Talk:Ellen Ternan

Invisibility needs discussion
The article must be pretty well entirely drawn from Claire Tomalin's biography (or from sources which draw on it e.g. the television programs and play listed) but does not have in line citations to acknowledge this.

Also, although it mentions that the public 'would have been shocked', the article doesn't mention how Nelly was kept out of any official discussion of Dickens in his life, and could have dropped completely from view as a consequence. Its the secrecy both in her life and afterwards that is the most interesting and illuminating thing about her life. Lucy1958 (talk) 02:34, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

"...May have had a son by Dickens..."
Who says? There is no citation for this and very little real world evidence. As this article correctly observes, the papers about Dickens' relationship with Ternan no longer exist and were in fact probably deliberately destroyed. There isn't even any evidence that they ever consecrated their relationship physically, even if it seems likely in the context of modern behaviour. It would have been much more frowned upon in 19th century England, I assure you, so while obviously this is a possibility, it cannot be assumed.

I think this article would be improved by stating that some biographers have conjectured about possible illegitimate children who may have died in infancy (and naming the biographers). The article should also make it clearer that this is entirely conjecture. The word "may..." simply does not express that adequately. 90.219.59.122 (talk) 13:53, 26 July 2011 (UTC)


 * If French Wikipedia is to be believed the uncorroborated story emerged with the biography of Gladys Storey, who had it from Ellen Ternan's daughter Kate. Claire Tomalin has apparently researched the papers and confirmed the story. Everybody got to be somewhere! (talk) 23:16, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

Need for revision of article Ellen Ternan
The article Ellen Ternan has several 'facts' that are still subject to significant doubt, and which should be re-phrased to reflect those doubts.

In the potted biography it is stated, as fact, that Charles Dickens was a 'partner' of Ellen Ternan. In today's parlance, the word 'partner' implies a fairly stable, cohabiting, sharing, sexual relationship. That never was the status of the relationship, whatever else it might have been, and therefore it is quite inaccurate to state that they were partners.

Whether Ellen Ternan was the mistress of Charles Dickens has never been fully established. It is true that Dickens provided accommodation and financial support to both Ellen and her mother, and on occasions to a sister, but whether the relationship was sexual in any way has never been proved. To the contrary, a letter from Ellen's maid, Jane Wheeler, to Ellen's daughter indicated quite clearly that 'your dear mother never was the mistress of Charles Dickens'. The notion that she was came from Thomas Wright of Olney, who in his 1935 book 'The Life of Charles Dickens' stated 'My friends and I had long known that Ellen Ternan was Charles Dickens's mistress, but we had no proof until Canon Benham provided it". Wright gave no information whatever as to how he had 'long known' that Ellen was Dickens's mistress. He may have believed it, but certainly could not have known it. In his own autobiography, published posthumously, Wright gave more details about the 'proof' he had received from Canon Benham. Following Dickens's death, Ellen married and went with her husband to Margate where they ran a school. Ellen took part in the usual activities expected of a school master's wife, and no doubt met Canon Benham, who was, at the time, the vicar of St John's Church in Margate. According to Wright, 'Ellen unburdened her soul to Benham, and told him the whole story'. However, by the time Wright's book was published in 1935, everyone who may have been able to corroborate the story, including, Ellen, Benham and Wright himself, were dead. But the unsubstantiated hearsay included in Wright's book took on a life of its own, and everyone began to believe it. The next 'revelation' came from Gladys Storey, who in 1939 published her book "Dickens and Daughter", in which she claimed to have been told by the aging Kate Perugini (Dickens's Daughter Kate), that 'there was a child but it died'. No mention of where or when it was born or how and when it died. However, given Gladys Storey's social standing, the story of the baby became accepted as fact despite no-one ever finding the smallest scrap of evidence to support the story. Searches by many scholars, involving hospital and church records both in England and in France have, to date, failed to turn up any evidence to support the story. However, as important people in the Dickens community have chosen to believe it, the baby now exists as fact, and is perpetuated in just about every article and book on Dickens and Ellen Ternan. Not surprisingly, the failure to find any evidence has now been interpreted as prima facae evidence of a very successful conspiracy to cover it up! I could go on, but I simply refer you to the article entitled "Ellen Ternan and Charles Dickens" by Brian Ruck, published in The Dickensian, no. 493, vol 110 part 2, 2014. I believe that there are sufficient doubts about the relationship between Charles Dickens and Ellen Ternan to require some editing of the Wikipedia article to reflect those doubts, rather than perpetuating opinions for which there is no evidence. I am not sure about the actual processes used by Wikipedia to verify potential edits, and put them into effect, but I hope that someone in authority can take some steps to verify the comments I have made. Slingsbyb (talk) 01:04, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Plans for Editing Document
I would like to make changes to the document that I believe would help to improve its format, style, and content. I want to begin by adjusting the granularity and reformatting the document to make sure that everything makes sense in terms of how its structured. I want to implement some of what this Talk page has described by way of describing information in such a way that ensures there is a difference between fact and popular belief. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Little.panda9 (talk • contribs) 21:21, 18 October 2020 (UTC)