Passion and Provision: Measuring Emotion among Illegitimate Children and their Families

Historians have long grappled with the complexities of emotional relationships within families, which are often fraught with competing expectations of material provision and emotional satisfaction. However, fewer researchers have investigated how these dynamics change when a family modifies to include an illegitimate child. The family of Henry Herbert, 10th Earl of Pembroke, poses just such a challenge. Lord Pembroke (1734-1794) was one of the most prominent peers in England and the father of two legitimate children when he attempted to integrate his younger illegitimate son, Augustus, into his legitimate family. This necessitated the cooperation of his wife, Lady Elizabeth Pembroke, as well as his public admittance of paternity. Although Augustus was able to form long-lasting and generally positive emotional relationships with his father, stepmother and half-siblings, his illegitimacy had a profound impact on his place in the family. Gender was also an important factor; although Augustus was largely accepted, his illegitimate half-sister Caroline was not. This paper will challenge the enduring social stereotype of the 'absentee father' and assess the difficulties of measuring emotion in a relationship largely governed by financial provision. What was the relationship between money and emotion, and how was it understood in the context of an eighteenth-century elite prioritisation of family lineage, title and estate? In answering these questions, this paper seeks to investigate how historians of gender and emotion can approach non-normative family structures, and intends to examine differences in the experience and expectation of emotional connections within biologically and socially accepted familial relationships.