The fascinating and tragic story of J.T. Blight has captured the imagination of writers and artists over many years. Library member Patricia Wilson Smith has written the third instalment of a blog for us about how Blight‘s story has inspired her…
Continuing my research into John Blight’s life, in May I revisited the archives at The Morrab Library and Kresen Kernow. In the Morrab library are two small diaries crammed with tiny writing and drawings, in which John Blight documents his first months at the Cornwall County Asylum. His writing is neat, mostly easy to read, but sometimes requiring a magnifying glass. His early entries are lucid and full of observational details.
Between 19th and 28th September he is clearly confused at times, and struggles to keep focused, but his wandering thoughts are punctuated with clear and unambiguous reflections that he has been ‘betrayed’ by those he has formerly counted as his friends. It seems that others shared his view:
From the Visitors Committee Minutes held at Kresen Kernow, I learned that William Borlase represented those responsible for administering the funds for Blight’s early years at the asylum, and that in 1878 he advised the Asylum Visitors (trustees) that he no longer had sufficient funds. In 1882 he reported that he could no longer be held personally responsible, which lead to a public appeal. The writer John Michell quotes from the Earl of Mt. Edgcombe’s address to the Royal Institution, Cornwall in May 1883:
“I think you will pardon me for recalling to your memory one whose name will live in Cornwall in connection with works which you all know, but whose face will never be seen amongst us again. His descriptive power and artistic skill are things of the past, because, thought the hand still lives, the overwrought brain, powerless to guide it”
(from ‘A Short Life at the Lands End’, Michell, 1977)
A few days later, on 30 May, Cornish newspapers printed an appeal by William Bolitho for contributions to Blight’s ‘upkeep’ at the asylum. A Royal bounty of £200 was guaranteed if a further contribution of £300 could be raised in donations. ‘£100 can be relied on’, said Bolitho, ‘it remains to raise the further £200’.
Until that time his care had been provided by ‘friends who knew him in happier days’ and 2 grants of £100 and £50 from the Queens fund. The aim now was to guarantee an annuity of £50 per year, failing that Blight would be transferred to the paupers’ wing. The committee of the Penzance Public Library concluded they hadn’t the funds, but voted to support a public appeal. Money was finally raised to purchase an annuity of £43, and Blight was to all intents and purposes forgotten. In 1884 an announcement by his publisher, Parker, in Oxford, pronounced him dead.
©patricia wilson smith 2025
https://patriciawilsonartist.com/2025/04/14/john-thomas-blight-1835-1911/