A century and a half ago: Not your usual amdram pic.

I lit upon this photo this morning. It was labelled simply as 'amateur theatricals', or something of the sort ...

It looked a bit classy for an amdram photo. Those costumes?  There was no date on it. Nor any indication of what the show might have been. But someone had inked in the names of the 'actors' on the mount, and a few of those made my eyes prick up.

Yes, these are amateur theatricals. Round about 1870, or a couple of years later, is my calculation. But they are not your Puddlesby-on-the-Marsh players on parade. This is a bunch of the fairly wealthy and the more-or-less aristocratic playing at actors. I would say, maybe, at a country house weekend. Or maybe in the lavish rooms of number 4 Albert Gate, Knightsbridge.

It's fairly clear who are the leading lights in this little group. The chappie in the middle, and the lady kneeling next to him. His wife. He is Tom Naylor Leyland (referred to as Lieutenant or later Colonel, thanks to a brief spell, in his 20s, in the 2nd Life Guards) (b 1841; d Garve, Scotland 24 August 1886) his wife is Mary Ann, née Scarisbrick (b 30 December 1841; d 15 Prince's Gate 15 June 1902). His wealth came from his father, landowner Thomas Leyland, from Northwich, Cheshire; she was the daughter of Charles Scarisbrick of Scarisbrick and Wrightington, whose antecedents et al you can exhume from Burke.  Baronets all over the place. In 1871 Mrs Leyland threw a ball at their home in Dover Street, Piccadilly: the guests list (duly reported in the press) was enormous and topped by a lump of aristocracy. In the 1881 census the Leylands are living at Albert Gate. The establishment has thirteen servants, which says it all ... Their country seat was Nantclwyd Hall in Denbighshire.

The chappie with the pointy hat, on the left, is John Talbot Searle (b London14 May 1837; d London 1921). He was at Mrs L's ball at Dover Street. In the census he describes himself, from his eternal-bachelor lodgings in Mount Street, as 'grandson of a peer'. His mother was Lady Harriet Talbot of the Earl of Shrewsbury's family. Once again, I refer you to Burke. He doesn't seem to have done much in his life other than go to balls, where, as a single man, related to a peer, he would doubtless have been a mamma's darling. But he clearly had other ideas. (PS Talbots come into the Scarisbrick family, so maybe he was a distant relation).

The man kneeling next to him is not a peer. He's a plain merchant. But a very rich one. And he hobnobbed with the Duke of St Albans and the like. His name was [Frederick] Leo Schuster (b Bradford 10 March 1839; d Cheltenham 19 February 1902), and I see that in the 1871 census he and his wife Sophie née Wood had a mere five servants. When his father died, in 1884, he left an enormous fortune (187,000L) which Leo managed to reduce by 80 percent.

The next, young, fellow, is Alfred Joseph Gandolfi Hornyold (b 7 October 1850; d Biarritz 26 April 1922). He was a descendant of a certain Marchese Gandolfi who makes the Burke-ish books, but who I have not been inspired to look into further. Minor nobility? He doesn't seem to have had a day job either. But he acquired a French wife (Marie Louise Genevieve Alice de la Chère) and two children ... In 1891, he is living in Richmond Hill 'on his own means' and the servant count is negligible...

The other ladies, alas, elude me. There was a 'Miss Gilbert Smith' (left) of some small social pretensions who came from the Isle of Wight ... Mrs ?Forster and Mrs ?Stadler, shoved into the back row, mean nothing to me ... and Miss Carlyle, doing some acting, on the right ... well, there were too many of those.

The chap lying down on the right is 'Frank Russell'. Too many of those, too. I'd like to think it was the social Captain Frank Russell but .. which leaves just 'Mr Easton', with the gun. Nope.

So there we are. One hundred and fifty year-old amdrammers ... of just a little more curious interest than usual ..

PS When I went back to ebay to have a second look, this was gone. But, happy end, one of my friends, having read this wee piece, had snapped it up ...

Potel: tenor and comic actor

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The folk who created the musical works of Meilhac, Halévy, Crémieux, Hervé and their colleagues, and of the parallel composers, headed of course, by Jacques Offenbach, who musicalised their works in the 1850s and 1860s, have always fascinated me. The little biographies of those actors and actresses, even the most buzzwordy and 21st-century 'famous' of them, which you see all over the place, are most often thirty-third-hand, not to say skimpy, so I thought I would have an in-depth go at one of the less buzzwordy ones ... we really don't need another, even bony, Life of Désiré, Dupuis, Léonce, Pradeau, Schneider or Bouffar ... so I turned to the gentleman known as Potel.

If you were going to summarise the career of 'Potel' in a few lines, I suppose you would just note that he created leading rôles in Le Pont de Soupirs, Monsieur Choufleuri, Les Bavards, Le Roman comique, the strangely underrated M Dunanan père et fils, Vert-Vert and Fantasio for Offenbach, and supporting ones in Bizet's Djamileh and Carmen, and in Guiraud's Piccolino, during a period of nearly twenty years almost unbroken performance on the Parisian musical stage (1858-1877). But there are another eight years or so, back to 1850, to tack on to the beginning of that career. And many, many, many other shows -- many of them ephemeral, many of them reprises featuring our man in roles first played by others ..

So, if you just wanted the bony biog, stop here. I'm going for the whole pig.

'Potel' was the stage name of Pierre Armand Piau. When he died, it was reported that he was 45 years old. He was actually 48, and had been born in Paris 3 July 1830. His father, Thomas Piau, was a wine merchant, his mother Marie Anne Legros (m 25 September 1822), and there was at least one elder sister, Anne Antoinette Piau (b 8 October 1826). I say 'at least' because the Parisian press reported that 'Mlle Anna Potel', 1st prize for acting at the Conservatoire, who debuted at the Odéon in 1844, was the sister of Mlle [Pauline] Potel of the Théâtre Beaumarchais, who was also said to be our man's sister. I seem to see Anna at the Théâtre Montmartre in 1847 and the Ambigu in 1849-50, while Pauline is at the Variétés ... so I guess they are not the same person. Oh. A theatrical Mlle or is it Madame Potel died in 1852 aged 30. Possibly Anna? The fine site www.artlyrique.fr says Pauline died in 1888. And what's this? A brother 'inspector of the Port of Le Havre' died July 1869 aged 31. He had lost an arm at the siege of Sebastapol...  And who is Mme Potel, in 1868, playing at Antwerp, surely it's Pauline ... More investigation needed.

Back to Armand. Who seems to have inherited, rather than chosen, the name of 'Potel'. A slightly unfortunate choice, in all, for the fruiterers and caterers 'Potel and Chabot' were to become a byword in Parisian life. It was rather like calling yourself 'Miss Fortnum'.

Although his sisters were into the mainstream theatre from their teens, Armand apparently started his 'career' in the goguettes, those Parisian singing-rooms, the equivalent of the London pre music-hall joints, where men gathered to gossip, drink and those who could sing 'added to the harmony of the meeting'. As in London, the Paris goguettes produced a few favourite singers of songs of the sentimental or comic genre who would go on to the professional halls or cafés-concerts, with their male/female audiences, and one of these was handsome young 'Potel'

Aramnd, naturally, went for the sentimental ditty. The little sketch of his early career written as an obituary by Jules Prevel is more charming than precise, and doesn't give us any dates, merely the approximation that, at his debuts, he was 'twenty years old' and the ladies called him 'Le bel Armand'. And that he went on to appear at Charles Mourier's Folies-Dramatiques in the Boulevard du Temple. The obituary in La Chanson mentions Chez Montié in the Place de la Corderie du Temple. Well, I imagine the goguettes didn't make the press, but I pick him up at at the Salle de la Redoute, Rue Grenelle St Honoré, in 1850, giving Mme Renard Tissot's 'N'effeuillez pas les marguérites', 'Ma voisine', 'Les Souvenirs' and a Duo des mousquétaires with one M Cazot.
In 1850, too, he becomes a regular Boulevard Temple, and, apart from giving his romances in between the acts, alongside the mpersonations of Brasseur, he also took part as an actor in some of the little vaudevilles that made up the theatre's programme. Une enfant gatée (Gustave), Adine (Henri), L'Enfant Prodigue à l'Opéra (San Francisco). His songs included Étienne Arnaud's popular 'Le Retour des chansons', 'Les Feuilles mortes', Les trois soldats bretons', 'Le Travail plaît à dieu', 'La Saison des fleurs', 'Dans la grand'hune', 'Enfants, n'en touchez pas', 'Mes Vingt ans', 'Je veux pas me marier' , La Chanson des cieux, 'Mes enfants, le bon Dieu vous voit', 'Mon âme à Dieu', the duet 'La Sympathie' ...

(Aside: I notice that one of the ladies on the books of the Folies at this time was Mlle Legros. Not Mama?)

In 1851, Armand moved to the Délassements Comiques for more of the same. Perhaps a little more acting -- Arthur in L'amour rend aveugle, Léonce in Quand le diable devient vieux, Félix in L'amour en loterie, L'Asperge in the revue Le Bonhomme dimanche starring Alphonsine -- but the usual ration of songs: his old favourites plus ''Ma république', 'Dans la saison de fleurs', 'Je ne veux pas vous aimer', 'Mon âme à Dieu, mon coeur à toi', plus Levassor's popular scena 'Titi à la representation de Robert le diable' which he trotted out regularly at Benefit performances.

Alphonsine

His next engagement seems to have been at the Théâtre and Concert de Belleville (1853, Jocko,  Guillaume in Stella, Delaroche in L'Honneur de la Maison, Victor in Les Lilas de Romainville, Jean de Beauvais in Les Deux voleurs) before, in June 1854, he joined the company at the Théâtre du Luxembourg. Another current member of the company was a young Belgian comedian-singer, Jules Dupuis. His employment was still the same: songs between the pieces -- 'Ce que femme veut', 'Pauvre homme', duo 'Marquis et Marquise', 'La plainte du mousse', 'Nous n'irons pas au bois' -- but an increasing amount of roles in the vaudevilles of all kinds which made up the entertainment. When he appeared in Henriette ou la grisette mariée (Adolphe), a perspicacious critic noted 'il a de la tenue, la voix flexible et bien timbrée, presqu'une voix d'opéra-comique ... nos éloges les plus sincères'. The critic even expressed doubts that the Luxembourg could keep him, but Potel saw out his twelve months -- Pauvre Mère (Arthur), Baron le comédien (Baron), Le Fou et le docteur (Raoul), L'Aumonier du régiment (Pascal), Les Ressources de Jonathan (Léopold), Le Colleur (Paul Brichard, with Dupuis), Marie Sorrin (Pierre), Le Commis et la grisette (Robineau), La Mère Gigogne (Calendrier/Edouard), The Cauchemar de son propriètaire (Cabrion), Une Allumette entre deux feux (Bajazet), Rossignol (Julien Rossignol), Une Coutume Russe (Armand Déricourt) -- before moving, at last, up to a major theatre. Even if in rather more minor roles.

Sister Pauline had been for a decade a much-liked member of the company at the Théâtre des Variétés, now Armand joined her for the little while left before her departure. The record of his time at the Variétés (September 1855-April 1857) reduces to simply a list of titles: Le Théâtre des zouaves (un officier), Les Erreurs du bel age (Henri), Le Royaume de calembour revue, Madame Roger Bontemps (Barnabé), Donnez-moi la paix (Wilhelm), M le Sac et Mme la Braise (Fin-Courant), L'Abbé galant (Jelyotte), Le Mari aux épingles (Duroset), Le Billet de faveur (St Clair), Le Musée comique (Bidault), L'Amour et le temps (Léon), Les Metamorphoses de Chamoiseau (Lavarennes), Un Provincial qui se forme (Polydore), La Lanterne magique (André), Les Lanciers (Edgard), La Princess de la rampe (Alexandre), Le Comète de Charles-Quint (Un pierrot), Un fiancé au l'huile (Ludovic). Occasionally, he brought out one of his songs - 'Vingt ans', 'La Mousse', 'L'aumonier du régiment', or 'Titi' -- for a Benefit, but the Variétés was not a theatre devoted, as yet, to music.

Semet

His next 'shop', however, was, and it was now in February 1858 that began the career for which Potel (potted version) in known. He joined the company at the aptly-named Théâtre Lyrique, and started from the bottom again. His first part was as 'a seigneur' in Semet's La Demoiselle d'honneur, but in March he took over from Fromont as the juvenile man, Léandre in Gounod's two-months old Le Medecin malgré lui. He was in the original cast of the 1-act Don Almanzor (16 April 1858,  Don Felix 'bien gauche et ben empêché'), succeeded to the parts of Mathéo in Maillart's Gastilbelza ('Sonnez, cloches de mon village'), Preciosa (Lorenzo) and Le Perle du Brésil (un chef Brésilien, Wartel was another) and, before the end of the season created two little operettas in concert: Henri Salomon's Au printemps and Edmond Hocmelle's La Mort de Socrate. During the relâche, he went with Delphine Ugalde to Spain the play a selection of little operas.  In 1859, he was seen in Lajarte's 1-act Mam'zelle Penelope (Landry, with a bourrée danced with Mlle Faivre), in Semet's vastly overblown Gil Blas (Nunez), the 1-act Les Valets de Gascogne and a piece named Maître Palma, as well as appearing with Mme Ugalde in the durable Les Voitures versées, before his time came again to an end and he moved on. This time to the Bouffes-Parisiens.

At the Bouffes, he played in Duchesne's 1-act L'Hôtel de la Poste (Athanase Birotteau), the little Le Mari sans le savoir (Chauvaroux) and a repeat of Offenbach's Savetier et financier, with Tostée and Tacova, before he was allotted his most memorable part to date as Malatromba, the arch villain, in Le Pont des soupirs. 'Potel a fort bien chanté et joué son rôle de traitre: il a composé ce type de Fabiano-Fabiani de la façon la plus sérieuse, et il n'en est que plus comique' ... alongside Lise Tautin, Desiré and Bache of Orphée aux enfers fame, Tacova and the ladies of the Bouffes, Armand scored a grand success.
In the off-season, he travelled to Vienna, Pesth, Berlin and Brussels with the Bouffes troupe playing his original roles in L'Hotel de la Poste and Le Pont des soupirs, as well as Tayau's part of Guido in La Chatte metamorphosée en femme, Bel Oeillet in Le Polka des Sabots and the role of Babylas in the new Monsieur Choufleuri. When the Bouffes reopened he introduced Parisians to Monsieur Choufleuri as well.

The season was a slightly disappointing one for Offenbach. If the little Monsieur et Madame Denis (Bellerose, 'un artiste distingué, intelligent et naturellement comique') did well, the full-length Le Roman comique (L'Aubespin, 'Potel est magnifique: costume, diction et gestes lui ont valu une véritable ovation') was a failure, and the delightful tale of M Dunanan père et fils in which Potel had a grand role as the charlatan Lespingot did not take off as it ought to have. Some performances of Apothicaire et perruqier and a 'superbe' performance as Ramasse-ta-tête in a revival of Croquefer, teamed with Pradeau, Léonce and Géraldine, could not compensate. The off-season at Ems included performances of Le Rendez-vous bourgeois, Le Café du roi, Les Bourguinonnes and the first version of Les Bavards. The original cast of this piece included Mlle Girard (Inès), Mlle Baudier (Béatrix), Wartel (Sarmiento) and Potel, the latter playing the part of Roland which (in spite of what Wikipedia claims) would later become a travesti role, played in Paris by his frequent colleague, Delphine Ugalde.

Potel would not, however, be around the Bouffes by the time Les Bavards got its Paris version. Laget had left the Opéra-Comique, and his replacement was to be Armand Potel. With one break of a year, in 1873, when he returned for a fairly unremarkable season at the Bouffes (where the 'bouffe' tradition had wittered away into opérette), creating La Petite Reine, La Rosière d'ici and Les Pattes blanches, he would remain at the Opéra-Comique from 1862, and his debut in Mocker's role of the miller in the little Gevaert piece Le Diable au moulin, until his retirement in 1877. It has to be said that those fourteen years years were not the most fruitful in memorable new works of the theatre's existence. Apart from his role as Dancairo in Carmen, Potel did not, truthfully, create an enduring piece. A few works which are remembered today because of their writers or composers, but nothing to match the pieces from previous years which he played in repertoire -- the works of Auber, Hérold, Grétry, Massé et al. So, there's no use in doing anything but exactly what the artlyrique.fr website does .. list them. Artlyrique has been selective. I am going to try to be as full as I can, so here goes ... worklist under construction!

1862
Antoine in Le Diable au moulin (1 act)

1863 (11 February) Rastoul in L'Illustre Gaspard (1 act)
Dickson in La Dame blanche, Daniel in Zampa, Lara, Palémich in Grisar's 3-act Les Amours du diable, Léandre in Grétry's Le Tableau parlant

1864 (5 November) Capitaine Pamphile in Le Trésor de Pierrot ('très bien')
Pierre Leroux in Monsigny's Rose et Colas, 

1865 Pompéry in Le Voyage en Chine. succeeded Couderc on the 14th night

Pompéry

1866 played in L'Ambassadrice

1867 takes over Laertes in Mignon after Couderc and Ponchard, Ali-Bajou in Le Caid, Le Maître de Chapelle at Etrétat

1868 (13 May) Perico in La Pénitante (1 act) three-hander, played 13 times
Le Grand Simon in Le Docteur Mirabolan, La servante maitresse

1869 (10 March) Bergerac in Vert-Vert. 
1869 (2 June) Baron de Beaubeuf in La Fontaine de Berny (1 act) played 15 times
1869 (11 September) Cousin Cadet-Caillaux in La Petite Fadette ('charmant de tact et de gaïté ... le public l'apellera Couderc II') played 34 times
1869 Andoche in Rêve d'amour succeeded Sainte-Foy at the 6th and last performance
Marcel in Le Secret de l'Oncle Vincent (1 act)

1870 (21 February) Marécot in L'Ours et le Pacha
Lord Kokbourg in Fra Diavolo ('d'un bon franc comique'), Cantarelli in Pré aux clercs, Basilio in Le Mariage de Figaro

1872 (18 January) Marinoni in Fantasio  ten performances
1872 (22 May) Splendiano in Djamileh eleven performances ('insuccès éclatant')
reprise of Les Dragons de Villars

1873
Midas in Galathée

1874 (25 February) Polpetto in Le Florentin (1 act)

1875 (3 February) Dancairo in Carmen
1875 (10 May) Roch in Don Mucurade (1 act)
Le Bailli in Le nouveau seigneur

1876 (11 April) Marcassonne in Piccolino
Pierrot in Pierrot Ténor (1 act) at Enghien
tour Etrétat, Trouville, Tréport et al

1877
Campomayor in Les Diamants de la couronne

During his years at the Opéra-Comique, Potel was a frequent performer at concerts and Benefits, often with others of his colleagues, and often with a variety of comic scenas.

After the completion of his time at the Opéra-Comique, Potel effectively retired. He died a year or so later (23 January 1879) while in Montpellier (6 rue de l'Observatoire), following the career of his daughter.

The daughter (or ?daughter) is another wee problem. She was enrolled at the Conservatoire (the records of which are normally very accurate) as Marie Julie Parizot ka Potel. I don't know where the Parizot comes in. I also didn't know that Armand had a wife. Illegitimate? But 'Julia Potel' was reported, from early on, as Armand Potel's daughter.

She made her first appearance at the Opéra-Comique in the title-role of Nicolo's Cendrillon, and spent much of her subsequent career in the provinces  -- Lille 1879, Toulouse 1881 (Violetta), Perpignan 1881 (Gilda), Marseille 1881-3 (La Part du diable, Contes de Hoffmann, La Dame blanche, Marguerite, Juliette, Ophelia, Philine, Micaela, Gilda, Mousquétaires de la reine), Aix-les-Bains 1883 (Lakmé), Brussels 1884-5, Antwerp 1885, Geneva 1885-6 (Cléopatre), Aix-les-Bains 1886, Nice 1886-7, Le Havre 1888, Lille 1893. She created Machado's opera Lauriane (9 January 1883) at Marseille.
In 1887 she married Louis Napoléon Bernard, manager of the Marseille Grand, who died the following year. She later became Mme Aguado. An attempt to return to the Paris stage in 1898 was not successful.

Honey, or My Turkestanish Stalker ...

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I posted this wee bit of research a couple of years ago. It has since had well over a thousand hits. No. I don't believe there are a thousand folk worldwide (and particularly in Russia and Turkestan) who care about Laura Honey. And, above all, every 24 hours. So, am I being unduly suspicious to think 'something's afoot'? Someone is anxious to infiltrate Blogger for goodness knows what purpose? So I am going to reproduce the post here, under a different title, delete the original, and see what happens ..

HONEY

A frustrating day. I got led astray. Checked into e-bay. Nothing interesting. Just ‘rare’ Adelina Pattis, Christine Nilssons and Maud Branscombes (not even identified!). These vendors are pretty pathetic! But don’t get me on to treacherous e-bay ‘descriptions’ …

So, I looked back to yesterday, when there was a nice photo, but at a ridiculous price, of George Honey. Of the original Pyne and Harrison company. Should I ‘do’ him. Just check first and make sure someone else hasn’t. Eh? What? Here’s a nice little piece on him, with a picture of his grave. Someone who evidently isn’t a theatre specialist, rather a graveyard specialist, has nevertheless put together a well-researched piece. Perhaps I won’t ‘do’ George. But what is this? A tentative suggestion that he might have been connected to the well-known Mrs [Laura] Honey? Oh no, that can’t be.

So that was me hooked. And I’ve wound in and out of the Honeys all day. Firstly, blow me down, Mrs Laura Honey is in the Dictionary of National Biography. Well, OK. The more the merrier. And she got quite a detailed obituary in a couple of papers when – like James Dean and Marilyn Monroe – she died young, at about 26 years of age. Put the one with the other and that means, yes! She has a Wikipedia article. Well, there isn’t a heck of a lot of room, in 26 years, to go wrong, but … here’s my version.

We start with a Hampshire shoemaker, by name Frederick Bell, who had a little daughter whom he christened Anne. She was a pretty little Anne, and she sang delightfully, and in her early teens she began singing in public. The biogs say the first occasion was at Gosport in 1814, but the first sighting I have made is, a little later, at a Benefit for one legged man who had broken his other leg … ‘Miss Bell sung several airs in a most inimitable manner, and was warmly and deservedly applauded’. By 1817, I spot her singing Julia Mannering (‘sung her songs in a style that gave great satisfaction’) at Southampton’s Theatre Royal. However, Miss Bell’s venture into the big world was fraught with peril, and on 6 December of 1816 or 1817 (the articles don’t agree, and I have no evidence) she gave birth to a little Lauretta Martha Rosier Bell. 

I can only assume that ‘Rosier’ was the father, unless she was conceived behind a rose bush. Fast forward a bit. 28 November 1823 Anne Bell got legal. She married one John Young 'artist', and produced some legitimate children. I spot only a John William (6 March 1831) and a Fanny (1834), before Mr Young evidently clocked out. And by which time teenaged Laura was a married woman and well-and-truly established as a delightful singing soubrette on the London stage.

Laura had married, 13 October 1831, a lad around town by name William Honey. The two had a daughter, after which Mr Honey went boating on the Thames on the 8-ton Lady Emma. The boat tipped over, off Lambeth Palace, and most on board were drowned. Including William. 17 July 1836, Laura was a widow.

She was also a favourite actress. But I’m not going to detail her career. She was simply another beautiful girl, with a good voice, and winning ways, who – I am convinced – owes her enduring ‘fame’ to her early death. And a certain etching …

Laura got herself another man. A gentleman this time. His name was Ernest Gaston, he was ‘independent’, he wrote, apparently decidedly tuneful, songs from time to time (some heard in the London theatres), and he gave Laura another child. I think. And here’s a puzzle…

Laura died in 1843. Mr Gaston survived her. And so did her two children. Her will -- yes, at 26, she made a will, three months before her death? don’t tell me that she didn’t know she was, for some reason, doomed – nominates Gaston as guardian of her children, Laura (legitimately born 26 May 1834) and ?Ada. Mr Gaston in the 1851 census is looking after just ‘Anne, born Jersey, aged 10’.

But mother! Mrs Young is still going strong! In 1840 she is acting and singing at the Grecian, and on the bill is a fairly lowly tenor, by name Tom Woollidge. I wonder if he’s the same person as the Tom Newman, with whom she is living in the 1841 census. Anyway, she married the man. And as Mrs Woollidge she would remain, through her long career, until she was laid low by a stroke, after nearly half a century on the stage, in 1861 (22 February)0.

End of story. Oh no.

(1) Fanny Young. Mrs Honey’s legitimate younger sister. Fanny also made something of a theatrical career, and played for a bit in London. But she made her home in Bristol, and worked largely in the Bath and Bristol theatres, up till her death, aged 29 (39 Queens Square, Bristol 8 March 1860).

(2) Laura Dalton Honey (b London 26 May 1834; d California 25 December 1884). Yes, I’m curious about that ‘Dalton’. Laura’s legitimate daughter by William? Born 1834. She would be. Anyway, she, too, went on the stage. The name must have helped. She did all right in Britain, before she married a certain Mr Samuel Wentworth Stevenson. And went west. (He promptly died). Well … there’s an article on the web under ‘Canada’s Early Women Writers’ from Simon Fraser University, which purports to tell the story of ‘Laura Agnes Stevenson’. Canada? Why Canada? Is it for real? Is it mixing up, partly, one Laura with another? Her latter day Californian career is rather … well, she WOULD write … anyway, she died 25 December 1884, officially as Mrs [John] Henry Church. She left two sons, by Mr Church: Arthur and Thomas ... 

PS, yes, there were other ‘Laura Honey’s. It was a buzzword name. See the one (Mrs Fred Caddick) who sang on the English music halls, played with the Gaiety Theatre company in Australia, and mothered singers Sara Beryl and Leila Roze …

(3) Actress ‘Marie Dalton’. CLOSE relation to Mrs Woollidge ... presumably not legitimately, or … but why did Laura jr have Dalton for her middle name? Well, it appears that there is a man at the bottom of it. One David Dalton Kennedy. Wait a moment David Dalton Kennedy of Craig married Margueretta Craufurd of Ayrshire, and died aged 39 (3 December 1847). So what's he doing around Laura? Oh. He was in London all right. I see him in 1836 in Fleet Prison. Debts, I suppose. Hm. A failed army man ...

 

And Marie Dalton... born Elise Marie Dalton Kennedy .. born France? 1847 ... died 7 August 1867 ... aged 29 ...  mother Eliza Birt? Who? How are they connected?  And yes, Laura Dalton Honey was said to be the daughter of William Honey but she wasn't christened till after his death by which time  ... was Kennedy out of prison?  Honestly, what a family..

And I have spent a whole day on THIS?

Well, here it is, for what it is worth. But if you want to put ‘Mrs Honey’ into a book or on to a webpage, these are the facts as I know them …

Oh, and here is another nice photo of George, who got me into all this ... apparently in The Duke's Motto (1863) .. but given the grimly melodramatic nature of that adaptation of Le Bossu, and the fact that George was appearing at the Strand when it was produced, it may more likely be in the burlesque version which followed.

Belval: the bassest of basses

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Usually, when I take on one of my vocalists for a careful study, I find that the ins and outs and events of his or her career have been, in some way and degree, distorted by encyclopaedists, footnotists and their ilk, and need quite a bit of straightening out. But when I light on someone such as the bass known as Belval, who spent twenty years of his life in music performing in one and the same theatre, there is, naturally, not a whole lot of searching and straightening out to do. Most of the facts are easily findable, and the brief biographical bits of writing to be found, concerning him, usually stick to, at least, a selection of them. However ...

'Belval' was a nom de théâtre. That's absolutely no secret ... just about every latter day comment on our man (copied, of course, one from another from another) refers to 'Belval, real name Jules Gaffiot'. Well, [Jules] Bernard Gaffiot. He was the son of Claude François Gaffiot of the Royal Artillery, Douai, and his wife Sophie Julie Constance Rue, and his birth was registered at La Fère, Aisne 2 June 1819. So says the website 'geneanet'. Heylli's dictionary of pseudonyms says his father was named René, and says that he took for stage name the surname of his wife. Since the latter statement (unless he had two wives) is pretty surely incorrect, I prefer to trust in geneanet and its precision. I suppose one could confirm, either way, by checking the lists of Chevaliers of the Légion d'Honneur, for, like all good soldiers, father was one such. His brothers, too. But Bernard went on the stage.

Tiens, here is Mons C F Gaffiot. Born Champagne 27 November 1785 'contrôleur à la formation de sels'. Capitaine. Died 10 February 1854. Widow Sophie b 10 October 1799 at Douai, living at Dôle in the Jura, gets his army pension. 400 francs pa? Sons Alfred Marie Etheline (?!) Gaffiot, Louis Desiré Gaffiot born Dijon, Edmond Charles Gaffiot born Strasbourg ...

Now things get a little 'flou'. One potted biog says 'He started his vocal studies in 1843 at the Conservatoire National in Paris. In 1846 he made his debut at the Opera of Antwerp'. Not so. The newspapers of provincial France stand witness. In April 1843, M Bernard Belval can already be seen singing as principal bass, not in Belgium, but at Bordeaux. Bordeaux, where thirty years earlier a Madame Belval had been the theatre's star. Thence the choice of stage name?

But a jolly little piece in a volume entitled Le Nouvel Opéra, published when Bernard was an established star, says (a) he studied at the Conservatoire (b) he went on the stage at Antwerp in 1846 (c) for that occasion he took his wife's maiden name as his, so as not to embarras the family soldiers. Hmm. I say: (a) if he studied at the Paris Conservatoire he went unnoticed. And the Conservatoire pupils were, at that time, eagerly discussed in the music press. So I beg to doubt it until proven. A Belgian Conservatoire, perhaps? (b) Antwerp was not his first job, and (c) the wife? Well, the only one I know of is Jeanne Sophie Montignac. She mothered his son, [Paul] Edmond, in Antwerp 18 October 1847 (d Paris 1928), his daughter [Julie Pauline] Marie in 1853 (Ghent), a Pauline [Desirée Camille] (b Paris 27 July 1856; d Paris 3 February 1921) and a Jules Bernard Emile sometime, somewhere, and he got round to marrying her in 1862. She called herself Mériadec de Montignac at one stage, and was registered as Jeanne Sophie Belval Gaffiot at her death at Le Plessis-Robinson 20 November 1884. Was there an earlier 'Madame Belval'? I'd guess 'no', but ... Anyhow 'Madame Belval' was at the side of 'Belval' in January 1844 when they were both engaged at Antwerp, and in 1846-7 at Rouen when she is already 'Mme Bernard-Belval' 1ere duègne', so I presume that's the same lady who is '1ere duègne et dugazon mère' with him at Lyon in 1853-5 ... But better than that I cannot do. I don't know, but I guess...

So what does Le Nouvel Opéra (and, therefore, Kutsch and Riemens, OUP et many al copied therefrom) say next? 'Après Anvers, il va a Toulouse .. Lyon. Il y reste 4 ans ... La Haye, the Brussels Monnaie and Gand ...  Hummmm. Here is my version, based on newspaper reviews I have dug up:

April 1843 Grand-Théâtre Bordeaux La Juive, La Favorita
December 1843 - December 1846 Anvers Robert le diable, La Juive, La Favorita, Andrea in La Reine de Chypre, Les Huguenots, Anna Bolena, Basilio in Il Barbiere di Siviglia, Guillaume Tell 'fort convenable' 'receuille des applaudissements'
July 1847 Capitole, Toulouse Les Huguenots, La Favorita, Il Barbiere di Siviglia
1848? 1849 - January 1850  Grand Théâtre Lyon Les Huguenots, Jérusalem, La Favorita, Robert le diable, Le Caid, Le Val d'Andorre

May 1851 The Hague Charles VI (Halévy)
September 1851 Brussels Les Huguenots, Le Prophète
1852 Grand Théâtre, Marseille Le Prophète, Moïse
September 1853 Grand Théâtre Lyon Le Songe d'une nuit d'été, La Favorita, Le Dieu et la Bayadère, Ludgers in Le Juif Errant, La Juive, Comte Ory, Les Huguenots, La Reine de Chypre, the oratorio Tobias, Guillaume Tell, Le Prophète, Peters in L'Etoile du nord, Gustavus III, Le Sourd et al 'une voix magnifique d'ampleur et d'étendue ... domine de toute la puissance de sa belle voix l'orchestration ...'

I am sure he sang at those other Belgian and Dutch houses, but I haven't yet found what or when.

And then the Paris Opéra called.

I'm not going to follow his 20-year career at the Opéra chronologically. Suffice it to say that, after a debut in Les Huguenots (7 September 1855), through those 20 years he played his staple roles -- Marcel in Les Huguenots, Bertram in Robert le diable, Brogni in La Juive, Zacharias in Le Prophète (while it lasted in the repertoire), Walter in Guillaume Tell, Balthasar in La Favorita -- over and over and over. He also took part in a number of the new operas produced, of which L'Africaine (28 April 1865, Don Pedro) and Hamlet (9 March 1868, King Claudius) succeeded in establishing themselves in the repertoire.

Otherwise, he appeared in
1855 (September) Sainte Claire by the Duke of Saxe-Coburg. Previously played at the Coburg Court Theatre.
1855 (25 December) Pantagruel (Gargantua). 1 performance.

1858 15 March La Magicienne (Comte de Poitou) 45 nights.

1864 3 October Roland à Roncevaux (Archevèque Turpin)

1862 28 February La Reine de Saba (Solomon)

It was, however, a role that he refused to create which got him into court and trouble. The role in question was that of the Inquisitor in Don Carlos. Belval counted the bars ('seventy lines!) instead of listening to them, found the amount didn't constitute his idea of a 'premiere basse' role, and refused point blank to play it. The press took sides vehemently, colleagues backed him up ... and in the end he didn't play what would have been one of his most impressive new roles.

Belval in his greatest role: Marcel

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Bertram in Robert le diable

During his years at the Opéra, Belval also sang at other venues and in concerts. I spot him in his old haunt of Douai in 1859 ('une des plus belles voix que nous ayons jamais entendu'), back at the Lyon Grand Théâtre giving a few performances of Huguenots and Robert le diable, at Lille (1862) with Miolan-Carvahlo giving those two pieces again, plus Jérusalem, Norma and La Favorita, and in 1871 he made a brief incursion into London (3 June 1871) for a much-liked production of Robert le diable with Titiens, di Murska and Nicolini, and to Moscow (October 1871).

Halanzier

He also seems to have interested himself in the running of the Opéra, and in 1879, when Halanzier's period as director of the house was coming to an end, he presented himself as a candidate for the succession. Auguste Vaucorbeil got the job.

After leaving the Opéra, with one last Les Huguenots, Belval visited Madrid and Barcelona where he appeared in his favourite role alongside the tenor Stagno. It seems to have been his last hurrah. His voice, at the approach of sixty, was losing its fabled power and plunge. He spent the last two years of his life in retirement, before his death at his Paris home, Rue Chalgrin 4 September 1879, following a fit of apoplexy.

Two of Belval's children followed him into the theatre. Son Paul became an actor in a career which included roles in opérettes such as L'Enlèvement de la Tolédad, La Dot de Brigitte and Mam'zelle Carabin before he took to directing. Daughter 'Marie Belval' had a fair career as an operatic soprano in Paris before moving with her husband or 'husband', conductor Auguste Vianesi (there had been other Mrs Vianesi's, including a Billingsgate chorine, Maria Henderson), to America. She is said to have died in New Orleans, but she is buried in Brooklyn's Greenwood Cemetery (February 1901).