Henry Chaplin A Memoir: 2 Family and Social Life Part II. Moving in the same social circle, and being mutually attracted, they had probably seen much of one another both in Scotland and in London, and by the time Mr. Chaplin's first letter to her which has been preserved was written—during the season of 1876— friendship on his part had evidently ripened into a warmer sentiment. The letter suggests a more sentimental epoch than ours, when a woman's interest in public affairs, however much it was appreciated, was to be treated rather with playful tenderness than to be taken seriously.

Dear Lady Florence (age 21) — Here is the pamphlet upon vivisection, that subject of such engrossing interest. I'm afraid you will find it very dry reading, unless you are really qualifying for the Leadership of the Women's Suffrage Party and their rights. I have only looked through it hurriedly, but there is nothing to shock you, and it will introduce you to a Parliamentary Bill, than which I cannot conceive anything in this world less amusing. Your entertainment to-night by comparison will be liveliness itself, but I hope it will turn out better than you anticipate. We were lucky, I think, to ride when we did. I wonder when I shall have the pleasure of seeing you again! I hope it may be before long, and till then—

Believe me, yours very truly,

[her future husband] Henry Chaplin (age 35).

Henry Chaplin A Memoir: 2 Family and Social Life Part II. To both these requests the lady seems to have demurred, for in his next letter he says: [[her future husband] Henry Chaplin 1st Viscount Chaplin (age 35) to Florence Sutherland Leveson-Gower (age 21)]

You dear One, I hope it isn't unlucky to cut your hair. I wouldn't have asked you if I had known it, but I cannot believe it, and Dot shakes his head when I ask him. You may send it to me with safety when you next write. Yes! and I still want you to weigh, and why should you hate it? If it wasn't that I know you are as light as a feather, I should really begin to think you were very heavy, but if the worst comes to the worst it will be only between you and me, and I'll promise faithfully never to divulge anything over 13 stone. There, darling, isn't that good, and you'll promise not to be angry with me for laughing a little?... All the people about Blankney and at Lincoln have got hold of our engagement, and they are all so delighted and send you all sorts of kind messages already, and whatever you say there is everything to love and to like in you even for outsiders, and if you don't win all their hearts very soon when they know you, I shan't ever give an opinion again.

Henry Chaplin A Memoir: 2 Family and Social Life Part II. HOMBURG, August 16. [[her future husband] Henry Chaplin 1st Viscount Chaplin (age 35) to Florence Sutherland Leveson-Gower (age 21)]

I sent you a line from Brussels, but, ugh! the journey from there, never shall I forget it. I've been in India and have travelled from Delhi to Calcutta without stopping, but I think yesterday beat it. It was 90° in the shade yesterday. What it was in the train I don't know, but I should think 190. Dot and Vic panted and puffed with their mouths wide open the whole of the way, though I got them water and ice at every station. And as for me—well, I simply melted and groaned whenever I could. And the dust, the black dust which it was. I declare it got regularly into the skin, and I arrived like one of the niggers who sing comic songs—the Christy Minstrels at Epsom. I've been washing ever since, and I can't get clean.... I was late at the waters, you'd hardly believe it! and every one was gone home. They have a fashion, these people who come to Homburg, of getting up in the middle of the night to drink their waters, some of them beginning between 6 and 7 A.M. I like mine to be aired by the morning sun and to take them between nine and 10.

Henry Chaplin A Memoir: 2 Family and Social Life Part II. His last letter to his bride a few days before their wedding has a pathetic interest in view of the few years of marriage which were before them.

[[her future husband] Henry Chaplin 1st Viscount Chaplin (age 35) to Florence Sutherland Leveson-Gower (age 21)]

October 11 [Note. A mistake for November 1876].— Ted (age 34) has gone to Lincoln to make a speech to his constituents to-night. His marriage is settled, and announced to Lady Gwendoline (age 18), and I've had a letter from Shrewsbury acquainting me with that fact. It may be some consolation and perhaps relief to you to know that they have a "Royal Party " at Ingestre and can't come to Trentham next week, but he sends every sort of kind message to you.... I am nervous, not about the ceremony! Now didn't you hope I was going to be? but about your rooms being done by the time they ought to be, but the paper you chose is up and they will look very nice, I feel sure. Darling little woman, do not fret or fidget about the awful ceremony. I often tell you that it has no effect of that sort upon me, and I will tell you why. Because I am as firmly convinced as I can be of anything that the step we are about to take with God's blessing will be, and ought to be, except through our own faults, for our mutual and enduring happiness both here and hereafter. Think of it in this light, and then the momentary passing agitation of a ceremony will not trouble you, and remember, child, that it is to you and your good influence that I look to help us in the cares, may be in the trials and temptations and, please God, the happiness which awaits us in the future.

After 08 Oct 1881. Monument to Florence Sutherland Leveson-Gower (deceased) commissioned by her husband [her former husband] Henry Chaplin 1st Viscount Chaplin (age 40), sculpted by Joseph Edgar Boehm (age 47). His memoir by his his daughter Edith ... "After her funeral at Blankney Mr. Chaplin returned a stricken man to Dunrobin. To the end of his life the memory of this radiant being, who for five years had given him perfect happiness, held the most sacred place in his memory—a place which was never to be usurped by another woman. He found some consolation in commissioning the beautiful kneeling marble figure of Lady Florence (deceased) by Sir Edgar Boehm (age 47), which he placed in the church of St. Oswald at Blankney — the church in which she had taken so deep an interest.

1883. Lych Gate at St Oswald's Church, Blankney. By George Frederick Bodley (age 55). Inscription over the gate: 'ERECTED IN MEMORY OF FLORENCE CHAPLIN, 1883'.