Hunsford Parsonage near Westerham Kent.Described thus in our modern times: Westerham is a real-life town and civil parish in the Sevenoaks district of Kent and located on the border of Kent with Greater London and the county of Surrey. It was also, in 1727, the birthplace of Major General James Wolfe, conqueror of Quebec. Hunsford parish, in Pride and Prejudice is located beside Westerham as disclosed by the Reverend Collins in his introductory letter to Mr Bennet in the novel.
As all her readers will readily acknowledge, Hunsford Parsonage, like all else in Pride and Prejudice, belongs, lock stock and barrel to Jane Austen. Like the mystical Brigadoon of a much later era, it is a place of fantasy based on her rich imagination. We know she situated it close to Westerham, an ancient small town situated between Oxted and Sevenoaks -which are approximately ten miles apart- and alongside Rosings Park, (also fictional) the sizeable estate of Lady Catherine de Bourgh and separated by just a lane from her grounds. It is stated by Mr Darcy, in a conversation with Elzabeth Bennet in the novel, to be some fifty miles or half a day’s ride from the Bennet estate in Hertfordshire. The Hunsford Parsonage and residential house and church are situated here. Lady Catherine, widow of Sir Lewis de Bourgh, is effectively, mistress of all she surveys within this realm.
The Hunsford tales are just that; rural and restricted to Hunsford and district. Mr Collins is the Parson of Hunsford and Charlotte Collins nee Lucas, is his wife. Lady Catherine and her daughter apart, any other characters in the tales are of my own imagination. Our tales then we shall keep in the vicinity of Hunsford and district and not wander too far afield, for if we lose sight of Hunsford, just like Brigadoon, we may never find it again.
