Harriet Martineau Visits Scale Hill, July 1845

From 1828 - 1845, Harriet Martineau had achieved the kind of eminence and respect enjoyed by no other literary woman before her. Her books had become best sellers at home and abroad, her company and opinions had been sought by statesman at the very heart of political power, she had been courted and flattered by the rich and famous both in England and America, and crowds of admirers had followed her in the streets. In addition to 50 books, Martineau penned over 1600 leader articles on the issue of slavery. She was considered an expert on America at home, having spent two years travelling the country in 1834. In America, from the slave market to the House of Congress, she travelled extensively – visiting prisons, schools, plantations, factories and universities – and she talked to an astonishing array of people, from prison inmates to Congressmen. Well known for her opposition to slavery, which she said was “indefensible, economically, socially, and morally”, she arrived in America during pro-slavery riots and was quick to lend the weight of her name to the abolitionist cause – which was seen as a wildly radical move at the time.

When she returned to Britain there was a Molière-type farce as three publishers simultaneously bid for her work from separate rooms in her house. Society in America resulted in 1837, followed in 1838 by Retrospect of Western Travel and by The Martyr Age of the United States in 1839: the first account of the history of American abolitionism. Published over a decade before Uncle Tom’s Cabin, her novel The Hour and the Man was written to support the abolition of slavery. She was foreign correspondent for the Anti-Slavery Standard in America and kept the issue prominent at home in articles in The Daily News.

While Harriet had always been ready to dedicate herself to others, and although it was deeply ingrained in her nature to continue to fight on the side of those who most needed her, to lead by example and to speak out with courage wherever she found injustice, now she was seeking a place where energy could be renewed and creativity flourish, a richly fulfilling environment where she could live and work in peace and happiness.

Martineau was successful and controversial, acknowledging in her autobiography that at least five of her books could potentially have ended her career. She can often be seen, however, head above the parapet when controversial Victorian storms raged. At an unveiling of a statue of her in Boston in 1877 Wendell Phillips, in his last public address, said:

“It is easy to be independent when all behind you agree with you, but the difficulty comes when nine hundred and ninety-nine of your friends think you are wrong.  Then it is the brave soul that stands up, one among a thousand…This was Harriet Martineau.”

 Martineau’s Adventure Across Blake Fell is retold in Martineau’s ‘Complete Guide To The English Lakes’ pp. 176-178, published in 1855. Below is an excerpt from ‘Harriet Martineau at Ambleside by Barbara Todd with A Year At Ambleside by Harriet Martineau’ (Barbara Todd, 2002) pp. 107-109.

“What a contrast was the next evening! We were lying at about two hours after noon, on the shingle at the head of Ennerdale Water, somewhat uneasy as to whether we could obtain a guide over Blake Fell to Scale Hill, at the end of Crummock Water. The distance was only six miles; and on the map the track looked clear enough; but I was resolved to allow no risks to the young people under my charge, and I refused to proceed without a guide, though it was hard to say to say what we could do, if we failed to procure one. The waters grew greater and rougher while we waited: but we thought no more of this than that the wind would be refreshing during the ascent, and the heat was at present intense. It was soon announced to us that a guide would await us at the distance of a few fields: we considered our affairs comfortably settled, and set up off the Fell, all in good spirits and security. The heat was still very great; so we took our time, and lagged behind the guide, though he carried our knapsacks and basket. He was a quiet-looking elderly mountaineer who appeared to walk very slowly; but his progress was great compared with ours, from the uniformity and continuity of his pace. In the worst part of our transit, I tried the effect of following close behind him, and putting my feet into his footsteps, and I was surprised to find with what ease and rapidity I got on. At first we stopped frequently to sit down and drink from the streams that crossed the track or flowed beside it: and during these halts, we observed that the blackness which had for some time been appearing in the west, now completely shrouded the sea. Next, we remarked that while the wind still blew in our faces – that is, from the north-east – the mass of western clouds was evidently climbing the sky. The guide quietly observed that there would be rain by-and-by. Next, when we were in the middle of the wide Fell, and we saw how puzzled we should have been to find a path, while winding among the swampy places, even in the calmest weather, we pointed out to one another how the light fleeces of cloud below the black mass swept round in a circle, following each other like straws in an eddy. Soon, the dark mass came driving up at such a rate that it was clear we should not get through our walk in good weather. The dense mist was presently upon us. On looking behind, to watch its rate of advance, I saw a few flashes of lightning burst from it. The thunder had for sometime been growling afar, almost incessantly. The moment before the explosion of the storm was more like a dream than perhaps any actual experience I ever had. We were walking on wild ground, now ascending, now descending – a deep tarn (Floutern Tarn) on our right-hand our feet treading on slippery rushes, or still more slippery grass: the air was dark as during an eclipse, and heavy mists drove past from behind, just at the level of our heads, and sinking every moment; while before us, and far, far below us down as in a different world – lay Buttermere and, the neighbouring vales, sleeping in the calmest sunshine. The contrast of that warm picture, with its yellow lights and soft blue shadows, with the turbulence and chill and gloom of the station from which we viewed it, made me feel this the newest scene I had witnessed for many a year. I had but a moment in which to devour it; for not only did the clouds close down before my eyes, but the wind scudded round to the opposite point of the compass, throwing me flat as it passed. Within a few minutes, I had several falls, from the force of the wind and the treachery of the ground – now in a trice a medley of small streams. It was impossible to stop the guide, much as I wanted to ask him to look back now and then, to see to the safety of my companions in the rear. So it was necessary to keep up my pace, that he might not stride away from us entirely; my companions making a similar effort to keep up with me. Through stumblings and slidings innumerable they did this – the lightning playing about our faces the while, like a will-o’-the -wisp on the face of the bog. The hail and rain had drenched us to the skin in three minutes. The first hailstones penetrated to the skin. They were driven in at every opening of our clothes’ they seemed to cut our necks behind, and they filled our shoes our hats were immediately soaked through, and our hair wringing wet. The thunder seemed to roll on our very skulls. In this weather we went plunging on for four miles, through spongy bogs, turbid streams, whose bridges and stones were covered by the rushing waters, or by narrow pathways, each one of which was converted by the storm into an impetuous brook. When we had descended into a region where we could hear ourselves speak, we congratulated one another on our prudence in not proceeding without a guide. Without him, how should we have known the path from the brook, or have guessed where we might ford the streams, whose bridges were out of sight? Two horses, we afterwards found, were killed on the Fell in that storm: and we should have never come down, we were persuaded, if we had been left to wander by ourselves. As we sat at our tea, in curious masquerade fashion, at the hospitable Scale Hill Inn, dressed in such odds and ends of clothes as the people could spare us while our own were drying, (our very knapsacks being wet through), we thought over our last two days of travel, and felt as if the calm sunset at Calder Abbey were enhanced in its charm, when we looked back upon through the storm on Blake Fell.”