Early life and educationWordsworth was born in Cumberland, part of the picturesque region in north-west England called the Lake District. His sister was the poet and diarist Dorothy Wordsworth. With his mother's death in 1778, his father sent him to Hawkshead Grammar School. In 1783 his father, who was a barrister and solicitor to the Earl of Lonsdale (a much despised man in the area), died. The estate consisted of around £4500[citation needed], mostly in claims against the Earl, who fought these claims until his death in 1802. The Earl's successor, however, settled the claims with interest. After their father's death, the Wordsworth children were left in the care of their uncles. Although many aspects of his childhood were positive, he recalled periods of loneliness and anxiety. It took him many years, and much writing, to recover from the death of his parents and the separation from his siblings. Wordsworth began attending St John's College, Cambridge in 1787. Three years later, in 1790, he visited revolutionary France and supported the Republican movement. The following year he graduated from Cambridge without distinction. Relationship with Annette Vallon In November 1791, Wordsworth came to France and made a walking tour of Europe that included the Alps and Italy. He fell in love with a French woman, Annette Vallon, who in 1792 gave birth to their daughter, Caroline..