'Twas Ever Thus...

It seems that the strange pronunciations of certain names among the upper-crust was a mystery to the Victorians as well -- or perhaps this was an attempt to "educate" the rural bumpkins. 

 

PRONUNCIATION OF PROPER NAMES A London correspondent says: - Everybody knows that Cholmondeley is pronounced Chumley, St John Singin, and Marjoribanks Marchbanks. It is also widely known that the Duke of Rutland's place, spelt Belvoir, is pronounced Beever. But fewer people know that Lord Spencer's place, Althorpe, is known among the people who live there and visit it as Oltrop. Possibly, too, the good people who live at Abergavenny would stare if their town were called Abergenny, though that is the way his lordship of that ilk is alluded to. Beauchamp is Beecham; Saumarez is Summery, whilst by the way of compensation St.Maur is pronounced as if it were written Seymour.  The great peer known throughout Lancashire as Lord Derby answers in London to the name of Darby. Similarly Lord Hotham is known as Lord Huttham. The Earl of Berkeley is known as Lord Barkly, a similar pronunciation being used for the London square that bears his name. Lord Granville's brother has the advantage of a double-barrelled name, both constituents of which are arbitrarily pronounced. He is always Mr Lewson-Gore. I never heard anyone call the well known street in which one of the metropolitan stations is fixed anything but Gower street. The old family of Featherstonhaugh call themselves and are called Freestonhay, and the Urquharts are in Polite speech Urest. This list might be extended, but it is already long enough. One more, perhaps the oddest of the lot, the Dalziels pronounce their name as if it were composed of the letters D. L., and they manage so to run the letters together that the name becomes monosyllabic.   Berrow's Worcester Journal (Worcester, England), Saturday, June 13, 1885