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Queer Heritage · Llangollen, Denbighshire

The Ladies of Llangollen's Tomb

Two runaway Irish gentlewomen who slept in one bed for fifty years, and the diarist 'Gentleman Jack' who came to see whether it was 'platonic'.

StatusDocumented history
Date1780–1831; Anne Lister's visit 11–23 July 1822
The peopleLady Eleanor Butler (1739–1829), Sarah Ponsonby (1755–1831), Mary Carryl (servant), Anne Lister (1822 visitor)
The siteThree-sided monument to Eleanor Butler, Sarah Ponsonby and Mary Carryl in the churchyard of St Collen's Church, Llangollen
Coordinates52.97170, -3.16750 (confidence 4/5)

The story

In the churchyard of St Collen's, Llangollen, a large three-sided monument marks a single grave shared by three people. Two faces belong to Lady Eleanor Butler, who died in 1829 aged about ninety, and Sarah Ponsonby, who died in 1831 — the celebrated Ladies of Llangollen, who lived together at nearby Plas Newydd for half a century. The third face belongs to Mary Carryll, their Irish servant, who had helped them elope in 1778, kept their house for over thirty years, saved money and bought land which she left to them, and died in 1809. She was buried first; the Ladies chose to join her. It is a rare thing: a grave that records not a marriage or a bloodline but a household of three who ran away together and stayed together to the end.

More stories at this spot

  • Anne Lister visited in July 1822 and wrote she could not 'help thinking that surely it was not platonic'
  • Hester Thrale privately called them 'damned Sapphists'
  • All three women — the couple and their servant — lie under one triangular monument

Sources

Nearby on the map

Queer HeritagePlas Newydd (the Ladies of Llangollen)Llangollen, Denbighshire · Wales

Two upper-class Irish women who eloped in 1778 to set up home together, scandalising and enthralling Georgian society; their Gothic cottage drew Wordsworth, Byron, Wellington and Walter Scott, and Queen Charlotte won them a royal pension. A cornerstone of British queer heritage — Anne Lister herself visited.

Documented historyHot spotLiterary PassionGwerful Mechain — Wales's Bawdiest PoetLlanfechain, Powys · Wales

The only medieval Welshwoman with a surviving body of verse — and she used it to write 'Ode to the Vulva', scolding male poets for praising everything but 'the best bit'.

Documented historyNotable LandmarksSt Winefride's WellHolywell, Flintshire · Wales

The 'Lourdes of Wales' — a holy well whose origin legend is a tale of thwarted lust; pilgrims still bathe in the star-shaped basin for healing and intercession.

Documented history

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