A selection of Liverpool history questions submitted to the Liverpool History Society.
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Friday 26 November 2010
The King and I Governess
Hello Rob,
could you please confirm whether the real King of Siam Governess was originally from Liverpool.
"Anna Leonowens was an Anglo-Indian educator, and social activist, known for working in Siam from 1862–1868, where she taught the wives and children of Mongkut , king of Siam . She is also known for co-founding the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design . Leonowens's experiences in Siam were fictionalised in Margaret Landon's 1944 bestselling novel Anna and the King of Siam and in various films and television miniseries based on the book, most notably Rodgers and Hammerstein 's 1951 hit musical The King and I .
She was born Anna Harriette Edwards in Ahmadnagar, India in 1831. The second daughter of Sergeant Thomas Edwards of the Sappers and Miners, a former London cabinetmaker, and his Anglo-Indian wife, Mary Anne Glasscott, daughter of a lieutenant in the Bombay Army. I n later life Leonowens was estranged from her family and took pains to disguise her modest origins by writing that she had been born a Crawford in Caernarfon and giving her father's rank as captain."
Hello Phil,
ReplyDelete"Anna Leonowens was an Anglo-Indian educator, and social activist, known for working in Siam from 1862–1868, where she taught the wives and children of Mongkut , king of Siam . She is also known for co-founding the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design . Leonowens's experiences in Siam were fictionalised in Margaret Landon's 1944 bestselling novel Anna and the King of Siam and in various films and television miniseries based on the book, most notably Rodgers and Hammerstein 's 1951 hit musical The King and I .
She was born Anna Harriette Edwards in Ahmadnagar, India in 1831. The second daughter of Sergeant Thomas Edwards of the Sappers and Miners, a former London cabinetmaker, and his Anglo-Indian wife, Mary Anne Glasscott, daughter of a lieutenant in the Bombay Army. I n later life Leonowens was estranged from her family and took pains to disguise her modest origins by writing that she had been born a Crawford in Caernarfon and giving her father's rank as captain."
Regards
Rob Ainsworth
Liverpool History Society