Simon Wingrave

Simon Wingrave

Portrayed by David Morrissey
Full Name	Simon William Wingrave
Title	Baron Comfield
Associated Noble House(s)	Barony of Comfield, Earldom of Morven
Date of Birth	August 19, 1768
Father	Hugh Wingrave
Father's Rank	Baron Comfield
Mother	Sarah Wingrave
Mother's Rank	Lady Comfield
Year Attained Title	1791
Year of Marriage	1792, 1800
Spouse	Cassandra Wingrave, Elizabeth Wingrave
Spouse's Rank	Lady Comfield
Spouse's Death	1795, 1807
Issue	Grace Wingrave (by Cassandra), Alexander Wingrave (by Eliza)

Simon Wingrave, Baron Comfield was born the only child of the previous Lord Comfield, Hugh, and his wife Sarah, Lady Comfield. He is the father of Alexander Wingrave (1803-1809) and Grace Wingrave (born 1795).

Simon was played by Meg.

Relationships

Family

Hugh Wingrave, father, 1732 – 1791
Sarah Wingrave, mother, 1749 – 1799
Cassandra Wingrave, nee Harcourt, first wife, 1773 – 1795, died age 22
--- Grace Wingrave, daughter, born 1795, age 16
Elizabeth Wingrave, nee Hackett, second wife, 1782 – 1807, died age 25
--- Alexander Wingrave, son, 1803 – 1809, died age 6

Ariadne Vickery, sister-in-law

George Hackett, brother-in-law
Augusta Harpole, sister-in-law

History

Simon enjoyed the most ordinary of childhoods, with no foreshadowing of the tragedies that would visit him later in life. His parents were fond of each other, if not deeply in love, and both cared very much for their son. He had no siblings, but, rather than being sequestered from society, was encouraged to play with other children his age in the area, even if they were not quite of his class. He attended school, where he did passably well, and university, where he behaved very badly but still managed some degree of success in his education. He traveled for a while, as was expected of him, but decided he preferred England to anything to be found abroad, and returned home to torment debutantes during the London season of 1791. He had only just managed to establish himself as a rake of the first order, though, when he was laid low by a pair of laughing gray eyes and a bright smile, found in Miss Cassandra Harcourt. He adored her, and she saw a hint of a man she could love under his bravado. They were engaged by June.

The banns had been read twice when Simon received a letter that his father was very ill and he must come home at once. It was the third such letter he had received in his life, and so, while he took it seriously, he tarried long enough to pay a call on his intended and tell her how very sorry he was he would not be able to share a few previously promised dances with her, but that he would be back in time for the wedding. He bid her a fond farewell and left for home, arriving not two hours after his father’s passing. Blaming himself for his failure to arrive in time, the new Baron Comfield wrote Cassandra to inform her that they must postpone the wedding until he was out of mourning.

They were married the following January, instead, and for a time all was well. They settled nicely into life as Lord and Lady Comfield, occasionally hosting parties either in London or the country, but often simply enjoying each other’s company, each falling more in love with the person they had chosen to marry. Their happiness became complete a few years later, when Cassandra was able to announce that she was pregnant. If anyone had doubted Simon’s devotion to his wife, one look at him throughout her pregnancy could have put those doubts immediately to rest. Cassandra went into labor on a bright autumn morning, and by the following dawn, Simon was both a father and a widower.

They lived quietly in the country for a number of years with the Dowager Baroness as the most prominent female presence in the house. Simon knew they could not go on so forever, but he was content to do so as long as he might. Shortly after Grace’s fifth birthday, though, his mother fell ill. Simon, unwilling to risk that he would be away for his mother’s passing as he was for his father’s, sat by her bed night and day, giving the two more time to talk than they had ever had before. Among their conversations, she exhorted him to find another wife, someone who might be a mother to Grace and bear a son to inherit his title and land. The promise was made, and later that day she fell into a sleep from which she never woke.

The following spring, Simon hesitantly entrusted his daughter to a governess, with strict instructions that he was to hear from them every day, and followed the crowd to London. He had found a bride there once before, after all, and no one in the circles of his country society seemed quite right. He soon met the young lady who would become his second wife - she was in only her first season, but was anxious to be married. This, along with her accomplishments, sweet manner, and poise, was enough to recommend her to him, and when he chanced upon her in the park and saw her with a friend and that friend’s young child, he could see the mother she would become. And so Lady Elizabeth Hackett became the new Lady Comfield.

Neither he nor his new bride had any expectation of falling in love, though the newlyweds were content, and both doted upon young Grace. Before long, Elizabeth had even given birth to a son they named Alexander, and Simon began to see how this might be - well, not better than the all-encompassing love he had shared with Cassandra, but at least a very worthy alternative.

When her son was four, though, Elizabeth became pregnant again, and this time it was much harder for her. Five months along, she went into labor, but it was far too early. In the end, neither she nor the child survived. Simon was sad to lose his young wife, for he had grown to care for her, but he was not devastated as he had been several years before. The same could not be said for his children, who had both lost their mother - even if she had only given birth to one of them. The small family grew ever more reliant on one another, the children panicking at the mere thought of their father leaving for as long as a night. They remained active in their local, limited society, but Simon had no interest in returning to London or remarrying - unfortunate as it was for Grace to have no better female example than her governess, he had an heir and had no need or desire to take a third bride.

Until, of course, a final and greatest tragedy struck. Alexander had been learning to ride for all of three months when his pony was spooked by something and the boy was thrown, his head striking against a rock. He was dead before anyone even realized he was on the ground.

Simon spent the two following years sequestered in the country, seeing almost no one apart from his staff and his daughter. He has realized, though, that the death of his son leaves him exactly where he was when his mother died - heirless, with a motherless daughter, and Grace must come out into society next year. And so he has returned to London for the first time since before Elizabeth’s death, resigned to taking a bride once more, and fulfilling again the promise he made to his mother.

Personality

No one meeting young Mr. Wingrave would have thought him a very serious type, but Baron Comfield has been visited by more tragedy than he cares to remember, and each loss wore away at him like flowing water on a stone - slowly, imperceptibly, and yet consistently, until a carefree young man was eroded into a widower twice over. He has buried both parents, two wives, and a child. A superstitious person might believe him cursed, but he shuns such absurdities - though the thought has crossed his mind more than once after a drink or two too many. He is a man no longer given to taking things lightly, and considers each of his actions carefully. Recklessness has no hold on him. Even in his younger days, when he aspired to be a perfect rake, it was more an act than a reflection of his true self.

This is not to say that he is a complete stranger to levity. While he has been visited by great sadness, and is serious more often than not, he can enjoy polite society and make interesting - sometimes even amusing! - conversation. Still, he is more likely to laugh at another’s jest than to make one himself, and any jest he does make is more likely to be at his own expense than any other’s. His manners, however, are faultless. Indeed, it is sometimes easier for him to say what is proscribed by the rules of polite society than it is to speak candidly. Privately, he is not inclined towards wallowing in sorrow or self-pity, though he does prefer solitude. He enjoys music and sings in a pleasant baritone, reads philosophy and literature as much as any man, and takes a deep interest in politics; he simply struggles to be at all himself in front of a room full of those he does not know well.

Simon is, most importantly, a father. He cares more about his family than anything else; when Cassandra was pregnant he was the most solicitous and attentive of expectant fathers, to the extent that his own mother was forced on more than one occasion to throw him out of the house for a day. His child - for a time his children - is the most important thing in the world to him, and damn whatever anyone says about priorities. Another man might have blamed his newborn daughter for the loss of a beloved wife, might have held her at arm’s length. Simon did not, instead treasuring Grace as the only remnant of Cassandra. When Elizabeth accepted his proposal, he thanked her, bid her farewell, and returned to his daughter in the country, telling his intended he would see her for their nuptials. Alexander, while he lived, was of course his heir, but was also treasured for himself. The loss of him nearly broke Simon, and it was only his duty to his daughter that kept him going.

He is very aware of his duty to his title as well as his daughter, and it is only the combination of the two that could persuade him to return to London. As to the former, he knows he requires an heir. He has no interest in having his father’s title pass to some distant cousin who may not respect it, or in separating it from the house, fortune, and history that sustain it. The only way to prevent all such outcomes is to have a son. As for the latter, he would gladly keep Grace with him all his days if he could, but she will need a protector when he is gone, and so he would have her make an excellent match - not just yet, as she is only 16, but soon. In order for that to happen, of course, she will need a proper introduction to society, something he is unable to provide. A wife will thus neatly solve his two most pressing problems.