F. Tennyson Jesse

F. Tennyson Jesse
Photograph c. 1922
Photograph c. 1922
BornWinifred Margaret Jesse
1 March 1888 (1888-03)
Chislehurst, Kent, United Kingdom
Died6 August 1958 (1958-08-07) (aged 70)
London, United Kingdom
Occupationnovelist, playwright, criminologist, cartoonist
LanguageEnglish
NationalityEnglish
Alma materNewlyn School
Period1913–1957
Genrecrime fiction, detective fiction, criminology
Notable worksA Pin to See the Peepshow, Murder & Its Motives, Notable British Trials
SpouseH. M. Harwood (m. 1918–1958; her death)
ParentsEustace Tennyson D'Eyncourt Jesse
Edith James Jesse
RelativesEmilia Tennyson (grandmother)
Alfred, Lord Tennyson (great uncle)

Fryniwyd Tennyson Jesse Harwood (born Wynifried (Winifred) Margaret Jesse; 1 March 1888 – 6 August 1958)[1] was an English journalist, author and criminologist.

Early life

[edit]

She was the second of three daughters of the Rev. Eustace Tennyson D'Eyncourt Jesse (1853–1928), vicar of St Peter Kirkley, and his wife Edith Louisa James (1866–1941).[2][3][4] Her paternal grandmother was Emilia Tennyson.[4]

Her older sister, Stella Mary Jesse (1887–1942), was an actress, and married in 1929 Eric Andrew Simson, who wrote under the name Laurence Kirk.[5][6] She wrote a novel, Eve in Egypt (1929), as Jane Starr.[7] Her younger sister, Edith Mary Ermyntrude was born in 1890, and died in 1892, in South Africa.[8][9]

The family's life was itinerant.[4] Eustace Jesse left Kirkley in 1890.[10] The family had an interlude in South Africa, sailing there at the end of 1891, and staying in Cape Town and Grahamstown, as Eustace Jesse sought a clerical appointment.[8] He moved in 1893 to St Stephen's Church on Guernsey, as a curate. In 1898 he was a chaplain at Marsala in Sicily, for a year. From 1900 for three years he was a licentiate in the Diocese of Colombo. Then he was a curate at St George's Cathedral, Georgetown from 1905 to 1907, after that returning to Ceylon, at Polwatte.[10]

After attending day schools, Wynifried Jesse aged 18 went, while her father was in British Guiana, to the Forbes School of Painting at Newlyn, Cornwall, run by Stanhope and Elizabeth Forbes.[4] "Fryn" is a self-made contraction of "Wynifried", which she adopted at this period.[4][11] She did not return home. She worked for a time as a painter, exhibiting in Liverpool and Leeds, and she illustrated a book.[12]

Journalist

[edit]

Jesse moved to London in 1911 and found work as a journalist.[4][13] She wrote for the Daily Mail and The Times.[14]

After an accident in a pusher configuration aeroplane, Jesse lost the use of her right hand, and used a prosthetic.[4] She learned to type her left hand alone, and picked up her career. She was treated with morphia for pain relief, became dependent, and was a patient of Armando Child to cope with the habit.[15] She for the rest of her life suffered from periods of depression.[4]

Jesse reported on the German attacks on Belgium in the First World War for Collier's Weekly, in November 1914,. She was in a group of American journalists: E. Alexander Powell, Joseph Medill Patterson and the photographer Donald C. Thompson, and witnessed the siege of Antwerp.[16]

Later life

[edit]

Frederick W. Hilles who met Jesse at dinner in 1930 described her in his diary as "blonde with a hard face & a tremendous sense of her importance in things intellectual."[17] With her husband, she travelled widely in the two decades after her marriage.[4] She associated with Somerset Maugham and E. Phillips Oppenheim on the French Riviera.[18][19] She died at home of a heart attack on 6 August 1958 at 11 Melina Place, St John's Wood, London.[4]

Books

[edit]

Crime

[edit]

Murder and its Motives (Heinemann, 1924) divided killers into six categories based on their motivations: those who murder for Gain, Revenge, Elimination, Jealousy, Conviction and Lust of killing. This classification of motive was quoted in 1958 by the criminologist Marvin Wolfgang.[20] The forensic scientist John Glaister suggested sex should be a seventh category.[21] The classification has been said to anticipate that in the FBI Crime Classification Manual.[22] The pathologist Francis Camps was complimentary about Jesse's standing as a criminologist.[4]

Jesse contributed introductions to cases in the Notable British Trials series.

  • Trial of Madeleine Smith (1927)[23] Madeleine Smith was acquitted on murder charges in 1857.
  • Trial of Samuel Herbert Dougal (1928).[24] Samuel Herbert Dougal was convicted in 1903 of the murder of Camille Cecile Holland.
  • Trial of Sidney Harry Fox (1934).[25] Sidney Harry Fox was convicted of the 1929 murder of his mother.
  • Trial of Alma Victoria Rattenbury and George Percy Stoner (1935)[26] Alma Rattenbury and George Stoner were accused of the murder of Alma's husband, with Rattenbury being acquitted and Stoner found guilty in 1935.
  • Trial of Thomas John Ley and Lawrence John Smith - the Chalk Pit Murder (1947)[27] Thomas Ley was found guilty in 1946 of the murder with accomplices of John McMain Mudie.
  • The Trials of Timothy John Evans and John Reginald Halliday Christie (1957).[28] Timothy Evans was hanged for the murder of his daughter Geraldine, and posthumously pardoned. The trial of serial killer John Christie followed.

Also Comments on Cain (1948), on the trials of Harold Wolcott, Reginald Ivor Hinks and the serial killer Eugen Weidmann[29]

Her novels include A Pin to See the Peepshow (London, W. Heinemann Ltd, 1934; Virago Modern Classics; British Library Women Writers), a fictional treatment of the case of Edith Thompson and Frederick Bywaters. She also edited the British edition of The Baffle Book, A Parlour Game of Mystery and Detection (1930), a crime puzzle book by the Americans Lassiter Wren and Randle McKay.[30]

Other non-fiction

[edit]
  • The Sword of Deborah (1918), collected war journalism.[31] Commissioned by the Ministry of Information, it concentrated on the work of the British Women's Army in France.[32]
  • Sabi Pas: Or, I Don't Know (1935), on life in Provence[33]
  • London Front: Letters Written to America, 1939–1940 (1941), with H. M. Harwood[34]
  • While London Burns: Letters Written to America. (July 1940–June 1941) (1942)[35]
  • The Saga of "San Demetrio" (1942), an HMSO publication.[36] The 1943 film San Demetrio London was based on it;[37] the screenwriters were Charles Frend and Robert Hamer, with Jesse given a story credit.[38]
  • The Story of Burma (1946).[39] Jesse visited India in the early 1920s, and met Harcourt Butler, at that time Governor of the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh.[40] He later governed Burma, and she visited him at Government House, Rangoon, when writing a novel based in Burma. There Arthur John Stanley White was asked to help her with access to historical records.[41][42] The Story of Burma was reviewed in The Observer in February 1946, and some correspondence ensued with Jesse, who "took great exception", while explaining that she enjoyed Orwell's work.[43]

Fiction

[edit]

Not including A Pin to See the Peepshow, Jesse wrote nine novels.[4]

  • The Milky Way (1913), first novel[44][45]
  • Secret Bread (1917)[46]
  • The White Riband (1921)[47]
  • Tom Fool (Heinemann, 1926), a novel, deals with a young man's experiences on sailing ships, and describes shipboard life in some detail.
  • Moonraker (Heinemann, 1927), historical novel. In his 1981 introduction Bob Leeson states that it contains both an embodiment of woman's rebellion and a cry for freedom for black people.
  • The Lacquer Lady (1929), historical novel, about the European maid of honour Fanny Moroni, the Third Anglo-Burmese War and the defeat of the Konbaung dynasty at the end of the 19th century. In the preface Jesse acknowledged help with the account from Rodway Charles John Swinhoe, an English barrister in Burma.[48]
  • Act of God (1937)[49]
  • The Alabaster Cup (1950), novel with some autobiographical content[50][51]
  • The Dragon in the Heart: A Love Story (1956)[52]

An early story was "The Dog Decides", published in The Idler in 1911.[53] Short story collections:

  • Beggars on Horseback (1915)[46][54][55]
  • Many Latitudes (1928)[46]
  • The Solange Stories (1931), with the character Solange Fontaine[56]

The 1924 story Thirty Pieces of Silver,[57] based on the biblical betrayal, was often reprinted, sometimes as the variant Treasure Trove.[58]

Poetry

[edit]
  • The Happy Bride (1921)[59]
  • The Compass: And Other Poems (1951)[60]

Plays

[edit]

Jesse co-wrote six plays with H. M. Harwood (her husband from 1918), and three more on her own.[4]

Marriage

[edit]

Fryniwyd Jesse married Harold Marsh Harwood (1874–1959), a businessman and theatre manager, in September 1918.[11] The marriage was kept secret until 1922;[71] a guest of Arnold Bennett for dinner at the Savoy Hotel on New Year's Eve 1920, she went as Miss Tennyson Jesse.[72] It was Harwood who wished for secrecy, since he was concerned to retain access to the son he had fathered with a married woman. Fryniwyd miscarried three times, the couple having no children.[4]

References

[edit]
  1. ^ The record of her birth in Bromley from April–June 1888 gives her name as "Winifred Margaret Jesse", the record of her death in Marylebone gives her name as "Fryniwyd Harwood", see [1].
  2. ^ Foster, Joseph (1888–1892). "Jesse, Eustace Tennyson D'Eyncourt" . Alumni Oxonienses: the Members of the University of Oxford, 1715–1886. Oxford: Parker and Co – via Wikisource.
  3. ^ Eustace Tennyson D'Eyncourt Jesse, 32, married Edith Louisa James, 19, at St Saviour's, Croydon, on 1 February 1886 (marriage entry for St Saviour's, held at Surrey History Centre). Eustace's death date taken from the National Probate Calendar on Ancestry; Louisa's death taken from the General Register Office (Horsham district, vol 02B, page 684).
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Cordero, Raymond (2004). "Jesse [married name Harwood], Wynifried Margaret [Fryniwyd] [pseud. F. Tennyson Jesse] (1888–1958), writer and criminologist". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/39087. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  5. ^ "Index entry". FreeBMD. ONS. Retrieved 17 September 2024.
  6. ^ "Index entry". FreeBMD. ONS. Retrieved 17 September 2024.
  7. ^ Jesse, Stella (2018). Eve in Egypt (reprint ed.). Michael Walmer. ISBN 978-0648023364.
  8. ^ a b Colenbrander, Joanna (1984). A Portrait of Fryn: A Biography of F. Tennyson Jesse. A. Deutsch. p. 16. ISBN 978-0-233-97572-6.
  9. ^ Edith was born 26 July 1890 in Kirkley, Suffolk, and baptised there by her father on 24 August 1890. The 1891 census for Kellswater, Bedford Hill Road, Streatham, records eight-month-old Edith at the residence with a 15-year-old housemaid, while her mother Edith Louisa and sisters were visiting Edith's family in Chislehurst. The younger Edith is not on the 1901 census.
  10. ^ a b Crockford's Clerical Directory for 1929. Oxford University Press. 1929. p. 689.
  11. ^ a b Susannah Clapp (7 June 1984). "You are my heart's delight: Book review of A Portrait of Fryn: A Biography of F. Tennyson Jesse ". London Review of Books. 06 (10). Retrieved 28 July 2012.
  12. ^ "Jesse, F. Tennyson". Who's Who. A & C Black. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  13. ^ Kabatchnik, Amnon (14 April 2011). Blood on the Stage, 1950-1975: Milestone Plays of Crime, Mystery, and Detection. Scarecrow Press. p. 32. ISBN 978-0-8108-7784-9.
  14. ^ Hartley, Cathy (15 April 2013). A Historical Dictionary of British Women. Routledge. p. 499. ISBN 978-1-135-35534-0.
  15. ^ Colenbrander, Joanna (1984). A Portrait of Fryn: A Biography of F. Tennyson Jesse. A. Deutsch. p. 77. ISBN 978-0-233-97572-6.
  16. ^ Dubbs, Chris (1 July 2020). An Unladylike Profession: American Women War Correspondents in World War I. U of Nebraska Press. pp. 11–13. ISBN 978-1-64012-306-9.
  17. ^ Hudson, Derek (1975). For Love of Painting: The Life of Sir Gerald Kelly. P. Davies. p. 49. ISBN 978-0-432-06962-2.
  18. ^ Hastings, Selina (1 July 2012). The Secret Lives of Somerset Maugham: A Biography. Simon and Schuster. p. 515. ISBN 978-1-61145-704-9.
  19. ^ Oppenheim, E. Phillips (10 January 2024). The Complete Works of E. Phillips Oppenheim: 109 Novels & 200+ Short Stories (Illustrated Edition): Intrigue and Adventure: A Masterful Collection of Classic Spy and Mystery Tales. Good Press. p. 18109.
  20. ^ Wolfgang, Marvin E. (11 November 2016). Patterns in Criminal Homicide. University of Pennsylvania Press. p. 185. ISBN 978-1-5128-0872-8.
  21. ^ Couzens, Tim (2005). Murder at Morija: Faith, Mystery, and Tragedy on an African Mission. University of Virginia Press. p. 384. ISBN 978-0-8139-2529-5.
  22. ^ Dabney, Dean A. (4 December 2012). Crime Types: A Text/Reader. Aspen Publishing. p. 65. ISBN 978-1-4548-2845-7.
  23. ^ Jesse, F. Tennyson (1927). Trial of Madeleine Smith. W. Hodge & Co.
  24. ^ Jesse, Fryniwyd Tennyson (1928). Trial of Samuel Herbert Dougal. W. Hodge.
  25. ^ Jesse, F. Tennyson (1934). Trial of Sidney Harry Fox. William Hodge & Co.
  26. ^ Jesse, F. Tennyson, ed. (1935). Trial of Alma Victoria Rattenbury and George Percy Stoner. W. Hodge.
  27. ^ Jesse, F. Tennyson (1947). Trial of Thomas John Ley and Lawrence John Smith - the Chalk Pit Murder. Hodge.
  28. ^ Jesse, F. Tennyson, ed. (1957). The Trials of Timothy John Evans and John Reginald Halliday Christie. Hodge.
  29. ^ Jesse, Fryniwyd Tennyson (1948). Comments on Cain. [An Examination of the Murder Trials of Harold Wolcott, Reginald Ivor Hinks and Eugen Weidmann.]. William Heinemann.
  30. ^ Light, Alison (21 August 2013). Forever England: Femininity, Literature and Conservatism Between the Wars. Routledge. p. 238 note 45. ISBN 978-1-135-62984-7.
  31. ^ a b Trodd, Anthea (23 December 2015). Encyclopedia of British Women's Writing 1900–1950. Springer. p. 130. ISBN 978-0-230-37947-3.
  32. ^ Anderson, Emily (11 September 2023). Humour in British First World War Literature: Taming the Great War. Springer Nature. p. 122. ISBN 978-3-031-34051-2.
  33. ^ Jesse, Fryniwyd Tennyson (1935). Sabi Pas: Or, I Don't Know. W. Heinemann.
  34. ^ Jesse, Fryniwyd Tennyson; Harwood, Harold Marsh (1941). London Front: Letters Written to America, 1939-1940. Doubleday Doran, Incorporated.
  35. ^ Jesse, Fryniwyd Tennyson; Harwood, Harold Marsh (1942). While London Burns: Letters Written to America. (July 1940-June 1941). Constable & Company Limited.
  36. ^ Jesse, Fryniwyd Tennyson (1942). The Saga of "San Demetrio". H.M. Stationery Office.
  37. ^ Calder, Robert L. (1 March 2004). Beware the British Serpent: The Role of Writers in British Propaganda in the United States, 1939-1945. McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP. p. 242. ISBN 978-0-7735-7179-2.
  38. ^ Murphy, Robert (15 August 2005). British Cinema and the Second World War. A&C Black. ISBN 978-0-8264-7897-9.
  39. ^ Jesse, Fryniwyd Tennyson (1946). The Story of Burma: With a List of Burmese and Other Foreign Words, and an Index of Dates. Macmillan.
  40. ^ Colenbrander, Joanna (1984). A Portrait of Fryn: A Biography of F. Tennyson Jesse. A. Deutsch. p. 133. ISBN 978-0-233-97572-6.
  41. ^ White, Arthur John Stanley (1991). The Burma of 'AJ': Memoirs of A.J.S. White. BACSA. p. 129. ISBN 978-0-907799-39-9.
  42. ^ "White, Arthur John Stanley". Who's Who. A & C Black. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  43. ^ Orwell, George (1998). Smothered Under Journalism: 1946. Secker & Warburg. pp. 124–128. ISBN 978-0-436-20377-0.
  44. ^ Sage, Lorna (30 September 1999). The Cambridge Guide to Women's Writing in English. Cambridge University Press. p. 350. ISBN 978-0-521-66813-2.
  45. ^ Jesse, Fryniwyd Tennyson (1913). The Milky Way. London, New York: W. Heinemann.
  46. ^ a b c Watson, George; Willison, I. R. (7 December 1972). The New Cambridge Bibliography of English Literature: Volume 4, 1900-1950. CUP Archive. p. 623.
  47. ^ Jesse, Fryniwyd Tennyson (1921). The White Riband: Or, A Young Female's Folly. Doran.
  48. ^ Jesse, F. Tennyson (1930). The Lacquer Lady. London: William Heinemann. p. vii.
  49. ^ Jesse, Fryniwyd Tennyson (1937). Act of God. B. Tauchnitz.
  50. ^ Colenbrander, Joanna (1984). A Portrait of Fryn: A Biography of F. Tennyson Jesse. A. Deutsch. p. ix. ISBN 978-0-233-97572-6.
  51. ^ Jesse, Fryniwyd Tennyson (1950). The Alabaster Cup. Evans Bros.
  52. ^ Jesse, Fryniwyd Tennyson (1956). The Dragon in the Heart: A Love Story. Constable.
  53. ^ Ashley, Michael (2006). The Age of the Storytellers: British Popular Fiction Magazines, 1880-1950. British Library. p. 99. ISBN 978-1-58456-170-5.
  54. ^ Jesse, Fryniwyd Tennyson (1915). Beggars on Horseback. G.H. Doran Company. ISBN 978-1-5085-5921-4.
  55. ^ Book Review Digest. Vol. 12. H. W. Wilson Company. 1917. p. 295.
  56. ^ Barnett, Colleen A. (1997). Mystery Women: An Encyclopedia of Leading Women Characters in Mystery Fiction. ReadHowYouWant.com. p. 56. ISBN 978-1-4596-1232-7.
  57. ^ "Title: Thirty Pieces of Silver". www.isfdb.org.
  58. ^ "Publication: Alfred Hitchcock's Spellbinders in Suspense". www.isfdb.org.
  59. ^ McKitterick, David (1992). A History of Cambridge University Press: Volume 3, New Worlds for Learning, 1873-1972. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-30803-8.
  60. ^ Jesse, Fryniwyd Tennyson (1951). The Compass: And Other Poems. William Hodge.
  61. ^ a b c NA, NA (25 December 2015). Twentieth Century Crime & Mystery Writers. Springer. p. 869. ISBN 978-1-349-81366-7.
  62. ^ a b c d e Parker, John (1947). Who's Who in the Theatre (10th, revised ed.). London: Sir Isaac Pitman & Sons. p. 830.
  63. ^ Maunder, Andrew (22 August 2015). British Theatre and the Great War, 1914-1919: New Perspectives. Springer. p. 81. ISBN 978-1-137-40200-4.
  64. ^ Aston, Elaine; Reinelt, Janelle G. (2000). The Cambridge Companion to Modern British Women Playwrights. Cambridge University Press. p. xiv. ISBN 978-0-521-59533-9.
  65. ^ Arts & Decoration. Artspur publications, Incorporated. 1924. p. 1.
  66. ^ United States Congress House Committee on Education (1926). Hearings Before the Committee on Education, House of Representatives, 69th Congress, First Session on H.R. 4094 and H.R. 6233 Bills to Create a Commission to be Known as the Federal Motion Picture Commission, and Defining Its Powers and Duties: April 14, 15, 16, 17, 27, and May 4, 1926. U.S. Government Printing Office. p. 300.
  67. ^ Hischak, Thomas S. (22 April 2009). Broadway Plays and Musicals: Descriptions and Essential Facts of More Than 14,000 Shows through 2007. McFarland. p. 356. ISBN 978-0-7864-5309-2.
  68. ^ "The Australian woman's mirror.Vol. 1 No. 22 (21 April 1925)". Trove. Retrieved 16 July 2023.
  69. ^ Gale, Maggie (7 March 2008). West End Women: Women and the London Stage 1918 - 1962. Routledge. p. 205. ISBN 978-1-134-88672-2.
  70. ^ Kabatchnik, Amnon (14 April 2011). Blood on the Stage, 1950-1975: Milestone Plays of Crime, Mystery, and Detection. Scarecrow Press. p. 657. ISBN 978-0-8108-7784-9.
  71. ^ The Sketch: A Journal of Art and Actuality. Ingram Brothers. 1922. p. 28.
  72. ^ Flower, Newman, ed. (28 June 2021). The Journals of Arnold Bennett. Read Books Ltd. p. 228. ISBN 978-1-5287-6039-3.
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