dating from end of the 17th century to the 1820s.)

'Pray desire Cousen Peg to buy me a pair of leading strings for Jak, ther is stuf made on purpose that is very strong for he is so heavy I dare not venture him with a comon ribin.'
(Verney letters of the 18th century op. cit, vol. 2)

'I am sorry your dear Boy has beat out his teeth.  Nature I hope will soon suply that defect; mine did not sleep last night till after midnight for want of his marbles, a new purchase that he is very fond of.'
(Verney letters op.cit. vol. 2)

Niky Rathbone: childhoodblog@gmail.com