A Little Extra Bloomsbury and China – Sir Leslie Stephen as a Chinese Bride

Posted: August 16th, 2025 | No Comments »

Writing a few posts on the Vanessa Bell exhibition in Lewes and some Chinese related items I did stumble across The Life and Letters of (Vanessa’s father) Leslie Stephen by Frederic William Maitland (1906). We tend to think of Stephen as the rather stern looking father of Vanessa and Virginia (and their brothers) though he was a pioneering academic, atheist and mountaineer. He died in 1904. Maitland’s short biography of Stephen includes the following:

‘His father settled at Wimbledon, and in February 1847 Leslie began to attend as a day-boy a school kept by Mr. Edelmann, where he had some seven or eight companions. He acquired some German, and was soon reading with enjoyment. He played cricket and rode his pony, being also much addicted to pets, including some Chinese mice. He could still look ‘very pretty* when dressed in the robes of a Chinese bride, unpacked from the curiosity box of a missionary.’

Sadly no early photograph or sketch!

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