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On the Trail of Mr Elder

On the Trail of Mr Elder#

In the correspondence to the Isle of Wight Country Press following the publication of Jacobs’ More English Fairy Tales, a certain R.G.D. wondered if any other readers knew of the real identity of Abraham Elder.

A query on the same topic has also been raised in Notes & Queries, Vol 12 Iss 296, dated August 30th, 1873, p168:

“TALES AND LEGENDS OF THE ISLE OF WIGHT: with the Adventures of the Author in search of Them.” By Abraham Elder, Esq. 2nd edition, 1843.— Who wrote this work? It is not mentioned in Mr. Olphar Hamst’s Handbook. Mr. Abraham Elder was evidently a person of culture and research, possessed of a delicate humour and much literary skill. His book is very interesting, and might well be reprinted. Even those parts of it which are out of date serve to show how far we have advanced, in certain directions, in the last thirty years, —such a sentence as the following, for instance, from his discourse on the Pied Piper of Newtown :—

“There are also still in existence some very beautiful and copious remains of ancient literature in a language which Sir William Jones affirms to be more perfect than the Greek, and more copious than the Latin—the Sans- crit, the oldest language known.”

The book is illustrated with pictures by Robert Cruikshank— a man how different from George!
A. J. Munby.
Temple.

It seems the question went unanswered, as the correspondent reiterated the query (again, as far as I can tell, without any response), in Notes & Queries Vol 6 Iss 147, p338, dated October 21st, 1876:

In Tales and Legends of the Isle of Wight, by Abraham Elder, Esq., 1843, this story is told as a legend of Newtown, in the island. The Hamel story is quoted as a parallel case, and an extract from Verstegan’s account is given. I have before now asked unsuccessfully in “N, & Q.” who “ Abraham Elder, Esq.,” was or is. His book is clever and interesting; but it does not appear how far the stories told by him are really local legend, and how far they are due to his own fancy or to the folk-lore of places other than the island. A. J. M.

So let us put our detective caps on, and see what we might learn.

Various stories authored under that name started to appear in Bentley’s Miscellany in 1839, the same year that the original edition of Tales and Legends of the Isle of Wight appeared. As we shall learn, they later appeared in an extended, reissued version of Tales and Legends of the Isle of Wight first published in 1841, which went to a second edition in 1843. The stories that appeared in Bentley’s Miscellany were unillustrated, but the 1841 and 1843 book editions, neither of which I have yet seen copies, or scans, of, apparently included “fourteen etchings, of very careless and indifferent character” (George Cruikshank: The Artist, the Humourist, and the Man, William Bates, 1878, p64).

Correspondent R.G.D’s own researches led him to believe that:

… he either was native of, or lived in, Shanklin and that to his parents he owed the name of Clayton, but I have not yet been able to find out what name was given him by his godfather and godmother.

That letter, which appeared on Saturday 16 December 1893, was answered a week later in the Saturday 23 December 1893 edition of the Isle of Wight County Press and South of England Reporter, p3:

ABRAHAM ELDER.

To the Editor, Isle of Wight County Press. Sir,

In reply to the inquiry of your correspondent R.G.D., I can state that author of the “Tales and Legends of the Isle of Wight” was the late Hon. Augustus Moreton, M.P. for Gloucestershire, who wrote the book under the name of Abraham Elder when living with his uncle, Col. Moreton, about that time at Bembridge. —Yours truly. W.W. Osbourne, Bembridge, IW., Dec. 21. 1893

Augustus Moreton

See also:

Augustus Macdonald The Hon. Augustus Henry Moreton Macdonald of Largie (24 June 1804 – 14 February 1862), born Augustus Moreton,

Born Augustus Moreton, Macdonald was a younger son of Thomas Reynolds-Moreton, 1st Earl of Ducie, and Lady Frances, daughter of Henry Herbert, 1st Earl of Carnarvon. Henry Reynolds-Moreton, 2nd Earl of Ducie, was his elder brother.

Political career

Macdonald was elected Member of Parliament for Gloucestershire West in 1832, a seat he held until 1835, and then represented Gloucestershire East between 1835 and 1841. He was also a campaigner for homeopathy. In 1836 he published the work Civilisation, or, a Brief Analysis of the Natural Laws that Regulate the Numbers and Condition of Mankind.

Another week on, on Saturday 30 December 1893, p2, we get another response that just missed making it into the previous week’s edition who is not so sure of the identity of Mr Elder, despite their own researches:

ABRAHAM ELDER

To the Editor of the Isle of Wight County Press.

Sir,— Abraham Elder’s “Tales and Legends of the Isle of Wight” contains a great deal of matter which has but little relation to, and which is by no means the natural product of, the Island, but which originated only in the fertile imagination of A. E., whose real name is shrouded in mystery, like the name of the builder of the pyramids. For years I have vainly endeavoured to discover it and still like Junius, stat nominis umbra. I do not think he was a native of the Island, but probably a visitor, or some one who had been resident for some time. I have heard the names of Clayton, Moreton, and others mentioned in connection with the tales, but nothing of satisfactory nature giving any real clue to the writer’s identity.

This correspondent then also goes into the publication history of Elder’s work and also passes comment on what they know of contributors to Bentley’s magazine:

The second part of the “Tales and Legends” first appeared in the pages of Bentley’s Miscellany in 1839 and 1840. I knew one of the earliest contributors to Bentley, and the last survivor of that brilliant circle of writers, a gentleman who was well acquainted with most of the contributors to the earlier volumes of the Miscellany, and through him I made inquiries few years ago of Bentley and Son to the real designation of A. Elder, but could obtain no reply, after much research. His identity was forgotten and remained unknown to his publishers. The first part of the tales, as your correspondent “R.G.D.” observes, was published in 1839, with four plates in lithograph. Another issue was published in 1841, with plates by R. Cruickshank, engraved by the “gypsographic” process. In this volume the second part of the tales was first published as a book, and with the first part makes a volume in 12mo of 336 pages. A second edition appeared in 1843, and is simply reprint of the volume published in 1841. All the editions are now become scarce, the first especially.— I am, yours truly,

W. H. Long. 120, High-street, Portsmouth, December 22, 1893.

[Mr. Long’s letter reached us too late for insertion in our last issue, in which, it will be remembered, it was asserted on the authority of Mr. W. W. Osborne that the author of the book in question was the Hon. A. Moreton.—ED. I.W.C.P.]

Fifteen or so years later, a curiousities column in the Isle of Wight County Press of Saturday, 12th September, 1908 recalled Elder’s work:

Random Jottings, IWCP, September. 1908

It may be of some use to those of my readers who are making a list of notable Island books if I call their attention to a somewhat rare work, for the loan of which I am indebted to Mr. Roach Pittis, whose interest in local historical and antiquarian matters is well known. It is entitled “Tales and Legends of the Isle of Wight; with the adventures of the author in search of them.” The name of the author is given as “Abraham Elder, Esq.”, and the work (second edition) is dated 1843. In an introductory chapter the writer says: “Some apology is due to the public for presenting another book about the Isle of Wight to them. Its hills, its chines, and its underclitfs, the Needls Rocks and Alnm Bay, its hanging woods, and purling streams, and all its other ineffable beauties have again and again been described by pens far more romantic and sentimental than mine. Yet still there remains a path as yet untrodden. No one has hitherto attempted to collect into a volume the ancient tales and traditions of the Island.” This is the task to which the author applies himself, and the result is a highly entertaining volume.

I should like to sketch the contents of this book, but regard for your space restrains me. Perhaps, if I am here, you will let me return to the diverting/ theme in your Christmas number ! It must now suffice to say that, amongst many wonderful stories, here we have the tale of “The Pied Piper of Newtown,” who freed the ancient town from a plague of rats, which had worked worse havoc even than the French. With much picturesque detail the history told of the ancient “borough of Woolverton,” compared with which Bradiog is but a modern town, the “ hermit’s cave ” and the “ haunted wood” furnishing material for wondrons legends. The reader is let into the secrets of ” Puck-pool ” and “ Puckaster,” with their traditions of the tricksy sprite immortalised in “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” Here we learn a great deal never knew before about “King Stuff” and “Wulphere,” sole monarchs of the Wight in days which are well-nigh lost in the mists of antiquity. Fully recounted is the legend relating to the miraculous manner in which Godshill church was built on the commanding elevation where it is now such a feature in the landscape, giving its name to the village, “though it is no nearer heaven than rest of the country !” We are taken in imagination to “The Queen’s Bower,” in the neighbourhood of Shanklin, deriving its name from the circumstance that Isabella de Fortibus, the Lady of the Wight in the reign of Edward I, erected her hunting pavilion in that romantic spot. The commotion caused along the banks of “ Whippingham Creek “ by the arrival there of “ four large vessels,” in one of which was King John, is described, though the veracioosnees of this bit of history cannot be vouched for in every detail, as there was no County Press then to trustworthily record the wonderful goiogs-on in the Wight ! Of course, Carisbrooke figures in the volume, as do St. Nicholas, and Quarr, and the “Wishing well,” and the famous “ Pillar of Mottiston,” and the “Logan Stone” and “the giant of Chale,” and many other places and things traditionally famous in the olden time. Bat 1 mast stop! It may be added that the letterpress is illustrated by some characteristic pictures by Robert Cruickshank.

By the way, may I beg space just to say that reflections of a more serioas character sometimes occur to the mind of the author to whose work I have been referring. When at Brading he is impressed by the changes wrought by the conflict that is eternally going on between sea and land. “The spot where we now stand,” he remarks to a companion, was at one time a deep sea, at another time it was land again, and then a freshwater lake; again, the sea, with its salt-water tribes, regained possession ; again, here a high beach of shingle fought for ascendance, inch by inch, against the rolling waves; and then the land rose slowly and gradually above the level of the surrounding water, and became a residence for mushroom man. Fashion, and folly, and the love of money now reign where long ago fishes swam.” Let us hope, Mr. Moraliaer, that some good and wise things reign also ! “But,” he goes on to observe, there is another thing, much more wonderful, relating to the Isle of Wight, which is, that the whole Island is gradually, though slowly and imperceptibly, sinking bodily again beneath the waves.” This considerably amazed his friend, and lest the prospect should prove startling to some of my readers also, I would refer them for comfort to our distinguished Island geologist. Mr. G. W. Colenutt, who will assure them most positively that the Isle of Wight will last their time.

…

Remarking on the column the following week (Isle of Wight County Press, Saturday, 19th September 1908), a correspondent confirmed the identity of Abraham Elder as the Hon. Augustus Moreton, M.P.:

TALES AND LEGENDS OF THE ISLE OF WIGHT.

To the Editor of the Isle of Wight County Press. Sir,— In your last number you mention “ The Tales and Legends of the Isle of Wight,” written by my father under the name of Abraham Elder. As I am thinking of revising and republishing, I would be very pleased to get any legends or true smuggling stories connected with the Island that would add to the interest of the new edition.—Yours, &c.

A. H. Macdonald Moreton. Bembridge, I.W.

So what evidence can we find of the honourable gentlemen on the island?

From the local records, we can probably vouch that his uncle did indeed live on the Island:

Bembridge.

In 1854 Colonel the Hon. Augustus John Francis Moreton by his will, proved 5 September, left £300, the interest to be given to deserving poor. The legacy was invested in £327 5s. 8d. consols, producing £8 3s. 8d. yearly.

We also see from a news report in the Hampshire Telegraph of Monday 19 October 1835, p2, that uncle and nephew were active in local good works:

Public Meeting of the Inhabitants of Bembridge, held at the Free School, on Monday the 12th of October, 1835.

Honourable A. MORETON, M.P. Chairman

Proposed by Mr. John DENNET, and seconded by John Newman:

  1. That this meeting deeply sensible of the important and valuable assistance rendered to the Educaton of the Children of the Poor by the Rev. Sir Henry Thompson, Bart. in not only erecting the School House at his own expense, and paying the salaries of the School Master and Mistress, but also for his unwearied personal attention to the moral and religious instructions of the Inhabitants generally, do hereby tender him, their ergrateful thanks, anld express their grateful and sincerest wishes for his future welfare and happiness.

…

  1. That a Committee be formed, consisting of: The Hon. Colonel Moreton, the Hon. Augustus Moreton, …

…

We also have evidence of Moreton’s social standing on the Island, as noted in this report from the Hampshire Advertiser of Saturday 07 June 1845, p8:

Cowes, Saturday June 7

Royal Yacht Squadron Intelligence
Arrivals

June 3 Elizabeth Hon Augustus Moreton, from Guernsey

Fashionable Arrivals. The following are among members of the R. Y. S. who have visited the Squadron House during the week: …, Hon. Augustus Moreton, …

Finally, we note this amusing anecdote, from the Globe of Monday 09 July 1838, p4:

FROM THE CONTEMPORARY PRESS. CHRONICLE.—

APPOINTMENT OF MAGISTRATES.

THE DUKE OF WELLINGTON.—A good deal of surprise is expressed by several of our contemporaries at the intemperate language of the Duke of Wellington in characterising the late appointments of magistrates by the Lord Chancellor. There are so many good points in the Duke of Wellington, that it is always painful to us to speak of him in terms of reprehension. On the occasion in question he certainly forgot what was due to the Lord Chancellor, and betrayed a most suspicious soreness. Every man loves justice in the abstract, but there are not many persons who are fond of it when the sentence is against themselves. The Duke of Wellington might have admired the conduct of the Lord Chancellor, had it not unfortunately happened that it amounted to a reproof of his Grace, in his capacity of Lord-Lieutenant of Hampshire. A Sunday paper (the Observer) remarks—” The illustrious duke put hypothetically some cases, in which the Lord Chancellor might wish, for political purposes, to include improper persons in the commission of the peace ; but we have a strong suspicion that the cause of the noble duke’s soreness is to be found in the consciousness that lie himself, as Lord Lieutenant of Hampshire, had objected to the insertion in the commission for that county of the name of such a gentleman as Mr. Augustus Moreton, Lord Ducie’s son, and resident in the Isle of Wight, simply because Mr. Augustus Moreton was the Liberal member for Gloucestershire. Are we mistaken in adding that the illustrious duke did also object to the appointment of Mr. Oglander as a magistrate for that same county, because he too had upon him a taint of Reform principles ?”

…