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Isabella meet outside of their individual communities her attitudes and behaviour were different, which placed some if not all of their problems within the public arena of the contemporary social meeting places. However, while Joseph’ s anxiety is the result of his religious fervour, Isabella’ s were caused by her personal desires. She was supported by peer pressure that ignited behind her cause, whether through care for Isabella or towards the detriment of Joseph, but her original intention was merely to force his hand to move more quickly towards marriage. Isabella’ s indiscretion acknowledged an undercurrent of nuance that could be considered an‘ imagined public sphere’. If this interpretation of Summerfield’ s note is correct, it is difficult to perceive how much information flooded into this intermediate world between absolute confidentiality and consented public knowledge.
Despite the imbalance that is inevitable with the survival of a one-sided correspondence, there is reference by Joseph of how Isabella feels, as on occasions he quotes her own words back to her. In the first two years of their courtship, it is possible to gain an understanding of Joseph’ s dilemma and an empathy for Isabella. Aged nineteen in 1788 it is possible to imagine that Isabella would have expected a more loving suitor in place of the parade of her faults and demands in written form. Joseph’ s inattentive behaviour gives the impression that Isabella, while loved and valued, was ultimately less important than her scope for negative impact on Strutt’ s business. At the outset of their courtship, her behaviour was adrift from Joseph’ s own congregational adherence and from the rigorous schedule he imposed for selfimprovement. Ultimately both Joseph and Isabella demonstrated the effect of the cultural communities in which they were positioned, and the dilemmas this context generated when they first contemplated marriage.
By close reading of courtship correspondence of middle-class industrialists this research adds to current work on the agency of women specifically on their route to restrictive marriages. Elaine Chalus and Hannah Barker have examined the role and agency of wives within political and artisan families respectively. This examines wives within industrialising family businesses and particularly examines the way in which women’ s agency was affected by religion and how this was strongly related to the largesse of their husbands or indented husbands.