Austenised: October 2026

Jane Austen comes from a large family of eight children, including 2 girls and six boys. Janeites are familiar with Jane's sailor brothers, Frank and Charles, her clergyman brother, James, and the country squire, Edward and the banker-turned soldier-turned clergyman, Henry. Jane's less known older brother, George, however, largely remains a mystery.

What we do know about George is that he was born second, in 1766, following Jane's eldest brother, James, and he was nearly ten years older than Jane. As was customary at the time within gentry circles, the Austen siblings were all sent to stay with a wet nurse in a local cottage or farm house for the first few years of their lives.

However, George didn't return to the family home; he suffered from seizures and had some type of disability and was therefore cared for in a local cottage. Jane Austen's father, George Austen, was a clergyman and concerned with ideas of goodness and virtue within his family. He writes of George, "We have this comfort, he cannot be a bad or a wicked child" (Tucker, 1983).

Jane is likely to have spent time with George as an infant, as George was still nearby in Steventon when Jane was born. When George was 6 years old, he was taken to stay with the Culham (or Cullum?) family in the village of Monk Sherborne near Basingstoke.

A few weeks ago, on a clear, crisp autumn's day, I decided to drive to the beautiful, sleepy village of Monk Sherborne to see if I could discover where George lived.

Entering the village

The roads leading up to the village were narrow and winding, and the area was very leafy and the village quiet and sleepy.

I had a lovely autumnal walk through the village, with leaves falling, acorns and apples dropping and birdsong to accompany me all the way. I admired these quaint cottages, many of which would have been around when George Austen lived here.

The house next door to the cottage where George stayed.

The Cullums lived at Beam End Cottage at the end of the village, on the road to Sherborne St John.

The road where George Austen boarded.

Beam End Cottage is now called Apple Tree Cottage. Apple Tree Cottage is a small cottage in a stunning rural property away from the rest of the village. It truly felt like the house was tucked away from elsewhere - intentionally perhaps?

Apple Tree Cottage where George Austen boarded.

The Cullum family were agricultural labourers who were tenants on this rather large farm; the land actually belonged to Queen's College. Francis Clerk was a respectable member of the community, becoming parish clerk at Monk Sherborne. The family augmented their income by nursing Austens' children and caring for disabled family members. The Cullums received 15 pounds a quarter (the equivalent of 800 pounds today) for this service.

Jane's eldest brother, James, was vicar at nearby Sherborne St John at the time. Working so close to George's cottage, James Austen probably oversaw George's care and administered his fees, which may have been paid by Edward from Mrs Austen's inheritance.

After Monk Sherborne, I drove to Sherborne St John and had a little walk around the church where James Austen was vicar. I enjoyed my small walk around this charming village.

St Andrew's Church in Sherborne St John where James was vicar.

You may be wondering what George's disability was? We can assume that George may have had epilepsy and probably had developmental difficulties. However, since George lived a long life, he most likely didn't have Down's syndrome, and he was able to walk. It is possible that George was deaf and dumb, as it is thought that Jane knew sign language. We know this because in December 1808, following the death of her father when Jane was living in Southampton with her brother, Francis' family, she socialised with the Lance family, a prominent merchant family in the city. Jane writes to Cassandra about socialising with Valentine FitzHugh one evening, who was the brother of Mrs Lance:

"He has lived in that house more than twenty years, and, poor man! is so totally deaf that they say he could not hear a cannon, were it fired close to him; having no cannon at hand to make the experiment, I took it for granted, and talked to him a little with my fingers, which was funny enough. I recommended him to read Corinna" (a book by Madame De Stael with a reference to cannons). This use of sign language was dramatised in the film, Becoming Jane.

Whatever George suffered from, it is likely to have been a hereditary illness, for Jane Austen's uncle Thomas, brother of Jane's mother Cassandra, also had a disability; they were both cared for together at Monk Sherborne.

Did the Austens visit George and his uncle at Monk Sherborne? No records survive of any family visits to the Cullums, but it is likely that they visited on occasion. James would have been the most common visitor thanks to his vicinity.

At a time when developmental disability was considered a stigma, George was rarely mentioned in family letters; he lived a sort of silent existence. Similarly, George was omitted from the early biographies written by family members; for example, Jane's niece and biographer, James Edward Austen-Leigh lists James as the oldest son and Edward as the second son, with no mention of George whatsoever.

St Andrew's Church in Monk Sherborne where George is buried.

Unlike Jane Austen, George Austen lived up to the ripe old age of 71. None of the Austen family members attended his funeral in 1838. However, one of the Cullum sons, George, witnessed his passing and recorded him as a "gentleman" on his death certificate. Sadly, there is no gravestone for George in the Monk Sherborne church graveyard where he is buried.