The real history behind The Forsytes

By the late Victorian era, having emerged from the Industrial Revolution, Britain was the wealthiest country in the world.

Cotton, coal and iron and steel had propelled the island nation from poverty to prosperity, while putting Manchester, Sheffield and Newcastle – along with Scotland and Wales – on the map. In a situation quite the reverse of today, London had been left lagging behind, with the northern regions the far wealthier side of the divide. But the emergence of the ‘City’ as the financial centre of the world was to change this.

Home to the London Stock Exchange and the Bank of England, the (quite literal) Square Mile, whose skyline is dominated by St Paul’s Cathedral, forms the backdrop to The Forsytes – Channel 5’s new period drama.

Is The Forsytes a true story?

No, The Forsytes is adapted by Debbie Horsfield from John Galsworthy’s classic novel series The Forsyte Saga, published in 1922. But as with many historical dramas there are truths underpinning the fiction.

The star-studded six-part series follows the fortunes, personal rivalries, and revelries of a wealthy family of stockbrokers in 1880s London.

We get to know Jolyon Forsyte, who is reluctantly set to inherit the family firm but whose wife – Frances (played by Tuppence Middleton) – would have it no other way.

Waiting in the wings is his cousin and rival, Soames, who considers himself to be a far more worthy heir and who is as hellbent on ‘possessing’ his love interest Irene (played by Millie Gibson) as much as his stocks and shares.

From Lady Carteret (played by Susan Hampshire, who won an Emmy Award for the original 1967 series) and the Forsyte matriarch Ann (played by Francesca Annis) to the dressmaker and former maid Louisa, the characters of The Forsytes span the British class system and give us a glimpse of life in a pivotal but often overlooked period of British history.

Here are five important real details in The Forystes that true fans of historical drama won’t want to miss…

The Forstyes were typical of the changing fortunes of ‘new money’ families

As Britain’s economy grew, it created opportunities for stockbrokers, solicitors and property developers – the professional services that could meet the needs not only of industry at home but also of Britain’s growing overseas empire.

From Africa and the Americas to Australia and India, railways needed to be built, land developed, and mines sunk – all of which required funds. British investors therefore refocused their energies away from investing at home to investing abroad. And they had deep pockets to do so.

In the late 19th century, the amount of savings in London-based bank accounts exceeded the combined savings in the banks of New York, Paris and Germany. By redeploying these savings overseas, Britain became the world’s biggest lender.

Stockbrokers like the Forsytes were able to build their own personal wealth by earning commissions on the investments they undertook on behalf of their clients. This meant that Britain’s upper classes – the traditional landed elites – now faced competition, not only from the industrialists of the north but also from ‘city-types’.

While being accepted in the most esteemed social circles was a struggle, it was easier for financiers than it was for industrialists, which meant that careful cultivation of social networks could bring social as well as economic dividends for families like the Forsytes.

As one etiquette guide noted, referring to the tradition of women being presented to royals at court: “The wives and daughters of merchants, or of men in business (excepting bankers), are not entitled to presentation.” In other words, those working in finance were special. While stockbroking families like the Forsytes had humble roots, they were on the way up.

Men like Soames Forsyte really did ‘own’ their wives – but rights were changing

In terms of their bodies, married women were considered the property of their husbands in late Victorian Britain.

This meant that women were expected to submit to the sexual desires of their husbands. In fact, only in the 1990s did rape within marriage come to be considered a crime under British law.

For most of the 19th century, married women also lacked any form of financial control – legally, husbands controlled not only their wives’ property and other assets, but also any wages she might have earned. Changing the law to give married women control over their own money became a central aim of Victorian feminism, successfully achieved in 1882 in the form of the Married Women’s Property Act.

By the close of the 19th century, women owned a quarter of stock market shares and a third of government bonds. While stockbrokers were much more likely to be men than women, their clients were increasingly women.

Working mothers were demonised, while ‘tradwives’ were celebrated

Despite a central role in the workforce during the Industrial Revolution, not only in cotton factories but also in coal mines, women’s opportunities for work narrowed over the course of the 19th century. They were left them with two main options: working as domestic servants or in the cloth industry, including as dressmakers.

Neither was particularly well paid and working hours were notoriously long. In The Forsytes, Louisa – Jolyon’s former love interest (played by Eleanor Tomlinson) – had done both types of work.

For young working-class women, paid work was – as it had been for centuries – the norm in Late Victorian Britain. But for married women it was a different story. The tradwife was just as much a trend then as it is today, which meant that women were increasingly expected to give up their job upon marriage to instead become the ‘angels in the house’. Housewives were considered virtuous, while working mothers were demonised as neglecting their children.

• Read more | From family to factory: women's lives during the Industrial Revolution

But while the Forstyes could afford for their womenfolk not to engage in paid work, most families were in a very different position.

Studying poverty in turn-of-the-century London, the contemporary social reformer Charles Booth found that the ‘male breadwinner’ model was only practical for (at most) thirty per cent of the population. In the average family, wives – and children – needed to earn money in order to pay the rent and avoid starvation. But given that women’s options were shrinking, many women had to resort to informal types of work in order to make ends meet, such as taking in laundry, housing lodgers, or selling hot buns on the side of the street (including in the Square Mile).

Women also performed unpaid labour within family businesses. In the case of the Forsyte women, that included the all-important social networking that lifted the family’s reputation – and with it, brought in new clients.

Scrutiny of parentage had significant social impact

The question of paternal parentage forms a central theme within The Forstyes. At the time, between four and five per cent of children were born out of wedlock and unmarried mothers faced serious social stigma, as did their children.

Given that women had less access to well-paid work than their male peers, supporting a family as a single mother would have been either impossible or exceptionally difficult.

• Watch now | Did Queen Victoria and John Brown have a SECRET child?

As a result, many women found themselves with no option other than to give up their children. Avoiding that typically required holding fathers to account – ensuring that they made a (sometimes secret) financial contribution to their child’s upbringing. Of course, most fathers failed to do so and, even when they did, their children were still at a clear social disadvantage compared with their ‘legitimate’ peers.

Big bottoms really were fashionable in late Victorian Britain

When it came to fashion, the crinoline – a device to hold voluminous hooped petticoats – was out, and the bustle – padding or wire at the back of a dress – was in.

Sitting wasn’t always easy with an exaggerated bottom, especially as bustles became bigger. But as usual, Victorian inventors had a solution for everything, which led to the development of the ‘New Phantom’ bustle (patented in 1884). This device collapsed in on itself as the wearer sat back in her chair and then popped back out as she stood up.

By the late 1880s, bustles were getting smaller rather than bigger, to the point that a small and simple pad, stuffed with horsehair, sufficed. In the 1890s, the ‘New Woman’ movement, which prioritised health and practicality, took the fashion world by storm, further simplifying the silhouette in what became known as ‘rational dress’.

But without the previous appendages, it was necessary to find some other way to protect a woman’s figure, and so skirts were made with heavier materials, sometimes supplemented with stiff petticoats. While fashion evolved dramatically during Queen Victoria’s reign, the object was still the same: maintaining a woman’s bodily modesty.

From regional divides and class tensions to tradwives and eye-popping fashion trends, it was in the Late Victorian period that today’s Britain was starting to emerge.

Dr Victoria Bateman is author of Economica: A Global History of Women, Wealth and Power and is historical consultant to The Forsytes

Series 1 of The Forsytes is available in the UK on Channel 5, and is soon to arrive on PBS Masterpiece in the USA