While attending Cowan Bridge as a young child, both of Charlotte's older sisters passed away from tuberculosis, the same disease that killed her mother just three years earlier. (Bloom, 61) This left Charlotte as the eldest Bronte sibling without a mother causing a lot of the maternal responsibilities to fall to her. In "Jane Eyre" while at Lowood, Helen Burns becomes a good friend and even a mother type figure to Jane even though they are close to the same age. Helen's death left Jane; much like Charlotte's sister's deaths left Charlotte, many more responsibilities with no mothering figure to lean on. This example shows that in all aspects of the Bronte sister's writings there are influences from their actual lives. .
One Byronic characteristic Rochester, Heathcliff and Branwell share is their love for a woman they can't have. Douglas A. Martin explains in his book "Branwell" that after his art career slowly failed, his youngest sister Anne was able to get Branwell a job with a wealthy family named the Robinsons. Branwell was fired from his position within just a few months for having an affair with Mrs. Robinson. Several years later, Mr. Robinson would pass away and Branwell began courting his newly widowed love again. He assumed that after a short courtship, Mrs. Robinson would agree to marry him and they would live happily ever after. Instead, Mrs. Robinson denied his proposal and Branwell's life quickly declined into alcoholism and an opiate addiction leading to his death at 31. The obvious comparison between Branwell and Heathcliff can be seen here. Both men were doomed to die without the love they so desired. Heathcliff refusing food and slowly dying while Branwell wasted himself away numbing his pain with drugs and alcohol. Although Rochester's forbidden love doesn't end in death he is completely helpless when Jane flees Thornwood because of his secret marriage to Bertha.
