Representing Regency: Multiracial People in the 19th Century

In prepping a review for Love’s Harbinger, I perused some of the reviews on GoodReads and Amazon, as I often do, to make sure I am addressing things that other readers love or find problematic. Its a practice that also helps me address my own biases and try to be upfront about them.

I was surprised when one reader on Amazon challenged the historical accuracy of the book because hero Guy Delamar was well received in the ton, and the reader felt this was unrealistic as he was mixed race.

Here are the descriptions of Delamar from the book: “Mr. Delamar was certainly extremely striking…He had an air of diablerie..dashing, angry, savagely handsome man who stared down a generous nose at her from a pair of topaz tiger’s eyes…his skin was bronze. Was he part Indian?”

As is later explained, Delamar is half French. His father was a member of the moderate Gironde party that fled during the revolution.

So aside from a couple of characters calling him dark, swarthy, or Indian, its not clear that Delamar is mixed race. He is definitely only half British. But other than him being French, there is no actual description of his ethnicity or race.

But I digress.

Because I really wanted to address the historical accuracy claims of multiracial people in Society in the 19th century in England, as part of my new Representing Regency series.

As the British Empire expanded its reaches throughout the globe and in places like Indian, Jamaica, Africa and Asia, there were increasing chances for white Brits to marry or produce offspring with people of color.

Research into children born from British men and Jamaican women has demonstrated that “about 10 percent…contained provisions for children being sent from the island back to Great Britain” (https://www.wm.edu/news/stories/2011/neh-postdoctoral-fellow-livesay-presents-new-views-on-mixed-races-and-their-families.php). While abolitionism saw the end of slavery in the beginning of the 19th century, it also increased discussions of race among citizens of the US and UK, including theories of scientific racism. However, some scholars point out that the difference between races was less pronounced than that of class in the 19th century (https://www.newstatesman.com/node/153394).

One famous multiracial child of a gentleman (Sir John Lindsay) and enslaved African woman (Maria Belle) was Dido Elizabeth Belle who was brought to England to be raised by her father’s Uncle and Aunt (Earl of Mansfield) along with their daughter. When Sir John passed away, he made Dido an heiress and ensured her freedom. Although more of Georgian era example, Dido represents one example of multiracial children raised with the benefits of the gentry (https://blackpast.org/gah/belle-dido-elizabeth-1761-1804). A recent movie, Belle, depicts her life.

Another distinguished biracial child was Col. James Skinner, who was an military man in Indian. His mother was an Indian princess and his father was Lieutenant-Col Hercules Skinner, an officer of the East India Company. His three sisters married East India Company gentlemen. One of the sisters, Elizabeth Jane Oldham, died in Staffordshire in 1849 at the age of 62.

The navy showed evidence of a multi-racial frigate captain, John Perkins (https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/places/portchester-castle/history-and-stories/black-people-in-late-18th-century-Britain/)

These are just a few examples of mixed race people integrated into British society. There are also a fair amount of scholars who posit Queen Charlotte was biracial (https://www.history.com/news/biracial-royalty-meghan-markle-queen-charlotte).

One scholar, Livesay, argues that during the Georgian era British families were more accepting of multi-racial children, but as the debate of abolitionism heated up families attitudes changed as they struggled with the concepts of slavery and race (https://www.wm.edu/news/stories/2011/neh-postdoctoral-fellow-livesay-presents-new-views-on-mixed-races-and-their-families.php). He gives multiple examples of multi-racial children and the different attitudes of family during the late 18th and early 19th centuries.

Livesay points out that as the abolitionism movement picked up steam, some families kept multi-racial children apart from the rest of the family socially. This might mean multi-racial family members were not invited to participate in external social events.

There is certainly not a wealth of information or evidence suggesting that the Regency ballrooms and drawing rooms were teeming with people of color. Yet British men continued to marry or have long term relationships with women of color at home and abroad, producing biracial children who were sometimes well loved and cared for, including integration into British homes and lives.

There were also examples of people of color being popular and well received in Georgian and Regency England. Bill Richmond was a Georgian/Regency boxer born in America but brought to England, educated and well received by many of higher classes. Richmond even served as an usher at the coronation of George IV. He also married a white, Englishwoman and had several children.

Joseph Emidy was a celebrated Guinea born violinist and composer who was left in Cornwall after being pressed into service as Admiral Pellew’s fiddler for four years during the Napoleonic Wars. In the 1820, John Edmonstone (a former slave from the West Indies) taught taxidermy at the University of Edinburgh. Charles Darwin was one of his students.

These examples point to the very real fact that there were clear examples of successful people of color and multi-racial persons that are an important part of Regency history. Attitudes towards race began to shift dramatically in the 19th century, particularly as institutional racism found its roots and justifications in biased scientific tomes. However, race’s complicated history make it even more important to include in our reimaginings and portrayals of 18th and 19th century UK life.

The 1764 Gentleman’s Magazine reported that there were as many as 20,000 black servants in residents throughout British homes. Many former slaves fought for the British in the American Revolutionary War and Napoleonic wars and returned to settle in London. The point is, the UK had a diversity of population that often gets left out of the stories of the past because its so complicated, problematic or sometimes unflattering.

I challenge all Regency Readers to seek out different and unique stories that represent the true variety of people and romance from the era and to also challenge assumptions about what is, in fact, historically accurate. And what that even means.