Anonymous wrote:What's an aristocrat versus upper class?

The British upper class was primarily comprised of the peerage and the gentry. The peerage is the titled nobility--the dukes and earls and so forth. The gentry referred to the landed gentry, families who owned country estates, often tenanted farms, and therefore did not have to work (other than the work involved in managing their estates). Many of the gentry came from very old, established, and respected families, and were sometimes wealthier than peers. Some had coats of arms. The two groups were closely connected--the families were often related. Gentry might have minor titles (baronet, knight, etc.) and the two groups often received similar educations, intermarried, and their non-eldest sons (who would not inherit) often pursued the same careers--the officer corps of the military, clergy, state service (as a Member of Parliament or a high-ranking position in the civil service), or the law.

In a larger sense, a "gentleman" was someone who did not have to work for a living.

Professionals and businessmen who became very wealthy could often mix socially with the upper classes, and would often try to buy a landed estate or seek a minor title (such as a knighthood or baronetcy) for the social prestige. They also sometimes married into the upper class, or married their children into the upper class.

One poster used Mr. Darcy from Pride and Prejudice as an example of the non-aristocratic upper class, and he's a great example. He inherits a landed estate, he does not have to work for a living, and he is related to the aristocracy (his mother was an earl's daughter). Elizabeth also comes from the gentry--her father inherited their estate and money, and does not work for a living, either. He married into the middle class, however--Mrs. Bennet's family was "in trade," her brother is in trade, and her brother-in-law is an attorney. Interestingly, Mr. Bingley is *not* from the landed gentry--he has inherited a lot of money from his father, who earned it "in trade," but does not own an estate. At the beginning of the novel, Bingley rents an estate. At the end of the novel, he buys one. So the Bingley sisters' snobbery about Jane's social status is pretty clearly based on anxiety because they are not feeling secure in their social position--Jane's mother was middle class, but so was Mr. Bingley, senior. They want their brother to marry someone of higher rank to cement the family's social climb.

Anonymous wrote:What's an aristocrat versus upper class?

In Holmes' day?

The aristocracy was a subcomponent of the upper classes and the most prestigious component. They were the titled upper classes, people who had hereditary titles and their families. The earls, lords, dukes and marquesses and the baronets.

The upper classes was a bigger group that included the aristocracy, plus the landed gentry, and the very rich families in trade. They overlapped and intermarried. Within this group there were gradations. The gentry, for example, could be divided into upper, middle and lower gentry. Mr. Darcy from Pride and Prejudice was of the upper gentry, he is effectively a non-titled aristocrat in that he had a large estate, a fortune, an illustrious family and family connections to the titled aristocracy, so he would be accepted by them as one of theirs. He'd actually be richer than may titled lords. The Bennets, on the other hand, were further down the gentry ranks and distant from the aristocracy in their eyes and that level of the gentry rarely intermarried with the aristocracy (Holmes likely would be from a gentry origin comparable to the Bennets).

Towards the end of the 19th century the rise of the industrial wealth changed the parameters somewhat as it added a new dimension to the upper classes.

In those days the pecking order among the aristocracy and gentry and other parts of the upper classes was clear cut. These days it's far less so.

Anonymous wrote:What's an aristocrat versus upper class?

You mean then or now? It's hard to delineate IMHO.

Then - there wasn't much daylight between aristocracy (inherited wealth, almost always landed) and upper classes. There were some upper classes a generation or two removed from trade (e.g., Charles Bingley from Pride and Prejudice).

Now - aristocracy is generational wealth mostly from estates, including the nobility. Upper classes can now include self-made (e.g. Richard Branson) or post-industrial wealth.

What's an aristocrat versus upper class?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Did he not have the money to live in particularly high style or did he, being Sherlock, think the whole thing preposterous and choose to live as he did/does?

In the first story, "A Study in Scarlet," Holmes needs someone to split the rent on a set of rooms (two bedrooms and a sitting room) in a house run by a landlady. That suggests that he has limited means. Eventually, he makes enough money from his consulting detective business that he could probably afford better lodgings, but probably doesn't feel like it's worth it to move.

Ah, just think--had Holmes not had to fund his drug habit he might not have needed a roommate, and we'd have been deprived of Watson--and deprived of Watson's accounts of Holmes's cases....

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you really must know then the answer is upper middle class with ancestry in the minor gentry. Much of the professional upper middle classes (barristers, clergy, army officers, senior civil service, certain types of doctors) were effectively younger sons and grandsons of the gentry. They carried themselves similarly as the gentry did, they attended the same schools, went to Oxford or Cambridge, held the same values, belonged to the same clubs, had the ancestry, but were a bit of a notch down due to not being landowners themselves. They, as a group, were somewhat different from the other half of the upper middle classes whose incomes came from trade and manufacturing.

His brother, Mycroft, is a very senior government civil service official. Another typical role for this group.

It was also normal for many of this class to live off of private incomes, the interest of capital invested in the markets. Being a gentleman of leisure was desirable. Or private incomes supplemented what incomes they earned if worked.

John Watson was more middle class than Holmes because he did not have wealth nor gentry ancestry but by American standards he'd have also be upper middle class.

I don't think that we get much information about Watson's ancestry. It's established that his father and older brother are dead, and the scene where Holmes analyzes his watch reveals that Watson's father started out with "good prospects" (meaning money and probably education), but squandered them (he was apparently an alcoholic). Watson appears to be pretty solidly MC by the standards of the time, but from a family that has come down in the world--hence the practical education and enlistment in the Army. Holmes is a step above, since he comes from the landed gentry, received a gentleman's education, and appears to have at least some private income (if not enough to allow him to live in particularly high style).

The biggest clues to his origins are that he was an army surgeon, which was a solidly middle class occupation, it was not a fashionable occupation. The other big clue is that he never mentions any sort of gentry or impressive heritage. It all suggests a family with roots in trade or maybe even farming stock. A moderately successful shopkeeper as a grandfather who was able to send his son to a good school, and who in turn studied medicine or was a solicitor or a senior clerk, and in turn gave his son (John) an education and medical training. The respectable middle classes.

Class in Britain was based in things other than your monetary position. No matter how poor Holmes might have been at points in his life he would always been seen as part of the upper middle classes. Same with Watson with the middle classes, no matter how much money he might later have.