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When Sarah Disraeli died, little was said in the newspapers about her, other than to identify her famous father. Her will and other legal documents did not give any information, either, about her character or her life; she was merely "Spinster Deceased". However, Sarah held important roles in the lives of her male relatives. As a woman in the nineteenth century, she was not encouraged to develop many of her own interests or goals, but through the surviving letters to and from her beloved brother, Benjamin Disraeli, her intelligence and passion can be seen to emerge. Benjamin treasured his sister, and valued her opinions on matters of state and literature. When she lost her fiancee, Benjamin promised to fill that void: "be my genius, my solace, my companion, my joy!...We will never part" (Benjamin Disraeli Letters vol. 1, p.201). Sadly, she was to fall fatally ill in 1859. The letters which make up this site document the reactions of family and friends to her illness and death.
Sarah Disraeli was born on December 29th, 1802 to an upper-middle-class family. She was educated at home. Though schools for girls did exist, her father, Isaac, appears to have enjoyed her intellectual company. She served as his protegee and private secretary for many years, meeting many of the great intellectual and artistic figures of the day, and reading important literature. Her father's reliance on her grew as his health began to fail, and the attachment which had provided her with a great early education was soon stifling her opportunities to become an independent adult. As a result, Sarah, living in an age in which women were given few opportunities to pursue intellectual activities in their own right, began a vicarious relationship with her brother, Benjamin Disraeli. Her intense involvement in his political career is documented in the surviving letters of Benjamin Disraeli (see Benjamin Disraeli Letters ).
At 19, Sarah became engaged to William Meredith. The Merediths were old friends of the Disraelis, and William, a promising student, seemed a perfect match for the intellectually precocious Sarah. The proposal seems to have been made out of feelings of respect and affection, rather than the traditional Victorian motives of possession and economics. The wedding was postponed because William's uncle refused to condone his nephew's marriage to a person of the Jewish faith, despite the fact that the Disraeli children had been baptised in 1817. Sarah and William remained close until the situation could be resolved. Sadly, this was never to be. In 1830, William's uncle requested that William take a year-long excursion, after which he would reconsider William and Sarah's union. Sarah's brother Benjamin accompanied William, while Sarah remained in London. The travellers kept in close contact with her through letters; this is probably what sparked the life-long prolificity of Benjamin's written communiques with his sister. While away, the sober William became dissatisfied with Benjamin's roguish activities, and by the spring of 1831, William and Benjamin separated.
While travelling in Egypt with a different party, William contracted smallpox. He died on July 19th. His uncle, ironically, finally consented to the marriage before discovering the tragedy. Benjamin, who heard of William's passing first, asked his father to tell Sarah, and then wrote to her:
"My own Sa! Ere you open this page, our beloved father will have imparted to you with all the tenderness of parental love the terrible intelligence which I have scarcely found courage enough to communicate to him. It is indeed true. Yes! our friend of many years, our life, and joy, and consolation, is in this world lost to us for ever. He has yielded to his Creator without a bodily, or mental, pang, that pure and honorable and upright soul, which we all so honored, and so esteemed; he has suddenly closed a life unsullied by a vice, scarcely by a weakness. Such a death is too awful but for those who are virtuous as himself, and if we regret, that the unconsciousness of his approaching fate has occasioned him to quit us without leaving some last memento of his affection, let us console ourselves by the recollection of the anguish that the same cause has spared him.
"Oh! my sister, in this hour of overwhelming affliction my thoughts are only for you. Alas, my beloved! if you are lost to me, where, where, am I to fly for refuge! I have no wife, I have no betrothed, nor since I have been better acquainted with my own mind and temper, and situation, have I sought them. Live then my heart's treasure for one, who has ever loved you with a surpassing love, and who would cheerfully have yielded his own existence to have saved you the bitterness of reading this. Yes! my beloved! be my genius, my solace, my companion, my joy! We will never part, and if I cannot be to you all of our lost friend, at least we will feel, that Life can never be a blank while illumined by the pure and perfect love of a Sister and a Brother!" (Benjamin Disraeli Letters vol.1, p.201)
Sarah was 28 years old when her only prospect of escape from her father to some degree of independence was thwarted by the death of her fiancee. Her role in Benjamin's life, though important before, became the primary interest of her life. As the letter above demonstrates, her relationship with her brother was both intellectual and emotional. She was involved in most aspects of his political and literary life, but she also depended on his affection: "I who am nothing, so utterly unworthy of belonging to you. Yet I am indeed proud of your love and tenderness, for which all mine is but poor return" (Benjamin Disraeli Letters vol.1, p.339). Not only did Sarah help Benjamin with his literary career, but they wrote a book together, called A Year at Hartlebury,or The Election .
In 1832, Benjamin met Mrs. Wyndham Lewis (later, Mary Anne Disraeli). In 1838, months after the death of her husband, Mary Anne commenced open involvement in her previously surreptitious relationship with Benjamin. The disruption which his marriage to Mary Anne brought to Sarah and Benjamin's intense bond was to prove very destructive. Sarah believed that Mary Anne's penchant for parties and gossip made her an inadequate intellectual companion for Benjamin. Mary Anne did not appreciate Sarah's suspicions; plus, Mary Anne was a very jealous person and she forbade Benjamin to communicate directly with Sarah. It was Mary Anne's belief that all missives from women ought to be addressed to her. A frigid politeness was maintained between them, though neither woman was very welcome at the other's home. Sarah and Benjamin continued their correspondence by directing letters to his club rather than his home.
Sarah was still living with and devoted to the care of her father. He was slowly going blind, and was therefore more reliant on her than ever. Meanwhile, Sarah's involvement in Benjamin's political career continued. She gave him advice, collected and analysed information about constituencies, and elicited endorsements on his behalf. Benjamin and Sarah, along with reformists including John Manners, hoped to win over the Conservative party and implement such reforms as alliance with the working classes, job creation, and protectionism. The reformist MPs founded a group called Young England. Thanks to the publication of Benjamin's novel, Coningsby, which outlined Young England's political and social beliefs, the profile of the movement was raised. Coningsby was the first in a trilogy of novels which also included Sybil and Tancred .
A character in Tancred was modelled after Sarah and her theories toward positive representation of Jewish people in the gentile British society. The events which surrounded the 1847 publication of this novel were tumultuous. Benjamin was appointed representative of the anti-Peel, anti-Gladstone, Protectionist faction in the House of Commons, to Sarah and Benjamin's delight. Also at this time, Miriam, Sarah and Benjamin's mother, died. Eight months later, their father died as well. Sarah and Benjamin were each bequeathed one third of the 10 000-11 000 pound estate. The other two siblings, Ralph and James, split the final third. Sarah was forced to leave the family home at Bradenham when the lease expired.
Due to the strained relations with Mary Anne, Sarah could not stay with Benjamin. Ralph was too content as a bachelor to be burdened with a spinster sister, and the prospect of living with James, the malcontent of the family, could not have been attractive. Therefore, Sarah settled, alone, into a suite of rooms at No. 3 Ailsa Park Villas, Twickenham. There she began editing a posthumous edition of her father's Curiosities of Literature, which appeared in 1849, and for which Benjamin wrote the introduction.
Once the edition was complete, Sarah resumed her involvement in her brother's political affairs. Since the Corn Laws had been repealed, food prices were a powerful issue. Sarah sent Benjamin detailed records of the rise and fall of food prices. In 1852, Derby, a long-time political enemy of Benjamin, appointed him Chancellor of the Exchequer. Sarah was, of course, overjoyed at his success, and her own prestige among the people of Twickenham rose with the announcement.
Sadly, Benjamin's new political duties gave him less time to devote to his sister. Sarah was not invited to any of the many banquets hosted at the Disraelis', probably because of continuing bitterness between Mary Anne and Sarah. In the 1850s, Benjamin and Mary Anne almost never visited Sarah, and when she would visit relatives for holidays, it was with Ralph or James that she would stay.
Though no documents survive which display Sarah's reactions to this new situation (most of her papers were burned upon her death, as was the custom), it can only be assumed that this separation was devastating for her. Sarah had devoted her life to the political rise of her brother, only to be cut off from enjoying the results. She died in 1859, at the home of her brother, Ralph.
Sarah's life and death are sadly representative of the lack of opportunities available to women of the Victorian era. Her only fulfilment was vicarious, and the achievement which her brother gained with her support, ironically, was the cause of her isolation from him.
In 1868, when Benjamin became Prime Minister of Britain for the first time, Philip Rose remarked to him, "If only your sister had been alive now to witness your triumph what happiness it would have given her," to which Benjamin is said to have replied, "Ah poor Sa, poor Sa! We've lost our audience, we've lost our audience" (The Life of Benjamin Disraeli vol. 1, p.180). Though Benjamin obviously held deep affection for his sister, this final pronouncement of her as merely an audience to the world of men, and her brother in particular, exemplifies the subordinate position that women held in the nineteenth century.
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Dec. 3, 1859 |
Sarah writes her last letter to Mary Anne Disraeli. Benjamin and MA postpone a trip to Hughenden to stay in London near Sarah. |
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Dec. 7, 1859 |
Sarah poor but stable. Staying with her brother, Ralph. Dr. Watson examines her. |
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Dec. 8, 1859 |
Doctors need to consult a surgeon, Dr. Hawkins. |
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Dec. 9, 1859 |
Sarah writes her Last Will and Testament. |
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Dec. 17, 1859 |
Sarah suffers a collapse and is delirious. Doctors are not hopeful. |
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Dec. 18, 1859 ? | |
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Dec. 19, 1859 |
Sarah Disraeli dies. |
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Dec. 20, 1859 |
Sympathy letters from friends begin to arrive. |
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Dec. 22, 1859 |
Henry Fitzroy dies. |
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Dec. 25, 1859 |
Benjamin Disraeli begins to reply to sympathy notes. |
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Dec. 28, 1859 |
Benjamin Disraeli writes a letter which mentions politics; therefore, his intense grieving period is over. He continues to grieve internally throughout his life. |
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Dec. 31, 1859 |
Sarah's will is registered, putting Ralph Disraeli in charge of her small estate. |
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Jan. 19, 1860 |
The last surviving sympathy letter is sent to the grieving Disraelis. |
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Jan. 24, 1860 |
Parliament goes back in session. |
This site was created as a final project for a graduate course in Bibliography, taught by Dr. Mary Millar and Dr. Mel Wiebe, at Queen's University. All resources come from the Disraeli collections at Queen's. Due to the nature of this interactive format, though, traditional, formal, academic conventions of presentation and diction are not always observed. Information on the World Wide Web should be accessible to a wider variety of people than information usually composed by academics. I have made every effort to provide interesting and accessible information, while maintaining accuracy and professionalism.
If you are new to hypertext, there are some important points which you should know to aid in manoeuvring around this site.
Any word or phrase which is blue and underlined is linked to another page which contains further information about that topic. When you wish to return to the original page, simply click on word BACK which appears at the top of your browser (the band at the top of the screen).
Once you have viewed the information from a link, the word or phrase will appear in purple. This way you will know when you have already encountered the information before. This should be helpful to you because each time a person or subject is named in a letter, and every time a name appears in a different form (for example, Benjamin Disraeli, Diz, Dis, Dizzy, D.), it is linked to a main note. You may choose to disregard the link once you have read it, and the colour change will make sure that you can identify new information.
The letters in this site are ordered chronologically. At the bottom of each letter is a bar with access points to the previous letter, the next letter, and back to this introduction. The index is only accessible via the introduction page.
If you have any questions or concerns about this site, please feel free to email me, Jessica Humphreys, at jdhumphreys@hotmail.com and I will be happy to address your comments.
Please enjoy the site.
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