Children
Jane became pregnant in spring 1827 and moved into Hogg's house. She then became known as Mrs Hogg, and he devoted himself to being a father to her two children.
Few people in London other than their close friends knew that the couple were not married. Hogg's family had heard rumours that he was planning to marry, and had been curious to know whom he had chosen. They were very upset after hearing of his plans for a union with Jane. His mother was unwilling to introduce Jane to their social circles as Mrs Hogg, which ensured that she would never visit them. Hogg did not enter his family's house in Durham for seven years after he informed them of his relationship with Jane. Word of their union spread throughout Durham, and Hogg stopped practising law there for some time because of the damage to his reputation. Several of their friends were supportive of their union. Mary Shelley particularly approved of their match, despite having earlier been jealous of the time Hogg had spent with Jane.
The couple's first child, Mary Prudentia Hogg, was born in November 1827. Her parents did their best not to spread the news, because she was born soon after they began cohabiting. Mary Prudentia died in May 1829. Jane gave birth to their second daughter, Prudentia, in 1836, and Mary Shelley was selected as her godmother. Hogg's friendship with Mary Shelley was disrupted several years later, however, when she republished Percy Shelley's Queen Mab in 1839. Hogg rebuked her for leaving out its previous dedication to Harriet Shelley, and they did not communicate with each other for several years.
Read more about this topic: Thomas Jefferson Hogg
Famous quotes containing the word children:
“It was common practice for me to take my children with me whenever I went shopping, out for a walk in a white neighborhood, or just felt like going about in a white world. The reason was simple enough: if a black man is alone or with other black men, he is a threat to whites. But if he is with children, then he is harmless, adorable.”
—Gerald Early (20th century)
“Other people’s harvests are always the best harvests, but one’s own children are always the best children.”
—Chinese proverb.
“I concluded that I was skilled, however poorly, at only one thing: marriage. And so I set about the business of selling myself and two children to some unsuspecting man who might think me a desirable second-hand mate, a man of good means and disposition willing to support another man’s children in some semblance of the style to which they were accustomed. My heart was not in the chase, but I was tired and there was no alternative. I could not afford freedom.”
—Barbara Howar (b. 1934)