The world
famous author Beatrix Potter was born on 28 July, 1866 in London.
This year it
will be the 150th anniversary of her birth and the Royal Mint is celebrating
it with coining a 50p piece.
Her books,
which she called her “little books” are estimated that every 15 seconds in the
world a book gets bought. The first book
Peter Rabbit alone sold over 40 million copies.
Altogether
she wrote and illustrated 23 animal stories. The stories were all written
before the First World War in a world which does not exists any more.
Her parent
Rupert and Helen Potter came from wealthy families. Their fortune came from
cotton mills in Lancashire. One Grandfather
built the greatest calico printing works and the other was a successful cotton
merchant and owned a fleet of merchant ships.
They live in
a grant house with seven servants. Rupert was a barrister but preferred leisure
to work. Her mother was a snob. Neither
cared a lot about the business nor about Beatrix
The first six
years Beatrix had a very stern Scottish nurse called Ann Mackenzie. Then a
governess was engaged. Florrie Hammond taught her till she was 17.
Most of her
time she was on the third floor in the nursery and till her brother Bertram arrived
in 1872 she was a lonely child. Her parents did not allow her to play with
other children because they feared she would catch germs.
Beatrix and
her brother Bertram had pets instead of friends. The nursery was full of frog, newts, two
lizards, a tortoise, caged birds, bats and a hedgehog.
When the
weather was fine she played in the walled garden at the back of the house.
Although her parents were wealthy she did not have a lot of toys.
In the
nursery Miss Mackenzie read fairy stories to her and Beatrix loved it all her
life. Although being lonely Beatrix was not unhappy. She loved art and animals.
Her father encouraged her to draw. He done sketches and gave it to Beatrix to
copy. He also design china for the nursery and decorated them himself. They are
exhibited at Hill Top , Beatrix’s farmhouse.
Her father
Rupert filled sketchbooks with a wide variety of drawings. One is seen a duck
with a bonnet and it could have inspired Beatrix to write Jemima Puddleduck. He was also a friend of the famous artist
John Everett Millais. Her grandparents had a paintings by Turner the famous
landscape painter.
From an early
age Beatrix was influenced by art and started art lesson at 12. Her favourites were animals and plants.
At the end
of her life she stated that her success came from being thorough. She painted
thousands of sketches and used a microscope to get the exact details.
She also
painted landscapes and at the age of 16 she went to the Lake District. She
absolutely loved it. A number of her
books were set in the Lakes and her illustrations copied from real places.
Since her lonely upbringing Beatrix was very
shy. She found she could relate to animals but not to people. She bought a rabbit
called Benjamin Bouncer. Another rabbit was called Peter. She painted them over
and over again and Peter became the model for her first book Peter Rabbit.
To begin
with Peter Rabbit began as a letter sent to a child in 1893. When it was
published nine years later it was a success.
Beatrix fell
in love with her publisher Norman Warne and her parents objected because he was
in trade. He proposed in July 1905 despite of and Beatrix accepted. Sadly he died a month later suddenly of leukaemia.
Beatrix
retreated to her farm Hill Top and dedicated her time to her books. She
developed a love for farming and became a prize winner breeding Herwick sheep.
She also became a defender of the Lake District being spoiled.
At the age
of 47 in 1913 she married a local solicitor William Heelis. All the following years
she bought many Lakeland farms and thousands of acres.
At her death
in 1943 she bequeathed it to the National Trust.
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