1792-1800] Josiah Wedgwood of Maer Hall 7 



Whether Josiah and his sister succeeded in persuading 

 Miss Allen to return with them to Staffordshire is not known. 

 But his wooing was successful, for his marriage took place 

 in December, 1792, when he was twenty-three, and she was 

 twenty-eight years old. Josiah, the younger, was always 

 called Jos, and by this name he will be known here. There 

 are but few letters from him in the Maer collection, and he had 

 not the Allen gift of expression. His character must be 

 realised not from what he says himself, but from the im- 

 pression he made on others. 



Fanny Allen said: "Daddy Jos is always right, always 

 just, and always generous," and Dr Darwin considered him 

 one of the wisest men he had ever known. He inspired awe 

 as well as respect. His wife, although deeply devoted 

 to him, was not quite at ease with him, and a little afraid of 

 annoying and vexing him. 1 But this was not judging him 

 quite fairly, for though he was silent and grave, he had no 

 harshness of temper. I have a dim impression of being told 

 that Bessy considered men as dangerous creatures who must 

 be humoured. Probably her early life at Cresselly had shaken 

 her nerves and left her with impressions that she never got 

 over. A little speech of Sydney Smith's, quoted to me by my 

 mother, is interesting : " Wedgwood's an excellent man it is 

 a pity he hates his friends . ' ! His nieces the Darwins were, as 

 girls, afraid of him, and I have been told that they were 

 astounded at their brother Charles talking to him freely as if 

 he was a common mortal, and that this trust on Charles' 

 part made his uncle fond of him. My father says of him in 

 his Autobiography : ' He was silent and reserved, so as to be 

 a rather awful man ; but he sometimes talked openly with me. 

 He was the very type of an upright man, with the clearest 

 judgment. I do not believe that any power on earth could 

 have made him swerve an inch from what he considered the 

 right course." 



During the first few years of their married life Jos and 

 Bessy lived at Little Etruria, a house near Etruria Hall, which 

 had been built for Bentley, his father's partner. Etruria 

 was then quite a rural spot. To those who know what it is 

 now with collieries, iron- works, and p )ttery kilns belching out 

 black smoke, with dying trees in the fields, and blackened 

 workmen's cottages, it is strange to read Emma Allen's 

 description written about 1800 : " I spent Saturday morning 



1 He must have been very indulgent to his wife's wishes, for I 

 have been told that no cows were kept at Maer, as the moaning of 

 the cows when their calves were taken away distressed her. 



