The Annual Register, Or A View of the History, Politicks, and Literature For the Year was a Georgian chronicle that detailed crimes, the weather, local bets (usually involving travelling a long distance in a short time by foot or on horse) and the activities of the royal family and state. But in its 1760 volume, it also recorded a couple that left a trace we would consider aligned with the LGBTQ community of today.
Samuel Bundy, a twenty-year old artist’s apprentice who lived in Southwark in London, married Mary Parlour in October 1759. Their neighbours, after the couple had been married for six months apparently had some confusion about the relationship, and ‘searched’ Samuel, ‘when, to their great surprise, the bridegroom proved a female’. Samuel then revealed that, at the age of thirteen, she was taken away from her mother at their home in Smithfield and ‘seduced’ by a male limner, an artist specialising in creating miniature paintings. The artist ‘debauched her’, and to ‘avoid the pursuit of her mother, or any discovery of her… he dressed her in boy’s apparel and adopted her for his son’, giving her the new name of Samuel Bundy.
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| Young Couple with Flute and Cittern, Johann Gotliebb Glume, Metropolitan Museum of Art |
After a year, Samuel separated from the limner and went to work at sea, managing to avoid suspicion from the rest of the crew, who believed Samuel to be a young boy. When the contract was finished, Samuel returned to land and found employment with another artist as an apprentice, a Mr Angel who lived and worked in the Green Walk near Paris Garden Stairs in the Christchurch area of London, in Southwark. Samuel even told the curious neighbours there were times apprentice and master would share a bed when they were ‘in the country at work… without the least discovery whatsoever’. Care must be taken to construe anything sexual in this statement; it was very common for travellers to share a bed at an inn on overnight stays, especially those travelling together. Samuel would later state that the only man anything sexual had occurred with was the first artist who took her away from her home.
While in the employment of Mr Angel, Samuel met Mary Parlour, who was recorded as living at The King’s Head in Southwark. A dispute soon broke out, and Mary and Samuel lived together, Mary offering to support her husband financially, even accruing debts during the early period of their marriage. Samuel related however that Mary did not know about her husband’s sex. ‘The adopted husband says’, continued the account, ‘the wife soon discovered the mistake she had made, but was determined for some time not to expose the matter’. It seems that Mary later charged Samuel with a ‘fraud’ over her lending of money and financial support, and so she may not have genuinely known of her husband’s previous identity. Samuel went to work at sea once again, on a warship called the Prince Frederick, which was then moored at Chatham in Kent. This may have been the 70-gun ship of that name that had been launched at Portsmouth in 1740. However, on boarding, Samuel decided against it ‘for fear the great number of hands on board should discover her sex’. Instead, Samuel boarded a merchant ship with about twenty crew, and found it easier to live as a male here with less chance of being discovered. However, the account states that Samuel left this service ‘to return to the wife, whom, she says, she dearly loves, and there seems a strong love and friendship on the other side’. Samuel was imprisoned over the ‘fraud’ and Mary visited often, regularly keeping ‘the prisoner company in her confinement’.
After imprisonment, Samuel seems to have resumed life as a woman, as the account mentions that she began to dress in feminine clothes, appearing as ‘a very agreeable woman’, wearing ‘her proper dress’. It states that she was gifted in shoemaking and painting, and had now sent for her mother, ‘and appears to be a very sensible woman’.
This is where the account in the Register ends. It doesn’t reveal any details about the future relationship between Samuel and Mary. It does, however, reveal some key facts about Samuel’s life. Born female in 1739, she was taken from her home in 1752 by the limner, who disguised her as a boy. It seems that from then Samuel lived as male and was by all accounts convincing, starting a career as a sailor at the age of around fourteen in 1753, and returning to work on subsequent ships without suspicion from members of different crews.
Did Samuel marry Mary to capitalise on her wealth and generosity, or through mutual love? Mary’s reluctance to report Samuel, at least in the beginning, suggests that there were emotional feelings at play and their love for one another was also reported by witnesses during Samuel’s imprisonment. Whether this was a friendship or more, it is difficult to say, but it is not for us centuries later to validate or dismiss aspects of their relationship that we can’t be certain of. We can only present the facts and make their lives known. The account in the Register also raises questions about the ‘search’ Samuel endured by nosy neighbours, which would have been incredibly intrusive and distressing.
More than 250 years after they stood at the church door as Mary and Samuel, it is impossible for us to know today the true nature of the couple’s relationship. What is certain though, is that the couple lived as man and wife for six months, and would have conducted a traditional ‘courting’ period before that, with Mary apparently not knowing that Samuel was born a female. They told others of their love for one another and Mary supported Samuel in financial hardship. Samuel also lived as a male from the age of thirteen, working on merchant and military ships and as an artists’ apprentice, until the age of twenty. There would have been a great deal of skill learned from the age of thirteen, and Samuel was regarded as a young man by innkeepers, employers, colleagues and eventually, a bride. Whether their feelings were platonic or romantic, and what knowledge Mary had of her husband’s identity before their marriage cannot be fully ascertained without further evidence, but their story is important as it points to many similarities with today’s LGBTQ community.
Source:
The Annual Register, or view of the History, Politicks, and Literature for the Year, Volume 3, J. Dodsley, London. 1760. Pages 87-89.
https://threedecks.org/index.php?display_type=show_ship&id=246
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