Charlotte came from Blewbury, where a branch of the Lousley family flourished according to the letters. A strong sense of family runs through all her letters.  She takes care to keep her son up to date on developments from both sides of the family, possibly even more detail on the Slades than Lousleys.

The letters resound with the endless worries that a mother has about her children, particularly her eldest son.  One letter begins with the admirable I was sorry to hear by your last letter that you had so many boils.  Time and again she reminds him, both indirectly and directly that he should find a wife and bring her back to England.  His sojourn amongst the fleshpots of Calcutta, however, does provoke some concerns.  Henry hints at a surprise in one of his letters and Charlotte jumps to the conclusion that he may have taken one of the fair sex.  Her mind runs on.  Will it be a blackee?  We shall be most happy to see her with you on your wedding excursion.  We can take her on Blewberton to have a little fresh air blew on her or walk her up Loughborough.  Twill blew some of the putrid scent from her.  She also reminds him constantly about the debts he trails behind him relating to various items sent out to Australia.  Needless to say, she advises him on keeping his underwear clean.  By the same token, she complains constantly about his not writing enough to her.  When he does write, he has, in the custom of the time, crossed the writing to such an extent that nobody can read them.  Endless successions of gentlemen borrow the letters to try their hand at decipherment.  She drops a series of hints to hear the exact nature of his business in Calcutta, but never really seems to get the full details she wants.  Her reading takes on a strong focus about stories from Australia and, latterly, India.  She allows herself to become worked up over stories recounting disasters that take place in Australia, worrying that Henry has drowned or died in some other way.

Charlotte had an enormously developed religious sense and was perhaps an Evangelical.  The letters contain many passages where she sends her son short sermons on the vicissitudes of life and the promise of a deserved afterlife.  She herself seems to have attended as many services as possible.

I see Herbert’s mother and little brothers at the Ranting meeting very often.  We still go on in the same way.  I go three times a week as usual and we have a good congregation on Sunday evenings and preaching once a fortnight on Monday evenings…... I continue to go to the Ranting prayer meeting on Sunday mornings and from there to the Meeting and to Church in the afternoon…. I attend our Ranting meeting as usual and no doubt but I was there on the Monday night you speak of.

Charlotte exhibits many characteristics of the Evangelical.  Notices of death, in particular, cause Charlotte to devote many lines to moralising and speculation.

Charlotte and Mrs Elizabeth Fuller clearly had a hot and cold relationship.  This unfolds from the letters.  We will cover the details of Mrs Fuller further elsewhere.  Here we need to remember that Mrs Fuller’s daughter, Anne, apparently was going to marry Henry Slade Junior, until Mrs Fuller wrote a letter that broke the engagement.  This apparently precipitated the voyage to Australia.  When shortly after he had left, Anne Fuller follows Deborah Slade, her best friend, in death through consumption, the combination of events seems to have unhinged Mrs Fuller.  Thereafter, Charlotte’s letters cover the mental health of her counterpart in Tirrold in some detail, possibly even with an edge to it, since, in effect, Mrs Fuller had taken her son to Australia.  Even Charlotte’s resilience takes a dent, when, early in 1845 she learns, from Mrs Fuller, that Henry will return and take her as his wife!  She shows remarkable restraint at all this and, perhaps comically, follows the paragraph discussing this unforeseen (and undesired) news with one where she expresses her concern about his lumbago.

Charlotte seems to have kept a sharp eye on the social niceties and the hierarchy of society.  We learn much about the Valpy family and their dynastic ambitions.  She keeps us appraised about the commercial rivalry between the two doctors practising in the villages.  In her own way she lends her support to one, Dr Workman, at the expense of the other, Dr Breach, as we shall see in more detail.  For our purposes here, we need only to observe that Dr Workman was none other than her son-in-law, and father of her only grandchild to date.  Charlotte takes care to befriend the people of quality in the village, for example Mrs Langford, and has very little to say about the masses who provided the workforce for her husband’s property.  Where she does refer to them, she does so with some vehemence.

Her daughter tells us in the first letter that Charlotte, having lost a tooth, now thought of herself as an old woman.  Sadly, she would die before reaching 60 only a few years after the letters, but not before Henry had returned.