Patrick Branwell Bronte was born on June 26th. 1817. He was part of England's greatest literary family together with his sisters Anne, Charlotte and Emily Jane. However that perhaps was to prove also his greatest misfortune. Although he was the first to be published as a poet in the 1840s he could make little headway after that whilst his sisters would produce some of the greatest works ever written in English. He sought solace as a tutor but after being fired for advances on the wife of his employer he descended into a drink fuelled decline. He was initially tempted by painting and his painting of his three sisters (with himself painted out) hangs in the National Gallery in London. He died on September 24th 1848.