Reading the Regency

Mourning - The Time of Mourning

"...black is so becoming to that sort of complexion, no doubt this is the reason Miss Stanley wears it so much longer than is customary for an uncle. Short or long mournings are, to be sure, just according to fashion, or feeling, as some say. For my part, I hate long mournings—so like ostentation of sentiment; whatever I did, at any rate I would be consistent. I never would dance in black."
[Chapter 22, Helen, by Maria Edgeworth]

The period of time someone would be expected to wear the various degrees of mourning was not set in stone. It depended very much on the relationship between the deceased and the mourner, and whether their grief was genuine or not.

In the case of a family member, the expected period of mourning was often decided by the family matriarch; either the oldest female, or sometimes the wife of the head of the family. If the deceased was someone she didn't like, then the expected mourning period might be shorter than for someone she loved or respected.

"Old Edgeworth, the fourth or fifth Mrs. Edgeworth, and the Miss Edgeworth were in London, 1813. Miss Edgeworth liked, Mrs. Edgeworth not disliked, old Edgeworth a bore, the worst of bores—a boisterous Bore. I met them in Society—once at a breakfast of Sir H. D.'s. Old Edgeworth came in late, boasting that he had given 'Dr. Parr a dressing the night before' (no such easy matter by the way). I thought her pleasant. They all abused Anna Seward's memory. When on the road they heard of her brother's—and his son's—death. What was to be done? Their London apparel was all ordered and made! so they sunk his death for the six weeks of their sojourn, and went into mourning on their way back to Ireland. Fact!"
[Detached Thoughts, journal 61 & 62, by Lord Byron, 1821-1822]

The above passage suggests that in certain circumstances, especially if a family was away from home and not surrounded by friends, it was possible to put off the mourning briefly to a more convenient moment.

I haven't yet found any specific recommendations, published between 1790 and 1820, for how long people were supposed to mourn. I suspect information like this would have been passed down verbally, among the family, rather than being printed in books or magazines. Only during the Victorian era did etiquette books begin to record specific details regarding mourning, and even then there was no general agreement on the length of mournings.

Mourning in Regency England may have had as much in common with the French way of mourning lost relatives from the mid to late 18th century as during the latter 19th century.

I've taken these timings from the three closest dated sources I've been able to locate. The first article, published in Walker's Hibernian Magazine of 1786, sets down the mourning periods of the French aristocracy, which they suggested would have been familiar to the English aristocracy of that time. The second source is called "The Gentleman and Lady's Book of Politeness and Propriety of Deportment", originally written in French by Élisabeth Celnart but translated into English in 1833. The third comes from a book called "The Workwoman's Guide", written by a Lady and published in 1838 in London.

Death of a husband

"After the proper season for the first mourning had elapsed, my mother resumed the progress of her contrivance, and at length directly proposed to me that I should receive the addresses of the Count."
[Second Sight, La Belle Assemblee, vol. 6, pub. 1809]

Mourning Period 1789: A year and six weeks. Four and a half months in first mourning, four and a half months in second mourning, three months in third mourning and six weeks in half-mourning.

Mourning Period 1833: A year and six weeks. Three months in first mourning, six months in second mourning, Three months in third mourning, and the last six weeks "in white only".