Rafe Neville Leycester

26/04/1843 — 18/11/1883
A brief biography

Rafe Neville Leycester


Son of Edmund Mortimer Leycester and Harriet Susan Neville. .

Born in 1843, the sixth year of the reign of Queen Victoria, and died aged forty in the forty-sixth year of the reign of Queen Victoria

Crawling through Life


A sketch from Rafe's diary

We are fortunate that Rafe Leycester's diaries from 1859-1865, covering his life from the age of 16 to when he was 21, still survive, as it is a rich source of information for several Richardson-related families and shows how much the extended family networked together in Victorian times.

Although never specifying his ailment, Rafe indicates that he is lame and decides that this would seriously impede his chances of marriage, which appear to be self-fulfilling as he died a bachelor in 1883 aged only 40.

Rafe's Diary - with annotations and links to the Richardson and other families, is in the Richardson Collection by kind permission of the owner, Edward Fenton.

Later life

Unfortunately Rafe's diaries do not cover his later life, but we do know that he worked as a clerk in Somerset House in 1862 although he did not deign to mention it in his diary.

Also in 1862 his father inherited the estate of White Place in Cookham following the early death of his uncle Henry.

He was evidently an accomplished artist, as evidenced by his picture entitled "The bibliophile's desk" (also shown above) dated circa 1883, the year of his death, sold at Christie in 2004.


The Bibliophile's Desk

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