The Merediths and Their Circle in 1856: A Letter from Peter Augustin Daniel to Henry Wallis

Despite intense biographical curiosity and speculation, little is actually known about the breakdown of George Meredith's first marriage or his wife Mary Ellen's affair with the painter Henry Wallis. Brief lives and chronologies still describe Mary Ellen as "eloping" with Wallis to Capri in the autumn of 1858, even though she had been separated from her husband for about a year and had borne a child by her lover in April. Here, Joukovsky looks at the letter from Peter Augustin Daniel to Henry Wallis, dated Jun 24-26 1856, which offers interesting glimpses of the Merediths and their circle of painter friends as well as the earliest evidence of Mary Ellen's attraction to Wallis.