Speaker 01: 0:00

Hi, and welcome to Behind the Paddle. I am Pors and Victoria. And I am Emily Sun. Yeah, and we are going to talk about the first lesbian marriage in the UK.

Speaker 02: 0:10

Yeah.

Speaker 01: 0:11

Yeah. So the previous episode, at least one of them, was we were going to do the first lesbian marriage in the UK. But of course, there is so much information, and we feel like this woman needs her own episode. So the previous one is called Gentleman Gentleman Jack. Yeah. Yes. And now this one is gonna be the first lesbian marriage in the UK.

Speaker 02: 0:38

She's too interested in a character not to have her own episodes. Absolutely. Um so this is a continuation of that story. So Shipton Hall had belonged to the Lister family for more than 200 years, a medieval manor house tucked behind a hill, its black and white facade had a network of dark rooms within. Even the house's goth, it's great. Um so if you'd listened to the previous episode, Anne had um just been trying to get together with a duchess and had been rejected for a man again many, many times. Basically, all her partners have just ended up with men, as as was the thing back in the day. That was kind of the expected thing, but she just wanted to be able to live her life like anybody, like a man, and wanted a wife, and was adamant she was gonna get one. Yep. Preferably, I think most importantly, with money and with status. Yeah, yeah. Important stuff. So she's been rejected, she's gone, fuck this, I'm gone home. Yep. She's gone back to her family home that she had inherited several years before, but had kinda not really spent any time in um because she wanted to go travelling and um headed back there. So she thought it was shabby and cold. Um, she'd spent much of the last decade in elegant resorts all over Europe and had come back to a place that was in much need of repair um and was kind of fallen apart. So she Halifax had recently had an industrial boom which had produced a huge demand for coal, and Anne spotted this opportunity and quickly expanded into Ship Shibden's coal collieries, which I think is just like coal mines and stuff. So she was quite a good businesswoman. Um her determination to be hands-on marked her out from other women with property. She took on the men who ran the local coal industry, and they soon learned she possessed a shrewd business brain.

Speaker 01: 2:47

So, so how did she get into that position? So, was she like the manager of them or like did she create her own?

Speaker 02: 2:55

So she expanded them. So basically, as part of the estate, uh-huh, it's like a house and land. And on this land, there clearly was already like coal mines, and because there was like a boom in that area, she's gone, right, that's where the money needs to go. So, like, that's how she had money when she was travelling because the the land that she had would have had like businesses and stuff on it. Got yeah, um and she would have been getting like a like a cut of that while she was away, yeah. Um, so she's came home and she's spotted an opportunity to she's been smart about it, yeah. To make herself more money. Um she told her diary how a coal merchant she had driven a hard bargain with complained he was never beaten but by ladies, and I had beaten him. Nice. Um she felt really at home there, she'd remarked, I have been happier here than anyone else. So I was quite nice, she was starting to settle in. Yeah. Um I feel like 41, she'd had she'd had quite a time in it, she'd been she'd been off Gallivantin for like nearly 30 eh nearly 20 years at that point, so it's nice she got quite settled where she was. Um basically poured over everything she could learn about the estate, and her diary was full of like all the estate business. Um amid the horticulture and landscaping references, a new name began to appear on the pages. Anne Walker was a shy, gentle, 29-year-old heiress from a larger neighbour in estate. Oh, okay. So she was like, Oh, we've got a rich neighbour, a rich hot neighbour. Yeah, yeah. The two women had met years before when Anne was in her twenties and the young Anne was just a teenager. Yeah. So she hadn't looked at the road she was on at that point, which fair enough. Yeah, good. So this was 15 years later.

Speaker 01: 4:47

Saint Oleonardo DiCaprio likes to be.

Speaker 02: 4:50

I've seen pictures of that earlier, it's given me the utter fear. Um, so 15 years later, the demure Miss Walker made a much bigger impression on our neighbour. The quote for the diary She has money, and this might make up for rank. That's good. So uh within a week of them being reacquainted, Anne was imagining the two of them together as she was telling her diary. Um, as with previous prospective lovers, the young heiress's fortune was a large part of this attraction. Um, Anne hoped that combining their wealth would enable her to complete her ambitions for Shibden, leaving enough spare to keep travelling. Okay. She lit she little dreams what is in my mind. She has money and this may make up for rank. We get on very well so far. Anne's infatuation with her new friend accelerated quickly, and Kurt Dacross thinking of Miss W for the first time. So she's wanking around at this point basically. Okay, okay. Um they began spending time in a secluded cottage in the grounds of Shibden that Anne had built for her own privacy and called the Moss House. So she's built up your Shagan tent, yeah. Um within weeks of them meeting, their relationship became intimate, and Anne responded warmly and enthusiastically to Anne's sexual advances. I really did feel rather in love with her than the hut. Perhaps after all, she will make me really happier than any of my former flames. So she's still like a wee bit a romantic in there. Yeah, yeah. She's just very she's just business-like in everything that she does. Um Throughout her relationships, Anne had seemingly been on a collision a collision course with the society she inhabited. She sought a woman to live with openly when such arrangements apparently had no precedent. Um so as we've said before, like she was kinda running with a script. She was making things up as she went along, like the things that she wanted weren't they she never had any like examples of that run about her. Yeah. Um she was very much just like blazing the trail and making her in whiten the world, which fucking hats off there. That's terrifying to think about. Um obviously our previous relationships, Marianna and Vere had both decided to marry men, but these decisions were as much to do with meeting society's expectations as they were a rejection of Anne. Yeah. Um like people just succumbed to the pressure, probably their families and stuff were putting on them. Um and just continued to refuse to conform to that, she just wanted to do her anything, and refused to She wanted to be happy in her own way, exactly, exactly. That's totally fair. Like I could see why she would be quite angry with them for not choosing their own happiness over yeah, but that was the done thing, so um after two months of them being together, she made her intentions clear. She wanted them to live together at Shibden, like a married couple, share their wealth and property, but young Anne was fraught with anxiety. Oh she was still really confused about her closeness to another woman and still grieving over the deaths of her fiance and parents.

Speaker 01: 8:12

Oh, okay.

Speaker 02: 8:13

She asked for six months to think about it. Six months? Yep. They'd only been together two months at this point.

Speaker 01: 8:19

Fair.

Speaker 02: 8:20

And she's like, mate, give me another six months.

Speaker 01: 8:22

Could you imagine if I got with somebody and they were like, move in now?

Speaker 02: 8:26

Two months is pretty quick. Let's say, especially I don't know what happened to her fiance and her parents.

Speaker 01: 8:33

Like we'll figure that out at some point.

Speaker 02: 8:36

Yeah. Um so six months went by and young Anne sent Anne a letter saying, 'I find it impossible to make up my mind.' Um, irritated in doubting their relationship had a future, Anne went fucked off to Paris and Copenhagen in a huff.

Speaker 01: 8:53

Oh, okay, fair.

Speaker 02: 8:55

Well, she seems to just stay alone. Yeah. Um, she came back to Halifax several months later, and young Anne was waiting for her. She had turned down an offer of marriage from a man. It was the clearest message yet. She was in favour of a life with Anne.

Speaker 01: 9:09

Yeah.

Speaker 02: 9:09

I feel like that must have been quite nice for her because like Absolutely.

Speaker 01: 9:13

After getting like denied for so long.

Speaker 02: 9:16

Yeah. Like I feel like the fact that she had been proposed to and said no would would have been like the best thing in that like the best case scenario for her to see that she was serious. Yeah. So um, she's 42 at this point. She's spent like her full life looking for a partner, and she was finally about to get what she wanted. Uh both women altered their will uh altered their wills, making the other a life tenant of their estate. And Anne told her family about her plans. Uh, she informed her elderly aunt, father, and sister, but they were far from shocked. All had witnessed her closeness with women throughout her life, and I felt they supported her choice. Which is really nice that she actually had like a supportive family and stuff. Um, after some quote unquote long capital grubling. Okay. During a sleepless night, Anne noted in her diary that young Anne was to give me a ring and I her one in token of our union. Anne was to wear a gold band and in return she gave her young love an Onyx ring. Its black stone was a nod to her signature style. So even the ring was black. That's key. But she's so nice. That gave me shivers there, actually. That's so nice. Um she believed Anne, young Anne, had saved her from the anguish caused by veer and allowed her to let go of Marianna once and for all. Awww. I believe I shall succeed with her, Anne told her diary. If I do, I will try to make her happy. Oh, that's so cute. And that's the the church that they got married in.

Speaker 01: 10:55

Oh, that's cute.

Speaker 02: 10:57

I don't know if he was a little seen. It's cute. Cool. So Anne Lister's wedding to Anne Walker took place at Holy Trinity Church in York on Easter Sunday, 1834. The event was purely symbolic. Attending church with another woman and taking communion was ceremony enough for Anne. She took the values of a traditional union serious uh seriously. Her pu promiscuous days were over. Marianna, who had continued to be a part of Anne's life throughout all her foreign flings and high society schemes, admitted defeat. Dearest Fred, she wrote in a letter using her pet name for Anne. Do you think Anne was trans? Why'd you say that? Well, if her pet if her lover's pet name for her was Fred, she wore men's clothes. She wanted to live life as a man. Well, that was like there was no words for it, but like that was my first thought.

Speaker 01: 11:53

Yeah. Um, just when you were just starting, and I was like, no, that sounds like I don't know. Presumptuous.

Speaker 02: 12:01

And I told that's fair. It's ju it's literally just the the Fred thing that's like tips more into like hmm. Yeah, she does definitely make note all the way through that like she wants to be treated as a man, like she wants to live her life as a man.

Speaker 01: 12:18

But we just don't know. Yeah.

Speaker 02: 12:20

I'm good I'm I'm so interested to read these diaries. Maybe this wasn't the first lesbian wedding then.

Speaker 01: 12:26

Exactly. Exactly.

Speaker 02: 12:30

But like with them wearing petticoats and stuff. But were they allowed to wear any handouts? She was wearing like suspenders and stuff underneath. Like I totally understand that like some things in tradition you couldn't cross.

Speaker 01: 12:46

Yeah. Because she was that.

Speaker 02: 12:50

Because like maybe it was finding the balance of like rebellion, but still achieving, still being ambitious, still very educated. Like still being in business, still being do you know what I mean, still being respected within being true to yourself as much as you could to still get by, rather than it being yeah.

Speaker 01: 13:11

That's very interesting, because Anne to Fred.

Speaker 02: 13:16

That's it could be like a joke with the whole like gentleman jack thing. Do you know what I mean? Like maybe this was like an ongoing Maybe, maybe. Or maybe so that Oh, here's an interesting one. Maybe it was so that if anybody read the letter and it was signed with a woman's name that it was getting sent to a man. Yeah. There's so much to this. There's so much to this. Um sorry, anyway, so dearest Fred, the die is cast and Mary must abide by the throw. You at least will be happy. So she's like through in the table. She's like, if this is how it's gonna be, this is how it's gonna be. The newlyweds embarked on a honeymoon, three months of travel through France and Switzerland. On their return, Anne installed her new wife in Shipden. Carts laden with furniture rumbled up the track between their homes. So she's two core furniture, which is hilarious. Uh the scandal was soon the talk of Yorkshire. Anne Lester, who had been mocked for looking like a man for so many years, was now very much acting like one. The cohabitation of two prominent women was outrageous, but without the language or the understanding to describe their relationships, critics opted for pranks instead. So as we'd kind of spoke about in the previous episode, the word lesbian was not had not been created yet at this point. Um like there just wasn't a the the words were there for people to be able to understand. Like, I don't even think like sexuality or any of that was like spoken about or had words for it yet. Um so they did their best, they did their best to take the piss as much as they could without the words to actually label things. Um so a mocking advert appeared in the Leeds Mercury announcing the marriage of Captain Tom Lister of Shibden Hall to Miss Anne Walker. Anonymous letters also arrived addressed to Captain Lister congratulating the couple on their happy connection.

Speaker 01: 15:14

But like I do wonder if like with the whole gentleman jack thing, if they if she preferred that.

Speaker 02: 15:29

Um like the only bit in uh retaliation at the Captain Lister bit she'd put in her diary probably meant to annoy, but if so, a failure. But like how without context that could be taken either way.

Speaker 01: 15:45

I'm also thinking as well, clearly they're a top. Yeah. So I'm like, hmm. They're very like in control in the sexual manner of things. I'm like, okay, I can I can I can see it. The stereotypical um male to female and being on top of things. Like, okay, okay.

Speaker 02: 16:07

That always has to kinda exist within like sexual relationships though. Yeah, yeah. But um so the marriage was not plain sailing, the women were completely different characters. Um Iran assertively ruled her estate and became embroiled in local politics while her new wealth often felt neglect her new wife, sorry, often felt neglected, suffering regular bouts of sadness.

Speaker 01: 16:33

Aww.

Speaker 02: 16:33

I mean it that sounds like the typical couple back in the day. The wife's just sitting bored in the house while the man's away fucking gallivanting. Yeah. Um Shipton Hall mid-renovation resembled a building site. And uh young Anne, whose wealth was largely funding the work, became increasingly hysterical about the cost. So she was spending all her money as well. Yeah. But always ended the argument giving her more cash for the repairs. So in 1838, Anne wanted to go abroad again. They headed to France via Brussels, but young Anne was not the ambitious travelling companion Anne had hoped for. She made frequent complaints of illness that Anne suspected were concocted. Returning to the Pyrenees, Anne decided she wanted to be the first person to officially climb Vignamail, the highest mountain in the range. Her wife unsurprisingly refused to join her. Of course. Undeterred, Anne tied her dress and petticoats around her legs and wearing nail-studdied leather boots, made her way up the mountainside. I love that this bitch is climbing mountains nobody has climbed before in a fucking dress. Yeah. It's excellent. In a black dress, in black boots, wear a black ring and black hats. It's fucking great. Um a Russian prince wrongly claimed to have beaten her to the summit and had the ascent named after him. But a nearby mountain pass is known as Calado de Lady Lister to this day. Oh. She was the first to climb that one. They then went to Russia, which was one of Anne's long-held dreams, was to go there, exploring St. Petersburg and Moscow, which Anne described as the most picturesquely beautiful town I have ever seen. Interesting. But the bitterly cold Russian winter arrived, and young Anne pleaded to go home. But Anne convinced her to stay. She bought them a new carriage and had two pairs of men's knee-length leather boots made and fur coats, and on they travelled. And in the summer of 1840 they reached the city of Cutesi. So they've been on the road for like two years at this point. It must have taken them a long ass time to go like gone to Europe wasn't like gone on a tour plane. That would have been like weeks, weeks and weeks of travelling to get anywhere. Like, no wonder young Anne's like, mate, can we just go hame? I know. It's been a year and a half. Can we go hame to it? Like that's fine. That's totally fair. So the women marvelled at the lush forests and Azalea clad mountains. The couple also seemed to be enjoying a happy spell as they shared in the joy of witnessing sights most westerners had never experienced. In the remote village of Galley, Anne described the views in her journal. High hills north and within, ridges of wooded hill rising every now and then into little wooded conical summits. They'd had tea at 8.25 pm and lay down at 9.30pm, she noted. So she's still keeping up the like dates and times and what she had for breakfast and like very rigorously kept notes of literally everything. Um these simple observations would be the last thing Anne Lister would ever write. It was the 11th of August 1940. Six weeks later, Anne aged 49, was dead.

Speaker 01: 20:12

Oh damn, how'd she die?

Speaker 02: 20:15

Um How did she die? We'll get there. I'm just gonna read the last week and I'll be in there. Um so she they were she was stranded. Oh sorry, it was thought that an insect bite led to the fever that killed us, so she got a fever and died. They were in a foreign country, they didn't have like pure inoculations and shit back then. Ah, like travelling was dangerous, so um she'd lived a life though, but poor young Anne was now stranded 4,500 miles from home with a body. It took her eight months to get back. Jesus Christ. Travelling through northern Europe with a coffin beside her. That's fucking horrendous.

Speaker 01: 20:58

Oh no no, that body would have smelt probably as well. They wouldn't like No man, I would have buried them there and then just like fucking you wanted to be here, stay there then.

Speaker 02: 21:08

Um Anne got the shipped in a state because they changed their wills, obviously. She continued living there, but which now had um all the improvements were finished when they got home, but Anne never got to see them because obviously she died when they were away. But her ownership did not last long. Her relatives, believing she had mental health problems, arranged for a doctor, lawyer, and policeman to break in and mental asylum. Yep. They found her cowering behind a locked door surrounded by papers and a brace of loaded pistols. She was taken off to the same York Asylum which still had Eliza in it. So I don't Eliza for the city. Two women to the asylum for this woman. Ridiculous. Um she brought all the diaries back with her and hid them and shipped in. So it was her that kept Anne's legacy alive.

Speaker 01: 22:05

Good, good.

Speaker 02: 22:06

And then obviously it was only a hundred and it took 150 years for the contents to be revealed after that. There's a rainbow plaque erected in our memory at the Holy Trinity Church in York, which describes Anne as the first modern lesbian. That was where they got married. Well, this definition is debated, Anne's importance to lesbian history is not in dispute because like there just isn't anything like what our diaries have got from that time period. Um the Queer British Art Exhibition was held at Tate Britain in 2017, its curator Claire Barlow described the history of queer culture as being punctuated by dustbins and bonfires, speaking about how similar records would have been destroyed by shame-filled families. Um the fact that John Lister chose to preserve Anne's diaries is therefore remarkable. Yeah. It's not known whether he did so out of love of history or whether, as has been suggested, he was also secretly homosexual. Yeah. But there's also there's now a BBC show that came out in 2017 called Gentleman Jack, but it's about her life when she went back to Shipton Hall, which I'm gonna watch. I think it is just like a shaggin' marathon. Of course, of course. I would expect nothing less of this woman's life, so um the person that created it had tried for 20 years to get it made, starting in 2003, but audiences weren't ready. Yeah, no, no. Um I just hope I can So we quote, I am resolved not to let my life pass without some private memorial that I may hereafter read perhaps with a smile. Oh which is a reason for keeping our diaries and why she kept them in a secret. Um I'm just trying to find that actual number. It was like I'm sure it was like over a million words she'd write or like over five million words she'd write.

Speaker 01: 24:15

Um well it's just eating and everything, just with that.

Speaker 02: 24:21

She also kept clippings of her lover's pubic hair. Oh which is hilarious.

Speaker 01: 24:28

Could you just imagine that you've eaten somebody out and it's like one second love, snip, snip, snip?

Speaker 02: 24:35

Bye, she was like just an absolutely amazing woman, and um although it wasn't an official marriage, it's believed to be the first at least recorded lesbian marriage in UK history, and her works are an absolute testament to like just that time period and the fact that they show that there's just always mere stuff going on, not even behind closed doors that um people don't let me know, but proud enough and she had enough courage to just go out and do and just be our friend to some extent, yeah. Yeah, when everybody when everybody in our life was telling her she was wrong, she was just fucking out there kicking us.

Speaker 01: 25:15

So absolutely awesome, but yeah. This has been Behind the Paddle podcast with Post and Victoria and Amy Leeson. Yeah, you can find us on Spotify, Apple, and also Dark Fans because now we dress up a little bit more or dress down for videoing behind the paddle. So if you want to go see that, you can go subscribe on our Dark Fans. If you want to get humiliated, you are more than welcome to give us a message. If you want to hear anything on the podcast, any topics, or if you even want to come on the podcast, you are more than welcome to give us a message and we can have a nice little talk. But yeah, if you also want to support us, that would be great. Every little helps. And your lovely shop.

Speaker 02: 26:11

Yeah, so as always, there's a Wii discount code for you guys. If you use behind the paddle at checkout at thesanctuaryofsin.com, you'll get a 10% discount. Uh, we also have the Uncensored Market coming up on the 15th of December in Glasgow, which is a safe space and sexy market, just filled with lovely kinky sex, positive goodies, activities, and other people, which is always nice. Um, the tickets are now on sale, go and check that out.

Speaker 01: 26:39

Yeah.

Speaker 02: 26:40

Thanks for listening, guys.

Speaker 01: 26:42

Yeah. Bye.

Speaker 02: 26:43

Bye.