The Courtier of the Days of Charles II

The Author

Catherine Grace Frances Gore (Moody) (1799 – 1861) was a British novelist and dramatist, daughter of a wine merchant at Retford, where she was born. She is amongst the well-known of the silver fork writers - authors of the Victorian era depicting the gentility and etiquette of high society. There is something of Jane Austen’s influence to be traced in her novels. Catherine Gore, like Mrs. Trollope, was a very prolific worker. In Mothers and Daughters (1831) and in Mrs. Armytage, or Female Domination (1836) there is considerable ability. In Mothers and Daughters may be traced clearly an attempt to follow Jane Austen in fidelity to life and in unity of form and matter. In Mrs. Armytage, Mrs. Gore came nearest to being a novelist of the first rank. 


The Novel

In 1651, Cromwell could not prevent Charles II from marching from Scotland deep into England at the head of a Royalist army.  Cromwell finally engaged and defeated the new king at Worcester on 3 September 1651. Charles II escaped, via safe houses and a famous oak tree, to France, ending the civil wars. Catherine Gore's tale sets in with a hurried marriage between Anne Heneage and the son of Lord Lovell during the night before the battle at Worcester... 


Contemporary Reviews


The New York Mirror, 1839 - Another new novel from the pen of Mrs. Gore will doubtless excite a fair share of public attention. These volumes are far superior in interest to most of the previous productions of the author, and we can sincerely commend them to the reader as composed with more than ordinary ability. These stories are of a character highly interesting and dramatic. 


The Athenæum, 1839 - Whatever contributes to the portraiture of national manners, or assists in developing those mazes of impulse and sentiment, which we term public opinion, will be assiduously consulted; and even works of fiction, provided they be faithfully executed, and really reflect contemporary civilisation in any of its aspects, will form authorities not to be overlooked without loss of lights otherwise unattainable. Under this aspect we are inclined to assign to Mrs. Gore's novels a rather prominent place among the historical documents of the day; and we would bind her volumes up, with those of Mr. Dickens, the forthcoming reports of Chartist trials, and a few similar books of fact and fiction, as contributions towards an encyclopaedia of the class-morality of the nation.