Anne Brontė was the youngest of the daughters of the literary
Irish clergyman Patrick Brontė. She was born shortly before
the family moved from Thornton to Haworth, where she lived for
most of her life. For a while she attended the Roe Head boarding
school, where her older sister Charlotte was a teacher. This
was no success. Her father was poor and after she finished her
education, she left Haworth in 1839 to work as a governess for
the Ingham family at Blake Hall near Mirfield. But she had problems
managing the bad behaviour of the children and was not authorised
to punish them. Before Christmas she was home. There she met
William Weightman, her father's new curate. From 1840 to 1845
she worked as a governess for the Robinson family at Thorp Green
Hall and this time things went better. She resigned after her
brother Branwell, who was also employed there, turned out to
have a relationship with Mrs Robinson, her employer.
In
1845 she and her sisters Charlotte and Emily secretly put together
a volume of poetry under the name of Currer, Ellis and Acton
Bell. They had it printed from their own money. It sold only
two copies in the first years allhough it received a few favourable
reviews. In 1848 her poems "The Three Guides" and The Narrow
Way" were published in magazines. At the same time, the sisters
each drafted a novel. Anne wrote "Agnes Grey", in which she
used her experiences at Blake Hall. "Agnes Grey" was published
in 1847 and sales were good. Her second novel "The Tenant of
Wildfell Hall" (1848) was an immediate success. Her style is
sharp and ironic and lacks the romanticism of the work of her
sisters.
In 1848 she visited London with Charlotte
to reveal their identity to their publisher George Smith and
to prove to him that they were not the same person. Her literary
future seemd bright now but in 1848 both her brother Branwell
and Emily died. The grief underminded her health and she became
ill herself and she was diagnosed with consumption, without
hope of recovery. In May 1849 she travelled to Scarborough,
hoping that the sea air might do her good. She had known happy
times at Scarborough with the Robinson family and liked the
place. She, Charlotte, and their friend Ellen Nussey arrived
at May 25th, but it was clear that she had little strength left.
They lodged at 'Wood's Lodgings', Number 2, The Cliff.
Anne
died three days after their arrival and Charlotte buried her
sister there instead of in Haworth (possibly Anne had expressed
a wish to be buried there to spare Charlotte the transportation
of her body to Haworth and her father another funeral, but Charlotte's
statement to 'lay the flower where it had fallen' suggests it
was Charlotte's decision). Patrick Brontė was not present at
the funeral, only Charlotte and Miss Wooler, the former teacher
at Roe Head, were there.
Three years later Charlotte
visited the grave and discovered five errors on the stone she
had ordered. They were corrected, but her age at the time of
death is still incorrectly stated as 28. Charlotte never visited
the grave again. In 2013 a plaque was put on her grave which
gave her age correctly as 29.
Related persons
• is brother/sister of Brontė, Charlotte
• is brother/sister of Brontė, Emily
• was criticized by Eastlake, Elizabeth
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