Patrick Brontë outlived his wife, the former Maria Branwell, by forty years, by which time all of their six children had died as well. He died in 1861 at the age of 84. [1]
When Maria Branwell and Patrick Brontë met, they fell in love at first sight, had a whirlwind romance and married on 29 December 1812 in the Church of St Oswald at Guiseley, West Yorkshire.
Maria Branwell was born into a wealthy merchant family in Penzance, Cornwall in 1783, and had a very comfortable life there in the smartest in town until the age of 29. In 1812, she was called to Yorkshire to help her aunt who was in need of a good seamstress who could care for children. She was to assist with household management at Woodhouse Grove School in Leeds run by John and Jane Fennell.
Patrick Brontë was born Patrick Brunty at Drumballyroney, near Rathfriland, County Down (now in Northern Ireland) in 1777. He was the eldest of ten children in a large and very poor Irish Catholic family. In adult life, Patrick Brunty formally changed the spelling of his name to Brontë (several reasons for this change have been proposed, but he may just have wished to hide his humble origins). John Fennell had known Patrick previously and invited him to take up a post as the classics examiner at the school.
In 1820 the Brontës moved to Haworth when Patrick took the perpetual curacy of St Michael and All Angels’ Church there. In 1821 Maria’s sister, Elizabeth Branwell joined the household to help look after the children and care for Maria, who had become after giving birth to her 6th child. Maria died less than 8 months later in September 1821. Patrick and Maria had been married for less than 9 years. Three of their daughters, Charlotte, Emily and Anne Brontë became some of the most celebrated Victorian-era novelists in history.
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