Today, we’re telling the story of Anne Lister’s life in her own words with a special emphasis on her search for a “great love.” But along the way, we’ll also try to give you some examples of why her diaries have been deemed the most important documents in LGBTQ+ history.
Transcript for Anne Lister
Written and researched by Marissa Rhodes, PhD
Produced by Marissa Rhodes, PhD and Elizabeth Garner Masarik, PhD
Marissa: This episode contains graphic descriptions of love-making that may be unsuitable for young ears. Listen with care.
It’s the 1930s and antiquarian Arthur Burrell is on the edge of his seat. He’s been working on the cypher created by his friend John Lister’s ancestor, a woman named Anne. In the 1880s, John had found his great, great aunt Anne’s diary (nearly 8,000 pages) hidden behind a panel in his ancestral home, Shibden Hall in Halifax, Yorkshire. Back then he’d tried to decode the cyphered passages but had little luck. When John Lister died in 1933 with no heirs, the home, and the diaries it contained, reverted to the local council.
Burrell, a friend of the family, agreed to take another stab at deciphering the code which contained Greek letters and algebraic symbols. And now, he was on the precipice of a historical event, the significance of which he barely understood. With the self-satisfaction of a successful scholar, Burrell cracked the code and began translating the encoded portion of this woman’s diary. But, very quickly, he began decoding passages that worried him immensely.
Elizabeth: This woman recorded with unladylike frankness her bodily functions: “up at seven— to the pot— long very thick piece with some difficulty.” She even confessed to self-abuse, noting with an X (or cross) in the margins of her diary when she was compelled to masturbate: “incurred a cross thinking of Miss Walker.” Burell is deeply disturbed by this frankness but nothing prepares him for this most shocking discovery: first, Anne Lister secretly dressed as a man in the privacy of her own rooms, recording her cross-dressing affairs in code. Second, Anne wrote extensively of intimate feelings for other women, referring to some women as her wife, and herself as their husband. Thirdly, and most shocking of all, Anne Lister had sex with other women, recording the number of orgasms she and her partners experienced during their love-making.
Marissa: Burrell slams closed the volume he is working on and mops his brow. He’s convinced. These events, these sentiments, these words, must never see the light of day. Burrell immediately contacts John Lister, recommending he destroy the diary to wipe this shocking account from the historical record. He is certain the Lister family would never recover from this scandal if their ancestor’s activities became known.
Thankfully, the Lister family didn’t take his advice. Still, it took another half-century before the decoded passages of Anne Lister’s diary were available to the public. Today, we’re telling the story of Anne Lister’s life in her own words with a special emphasis on her search for a “great love.” But along the way, we’ll also try to give you some examples of why her diaries have been deemed the most important documents in LGBTQ+ history.
I’m Marissa.
And I’m Elizabeth
Marissa: And we are your historians for this episode of DIG.
Elizabeth: We are so thankful for all of our Patreon supporters – especially our Auger and Excavator level patrons: Karl, Alissa, Maria, Colin, Denise, Edward, Jessy, Judy, Karen, Lauren, Lisa, Megan, and Susan! We can’t thank you enough. Listener, if you enjoy what we do here but aren’t yet a patron of this show, it’s easy: just go to patreon.com/digpodcast to learn more.
Marissa: Anne Lister was born in 1791 in Halifax, England to a wealthy land-owning family. From a young age, Anne was an intelligent, confident, extroverted, and physically active girl. She was intellectually curious in the extreme, devouring the classics, mathematics texts, and teaching herself several languages. She ate sparingly and exercised vigorously. Unusually for the time, Anne was designated as heir to her family seat, serving for some of her life as the Lister family matriarch. As such, she recorded her dealings with the families of Halifax and Yorkshire’s larger social milieu. She traveled extensively and pursued risky endeavors like climbing treacherous mountains, ignoring war-related travel bands, and braving the Russian winter. And, perhaps most important to our purposes here, she is considered history’s first modern lesbian.
Elizabeth: Before her words were available for the public to read and discuss, Anne Lister’s diaries were studied by a motivated contingent of women scholars. When Muriel Green (in the 1930s), Vivien Ingham and Phyllis Ramsden (in the 1960s) began studying and transcribing the diaries, they were allowed to only under the condition that they did not publish any of the inappropriate material. For decades, only a few people in Halifax knew about the coded contents of the journal. When Phyllis Ramsden encountered “objectionable material” she omitted it from the transcriptions with a note that it was “nothing of interest.”
Note: we’ll be focusing particularly on the “nothing of interest” but this source is so rich that dozens of scholars could dedicate their careers to Anne’s diary and still have material leftover. Politics, hygiene, health, estate-management, social customs, fashion, travel, all of these things are covered in detail and they are worthy of study even without the juicy bits.
After the Women’s Lib movement in the 1970s and 1980s, the sensitive parts of Anne’s journal were revealed to the public. Helena Whitbread and Jill Liddington transcribed, compiled, and edited massive portions of the text and published the previously-unmentionable parts. We are deeply indebted to all of these women scholars.
Marissa: Anne grew up in a household that encouraged her intellectual pursuits. Her uncle James Lister, who owned Shibden Hall, recognized her sharp mind and treated her more like a son than a niece. She received an excellent education for a woman of her time, studying at the Manor School in York and later at a school in Ripon. Even as a teenager, she displayed the confidence and masculine presentation that would define her adult life—wearing black clothes, keeping her hair short, and walking with a commanding stride that earned her the local nickname “Gentleman Jack.”
My first introduction to Anne Lister was through fiction. My favorite author of all time, Emma Donoghue, wrote a novel about Anne Lister’s first love affair as a girl in a Yorkshire boarding school. Donoghue’s novel, Learned by Heart, tells the story of Eliza Raine, a “half-caste” girl in an uptight ladies boarding school in the 18-oughts. Though Donoghue’s character is partly fictionalized, the real Eliza Raine’s story requires little dramatization.
Elizabeth: Eliza Raine was the illegitimate daughter of an East India Company surgeon and his Indian lover (illegitimate because interracial marriages were not officially recognized). Eliza and her older sister spent their childhood in Madras. Their lives took a turn for the worst when their father became ill and returned to London for treatment. He died during the journey, leaving his girls in the care of an EIC colleague, William Duffin. Duffin arranged for the girls to be brought to London where they attended boarding school from 1802-1804. In 1804 they were brought to Duffin’s family seat in Yorkshire and enrolled in the Manor School. Eliza boarded at the school but due to her being biracial (“half-caste”) and illegitimate, she was housed in the school’s attic, separately from the other students.
Marissa: It was in this attic room, dubbed affectionately by the girls as “the Slope” for its sloped ceilings, that Anne Lister joined Eliza as a roommate. Anne was disruptive and strange. She was not particularly deferential to authority and the courses at the Manor school were either too easy for her (reading and writing) or of no interest to her (needlepoint). Anne and Eliza made an odd pair. By all accounts, their relationship turned romantic in short order and they used the privacy of the Slope for frequent sexual encounters. By the end of 1804, the two had pledged themselves to each other, referring to themselves as husband (Anne) and wife (Eliza). The two planned to abscond live together in southern Europe once Eliza’s trust became available to her when she reached adulthood.
Elizabeth: For Eliza, these vows were lifelong. She wrote love letters to Anne for the rest of her life. But Anne’s feelings for Eliza changed between 1806 and 1808, when the girls were made to spend some time apart. Anne may have been expelled from the Manor school. Eliza began to suspect that Anne’s affections were waning. In one of her letters to Eliza, Anne wrote “I assure you Eliza I am very steady in my attachments and though not deemed of an affectionate disposition I feel that I can be strongly attached to my dear and best friend ER.”[1]
Marissa: By 1810, Eliza was extremely unhappy and living with an elderly cousin (a condition of her inheritance). Her letters to Anne reek of desperation. In them, Eliza refers to Anne’s new love interest, Isabelle Norcliffe. Anne showered attention on Isabella but she was also distracted by the death of one of her brothers. In an attempt to resolve the issue of Eliza’s now-unrequited love, Anne suggested that Eliza marry a Halifax man named John Alexander. Increasingly enraged by Anne’s rejection and frustrated with her lack of control over her living situation, Eliza began to self-destruct. She had fallings-out with her distant English family and her guardians, the Duffins. In 1813, Anne’s last surviving brother, Sam, died in a drowning accident, leaving Anne as the ultimate heir to the Lister estates. Preoccupied with family affairs, and a host of new love interests (more on this this come), Anne neglected Eliza further.
Elizabeth: In a cruel twist of fate, Eliza was committed to an insane asylum owned by the father of the woman who would become Anne’s third lover, Mariana Belcombe, in 1814. She was imprisoned there until the asylum closed in 1853. There is at least some evidence that Eliza’s obsession with Anne may have contributed to Eliza’s commitment to the asylum. After her commitment, Eliza asked Anne to obliterate evidence of their romance: “The particular question I had to ask is, if you have our school letters? Tho they be still in your possession I beg you will burn them whenever it may be convenient.”[2] Eliza stopped writing to Anne after 1814, perhaps because it could be used as evidence of her “mental illness.”[3] Anne visited Eliza at the asylum intermittently but never returned the passion they had shared when they were young. After the asylum closed, Eliza was transferred to a house in a nearby village where she lived with her nurse until her death in 1860. In 1817, when Anne was sorting through her papers, she explored Eliza Raine’s letters she recorded in her diary: “My heart bled at the remembrance of the past, poor girl! She did indeed love me truly.”[4]
Marissa: While Eliza’s same-sex desire contributed to her lifelong commitment to an asylum, Anne Lister maintained her freedom. Perhaps her whiteness, Englishness, and wealth shielded her from fates like Eliza’s. Averill writes about this in her book a bit. There were some men in Dublin who, through their wealth and connection with the theatre and the arts, were able to live semi-openly as same-sex couples.This is also a phenomenon we see in Anne Lister’s biography. Anne’s same-sex desire was an open secret. Her lovers knew about her orientation, of course, but Anne’s aunt and uncle also knew. She often discussed her romantic entanglements and masculine qualities with them.
Elizabeth: She probably consulted them most about Isabelle “Tib” Norcliffe with whom Anne had an on-again, off-again relationship for almost her entire adult life. Anne was always looking for a permanent relationship, someone who would not only be her lover but also her companion, helpmeet, and financial stability. While the Lister family was, in theory, wealthy and landed, in reality, they struggled with money. Anne’s aunts and uncles had no heirs so her father was likely to inherit the family seat eventually. But he was eccentric, erratic, and incompetent with money. He bankrupted his nuclear family several times over. The Lister estate had potential to bring in good income but it needed refurbishment and careful management. Anne Lister seemed to be the only family member who was capable of this. This is why she was designated as their heir to the Lister estate from a young age.
Marissa: Like most people in the 18-teens and 1820s, Anne viewed possible partnerships through not only the lenses of love and sexual compatibility but also as a contract that had the potential to either enrich or impoverish her estate. The problem was that Anne needed injections of capital to invest into the estate to make it the income-generating asset she knew it could be. Isabella Norcliffe had potential to make the Lister estate financially stable. She was the heir to a sizable estate. This was extremely attractive to Anne. And Isabella, or “Tib” as Anne called her, was a delightful companion and popular socialite. She was outgoing, well-traveled, and socially adventurous. But for Anne, her charms ended there.
Elizabeth: Anne was turned off by Tib’s mannerisms which were quite masculine (like her own). Anne felt that Tib had all the ingredients of a perfect partner but that they were not arranged in such a way that could ever be acceptable to Anne. Tib drank too much, laughed too loudly, and was altogether too romantically and sexually assertive for Anne. While she cared deeply for Tib, it took a lot of convincing for Anne to accept her faults. So when future lovers betrayed Anne, she always came back to Tib as an option. In 1817, doubting her new lover, Anne wrote the following “As I was getting into bed I began thinking how little confidence I had in π [Mariana] and how little likely it was that we should ever get together. I was very low. I felt that my happiness depended upon having some female companion whom I could love and depend upon and my thoughts naturally turned to Isabella. I got out her picture and looked at it for ten minutes with considerable emotion. I almost wished to persuade myself I could so manage her temper as to be happy with her.”[5]
Marissa: Unfortunately for Tib, who seems to have favored a life partnership with Anne, it was not meant to be. There were just too many impediments for Anne to overcome. Anne sometimes complained about sex with Tib: “A good kiss last night, but she will make me be constantly feeling her, putting my finger up, etc., tho I do it as little as I can help. She is too fond of gross language.”[6] Ultimately, Anne was not just not sexually attracted to a masc women. Referring to her own masculine nature, Anne said: “Mr Lally had been visiting at Moreton last September and said he would as soon turn a man loose in his house as me – as for Miss Norcliffe, two jacks would not suit together.”[7] Still, Anne and Tib remained intimate friends and occasional lovers for the rest of Anne’s life.
Elizabeth: Tib was crucial to Anne’s life in another way, however. She is responsible for introducing Anne Lister to Mariana Belcombe around 1812. Anne was infatuated by Mariana from the start. After falling for Mariana, Anne went back to Tib for intermittent rolls in the hay but she was always compared unfavorably to Mariana. By 1826 Anne was ready to move on from Tib permanently: “a kiss last night of Isabella – perhaps I may never have another.”[8] A “kiss” was Anne’s euphemism for sex leading to orgasm. So when she says she gave someone two kisses or they gave her three, she is referring to orgasms from same-sex sex.
Marissa: One of Anne’s complaints about Tib was that she was not one of the uninitiated. Anne preferred women who were sexually inexperienced. In 1818, Anne complained about Tib: “She has seen a great deal of vice abroad and heard a great deal of loose conversation. Her mind is not pure enough for me but time must tell…”[9] Mariana Belcombe, especially when they were first introduced in 1812, had the requisite innocence and inexperience that Anne preferred.
Elizabeth: Mariana Belcombe’s family did not have a long pedigree but they were respectable enough. Her father, Dr. William Belcombe, was a physician who served as a surgeon in the Royal Navy during the American Revolution. After he was decommissioned, he moved his family to continental Europe. He and his wife had one son and five daughters. Mariana was the middle daughter, born in 1788, which made her one year older than Anne Lister.
Marissa: Anne was immediately taken with Mariana. She gushed about Mariana to Tib: “She is indeed a charming girl, and, from the real worth of her character, has gained no mean portion of my esteem and regard. Yet all good mental good qualities aside, your friend is a sweet looking girl.”[10] We suspect that Anne and Mariana began a sexual relationship in December 1812 during a visit to York. After the York visit, the two began a semi-long-distance affair. Mariana lived in London and Anne lived in Halifax but both traveled extensively. During 1813, they wrote each other 60 letters; Anne received 87 letters from Mariana in 1814. Unfortunately, these letters and the diaries from these years were burned (by Anne at Mariana’s request). Based on the surviving diaries and letters, we can infer that these were passionate love letters. We can also assume that they had a robust sexual relationship. In later life, the two had sex several times per day whenever they were together.
Elizabeth: And good sex it was. Anne would later write: “No one had ever given me kisses like hers.”[11] Her later dalliances with Mariana (which we’ll get to in a bit) were recorded in cypher, which Anne called “crypt hand.” Anne described one night of passion thusly: “Two last night. M– spoke in the very act. ‘Ah’ said she, ‘Can you ever love anyone else?’ She knows how to heighten the pleasure of our intercourse. She often murmurs, ‘Oh how delicious,’ just at the very moment. All her kisses are good ones.”[12] Mariana called Anne “her Freddy” and, according to the diaries, Mariana ignored Anne’s menstruation and preferred her in men’s clothes.
Marissa: During this time, Anne’s last surviving brother died (by drowning as we mentioned above). Anne’s aunts and uncles turned to Anne to continue on the Lister legacy. They were entirely aware that Anne was unlikely to marry a man. Anne wrote about conversations she had with them about her sexual orientation: “I love, & only love, the fairer sex & thus, beloved by them in turn, my heart revolts from any other love but theirs.”[13] So her family decided to, experimentally, designate her as heir and to move her into Shibden Hall, the family seat, so she could learn about the running of the estate.
Elizabeth: By early 1815, however, there was trouble in paradise. Mariana was being pursued by a wealthy, older suitor, Charles Lawton, of Lawton Hall. And to Anne’s horror, Mariana was encouraging the courtship. Anne raged bitterly in her journal for years about what she saw as Mariana choosing wealth and comfort over love: “never was so wretched in my life. Beginning of 1815: whatever might be her regard for me it is very plain it bore but a very subservient portion to her regard for the good things of this world. I was in love or surely I could not have been so blinded and acted with such doting folly; Oh that I then could have given her up without a struggle.”[14]
The early months of 1815 were a mere taste of the heartbreak Anne was to suffer for the rest of her life. Anne tried her hardest to convince Mariana to give up this scheme, citing their mutual love as the primary motivation. For a brief few months, Mariana gave in, postponing her nuptials. Mariana’s family even intervenes, begging Anne to not disrupt the courtship and acknowledging that Mariana should marry for financial security even if she didn’t like Charles Lawton. Anne reveled in her victory over Mariana’s marriage plans and wrote fondly of these months: “Surely no one ever doted on another as I did then on her. I fondly thought my love & happiness would last for ever.”[15] But she was wrong.
Marissa: In March 1816, Mariana married Charles Lawton and moved into Lawton Hall. But Mariana wanted the best of both worlds. She reasoned that as a wealthy, landed, married woman, that she would have bottomless resources to travel with Anne and continue their romance. Mariana hoped to give her husband an heir and then enjoy his wealth with her girlfriend on the side. So Mariana and Anne continued their romance intermittently. Mariana was able to convince Anne that this was just a detour in their great romance. She reasoned that since Charles Lawton was two decades older than her, that she would be widowed in short order. Then she’d have a large inheritance to bring with her to Shibden Hall where she’d live the rest of her life with Anne.
The insufficiency of this arrangement, however, became clear to Anne directly after the marriage. Charles and Mariana Lawton went on an extended honeymoon for 6 months accompanied by an aristocratic retinue. Mariana’s eldest sister Nantz came along to help Mariana get settled into married life. Anne Lister met up with the party on occasion. During a trip to Buxton, a spa town, Anne flirted with Nantz Belcombe. Anne was jealous of the sex she knew Mariana was having with her new husband.
Elizabeth: During this dalliance with Nantz, Anne Lister behaved in a way that most would interpret as abusive nowadays. After flirting with Nantz all day, the two slept in the same bed and stayed up all night chatting. Anne told Nantz that she only loved women and could never have feelings for a man. Nantz, a very sympathetic soul, cried for Anne. The next morning, Anne berated her for believing her speech the night before, saying it was in jest. Nantz was captivated by Anne and made arrangements to visit Shibden Hall in a couple months.
During that visit, Nantz and Anne slept in the same bed and Anne continued to coerce Nantz into sex. The two stayed up all night and at 4am, Anne finally admitted her sexual orientation to Nantz. Anne told Nantz she was attracted to her and asked her if she liked Anne any less for having learned this secrets about her. Nantz answered her with a kiss (an actual kiss this time). Anne was convinced that Nantz had been conquered but the sex stopped mid-stream because of Nantz’s nerves: “We went to great length as we had often done before such as feeling her all over pushing my finger up her etc. but still she did not get to the last extremity.”[16]
Marissa: Anne used Nantz’s reticence against her. After a couple days of coercion, Anne picked a fight with Nantz, saying “she was acting unfairly” and that she “ought either to make up her mind to let me have a kiss at once or change her manners altogether.”[17] Anne doesn’t write much about Nantz’s replies but Anne’s guilt-tripping must have worked because two days after this argument Anne writes: “Had a very good kiss last night. Anne gave it to me with pleasure, not thinking it necessary to refuse me any longer.”[18]
After they went all the way, Nantz was plagued by moral doubts. Anne’s diaries are filled with her conversations with Nantz about the morality of same-sex sex. Anne was effective at arguing away her lovers’ moral scruples with lesbianism. Anne saw her own sexual attraction as evidence of the naturalness of same-sex attraction and same-sex sex, “I urged in my own defence the strength of natural feeling & instinct, for so I might call it… When we leave nature we leave our only steady guide, and, from that moment, become inconsistent with ourselves.”[19]
Elizabeth: After three weeks of this philosophising to appease Nantz’s guilty conscience, Anne grew tired of her. She gave Nantz an excuse about her family needing quiet and asked Nantz to leave. Anne described her feelings for Nantz this way: “I do not admire her but rather feel a sort of disgust for her she is not nice & her breath is disagreeable however her manners made me feel desire.”[20]
After the lukewarm dalliance with Nantz, Anne took a break from romance and focused on her studies. But in January 1817, Anne had an opportunity to meet with Mariana who showed up unannounced at Anne’s home during a trip to York. The two ate dinner with Anne’s family and then went back to Mariana’s hotel for a romantic interlude. They spent the night and much of the next day together before Mariana went off to York. Mariana promised Anne that she would stop for another liaison on her way home from York in two weeks’ time.
Marissa: But in the meantime, disaster struck. Mariana’s husband, Charles Lawton, intercepted a love letter Anne had written to his wife. The letter contained professions of love, admissions of sexual activity, and, perhaps worst of all, their hopes of Charles’s early demise so they could live happily ever after on Charles’s money. Mariana appeared a few days later than expected at Shibden Hall to deliver this disastrous news. Charles forbade Mariana from seeing Anne and it appeared as if he planned to screen Anne’s letters to his wife. To avoid his prying eyes, Mariana learned Anne’s “crypt hand.”. Anne was no longer welcome at Lawton Hall and the two women struggled to plan regular meetings. Mariana promised to visit Shibden Hall covertly once per year. But it appeared as if their plans to carry on their affair under Charles’s nose was not going to happen.
Elizabeth: After a blissful but heartbreaking four days together, the two parted. In the wake of Mariana’s bad news, Anne re-dedicated herself to her studying, attending lectures, and diary-writing. Her diary seemed to be, in some sense, therapeutic for her: “What a comfort [are] my journals, how I can write in crypt all as it really is, & throw it off my mind & console myself– thank God for it.”[21] There is no evidence that Anne ever told Mariana about her dalliance with her older sister Nantz. Anne’s diaries suggest that she was (for most of her life) on the lookout for a life partner, even when she was hot and heavy with Mariana. She and Mariana would renew their dedication to each other several times during Anne’s lifetime but Anne was always torn about whether she should wait for Mariana and, in the end, she decided not to. All this time, Anne still kept Tib waiting in the wings. We’ll move on to discuss the rest of Anne’s romances but keep in mind that both Mariana and Tib will continue to pop up in her life. Tib as a deep friendship and lukewarm romance Anne wished she wanted to continue (because it would make life simpler) and Mariana as her one great love who betrayed her by marrying a man.
Marissa: One of Anne’s entries during this time demonstrates how torn she was about her love life: “In the morning and part of the afternoon got nearly to the bottom of the third page of my letter to Isabella. What a labour! For fear of saying too much I know not what to say and now such gets my trembling confidence in Mariana that I begin to feel some difficulty even in writing to her. I have not made use of consonants in my two last letters nor have I said anything particularly affectionate. What will be my fate between these two? At last perhaps I shall ultimately have neither of them – I should be much happier if I could really feel settled in a choice that was in every respect advisable”[22]
Elizabeth: In August 1817, Anne was deep into her single-girl summer when a woman in the same scientific lectures caught her eye. Miss Brown, dubbed “Kallista” in Anne’s journals, was a few years younger than Anne, and from a socially inferior family. Due to this fact, Anne never truly considered seducing and pursuing Miss Brown but she fantasized about her for the next few years. Two days after they met, Anne wrote: “Did nothing but dream of Miss Brown and though I awoke at six yet had not resolution to get up but lay dosing and thinking of the fair charmer – she is certainly very pretty. She seemed evidently not displeased with my attention and I felt all possible inclination to be as foolish as I ever was in former days – in fact I shall be much better out of the way of the lovely Maria (for such is her name) than in it.”[23]
Marissa: Miss Brown is mentioned often in the diary for the next year but Anne appears to have not made any headway with her. By August 1818, Anne was doing her best to forget her “Kallista.” She wrote, “thought the matter seriously over – lamented – prayed God to have mercy on me and to help me and resolved never more to mention Miss B and to avoid her entirely for the last time.”[24] But upon her next meeting with Miss Brown, Anne was, again, smitten. Over the next two days she wrote: “How changed since last night when I declared to seek after the girl only once more. This once has done the business. I like her and this morning’s walk and having got her to meet me tomorrow have certainly made me – shall I call it happier? – than I was before. At any rate she does not shew [sic] any antipathy to my attentions” and “This meeting with Miss B seems to have stimulated and roused me alto[ge]ther – I cannot live happily without female society, without someone to interest me.”[25]
Elizabeth: All this time, though, Anne never pursued sex with Miss Brown or professed her romantic feelings toward her. This is likely because she knew Miss Brown wasn’t the perfect match. She brought no inheritance or prestige to the match and Anne already had two imperfect matches (Tib and Mariana) which taunted her. This is fortunate because in 1819, Miss Brown got engaged to a Scotsman named Mr. Kelly. Unlike Mariana’s sham of a marriage, Miss Brown’s engagement appeared to be a love match. Anne wrote: “She told me I was the only one in Halifax to whom she woul[d] have mentioned the present case, but she is in love it seems and this gives me little hope of making much impression on her in the amatory way…”[26]
Elizabeth: With Miss Brown out of the picture, Anne Lister turned back to Tib and Mariana. Tib stayed at Shibden Hall for some of 1819 and Anne could tell that they were not on the same page: “Poor soul! She little thinks how things are. She feels secure. I scarce can bear it. I wish she knew all & all was settled.” Apparently Tib suggested the two move in together once Tib inherited her parents’ estate. During this visit, it became clear to Tib that she didn’t have Anne’s heart and that she would always share Anne with others. Perhaps as a way of showing that she understood the ground rules, Tib, Anne, and Miss Brown (whose family was visiting) shared cheeky kisses in the Shibden Hall garden.
Marissa: Anne’s doubts about Tib grew during this visit. She witnessed Tib’s excessive drinking with disgust and complained constantly about her manners. The two were experiencing trouble in their sex life as well. For example, Anne recorded what happened when she propositioned Tib one night: “[Tib] was going to sleep, but I would have a kiss. She says it gives her a pain in her back. I feel towards her differently more coolly than I did…. I cannot feel that she is, or ever can be, all to me I want & wish.”[27] Anne was quickly reminded why she and Tib did better as friends (friends who occasionally had sex).
At the same time, Mariana appeared to fall deeper into married life. Anne lamented: “I suppose she is more comfortable now with C–. She has her carriage & the luxuries of life and thinks proportionately less of me.”[28] Anne never really forgave Mariana for choosing financial security over a life with her. Which is interesting because Anne ALSO based her romantic decisions on financial security and social status. However, Mariana lived rent-free in Anne’s head. When Anne saw Mariana in person for the first time in two years, they interrogated each other about their sex lives. Anne just HAD to know how often Mariana had sex with her husband (about twenty times per year was Mariana’s answer). Anne kept her own sexual activities– with Tib, Nantz, and almost Miss Brown– to herself.
Elizabeth: Anne was enraged by Mariana’s sexual activities with her husband Charles Lawton, writing: “I felt that she was another man’s wife.”[29] This is interesting because it shows– “another” man– that, in Anne’s mind, she was a man. And others felt the same. Anne wrote in her diary, “The people generally remark, as I pass along, how much I am like a man.” One time, as she walked down the street, a stranger observed her and yelled “That’s a man!” and his companion yelled out “Does your cock stand?” When Anne visited York, prostitutes solicited her as they did the men. Sometimes Anne even fantasized about being a man: “Supposing myself in men’s clothes and having a penis, though nothing more.”[30] Anne often wrote about trying on men’s clothes and sitting in her room with them on. She once wrote “Began this morning to sit, before breakfast, in my drawers put on with gentlemens braces.”[31]
Marissa: In a pre-identity-politics society it’s hard to say what this really means. If Anne lived today would she be trans? Non-binary? Or a butch lesbian? We can’t know but what’s interesting is that her loved ones, and even her casual acquaintances, seemed willing to concede that she was quite masculine. And women who had never had any other same-sex attractions (Mariana, Nantz, Miss Brown, and several others) were attracted to Anne. It suggests that queer history is a lot more complex and that queerness was more common than we assume. That assumption comes from the lack of documentary evidence in most cases. Historical queer people often did not record their feelings or their encounters. Those who did, destroyed them before their deaths. Those few that survived their author’s death were destroyed by Families out of shame. That’s why Anne’s diary is so incredibly important. It gives us insight into a reality that many want to deny: there have always been, and there will always be, queer people.
Elizabeth: OK back to Anne’s anger at Mariana for having sex with her own husband… Anne goes on to compare Mariana’s arrangement with her husband as “legal prostitution.” Petulantly, Anne refused Mariana sex the first night they spent together to make the extent of her displeasure clear. But Anne could not hold out for long: “From the kiss she gave me it seemed as if she loved me as fondly as ever. By & by, we seemed to drop asleep but, by & by, I perceived she would like another kiss & she whispered, ‘Come again a bit Freddy.’ For a little while I pretend to sleep. In fact, it was inconvenient.. But soon, I got up a second time, again took off, went to her a second time & in spite of all, she really gave me pleasure.”[32]
Marissa: Anne and Mariana were able to meet again in the Spring of 1820. The two sorted through their letters to each other over the years and Anne allowed Mariana to read her diary entries from the years when Mariana first got married. Anne even confessed her obsession with Miss Brown. Mariana was overcome with guilt and jealousy: “She grieved over what I had suffered & would never doubt me again.”[33]
This emotional encounter sparked a renewal of their love. Anne wrote: “Sat up lovemaking, she conjuring me to be faithful, to consider myself as married and always to act to other women as if I was M’s husband.” Anne decided to “now begin to think & act as if she were indeed my wife”[34] but when Mariana asked her to verbalize a promise to her and only her, Anne avoided answering.
Elizabeth: A few months later, Tib’s father died and Mariana went into a tailspin, concerned that Anne would forget their promise to each other and sleep with Tib (or more) to comfort her. Mariana wrote: “My Fred, will this melancholy event make any difference to you or me? I shall not lose you, my husband, shall I? Oh, no, no. You will not, cannot, forget I am your constant, faithful, your affectionate wife.”[35] These reminders incensed Anne (to be fair, Mariana was free to sleep with her husband whenever she wanted) so Anne rebelled a bit, writing that she felt “as much at liberty as ever.”[36]
Marissa: This was, apparently, true. Because in October 1820, Anne Lister visited Tib at her family seat, Langton Hall. Immediately, Anne clocked a woman named Mary Vallance who she had met years before. Miss Valance was enamored with Anne and asked Anne to visit her room late at night. Anne was supposed to be sharing Tib’s bed with her but she sneaked out and found Miss Vallance’s room. The two were in the early stages of lovemaking when Tib crashed into the room looking for Anne. Anne “got quit of Tib” and went back to Miss Valance who was, according to her maid, suffering from a complaint that Anne took to mean she was aroused.
“Burnett [the maid] says her [Miss Vallance’s] complaint is quite on her nerves. I know it is and I am the best doctor. I soon found out what was the matter, kissed and put my tongue in while I had the three fingers of my right hand pushed as far as they would go up there.”[37] (It continues but we’ll leave the rest to your imagination.)
Elizabeth: Tib and Anne’s relationship may have been an open secret among Tib’s family because Tib’s sister Charlotte berated Anne for her attention to Miss Vallance. After Charlotte’s protests, Anne turned her attention away from Miss Valance and toward a newly arrived guest, Nantz Belcombe. Remember, Nantz is Mariana’s oldest sister whom Anne coerced into sex years before. Anne again seduced Nantz but became quickly annoyed with Nantz’s moral scruples as before. She also didn’t desire Nantz as much as she did Miss Valance (poor Nantz suffers a lot of criticism in Anne’s diary).
Anne continues on this path of chase and conquer during her entire visit to Langton. Some time after her sex with Nantz, another Belcombe sister arrives at Langton (evidence that this was quite an interconnected social circle). Henrietta Belcombe was the second sister (just below Nantz and above Mariana). Though by this time, she was referred to as Mrs. Milne because she’d married Lt. Cl. Milne of York. It’s unclear how far Anne’s seduction of Mrs. Milne went but we know Anne spends hours every night in Mrs. Milne’s room. Both Nantz and Miss Vallance reproached Anne for neglecting them in Mrs. Milne’s favor, to which Anne replied, “Said I could not help it. Mrs. Milne was fascinating.”[38] Before the visit was over, Anne also purportedly turned her attention to the youngest Belcombe sister, Louisa.
Marissa: The visit lasted until January 1821, when all the guests, including Anne, finally left Tib’s house. Anne relocated to the Belcombe home and had sex with Nantz, “whom I easily persuaded to sleep with me.” Anne felt bad for using Nantz for sex and for being unfaithful to Mariana (four times over) during the holiday, writing: “I shall not think much about her but get out of the scrape as well as I can, sorry & remorseful to have been in it at all. Heaven forgive me, & may M– never know it.”
To assuage her guilt, Anne spent four hours writing Mariana a letter in which she promised from thenceforth to be faithful to Mariana (justifying to herself that the past four dalliances didn’t matter and that she was starting anew at the time of letter-writing but allowing Mariana to think she was voicing the same promise they had made months earlier before her affairs at Langton Hall.) Mariana, not knowing anything about Anne’s escapades at Langton, received her words as affirming their earlier oath.
Elizabeth: In July 1821, Mariana and Anne were able to meet again for the christening of Mariana’s niece. They took the opportunity to perform a nuptial ceremony (of course not legal in Britain at the time). They, as a couple, became Mariana’s niece’s godmothers. Anne and Mariana, thinking of themselves as newlyweds, made love during this trip. Unfortunately, it was during this trip that Anne contracted venereal disease from Mariana (who purportedly contracted it from her husband Charles who had had some affairs).
Mariana’s brother Stephen (the father of her new goddaughter) was a physician so Anne approaches him discreetly with the “I have a friend who is suffering these symptoms” trick. Anne was infected with venereal disease (believed by scholars to be trichomoniasis) for the rest of her life. A few months later, Nantz propositioned Anne again but Anne refused, perhaps mindful of her new condition. Nonetheless, Anne had (somewhat unenthusiastic) sex with Tib a few months later, “I hope Tib will not have caught any infection from me. At the moment of my offering to sleep with her, I forgot this, & afterwards there was no retracting.”[39] Anne continued to go between Nantz and Mariana for the following year. Tib was available and always willing. Mariana was harder for her to spend time with and was still considered her great love.
Marissa: In 1822, Anne and her aunt (Anne Sr.) visited the Ladies of Llangollen. Averill’s episode from this series is about these two women, Sarah Ponsonby and Eleanor Butler, who lived their entire lives together. Their cottage became a place of pilgrimage for gardeners and closeted queers alike. Anne met only Sarah Ponsonby during her visit (Eleanor Butler was not present). Her detailed description of Sarah, recorded in her diary, provides fascinating insight: “A large woman so as to waddle in walking but, tho’, not taller than myself. In a blue, shortish waisted cloth habit, the jacket unbuttoned shewing a plain plaited frilled habit shirt – a thick white cravat, rather loosely put on – hair powdered… The remains of a very fine face. Coarsish white cotton stockings. Ladies slipper shoes cut low down, the foot hanging a little over. Altogether a very odd figure…Mild & gentle, certainly not masculine & yet there was a je-ne-sais-quoi striking.”
Anne tried to discreetly establish whether Sarah Ponsonby and Eleanor Butler were more than friends. She asked ‘if they were classical’ to which Sarah Ponsonby replied, ‘No… Thank God from Latin & Greek I am free.’ Anne’s attempts to discover more about the nature of Sarah and Eleanor’s relationship were unsuccessful. Mariana, who had already visited the cottage some years before, wrote to Anne: “Tell me if you think their regard has always been platonic & if you ever believed pure friendship could be so exalted. If you do, I shall think there are brighter amongst mortals than I ever believed there were…” The Ladies of Llangollen gave Anne and Mariana hope that their life could be like that one day.
Elizabeth: In 1823, Anne met a new friend, Frances Pickford, who was called Frank by her friends. Pickford often visited her sister in Halifax and she developed a reputation for being very masculine like Anne Lister. The two met at a chemistry lecture and became fast friends. This seems to have been another “two jacks” situation. Anne wrote about Frank: “I wish she would care a little more about dress. At least not wear such an old-fashioned, short-waisted, fright of a brown habit [a men’s jacket] with yellow metal buttons.”[40] Her friendship with Frank affirmed what Anne thought she already knew: she was into feminine women, unlike Frank: “I would rather have a pretty girl to flirt with. She is clever for a lady, but her style of manner & character do not naturally suit me. She is not lovable.”[41]
Frank, on the other hand, was romantically interested in Anne. To ward off Frank’s advances, Anne had to pretend to be asexual. Frank even outright admitted her feelings for women to Anne. Stone-faced, Anne denied having similar feelings. Frank didn’t believe her so Anne eventually conceded that her sexual orientation was theoretical while Frank’s was actually a practicing desirer of the female sex. (This was a lie obviously). And Frank didn’t really believe it. Anne kept up the act until Frank left town. Anne was satisfied with how she handled the situation, “I am now let into her secret & she forever barred from mine. Are there more Miss Pickfords in the world than I have ever before thought of?”[42]
Marissa: It’s strange (to me at least) that Anne behaved this way. She and Frank could have been confidantes in a world where women like them desperately needed it. Strangely, they remained friends but never spoke of their sexuality again. Apparently Anne was not looking for friendship and a confidante, she wanted a very femme lifelong romantic partner, one with an inheritance, and social capital that would improve even her own elite standing. With Frank gone, Anne went back to Tib and Mariana.
Elizabeth: By 1823, Anne Lister’s relationships with her two closest companions were reaching a crisis point. Tib’s excessive snuff-taking and drinking alienated the very health-conscious Anne, and Marianna’s continued marriage was frustrating. Perhaps the most damaging was the venereal disease scandal we mentioned above that had, by this time, created a painful chain of infection: Charles Lawton had contracted the disease from a servant, passed it to Mariana, who transmitted it to Anne, who then infected Isabella – creating ongoing shame and tension between all three women. Meanwhile, Anne was deeply ‘mortified’ on a trip to Scarborough in 1823 by Mariana’s criticisms of her masculine appearance, and Mariana had expressed reservations about their unconventional relationship becoming public knowledge. Anne felt totally and utterly rejected by her great love.
These mounting pressures led Anne to a profound disillusionment with both relationships. She wrote: “It has taught me that, tho’ [Mariana] loves me, it is without that beautiful romance of sentiment that all my soul desires. But mine are not affections to be returned in this world”. Anne told Mariana “I always considered your marriage legal prostitution.” Despite Tib’s devotion, her drinking and snuff-taking made her an increasingly unappealing life partner. The crisis reached its climax in 1824 when Anne decided to travel to Paris, both to escape these painful dynamics and to seek medical treatment for her venereal complaint.
Marissa: During her time abroad, Anne met Maria Barlow, the daughter of a Captain and American Revolutionary War veteran (he fought on the loyalist side). Mrs. Barlow was also the widow of Frederick Barlow, a slain Lt.-Cl. Who had been killed in the Battle of Salamanca in 1812. She had a 12 year-old daughter. Anne and Mrs. Barlow took an instance liking to each other. When Anne first laid eyes on her she noticed that Mrs. Barlow had a “nice little figure” and made sure to shoot a glance “directed at her bosom.”[43] Anne recorded their first sexual encounters which took place three weeks after they met:
“I had kissed and pressed Mrs B on my knee till I had had a complete fit of passion. My knees and thighs shook, my breathing and everything told her what was the matter. She said she did me no good. I said it was a little headache and I could go to sleep. I then leaned on her bosom and pretending to sleep kept pottering about and rubbing the surface of her queer[vulva] – then made several gentle efforts to put my hand up her petticoats which however she prevented, but she so crossed her legs and leaned against me that I put my hand over and grubbled her on the outside of her petticoats till she was evidently a little excited” (11-Nov-1824).
Elizabeth: During her months with Mrs. Barlow, Anne began to see Mariana as provincial and financially burdensome. Anne and Mrs. Barlow continued to advance their sexual relationship. After a few months, they decided to move in together into Paris apartments. Anne’s entries become increasingly graphic and sexual during this time. One of the more tame entries read: “Kept the candle burning last night for some time after getting into bed hoping to see her but she would not let me… She had a cup of tea in bed and we grubbled [sexual touching over their clothes] again just before getting up – finally she let me put my head under the clothes, kiss the top of her queer, and look at her.”
Marissa: But after a few months in their Paris apartment, Anne became disenchanted with Mrs. Barlow, for reasons that seemed to be related to Anne Lister’s own gender identity. We’ll read the entire entry here because the context may be important. Heads up- the descriptions are sexually graphic.. If you’re into that, read the Mrs. Barlow parts of Anne’s diary. If you’re not, you’ve been warned. This is one of the last times Anne and Mrs. Barlow made love:
“A strong excitement last night just after getting into bed; she said again this morning it was the best she had ever had. A very good one an hour before we got up, slumbering all the while afterwards. On getting out of bed, she suddenly touching my queer, I started back. ‘Ah,’ said she, ‘that is because you are a pucelle. I must undo that, I can give you relief, I must do to you as you do to me.’ I liked not this and said she astonished me. She asked if I was angry – no, merely astonished. However, I found I could not easily make her understand my feeling on the subiect and I dropped the matter altogether. Mariana would not make such a speech – this is womanizing me too much. Mariana will suit me better. I cannot do much for Mrs B except with my finger. I am more sure of going on well with Mariana who is contented with having myself next to her.”[44] Anne left Mrs. Barlow immediately after this and, instead, pursued a fling with Mme de Rosny, the Duchess de Barri.
Elizabeth: Ann returned to Yorkshire in 1828. This period marked the beginning of the end of the intense triangular relationship that had dominated Anne’s emotional life: Tib, Anne, Mariana. Though Anne continued to have occasional sex and occasional romantic renewals with Mariana over the next few years, she no longer believed in their future plans together. Anne removed Mariana from her will and finally severed their relationship entirely in 1828, a few months after her return to England. Anne also distanced herself from Tib, reasoning that Tib was self-destructing with alcohol. They remained friends and had a few more sexual encounters but Tib appears to have given up her campaign for Anne’s partnership, giving Anne the freedom to find her “wife” once and for all.
Marissa: By 1832, Anne was 41 years old and she was taking her role as heir to the Shibden estate more seriously than ever. She had had two more false starts with two potential great-loves. Anne Lister chose these two women with their inheritance and social standing in mind. Sibella Maclean was a Scottish aristocrat whom Anne seduced by letter from 1825 and 1829. Their correspondence became more promising for Anne in 1828 when they agreed to meet. Anne traveled to Edinburgh where she and Sibella became lovers. Anne was trying to convince the Maclean family to let Sibella move into Shibden with her when Sibella died from consumption in 1830.
Anne then pursued a relationship with a British aristocrat named Vere Hobart. Vere was sophisticated, educated and elegant, with enviable connections to the high society circles in which Anne aspired to move. Vere was the cousin of Lord and Lady Stuart de Rothsay, the British ambassador in Paris.The relationship was characterized by Anne’s passionate pursuit and Vere’s gentle but firm rejection. Anne did a lot of fruitless sweet-talking by the fire, a lot of sitting too close to Vere on the sofa, a lot of listening longingly to her playing sentimental songs on the piano. And a lot of getting absolutely nowhere. Anne would hang over Vere as she played piano and attempted to create romantic moments. This went on from 1829 to 1832. But then Anne’s hopes were dashed when Vere accepted the proposal of a man. Anne was required to attend the wedding where Vere gently told her what she already knew: that she just wasn’t attracted to women.
Elizabeth: Anne’s search for the perfect companion finally ended in 1834, when she realized that her “great love” had been under her nose all this time. Ann Walker was the wealthy heiress who lived on the estate next door. Though they had known each other for decades, it was only in 1834 that Anne Lister began to see Ann Walker in a romantic light. They soon began an intense romantic and sexual relationship. Anne introduced Ann to the estate management of Shibden Hall and they attended social events together, living openly as a couple. In 1834, they took communion together at Holy Trinity Church and thereafter considered themselves married, again without legal recognition.
Ann Walker was very different from Anne’s previous lovers—nervous, dependent, and easily manipulated. Anne was attracted to her wealth (Ann was one of the richest women in Yorkshire) but also felt genuine affection for her. Their relationship was both protective and controlling, with Anne Lister managing Ann Walker’s finances and making most decisions for both of them. In many ways Anne and Ann had a typical marriage for the 1830s. They bickered. They compromised. They rubbed each others’ backs when they were sore. They confided in each other and occasionally pissed each other off. They even rented a pew in their local church like any 19th-century hetero couple would.
Marissa: The sexual aspect of their relationship was important to Anne, though she found Ann Walker less passionate than her previous lovers. Anne’s diary records their intimate moments, noting both the physical pleasure and her sometimes frustrated attempts to awaken Ann Walker’s sexual appetite. In her younger years, this occasional sexual incompatibility would have been a deal-breaker for Anne Lister but at this point in her life, it was something she was willing to endure, especially since Ann Walker enjoyed adventure and travel as much as Anne Lister did. It also helped that Ann Walker’s estate was large and that it enriched the Listers’ estate immeasurably.
Elizabeth: Anne Lister and Ann Walker faced challenges and opposition to their relationship, including from Ann’s family who were wary of Anne Lister’s attempts to share in Ann Walker’s inheritance. However, they pursued projects on the Shibden estate, and traveled extensively together throughout Scandinavia, continental Europe, Russia, and the middle east. When Mariana finally met who Tib’s sister Charlotte called “her successor,” during a gathering at Lawton Hall, she was not impressed. Indeed, Mariana attempted to seduce Anne Lister one morning during the visit. Anne wrote: “she cannot get over her love for me— but I behaved with perfect propriety.”
It appears as if Anne Lister had finally found the woman who won her loyalty even when she was tempted by the woman she once called her “great love.” If only Anne and Ann had had more years together. They might have succeeded in modeling themselves after the Ladies of Llangolen. But it was not meant to be. Tragically, in 1840 at age 49, Anne Lister died of a fever while traveling in the Caucasus Mountains with Ann. After Anne’s death, Ann Walker took on the arduous task of returning her remains to Halifax which took six months. After her return to Shibden, Walker faced legal disputes over the division of their estate.
Ann Walker was, in 1843, declared of “unsound mind” and made to live in the care of relatives. This begs the question of whether Ann Walker, like Eliza Raine, was vulnerable to mental illness, or at least accusations of mental illness, because of her unusual partnership with Anne. Amongst Anne Lister’s friends, Ann Walker was regarded as a widow. But the Walker family, and British society at large, never acknowledged their marriage. Being unable to mourn her life partner publicly must have taken a toll on her. Sadly, Ann Walker died in 1854.
Marissa: What makes Anne’s diaries so invaluable to LGBTQ+ history isn’t just their explicit documentation of same-sex relationships—it’s their revelation of a fully realized queer life. Anne didn’t just exist in the shadows; she owned property, managed estates, traveled the world, and formed deep, lasting relationships. She saw herself as a husband to her wives, dressed in men’s clothing in private, and navigated the complex social dynamics of 19th-century England while remaining fundamentally true to herself.
Her story also reminds us how precarious queer history can be. If Arthur Burrell had succeeded in his mission to destroy these diaries, we would have lost one of the most complete records of LGBTQ+ life from this era. Instead, thanks to the Lister family’s ultimate decision to preserve them and the dedicated work of scholars like Helena Whitbread and Jill Liddington, we have this extraordinary window into a world we might never have known existed.
Anne Lister’s legacy extends far beyond her romantic relationships. She was a scholar, a traveler, a businesswoman, and a pioneer who refused to accept the limitations society placed on her gender and sexuality. Her coded diary entries prove that LGBTQ+ people have always been here, have always loved deeply, and have always found ways to create meaningful lives, even when—perhaps especially when—the world told them they couldn’t.
In preserving Anne’s story, we preserve something essential about the human experience: that love finds a way, that authenticity demands courage, and that sometimes the most radical act is simply living as yourself.
Elizabeth: Thank you for joining us today. As always, we invite you to follow us on BlueSky and Instagram at dig_history. If you have a comment or question or want to share some kind words with us, you can always email us at hello@digpodcast.org – we love listener mail! If you’re an educator, we’ve got a compendium of episodes you can use in the classroom – and free teaching resources, including full lesson plans! – on our website, digpodcast.org. You’ll also find full bibliographies, the scripts for all of our episodes, resources, and a link to our swag store at digpodcast.org.
Show Notes
Liddington, Jill. 2022. Lister, Anne, and Muriel M. Green. 1992. Miss Lister of Shibden Hall : Selected Letters (1800-1840). Lewes: Book Guild.
Lister, Anne. 2020. The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister 1824-1826 : No Priest but Love. Edited by Helena Whitbread. London: Virago Press.
Lister, Anne. 2010. The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister (1791-1840): I Know my Own Heart. Edited by Helena Whitbread. Paperback edition. London: Virago.
Roulston, Chris, and Caroline Gonda, eds. 2023. Decoding Anne Lister : From the Archives to ‘Gentleman Jack’. Cambridge, United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press.
Steidele, Angela. 2018. Gentleman Jack : A Biography of Anne Lister : Regency Landowner, Seducer & Secret Diarist. . Translated by Katy Derbyshire. Paperback edition. London: Serpent’s Tail.
Footnotes
[1] 21 Feb 1808 – Letter from Anne Lister, Halifax, to Eliza Raine, York (SH:7/ML/A/8) https://wyascatablogue.wordpress.com/exhibitions/anne-lister/anne-lister-love-life/
[2] 10 Oct 1814 – Letter from Eliza Raine, York, to Anne Lister, Halifax (SH:7/ML/A/90) https://wyascatablogue.wordpress.com/exhibitions/anne-lister/anne-lister-love-life/
[3] For some thoughts on how Eliza’s relationship with Anne contributed to her treatment see, https://www.herstoryyork.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Eliza-Raine.pdf
[4] October 1817, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f1%2f44&pos=1
[5] https://cdn.knightlab.com/libs/timeline3/latest/embed/index.html?source=1fL28z7Sk-hZMDNILFXq1me0pnMTARLgtm1eKKiIdPUo&font=Georgia-Helvetica&lang=en&initial_zoom=5&height=650
[6] https://cdn.knightlab.com/libs/timeline3/latest/embed/index.html?source=1fL28z7Sk-hZMDNILFXq1me0pnMTARLgtm1eKKiIdPUo&font=Georgia-Helvetica&lang=en&initial_zoom=5&height=650
[7] https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f9%2f16&pos=17
[8] https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f9%2f59&pos=60
[9] https://cdn.knightlab.com/libs/timeline3/latest/embed/index.html?source=1fL28z7Sk-hZMDNILFXq1me0pnMTARLgtm1eKKiIdPUo&font=Georgia-Helvetica&lang=en&initial_zoom=5&height=650
[10] Quoted in Angela Steidel, Gentleman Jack, p. 51
[11] November 1819, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f3%2f113&pos=1
[12] January 1819, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f2%2f97&pos=1
[13] January 1821, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f4%2f122&pos=1
[14] October 1817, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f1%2f45&pos=1
[15] September 1817, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f1%2f38&pos=1
[16] November 1816, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f26%2f3%2f3&pos=1
[17] November 1816, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f26%2f3%2f4&pos=1
[18] November 1816, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f26%2f3%2f4&pos=1
[19] November 1816, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f26%2f3%2f4&pos=1
[20] November 1816, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f26%2f3%2f3&pos=1
[21] April 1832, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f15%2f62&pos=1
[22] August 1817, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f1%2f34
[23] August 1817, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f1%2f34
[24] September 1818, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f2%2f62
[25] Both quotes from September 1818, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f2%2f63
[26] January 1819, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f2%2f102
[27] August 1819, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f3%2f81&pos=1
[28] August 1818, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f2%2f59&pos=1
[29] Thursday 18 November, https://bookreadfree.com/258864/6387625
[30] May 1821, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f5%2f26&pos=1
[31] March to April, 1817, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f1%2f3&pos=1
[32] November 1819 https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f3%2f113&pos=1
[33] Tuesday 4 April, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f3%2f113&pos=1
[34] April 1820, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f4%2f45&pos=1
[35] April 1820, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f4%2f45&pos=1
[36] August 1820, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f4%2f78&pos=1
[37] October 1820, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f4%2f89&pos=1
[38] December 1820, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f4%2f114&pos=1
[39] October 1821, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f5%2f74&pos=1
[40] March 1823, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f6%2f100&pos=1
[41] March 1823, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f6%2f102&pos=1
[42] August 1823, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f7%2f49&pos=1
[43] November 1824, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f8%2f78&pos=5
[44] March 1825, https://www.catalogue.wyjs.org.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=CC00001%2f7%2f9%2f6%2f8%2f134
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