The Tale of Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle - Background

Background

The story of Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle was inspired by Kitty MacDonald, a Scottish washerwoman the Potters employed over the course of eleven summers at Dalguise House on the River Tay in Perthshire, writes Leslie Linder. Potter was 26 when, in 1892, she visited MacDonald while staying at Heath Park, Birnam. She wrote in her journal: "Went out with the pony ... to see Kitty MacDonald, our old washerwoman ... Kitty is eighty-three but waken, and delightfully merry ... She is a comical, round little woman, as brown as a berry and wears a multitude of petticoats and a white mutch. Her memory goes back for seventy years, and I really believe she is prepared to enumerate the articles of her first wash in the year '71".

In 1942, the year before she died, Potter's thoughts returned to Kitty MacDonald when she wrote about a piece of crockery:

Seventy eighty years ago it belonged to another old woman, old Katie MacDonald, the Highland washerwoman. She was a tiny body, brown as a berry, beady black eyes and much wrinkled, against an incongruously white frilled mutch. She wore a small plaid crossed over shawl pinned with a silver brooch, a bed jacket, and a full kilted petticoat. She dropped bob curtsies, but she was outspoken and very independent, proud and proper ... The joy of converse with old Katie was to draw her out to talk of the days when she was a wee bit lassie—herding the kine. The days when 'Boney' was a terror ... the old woman wouldn't dwell upon hard weather and storms; she spoke of the sunshine and clouds, and shadows, the heather bells, the ... "the broom of the Cowden Knowes", the sun and wind on the hills where she played, and knitted, and herded cattle and sheep. A bonny life it was, but it never came back ..."

Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle may have been conceived as early as 1886, it was not until 1901 Potter began elaborating it while on holiday at Lingholm west of Derwentwater where she met young Kathleen and Lucie Carr, daughters of the local vicar. In 1902, it was put to paper. The Carr family lived at Skelghyl, but Potter took some artistic liberty and moved the house's location to Little Town in the text. The family came to tea at Lingholm often with Potter delighted by the one-year-child's behaviour. On one occasion, Lucie left her gloves behind at Lingholm, and Potter transformed the incident into the fictional Lucie's propensity for losing her pocket handkerchiefs. A small copy book contains what is believed to be the earliest manuscript of Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle. Its title page is inscribed: "Made at Lingholm, Sept. 01 told to cousin Stephanie at Melford Nov. 01—written down Nov. 02. There are no pictures, it is a good one to tell—"

Potter used her cousin's daughter, Stephanie Hyde Parker, as audience for the draft of the story. She likely meant to dedicate the book to Stephanie, writing in the manuscript, "Now Stephanie, this is a story about a little girl called Lucie; she was smaller than you and could not speak quite plain.". In the end however, the book was dedicated to Lucie Carr. Stephanie would receive the dedication to The Tale of Mr. Jeremy Fisher in 1906.

Early in 1904, Potter was putting the finishing touches on Benjamin Bunny and Two Bad Mice. At the same time, she began giving serious thought to developing the tale about Mrs. Tiggy-winkle and Lucie. She had been working on backgrounds and had been carrying her pet hedgehog with her when travelling. On 15 March, she wrote her editor Norman Warne, "I have been drawing the stump of a hollow tree for another hedgehog drawing".

Potter and Warne agreed volume of nursery rhymes would be created in 1905 but she also brought his attention to a story she had previously written, writing to him, "I think 'Mrs. Tiggy' would be all right; it is a girl's book ... there must be a large audience of little girls. I think they would like the different clothes." She began the illustrations in the summer once he agreed to the concept.