Fanny Duberly
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Frances Isabella Duberly (27 September 1829 – 19 November 1902) was an English soldier’s wife who wrote a journal of her experiences on campaign in the
Early history
Born Frances Isabella Locke in Devizes in Wiltshire in 1829, she was the daughter of Anna Maria Selina née Powell (1783–1838) and Wadham Locke (1779–1835), a Wiltshire banker. After her mother's death she moved to live with her eldest brother (also Wadham Locke) at Ashton Gifford House, Wiltshire. She left Ashton Gifford on her marriage to Henry Duberly (1822–1890) in 1845, which took place shortly after her brother had married for a second time.
Crimea
Duberly travelled with her husband to the Crimea in 1854 and stayed with him throughout his time there, despite the protests of commanders such as Lord Lucan. As the only officer's wife at the front, she was the centre of attention. Described as "a splendid rider, witty, ambitious, daring, lively, loquacious and gregarious", she seemed to possess the physical requirements and tough attitude required of her surroundings, writing shortly after her arrival at Varna, in Bulgaria, en route to the Crimea that she "was awoke by the reveillée at half-past two; rose, packed our bedding and tent, got a stale egg and a mouthful of brandy and was in my saddle by half-past five." She was told of planned attacks ahead of time, giving her the opportunity to be in a good position to witness them. Such was the case at the Battle of Balaclava, where her journey from camp to meet up with Henry and watch the battle took her quite close to the enemy. Though her husband survived the day (being away on staff duties), many of her friends did not: "Even my closed eyelids were filled with the ruddy glare of blood." Being so close to the front line in one of the first "modern" wars, Mrs Duberly differed from many of her compatriots back home in comprehending the reality of war. When her husband asked if she wanted to view the aftermath of the Battle of Inkerman, she told him she could not as "the thought of it made me shutter [sic] and turn sick."
Duberly’s adventures did not always sit well with society. She was pointedly snubbed at the Royal review of her husband’s regiment after the war. The journal she published after the war had originally been intended to have a dedication to
India
Duberly again accompanied her husband when the 8th Hussars were sent to India in 1856, travelling on the
Married life
The Duberlys had no children. She was a great friend and supporter of her husband, who never seemed to be jealous of his wife as the centre of attention in the all-male environment of the British Army in the field. She described her husband as "a friend I am obliged to support." He was ill when the time came to go ashore in the Crimea and she told her sister that "Lord Cardigan intends him to land with the troops, but I don’t intend him to do so." The Duberlys had their differences of opinion on the nature of military service. When orders came from Lucan that she must be put ashore at Constantinople, she wrote that "Henry looks upon the order as a soldier; I as a woman, and laugh at it."
Later life
The Duberlys returned to Britain in 1864. She retained her campaign memories but, when asked to reminisce about what she had witnessed, she replied that "those days are best forgotten." Nevertheless, she retained her adventurous spirit and complained to a nephew in 1896 that "I cannot stand dullness for long, and life gets duller and duller as one gets older." She died at Cheltenham in 1902, aged 73[2] and was buried with her husband in the churchyard of St Peter's church in the Leckhampton district of that town. Her husband, having risen to the rank of Lt. Colonel in the Army Pay Department, had died in 1890.
In fiction
Fanny Duberly was played by Jill Bennett in the 1968 film The Charge of the Light Brigade in which she was wrongly depicted as having a sexual relationship with Cardigan, played by Trevor Howard.[3]
She featured in two books about
Mrs Duberly is mentioned in Queen Victoria's Bomb by Ronald W. Clark (1967). The story consists of the memoirs of Professor Franklin Huxtable whose invention of an ultimate weapon in the 1850s was supposed to make warfare impossible. The bomb is trialled in a remote part of India.
References
Sources
- Barham, John. The Indomitable Duberly, 29 June 2006.
- Farwell, Byron. Queen Victoria’s Little Wars. New York: W. W. Norton, 1985.
- Warner, Philip. The Crimean War, A Reappraisal. New York: Taplinger, 1972.
- Mrs. Duberly's War: Journal and Letters from the Crimea, 1854–1856. Edited by Christine Kelly. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
- Duberly, Mrs. Henry. Journal Kept During The Russian War: From The Departure Of The Army From England In April 1854, To The Fall Of Sebastopol London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1856, at A Celebration of Women Writers.
Further reading
- Rappaport, Helen. No Place for Ladies: the Untold Story of Women in the Crimean War. Arum, 2007.
- Tisdall, E. E. P. Mrs. Duberly's Campaigns. New York: Rand McNally, 1963.