A remarkable collection of letters sent by some of history’s most famous actors to a Bristol family has been made available to the public for the first time by the University of Bristol’s Theatre Collection.
Digital images of more than a hundred previously uncatalogued letters written to members of the Macready/Chute family between 1797 and 1937 can now be viewed online via the Theatre Collection’s website.
The Bristol actor-manager family of the Macready/Chutes dominated the local theatre scene throughout the nineteenth century. They ran the Bristol Theatre Royal in King Street and the new Theatre Royal in Park Row (later renamed the Prince’s Theatre and destroyed by enemy bombs in 1940), and the Theatre Royal and the Assembly Rooms in Bath.
The letters, which largely concern arrangements for appearances by famous stars of the day on the Bath and Bristol stage, read like a theatrical edition of Who’s Who of the nineteenth century. The collection includes letters from some of the most celebrated actors of the era including Sir Henry Irving, Charles and Ellen Kean, Charles Kemble, Sarah Siddons and Herbert Beerbohm Tree.
The collection also includes good luck messages sent in 1834 to Sarah Desmond Macready when she took over the lease of the Bristol Theatre Royal after the death of her husband William ‘Mac’ Macready and a love letter written in 1843 to Sarah’s step-daughter Mazzarina Macready by her future husband John Henry Chute in which he remembers: “Ah Bristol, dear Bristol comes full upon my mind with pleasant recollections, delightful associations and sweet remembrances to remind me that I was once happy.”
Other notable missives include a letter written in 1848 by Harriet Grote recording the Swedish singer Jenny Lind’s regret for the cancellation of her appearance at the Theatre Royal in favour of the Victoria Rooms in Clifton; a request in 1857 from the comedian Sir William Don, known as the ‘Eccentric Baronet’, for contributions towards his bail from Bristol debtor’s prison; and a letter written in 1866 by Ellen Kean while touring America, recounting her distress at the living conditions of the former slaves since the abolition of slavery.
There are also letters from important figures of the day including Tim Healey, the first governor-general of the Irish Free State, the Pre-Raphaelite artist Sir John Everett Millais; and the novelist Mary St Leger Harrison who wrote under the pseudonym of Lucas Malet.
The story of this great theatrical dynasty and their 112 year connection with the Bristol theatre finally came to an end in 1931 with the death of Abigail Chute, director of the Prince’s Theatre. Abigail’s son, Desmond Macready Chute, great-grandson of William and Sarah Macready, had by this time become a Roman Catholic priest and was living in Rapallo in Italy from where the last two letters in the collection were written in 1937.