EXCERPT - Ouida

And so into this little romantic and historical town the baby girl was born and named Maria Louise Ramé. She was spoiled by her cousins and much loved by the rest of the household. The little girl was unable to pronounce Louise and called herself “Ouida” which is the name she preferred all of her life. True to form, in later years, Ouida added the “de la” and added an “e” to her surname. 

I was always called Louisa, but all my infant tongue could make of it was Oo-e-da. I love my name; it is as the children say “my very own.” 

Her mother, Susan Sutton, was from a middle-class family and had a modest dowry which her husband, Louis Ramé, soon frittered away. Ouida’s parents were married on January 16, 1838; however, her father was somewhat of an enigma throughout her entire life. Having arrived suddenly in Bury one day, he began to teach mathematics and French, his native language, in different schools in town. But little is known about him. He would appear and disappear mysteriously without any warning. Even his poor wife knew nothing of his pursuits. Louis was middle-aged, much older than his wife, was short and ugly but had great magnetism, was highly intelligent, witty, droll, and continental with polished manners. It was a case of him being so ugly he was cute, and he set all of the local young ladies aflutter when he attended dinner and card parties. But why was he in Bury St. Edmunds? 

The gossips in town surmised that he was a spy; others claimed that he must be an illegitimate offspring of Napoleon. While attending soirées and dinner parties Louis Ramé dropped subtle hints that he was a friend of Louis Napoleon. Throughout all of this information there was still the uneasiness of his disappearances without any explanations, and there was no positive proof that he was French let alone of French noble descent. 

Although Ouida declared that she hated Bury St. Edmunds, during her girlhood she lived close to Hardwick House, the property of Sir Thomas G. Cullum. Some said she disliked Bury probably due to being criticized about her father who scandalized the people around them when he disappeared for months at a time. In fact, as an adult she would visit her relatives but never returned to live in Bury. 

She walked every day in the Hardwick House park and gardens with her father, when he was around. Although Ouida had declared her hatred for the backward town, she had a change of heart as she neared her death, she wrote longingly about her beloved Hardwick. In a letter from Bagni di Lucca in 1906, she said: 

Tell the trees, the flowers, the birds, I do not forget the beauty of their home. Would it have been better with me if I had stayed near them? Si jeunesse savait! But, alas! All that youth thinks of is to flee away into the sunrise light of what it believes to be the glory of the future. We are but unwise dreamers at our wisest.*

*This passage is taken from a letter presented to the Moyses Hall Museum, Bury St. Edmunds by Mr. Milner-Gibson-Cullum.

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