Papers of the Bourke family

Overview

Antonia Jane Belinda Bourke (1840-1919, actress), also known by the names Tony and Jessie, and Anna Mary Bourke (1843-1919, actress), known as Annie, were raised by their widowed mother Mary Anne Bourke (c. 1819-1892) alongside their younger cousin Eva Watson (1852-1897, actress). From c. 1859 to c. 1871, Antonia, Annie and Eva performed across a range of regional and London theatres, with the two Bourke sisters’ first documented performance taking place at the Theatre Royal, Bristol in September 1859. They appeared regularly at the theatre until mid 1861, after which they began taking work which would see them travel to towns and cities across the UK and Ireland.

During their years in Bristol and at other regional venues, the Bourke sisters performed across a range of genres including pantomime, melodrama, Shakespearean comedy and tragedy, farce and burlesque. In 1865, Antonia and Annie found their footing in the latter genre when they became regular performers at the New Royalty Theatre (later the Royalty Theatre) on Dean Street in Soho, taking minor roles in the theatre’s popular burlesques, including the long-running ‘Black Eyed Susan’. Eva’s short-lived career on the London stage began later, starting in 1869 at the Gaiety Theatre; having struggled to obtain acting work, both Eva’s and Antonia’s careers seem to have come to an abrupt close in 1871.

Annie left the stage in 1868, marrying Henry Benson Stuart, a retired army officer, with whom she lived in Vienna, Austria, until 1872. Upon returning to London, she lived with her family and separated from her husband in 1876; this followed years of financial troubles, in which his failed entrepreneurship on the continent appears to have played a part. London would be the family’s shared home for the remainder of their lives, excepting Eva, who married John Connell, an employee of the Bombay-Burmah Trading Corporation, and lived in Mawlamyine, Myanmar (then known as Moulmein, British Burma), from 1887 to 1893.

What the collection holds

The Bourke actresses were never to attain the celebrity, legacy and wealth of some of their Victorian contemporaries. It is for this reason that their archive offers a unique insight into the lives of three women for whom performance was perhaps as much a means of financial supporting themselves as it was a professional craft.

This collection consists of the correspondence and personal papers of the Bourke family, created and kept by Annie Bourke, her sister Antonia Jane Belinda Bourke, their mother Mary Anne Bourke, and their cousin Eva Watson. The series of approximately 1,700 letters (BTC80/1) spans a large period of the family’s lives from 1860 to the early 1900s, beginning with a decade of theatrical performance. The correspondence reveals the acting circles in which Annie, Antonia and Eva moved, the mechanisms by which they attempted and managed to secure parts, and the social lives they lived alongside their stage work. The letters exchanged within the family circle are particularly expressive of their opinions of the theatres and companies within which they worked, their relationships with their suitors and husbands, and the difficulties and prejudices affecting women in theatre.

Besides the period of the Annie’s, Antonia’s and Eva’s acting careers, the letters detail: Annie’s years living in Vienna, Austria, with her husband Henry Benson Stuart; the family’s financial hardship in the early 1870s and in the early 1890s, while living in London; the breakdown of the Stuarts’ marriage in 1876; Eva’s marriage to John Connell and their life in Mawlamyine, Myanmar; the deaths of Mary Anne Bourke and John Connell in 1892 and 1893 respectively, followed by Eva’s return to London.  More broadly, the correspondence gives an insight into the domestic and financial precarity of the four women and their familial relationships.

Aside from the correspondence, there is a small series of personal material (BTC80/2), some of which is related to the Bourkes’ theatrical work, such as photographs of costumed performers (including cartes de visite of two women believed to be the Bourke sisters) and cuttings from print reviews of theatre productions.

The online catalogue for this collection can be viewed here: BTC80 - Papers of the Bourke family