Foot and horse racing in the Park--Prize fighting--Duelling--The
duel between Lord Mohun and the Duke of Hamilton.
Then, also, there were races run in the Park, both horse, coach and
foot. In Shirley’s _Hide Parke_ we read,--
L. BONAVENT. Be there any races here?
MR. LACY. Yes, Sir, horse and foot.
* * * * *
MISTRESS BON. Prethee, sweetheart, who runnes?
LA. An Irish and an English footeman!
M. BON. Will they runne this way?
LA. Just before you, I must have a bet!
[_Exit._
M. BON. Nay, nay, you shall not leave me.
MISTRESS CARROLL. Do it discreetely, I must speak to him,
To ease my heart. I shall burst else.
Weele expect ’em here, Cousen, do they runne naked?
M. BON. That were a most immodest sight.
M. CA. Here have bin such fellowes, Cousen.
M. BON. It would fright the women!
M. CA. Some are of opinion it brings us hither.
Harke what a confusion of tongues there is.
Let you and I venture a paire of Gloves
Upon their feete; I’le take the Irish.
M. BON. ’Tis done, but you shall pay if you lose.
M. CA. Here’s my hand, you shall have the Gloves if you winne.
M. BON. I thinke they are started.
_The Runners, after them the Gentlemen._
OMNES. A Teag, A Teag, make way for shame.
LA. I hold any man forty peeces yet.
VENTURE. A hundred pound to ten! a hundred peeces to ten!
Will no man take me?
M. BON. I hold you, Sir.
VEN. Well, you shall see. A Teag! a Teag! hey!
TRYER. Ha! Well run, Irish!
BON. He may be in a Bogge anon.
[_Exeunt._
The horse race is thus described.
_Enter Jockey and Gentleman._
I. What dost thinke, _Jockey_?
II. The crack o’ th’ field against you.
JO. Let them crack nuts.
I. What weighte?
II. I think he has the heeles.
III. Get but the start.
JO. However, if I get within his quarters, let me alone.
[_Exeunt._
_Confused noise of betting within, after that, a shoute._
M. CA. They are started.
_Enter Bonvile_, _Rider_, _Bonavent_, _Tryer_, _and Fairefield._
RI. Twenty pounds to fifteene.
L. BON. ’Tis done we’e.
FA. Forty pounds to thirty.
L. BON. Done, done, Ile take all oddes.
TR. My Lord, I hold as much.
L. BON. Not so.
TR. Forty pounds to twenty.
L. BON. Done, done.
M. BON. You ha’ lost all, my Lord, and it were a Million.
L. BON. In your imagination, who can helpe it?
LA. _Venture_ had the start, and keepes it.
L. BON. Gentlemen, you have a fine time to triumph,
’Tis not your oddes that makes you win.
_Within_--_Venture!_ _Venture!_
[_Exeunt Men._
JULIETTA. Shall we venture nothing o’ th’ horses?
What oddes against my Lord?
M. CA. Silke stockings.
JU. To a paire of perfum’d gloves, I take it.
M. CA. Done!
M. BON. And I as much.
JU. Done with you both!
M. CA. Ile have em Spanish sent.
JU. The stockings shall be scarlet, if you choose
Your sent, Ile choose my sent.
M. CA. ’Tis done, if _Venture_
Knew but my lay, it would halfe breake his necke now,
And crying _A Jockey!_ _hay!_
[_A shoute within._
JU. Is the wind in that coast, harke the noyse.
Is _Jockey_ now?
M. CA. ’Tis but a paire of gloves.
JU. Still it holds.
[_Enter My Lord._
How ha’ you sped, my Lord?
L. BON. Won, Won, I knew by instinct
The mare would put some tricke upon him.
M. BON. Then we ha’ lost; but, good my Lord, the circumstance.
L. BON. Great _John_ at all adventure and grave _Jockey_
Mounted their severall Mares, I sha’not tell
The story out for laughing, ha, ha, ha,
But this in briefe; _Jockey_ was left behind,
The pitty and the scorne of all the oddes,
Plaid ’bout my eares like Cannon, but lesse dangerous,
I looke all still: the acclamations was
For _Venture_, whose disdainful Mare threw durt
In my old _Jockey’s_ face, all hopes forsaking us,
Two hundred peeces desperate, and two thousand
Oathes sent after them: upon the suddaine,
When we expected no such tricke, we saw
My rider, that was domineering ripe,
Vault ore his Mare into a tender slough,
Where he was much beholding to one shoulder
For saving of his necke; his beast recovered,
And he, by this time, somewhat mortified,
Besides mortified, hath left the triumph
To his Olympick Adversary, who shall
Ride hither in full pompe on his _Bucephalus_,
With his victorious bagpipe.
These pedestrian races between “Running footmen” seem to have been
common in Hyde Park, as Pepys notes under date August 10, 1660. “With
Mr. Moore and Creed to Hyde Park by Coach, and saw a fine foot race
three times round the Park, between an Irishman and Crow, that was once
my Lord Claypole’s footman.” And for another instance of horse-racing in
the Park we can find one in the comedy of _The Mulberry Garden_, by Sir
Charles Sedley (1668), where, in Act I. Scene 2, Ned Estridge, speaking
of Sir John Everyoung, says, “’Tis a pleasant old fellow. He has given
me a hundred pounds for my _Graybeard_, and is to ride himself, this day
month, twice round the Park, against a bay stone horse of _Wildishe’s_,
for two hundred more.” Whilst for a different kind of race we have the
testimony of Evelyn, who says: “May 20th, 1658. I went to see a coach
race in Hide Park, and collationed in Spring Garden.” In _The Merry
Life and mad Exploits of Captain_ James Hind, _The great Robber of
England_, a noted highwayman _temp._ Charles II., is a story of “How
_Hind_ robbed a Gentleman in _Hide Park_ of a Bag of Money. _Hind_ being
well mounted, went one Evening into _Hide Park_, to see some Sport, and
riding by a Gentleman’s Coach, espied a Bag of Money, upon which _Hind_
used some Discourse about the Race that was going to be run; but the
Race beginning, the Gentleman caused his Coach to stand still, that he
might the easier judge which of the Horses run best. Hind’s head not
being idle, rode close to the Coach side, took the Bag of Money in his
hands, and rode away with it. The Gentleman presently missing his Bag of
Money, cries out, _Stay him, Stay him, I am robbed_. Many rode after
him, especially the Captain whom he robbed at _Chalk Hill_, who pursued
him very hard. _Hind_ riding by _St. James’s_, said to the Soldiers, _I
have won the Wager_; but holding of the Bag fast, his Cloak fell off,
which he left for them that came next. But when he came to his
companions, he said, _I never earned a hundred pounds so dear in all my
life_.”
Larwood says that foot-racing was carried on till early in the present
century, and gives instances down to 1807; the only one I am at all able
to verify was one run by two boys on 5th March, 1807--when one dropped
down dead--_but that race was run in St. James’s Park_.
In the somewhat brutal days of George III. (which brutality has
descended to our own times) the Park was disgraced by prize-fights, and
several duels were fought there, although the place was not so private
as Wimbledon Common, Putney, or Kensington Gravel Pits. One of the
favourite places in the Park for these encounters was near the
Cheesecake House, or Price’s Lodge, for it was there that the celebrated
duel between Lord Mohun and the Duke of Hamilton took place in 1712, and
it certainly retained its position till 1751, when Fielding wrote
_Amelia_, where Colonel Bath and Booth meeting in St. James’s Park, the
Colonel says, “‘I will tell you therefore, Sir, that you have acted like
a Scoundrel.’--‘If we were not in the Park,’ answered _Booth_ warmly, ‘I
would thank you very properly for that Compliment.’--‘O Sir!’ cries the
Colonel, ‘we can soon be in a convenient place.’ Upon which _Booth_
answered he would attend him wherever he pleased.--The Colonel then bid
him come along, and strutted forward directly up _Constitution Hill_ to
_Hyde Park_, _Booth_ following him at first, and afterwards walking
before him, till they came to that Place which may be properly called
the Field of Blood, being that part a little to the Left of the Ring,
which Heroes have chosen for the Scene of their Exit out of this World.”
Booth ran the Colonel through the body, without seriously injuring him,
and a reconciliation took place, ending, “‘I bleed a little, but I can
walk to the house by the water, (_the Cheesecake House_) and, if you
will send me a Chair thither, I shall be obliged to you.’”[25]
I propose to give an account of some authentic duels which have taken
place in Hyde Park, commencing with that of Lord Mohun and the Duke of
Hamilton, on November 15th, 1712, all the rest being taken from _The
Gentleman’s Magazine_.
[Illustration: DUEL BETWEEN LORD MOHUN AND THE DUKE OF HAMILTON.
Page 37.
]
This duel was invested with a political colouring, the Duke being the
leader of the Jacobite faction in Scotland, and Mohun being a violent
Whig; so that the Tories, enraged at Hamilton’s fall, did not scruple to
call it a Whig murder, and denounce Lord Mohun’s second, General
Macartney, as having unfairly stabbed him; but from the evidence taken
at the two inquests,[26] there is not a _scintilla_ of truth in the
statement.
The story of the duel is, briefly, this. The two noblemen were opposing
parties in a lawsuit; and, on Nov. 13, 1712, met in the chambers of a
Master in Chancery, when the Duke remarked of a witness--“There is no
truth or justice in him.” Lord Mohun replied, “I know Mr. Whitworth; he
is an honest Man, and has as much truth as your Grace.” This, fanned to
flame by officious friends, was enough; and, two days afterwards, they
fought, early in the morning, in Hyde Park, near Price’s Lodge; their
seconds, Col. Hamilton and General Macartney, also fighting, as was the
custom; or, as they expressed it, “taking their share in the dance.”
The duel is shortly described by a witness, “John Reynolds _of_ Price’s
_Lodge in the_ Park, Swore, That hearing of a Quarrel, he and one
_Nicholson_, got Staves and ran to part them: that he _Reynolds_ was
within 30 or 40 yards of Duke _Hamilton_ and my Lord _Mohun_ when they
fell. That my Lord _Mohun_ fell into the ditch upon his back, and Duke
_Hamilton_ fell near him, leaning over him. That the two seconds ran in
to them; and immediately after them this _John Reynolds_, who demanded
the Seconds’ Swords, which they gave him, without any Resistance. He
then wrested the Duke’s Sword out of his Hand, and _Nicholson_ took away
my Lord _Mohun’s_, and gave it to _Reynolds_, who carried the four
swords some distance from the parties: He return’d and help’d Duke
_Hamilton_ up, who still lay on his Face. He got him up, and he walk’d
about 30 Yards: they desir’d him to walk farther, and he said he could
walk no farther.”
By this witness, supported by two others, we see no mention of General
Macartney stabbing the Duke, as represented in the illustration, and as
it was currently reported at the time. Macartney fled; but Col. Hamilton
remained, stood his trial, and was found guilty of manslaughter. He
accused Macartney of the foul deed, and great was the hue and cry after
him. The Duchess was naturally enraged, and offered a reward of £300 for
his apprehension, the Government supplementing her offer by an
additional £500, but Macartney got away safely. When things were
quieter, he returned, stood his trial at the Queen’s Bench, Colonel
Hamilton’s testimony was contradicted, and he was acquitted of the
murder, but found guilty of manslaughter. The punishment for this, by
pleading benefit of Clergy, which, of course, was always done, was
reduced to a very minimum--something amounting to the supposed burning
of the hand with a barely warm, or cold iron--and he was restored to his
rank in the army, and had a regiment given him.
[Illustration: decorative bar]