19th Century authors with ties to Essex: part 1

Sometimes you can overlook Essex as being a county with a rich literary link. In this blog, we highlight some of the authors who have links with Essex. Today, we are going to talk about Joseph Conrad.

Joseph Conrad was born in the Ukraine in 1857, to Polish parents, and from the age of 16 started his education to become a merchant seaman. He then went to sea in a number of roles such as steward, apprentice, able-bodied seaman, first and second mate, and from 1888-89 did his sole captaincy of the Otago, which sailed from Sydney to Mauritius. During his time at sea, Joesph Conrad spent time in India and the Far East. His time at sea in the Far East clearly gave him the experiences to write a number of sea and Far East based stories such as The Victory, Typhoon, An Outcast of the Islands, Almayer's Folly.

Jospeh Conrad's link to Essex came from his time when he lived with his wife, Jessie George, in Stanford-le-hope (Thames Estuary) from 1896. It was in Stanford-le-Hope where they found "a brand new twin villa at the end of the road running from the railway station".

This was probably Victoria Road, although the house has never been positively identified. Arrangements were made for Mrs Conrad to stay locally while she equipped the house with furnishings. Some five months later they had moved out of the Victoria Road house and on 13 March 1897 were relocated just down the road into an old timber framed medieval farmstead house on the outskirts of Stanford-le-Hope, called 'Ivy walls', in Billet Lane (the building was demolished in the 1950s and a brick built house now stands on the site).

The River Thames and foreshore were used as the locality of 'Nellie' in his famous novel, "Heart of Darkness". He also wrote "Lagoon" and "Outpost of Progress" while at Stanford-le-Hope. They moved out of the area on 26 October 1898 to a house in Kent.