Expedition to surprise Rochfort--Officers employed--The Fleet
off the Isle of Oleron--Council of War--Difficulties of the
Enterprise--Conway proposes an Attack on Fouras--Failure of the
Expedition--Affairs in the East Indies--Victory of the Prussians
over the Russians--Convention of Closter Seven--The King disavows
it--The Duke of Cumberland’s return--His reception at Court,
and subsequent conduct--Resigns all his Employments--Affairs
of Ireland--State of Parties--Inquiry into the Miscarriages
at Rochfort--Court-Martial--Lord Mansfield becomes a Cabinet
Minister--Victories of the King of Prussia--Sir John Ligonier
made a Field-Marshal and a Viscount--Death of Princess Caroline.
The measure was settled in July; but it was the 8th of September
before the Fleet sailed. The French, though they did not learn the
specific spot of destination, had ample time for preparation; and
having a chain of garrisons along the coast, and being never totally
destitute of supernumerary troops, hoped to be able to draw together
a sufficient body wherever the storm should fall. As the event
occasioned much discourse, I shall be excusable for detailing it; yet
I shall do it with brevity; and, as much proceeded from the personal
characters of the commanders, I shall describe them shortly, and
with the more satisfaction, as their faults flowed from no want of
courage; on the contrary, they possessed amongst them most of the
various shades of that qualification. Mordaunt, as I have said, had
a sort of alacrity in daring, but from ill health was grown more
indifferent to it. He affected not Mr. Pitt, and from not loving the
projector, was more careless than he should have been of the success
of the project, presuming, unfortunately for himself, that if it
should appear impracticable, the original mover would bear the blame.
Conway, secure of his own intrepidity, and of no ostentation, could
not help foreseeing that from the superiority of his talents to
those of Mordaunt, the good conduct of the expedition would be
expected from him. The more answerable he thought himself, the more
he guarded against objections. Cold in his deportment, and with a
dignity of soul that kept him too much above familiarity, he missed
that affection from his brother officers, which his unsullied
virtues and humanity deserved; for he wanted the extrinsic of merit.
Added to these little failings, he had a natural indecision in his
temper, weighing with too much minuteness and too much fluctuation
whatever depended on his own judgment. Cornwallis was a man of a
very different complexion: as cool as Conway, and as brave, he was
indifferent to everything but to being in the right. He held fame
cheap, and smiled at reproach. General Howard was one of those
sort of characters who are only to be distinguished by having no
peculiarity of character. Under these was Wolfe, a young officer who
had contracted reputation from his intelligence of discipline, and
from the perfection to which he had brought his own regiment. The
world could not expect more from him than he thought himself capable
of performing. He looked on danger as the favourable moment that
would call forth his talents.
Sir Edward Hawke commanded the fleet--a man of steady courage, of
fair appearance, and who even did not want a plausible kind of sense;
but he was really weak, and childishly abandoned to the guidance of
a Scotch secretary. The next was Knowles, a vain man, of more parade
than real bravery. Howe, brother of the Lord of that name, was the
third on the naval list. He was undaunted as a rock, and as silent;
the characteristics of his whole race. He and Wolfe soon contracted
a friendship like the union of a cannon and gunpowder.
September 20th.--The Fleet appeared off the isle of Oleron; but it
was the 23rd before they got in. Knowles, the Vice-Admiral, with his
division, was ordered to attack the little isle of Aix. Howe, who led
this detachment, sailed up with a steady magnanimity without firing
till within pistol-shot of the fort. Greaves followed, and Keppel
pressed forward to get in between them: Knowles kept a little more
distant. Howe began a dreadful fire, and in less than two hours the
garrison surrendered. Conway pressed them to proceed immediately on
some further enterprise, and proposed directly to go and consult Sir
Edward Hawke, who lay more out at sea. Knowles replied, that he was
so fatigued that he could not go till next morning; when he reposed
himself till ten. When Conway got him to Sir Edward Hawke’s ship,
they found Sir Edward had sent Broderick with their only pilot to
see where they could land--and these men did not return till noon.
Mordaunt appeared incapable of forming any opinion, and said he was
ready to take any officer’s advice.
In this dilemma they called a Council of War. In their deliberation,
it appeared that Clarke, and Thierri, a French Pilot, had not seen
Rochfort in three years and half: it was longer since the latter was
there: that the nature of the road of Basques, the country, the state
of the troops and garrison, were entirely unknown to them: that the
expedition had been projected on the sole footing of a surprise, a
view now entirely vanished, for our troops had lain near two months
in the Isle of Wight, and many letters and neutral vessels had been
intercepted, which spoke the alarm spread along the coast: that no
man of war could lie within two miles of the landing to assist that
or secure a retreat; and that if the wind came to the west, as was
usual at that season, all communication with the Fleet would be cut
off; a point recommended to them to guard against by the express
instructions of Marshal Ligonier: that there were sand-hills on the
shore equivalent to an entrenchment, from behind which a small body
of men might prevent a descent of 2000 men, the most the boats could
contain at a time; and that even more troops than were sufficient
for that purpose had been seen by the captains who went to sound and
reconnoitre the coast: and what was even more discouraging than all
these impediments, the chief engineer declared that they had not
brought artillery sufficient for a regular attack.
As to Rochfort, many difficulties were foreseen from the state of the
place; and considering how long the fleet had lain off the coast,
it was highly probable that not only the approach was guarded in a
manner to have our troops cut to pieces, as they must have landed in
small divisions; but that a strong garrison must have been thrown
into the place, if not provided with one before. Bonville, a French
volunteer, declared there were sluices with which they could flow
the place all round; and he and the pilot of the Neptune had seen
the ditch full of water. The dock-men were numerous, and five ships
lay in the river, whose crews amounted to near 3000 men; besides the
Militia of the country. We should have been two days marching to the
place, and could have carried up to it but 7400 men. The nights were
as light as day; and a letter found in a Priest’s house at Aix, dated
from Rochfort on the 18th, spoke expressly of the precautions the
Governor had taken.
No reasonable man could hope to surmount all these difficulties.
Those, who had carried the same opinion from home with them, were not
likely to find the objections weaker when mustered together on the
spot. Both land and sea concurred in voting the surprisal of Rochfort
impracticable, and then would have returned to England; but Conway,
who the evening before had proposed to make themselves masters of
Fouras, a little fort on the shore, where, when once established,
they might examine what further damage could be done to the enemy,
persuaded the Council that it was necessary to do something before
they retired. To that they all agreed except Cornwallis, who had seen
no attainable object, or none worth attaining, from the beginning to
the end of the plan. Yet, that he might not stand single in a vote
for retreating, he was induced to acquiesce:--however, Sir Edward
Hawke’s secretary, who took the minutes of the deliberation, inserted
Cornwallis’s real opinion into their votes, and without reading them
to the Council, sent them to the English Admiralty, by whom they
were shown to the King; and what Cornwallis’s associates had advised
him to depart from, lest it might turn to his prejudice, was, after
their return, construed into the only sensible opinion.
Conway renewed his proposal of an attack on Fouras, as, when once
entrenched there, they might with more preparation march to Rochfort;
or at least from thence hope to burn the five ships and the magazines
on the Charente. Nobody approved the scheme. In these discussions
three or four days were wasted. Conway perpetually pressed for some
action--at last Mordaunt said carelessly, “Ay, let us go stretch
our legs on the Isle of Oleron.” Conway said, a feigned diversion
towards the Isle of Rhée would be more advisable; it would draw the
French troops, who by this time must be alarmed, to that side; and
then some surprise might be practicable. To this the rest would not
agree. Conway then offered to make a real attack on the Isle of
Oleron: they disputed on it till two in the morning; and though the
first proposal had come from the others, he could not obtain their
acquiescence. They wasted time even in dining; Sir Edward Hawke’s
table lasted till late in the evening. Conway’s[10] importunity at
last prevailed for an attack on Fouras; and all the Generals, to
show that want of spirit had not operated in their Councils, resolved
to be present. The first division embarked, but being moonlight, and
the nights clear, and the wind turning against them, Howe himself
told them it was not safe at that time; and Wolfe pronounced it
would be bloody work. They were ordered back from their boats. Yet
Conway persisting for an attempt on Fouras, Mordaunt offered to
undertake it, if Conway would take the advice solely on himself.
Conway, eager for the danger, was averse to being the author of
it. Mordaunt then artfully desired him to relinquish proposing it.
Neither to that would he yield. Mordaunt solicited him with strange
earnestness, either to abandon the project, or to undertake it as his
own; Mordaunt offering to share the danger of the execution, not
of the opinion. Conway at last said, if Mordaunt would call Wolfe
and any other man, and they would advise him to advise the attack
he would; or if they advised him to desist from proposing it, he
would; but either Mordaunt declined--in truth, it was a contest to be
pitied rather than blamed: both saw the rashness of the project, to
which they were willing to sacrifice themselves and their soldiers.
Mordaunt, from esteem of Conway’s abilities, hoped to be excused if
he executed what the latter advised--and the latter was too happy
in not being commanding officer, to take that charge upon himself
in a hopeless bravado. Conway then proposed to submit to the same
alternative from the opinions of Cornwallis and Howard; to which
the General acquiesced; and they, as he foresaw, concurring with
him, Conway submitted, but desired they would observe, he acquiesced
against his opinion--and it was determined to return, Sir Edward
Hawke having often pressed the Generals to come to some resolution,
the bad season approaching so near that he could not venture to keep
the great ships much longer at sea. Wolfe and Howe had borne the
dilatoriness of the chief commanders with indignation; yet seeing the
minute lost, made no objection to a retreat; and the Fleet arrived at
Portsmouth October 3rd--in the meantime, many important events had
happened.
In the East Indies, the fleet under Admiral Watson retrieved the
damages inflicted on our settlements by a new Nabob, of which we
had received notice in the preceding June. That Viceroy had seized
Cossimbuzar and Calcutta; the cruelties exercised on the factory in
the latter place, where 170 persons were crammed into a dungeon, and
stifled in the most shocking torments of heat, will not bear to be
described to a good-natured reader. Watson was seconded by Captain
Clive, one of those extraordinary men, whose great soul broke out
under all the disadvantages of an ugly and contemptible person.
In the north of Germany, affairs had taken a favourable turn for the
King of Prussia. Lehwald, one of his Generals, defeated a mighty
army of Russians, who, in the most barbarian style, were pouring
into Prussia. The Germans, whatever they pretended, were not cheaply
conquerors. But the consequences of the battle were decisive; the
Muscovites disappeared from the campaign for the rest of the summer.
The Duke of Cumberland, after the battle of Hastenbecke, had retired
with his army towards Stade, and was followed by the French. The
Duchies of Bremen and Verden were at the eve of falling into their
hands, and the King expected that they would be given back to Sweden.
The Hanoverian Ministry did not doubt but the Duke’s high spirit
would venture the Army being cut to pieces rather than surrender them
prisoners, and they complained of the scanty assistance afforded
by England. Lady Yarmouth even said to Lord Hertford, “_Que peut
on faire, my Lord! le Ministere Anglois ne nous a voulu donner que
quelque tonneaux de farine_.” The truth was, the King, to avoid
expense, had neglected to raise the Militia of Hanover, though
they had implored it, and might have given a decisive turn to the
battle in his favour. Both the Sovereign and his German Council were
determined at all events to save the Duchies and the troops, and
the most positive orders were dispatched to the Duke in consequence
of those resolutions. Yet, not trusting to what conditions his
son, however obedient, might obtain, his Majesty prevailed on his
son-in-law, the King of Denmark, to interpose his good offices,
and accordingly, on the 7th of September, Count Lynar, Governor of
Oldenburg, arrived in the Duke’s camp as mediator, and a passport
being demanded for him from Marshal Richelieu, the latter sent it
with an escort of a hundred horse, and by the next day a convention
was obtained and signed, by which Stade and the district round it was
left to the Hanoverians, with permission to the rest of those troops
to repass the Elbe, observing a strict neutrality. The troops of
Hesse, Brunswick, Saxe-Gotha, &c., in the King’s pay, were to retire
to their several countries.
When the news of this suspension of arms arrived at Kensington, it
occasioned the greatest surprise, the greatest clamour--for even the
Monarch acted surprise! The Foreign Ministers acquainted those of
England that it was concluded, or certainly would be. The English
with great truth disavowed all knowledge, and protested entire
disbelief of it. They not only had not been entrusted with the
secret, but saw their master affect equal indignation, and encouraged
by that dissimulation, ventured to insist on his permitting them to
write to foreign Courts that he disavowed the transaction. Even this
he granted. He went further: he told Dabreu, the Spanish Minister,
that he would show him the rough draft of a letter which he had
prepared to send to his son, with a positive command to fight. It was
true, he had written such a letter; it is no less true that he never
sent it.
As the Dictator of the Convention disavowed it, as the father
disclaimed the son, it was natural for those who suffered by the
act, and for those who hated the actor, to break out against both.
The King of Prussia said we had undone him, without mending our own
situation. The Princess of Wales, Lord Hardwicke, and Legge threw the
strongest reflections on the Duke; the last, indeed, with appearance
of reason, being extremely hampered, as Chancellor of the Exchequer,
by this transaction. How should he be able, he said, next winter
to propose the Hessian troops, whose hands were now tied up from
assisting us? or must he wave the subsidy to them, when they were
starving in our cause? The others went further; they called his Royal
Highness’s Generalship in question; he was brave indeed, but that was
all; he had wasted a good Army; had beaten the French, and did not
know it.
But the most indecent in personal invectives was Baron Munchausen,
the Hanoverian Minister in England--a man reckoned one of their
ablest heads, and who had hitherto always comported himself with
civility and inoffensively. He went so far as to call for a Council
to examine the Duke’s behaviour; and Lord Hardwicke, to extend the
insult, or to divide it amongst many, desired the whole Cabinet
Council, not merely the junto, might meet: the affair was too
serious. Thither Munchausen brought copies of his own letters to the
Duke, to prove that his Royal Highness had acted without authority.
Mr. Pitt observed, that they proved the direct contrary; and he, who
certainly had never managed the Duke, nor stood on any good terms
with him, acted a part nobly honest: when the King told him that he
had given his son no _orders_ for this treaty, Pitt replied with
firmness, “But _full powers_, Sir; very _full powers_.”
Yet this sincerity in a foe could infuse none into a father. Two
messengers were dispatched to recall the Duke, and, October 12th,
he arrived at Kensington. It was in the evening, and he retired to
his own apartment, where Mr. Fox and his servants were attending.
He thanked Mr. Fox for being there, and said, “You see me well both
in body and mind. I have written orders in my pocket for everything
I did.” (He afterwards said, his orders had been so strong, that he
had not expected to obtain such good conditions.) He then dismissed
Fox, saying, he would send for him again. (The shortness of this
interview, he afterwards told Mr. Fox, had proceeded from his
determination of seeing nobody alone who could be supposed to advise
him, till he had taken the step he meditated.) At nine, the hour
the King punctually goes to play in the apartment of the Princess
Emily, the Duke went to her. The King, who was there, had ordered
the Princess not to leave them alone, received him with extreme
coldness; and when his Royal Highness went afterwards into the other
room where the King was at cards, his Majesty said aloud, “Here is
my son, who has ruined me and disgraced himself,”--and unless this
was speaking to him, spoke not a word. At eleven, when the cards were
over, the Duke went down to Lady Yarmouth, and told her the King had
left him but one favour to ask, which he was come to solicit by her
interposition, as he wished to make it as little disagreeable to the
King as possible--it was to desire leave to resign everything, the
post of Captain-General, and his regiment. The Countess was in great
concern at the request, and said, “Pray, Sir, don’t determine this at
once.” He replied, “He begged her pardon; he was not come for advice;
he had had time to think, and was determined.” “Then, Sir,” said she,
“I have nothing left but to obey.”
The King received the notification with as much real agitation as he
had counterfeited before. The next morning he ordered the Cabinet
Council to wait on the Duke, and pay their respects to him. Lord
Holderness went in first, and kissed his hand, but was not spoken
to. Pitt followed; and of him his Royal Highness took most notice,
speaking to him at different reprisals with kindness, to mark his
satisfaction with Pitt’s behaviour. He said a little to the Duke of
Newcastle, Lord Granville, and Lord Anson. Lord Hardwicke was out
of town. The Duke of Devonshire was sent to the Duke in private, to
persuade him not to resign. He was inflexible. Devonshire was sent
again to ask from the King as a favour that he would at least retain
his regiment; he need not do the duty; but his Majesty should not
think himself safe in any other hands; yet even this counterfeit of
confidence was an aggravation of the cruelty. The Duke learned that
this solicitude about the regiment proceeded solely from the King’s
averseness to give it to Prince Edward; as would be expected, and he
was not softened by such duplicity. He even determined never to be
employed under his father again, telling Fox, that no collusion about
the treaty should be imputed to him, by his resuming his command. To
Conway he said, he could not, did not hope that the King would do
what was necessary to justify him, it was therefore necessary to do
all he could to justify himself. The next day, the Duke visited the
Princess, and beginning to mention his resolution of resigning, she
rung the bell, and asked him if he would not see the children.
When the King found his son’s resentment inflexible, he thought of
nothing but making it as little uncomfortable to himself as possible:
provided the interior face of the palace was not discomposed, he
cared little about justifying himself or making any reparation to
his son; who, he thought, might as easily forget in the ceremonies
of the drawing-room what he had suffered, as his Majesty drowned all
sensibility in the parade of that narrow sphere. He insisted that the
Duke should appear as usual at Court, and come to him in a morning.
The Duke acquiesced, saying, he should always show the utmost respect
to the King as his father, but never could serve him more. When these
_essential_ forms were adjusted, the Duke sent for Munchausen, and
said, “Mr. Privy-councillor, I hear the King has sent for opinions
of Hanoverian Generals on my conduct; here are the opinions of the
Hessian Generals, and of the Duke of Wolfenbuttle. As the King has
ordered the former to be deposited among the Archives of Hanover, I
hope he will do me the justice to let these be registered with them.
Take them, and bring them back to me to-morrow.” Munchausen returned
with them the next day, and with a message from the King that his
Majesty had been better informed, and thought better of his Royal
Highness than he had done; and then Munchausen falling prostrate to
kiss the lappet of his coat, the Duke with dignity and anger checked
him, and said, “Mr. Privy-councillor, confine yourself to that
office; and take care what you say, even though the words you repeat
should be my father’s; I have all possible deference for him, but I
know how to punish anybody else that presumes to speak improperly of
me.”
On the 15th, the Duke resigned all his commands.
I have dwelt minutely on the circumstances of this history,
having learned from the best authorities, and being sure that few
transactions deserve more to be remembered. A young Prince, warm,
greedy of military glory, yet resigning all his passions to the
interested dictates of a father’s pleasure, and then loaded with
the imputation of having acted basely without authority: hurt with
unmerited disgrace, yet never breaking out into the least unguarded
expression; preserving dignity under oppression, and the utmost
tenderness of duty under the utmost delicacy of honour--this an
uncommon picture--for the sake of human nature, I hope the conduct
of the father is uncommon too! When the Duke could tear himself
from his favourite passion, the Army, one may judge how sharply
he must have been wounded. When afterwards the King, perfidiously
enough, broke that famous convention, mankind were so equitable as to
impute it to the same unworthy politics, not to the disapprobation
he had pretended to feel on its being made. In a former part of
this history, I have said with regard to his eldest, that the King
might have been an honest man, if he had never hated his father, or
had ever loved his son--what double force has this truth, when it
is again applied to him on his treachery to the best son that ever
lived! Considering with what freedom I have spoken of the Duke’s
faults in other parts of this work, I may be believed in the just
praise bestowed on him here.
We must now turn our eyes to Ireland, which Mr. Conway had left in a
state of perfect tranquillity. The imprudence of the new Governors
opened the wounds afresh. The Duke of Bedford set out for that
Kingdom on the 20th of September, determined as he thought to observe
a strict neutrality between the factions, and rigid uprightness in
the conduct of his Administration. He began with exacting strict
attendance on their posts from persons in employment, and with
refusing leave of absence to officers and chaplains of regiments;
and considering, too, how his new dominions had been loaded of late
years to smooth the difficulties of the English Government, his
Grace commenced his reign with strong declamations against Irish
pensions. He had two difficulties to encounter before these fair
views could be carried into execution: his own Court were far from
being so disinterested as their master, and his new subjects were
as little desirous of a reign of virtue. Nor had the Duke himself
the art of reconciling them to it by his manner, which was shy,
untractable, ungracious, ungenerous. The Duchess pleased universally;
she had all her life been practising the part of a Queen; dignity
and dissimulation were natural to her. The Irish were charmed with a
woman who seemed to depart from her state from mere affability. But
the person who influenced them both was the Secretary Rigby. He had
ingratiated himself with the Duchess, and had acquired an absolute
ascendant over her husband, who, with all his impetuosity, was
governed by his favourite in a style that approached to domineering.
Rigby had an advantageous and manly person, recommended by a
spirited jollity that was very pleasing, though sometimes roughened
into brutality: of most insinuating good-breeding when he wished
to be agreeable. His passions were turbulent and overbearing; his
courage bold and fond of exerting itself. His parts strong and
quick, but totally uncultivated; and so much had he trusted to
unaffected common sense, that he could never afterwards acquire the
necessary temperament of art in his public speaking. He had been a
pupil of Winnington, and owed the chief errors of his life to that
man’s maxims, perniciously witty. Winnington had unluckily lived
when all virtue had been set to notorious sale, and in ridicule of
false pretences had affected an honesty in avowing whatever was
dishonourable. Rigby, whose heart was naturally good, grew to think
it sensible to laugh at the shackles of morality; and having early
encumbered his fortune by gaming, he found his patron’s maxims but
too well adapted to retrieve his desperate fortunes. He placed
his honour in steady addiction to whatever faction he was united
with: and from the gaiety of his temper, having indulged himself in
profuse drinking, (for in private few men were more temperate,) he
was often hurried beyond the bounds of that interest which he meant
should govern all his actions, and which his generous extravagance
for ever combated. In short, he was a man who was seldom loved or
hated with moderation; yet he himself, though a violent opponent, was
never a bitter enemy. His amiable qualities were all natural; his
faults acquired, or fatally linked to him by the chain of some other
failings.
In a Court of such a complexion as I have described, no wonder the
reign of virtue was violated in the outset. The Queen-Dowager of
Prussia, the King’s sister, was lately dead: during the parsimonious
barbarity of her husband, a pension of 800_l._ a year, on Ireland,
had been privately transmitted to her; and she retained it to
her death. The Duke of Bedford was persuaded to ask this for the
Duchess’s sister, Lady Betty Waldegrave, and obtained it. His
impartiality was as ill-observed as his maxims of frugality. Rigby,
sacrificing to what he concluded Mr. Fox’s inclination, hurried the
Lord-Lieutenant into flagrant partiality to Lord Kildare. The Primate
was neglected; but he knew how to make himself of consequence. The
prostitution of his opponents had raised his character, and he
omitted no address to conciliate popularity. Malone had at length
accepted the office of Chancellor of the Exchequer; and being the
last renegade, was the most obnoxious. Being regarded as Minister
in the House of Commons, the storm was intended to fall on him,
for Rigby was not known as a man of business; and till Lord George
Sackville affected the active part of power, and after him Mr.
Conway, the Lord-Lieutenant’s secretary had been no character in
Parliament.
The factions existing were, the Primate’s, Lord Kildare’s, those
attached to the Speaker Ponsonby, and who in truth were a defection
from Kildare; and a flying squadron of patriots, the smallest body
of the four, and composed as is usual, of the discontented--that
is, of those who had been too insignificant to be bought off, or
whose demands had been too high--and of a few well-meaning men.
Lord Kildare had still the greatest number of dependents, though
inferior to those of the Primate and Ponsonby, if united; a
point[11] now eagerly pursued by the Archbishop, while at the same
time he underhand inflamed the patriots against the Castle: and
had sufficient success. The Session no sooner opened, than French,
a lawyer, proposed a trifling amendment to the Address, but with
indirect reflections on Malone, whom they endeavoured to make rise,
and take the Minister upon him; but he avoided it, and suffered the
amendment. The next day, one Upton, a warm and obstinate Patriot,
formerly a friend of Malone, moved for the list of Pensions, on which
Lady Betty Waldegrave’s name must have appeared. Malone at last rose,
and said, the Motion was premature, for the list would be given
in with the Estimates. Upton, not being content with this answer,
Malone moved to adjourn, the other threatening to renew his Motion
at their next meeting. And when he did repeat it, it was rejected
but by a majority of five; an advantage so slender, that the Castle
did not venture to stem a torrent of violent resolutions, which the
House passed a few days afterwards against pensions, absentees,
and other grievances, of which they demanded redress, desiring the
Lord-Lieutenant to transmit them to his Majesty in their very words.
This heat was led by one Perry, a bold, troublesome, and corrupt
lawyer, who had been vexatious to Mr. Conway, and between whom and
Rigby there soon passed such warm altercations, that they were with
difficulty prevented from going greater lengths.
The Duke, in answer to their resolutions, told them they were couched
in such extraordinary terms, and aimed so high, that he should take
time to consider whether he would transmit them to England; and this
answer Rigby moved to have entered in the Journals, but desisted, on
finding great opposition. Both the Duke and he acted with incredible
intemperance; and intending to establish their authority by the
weight of power, his Grace sent to England for assistance, and
demanded to be invested with a latitude of rewards and punishments.
The absentees were sent over to strengthen his party in the House
of Commons; but the English Council meeting upon his other demand,
and not being composed of many of his friends, Mr. Pitt wrote him
a civil excuse, with a refusal of full powers; if his Grace would
name whom he wished to displace or prefer, he should be supported;
on the whole, he was advised to compose the heats that had arisen.
The Primate no doubt had early intelligence from Lord George of the
little attention paid to the Lord Lieutenant’s remonstrance; but
being disposed to govern the Castle rather than overturn them, he
retired to his country seat at Leixlip, declaring his disapprobation
of the violence of the Commons; and the next day sent two of his
creatures to the Duke to disavow any connexions with the Speaker, and
to profess his aversion to disturbing the Government; in elections
only against Lord Kildare and Malone he proposed to interfere. On
the other hand, Lord Kildare protested that if the Primate was left
of the Regency, he would not be of it. A menace most indifferent to
the Prelate, who could forgive anything but exclusion from power, and
who on his former disgrace had much resented the part his brother had
acted in consenting to his being laid aside; and when it was notified
to him, he broke out, “Now will my wise brother write me four sides
to tell me it is all for the better.”
The dissimulation of the Primate was soon detected: the Duke of
Bedford, to oblige him, had preferred Cunningham in rank, who,
however, voted against the Court in the strongest questions. Yet
continuing to frequent the assemblies at the Castle, the Duke took
him aside, reproached him with his behaviour, and told him, the bread
he eat was the King’s. The young man replied honestly, he had such
obligations to the Primate and Lord George, that though he should
be reduced to his pristine indigence, he would act in all things
as they ordered him. Some days afterwards, the Opposition calling
in question the great powers exercised by the Privy Council of
Ireland, and Malone sitting silent, the Solicitor-General, a friend
of the Primate, said, that, as an officer of the Crown, he could
not sit still and see the prerogative attacked, without marking his
disapprobation. He was joined by all the Primate’s friends, and the
motion for abridging those powers was rejected by 140 to 40. This
more civil way of displaying to the Castle the Primate’s interest in
the House was not calculated to inspire them with less awe of his
strength.
Lord Kildare (who had no talents for governing, and yet would not
unite with anybody that had,) declined Mr. Fox’s advice of joining
with the Speaker, by which he might have balanced the efforts of
the Primate. The Earl thought of repelling the war by carrying it
into the quarters of the enemy, and the Castle weakly concurred in
this silly project. They determined to move for an inquiry into the
conduct of the Commissioners of the Revenue for the last twenty
years, in which the principal retrospect would involve the partizans
of the House of Dorset. The execution of the measure was delegated
to Sir Archibald Atcheson, a man so insignificant, that, having
acquainted the House that he had a Motion of consequence to propose
on the following Monday, he was so little regarded, that when the
day came, the House was remarkably empty. The Courtiers opposed the
question, till Rigby rose and said, a Motion from so respectable
a person must be of consequence; the gentleman, he supposed, had
some mismanagement to lay open. A secret Committee was immediately
proposed and elected by ballot, when, to the great confusion of
the Ministers, they carried but three out of thirty-one; the other
twenty-eight were all elected from the creatures of the Primate
and Speaker. The Castle had no more success in the popularity they
expected from this inquisition, than they had in the choice of the
inquisitors. The Lord-Lieutenant, too, increased the offence by
his ungracious reception of the Commissioners of the Revenue, who
waiting on him to disculpate themselves, as they feared they had been
misrepresented to his Grace, he answered them dryly, if anything was
wrong, he supposed it would come out; if innocent, they would clear
themselves.
These transactions, which reached to the end of the year, I have
chosen to throw together, as they would be little intelligible, if
broken into the precise order in which they happened. I shall use
the same method on the sequel of the expedition to Rochfort.
As soon as the Fleet was returned, Sir John Mordaunt was ordered to
town to give an account of his conduct; and Mr. Pitt inserted in the
Gazette his letter to the General and Admiral, empowering them to
stay out longer if they should find it necessary. This did not allay
the ill-humour in the City, where they coupled the fruitlessness
of the expedition with the Hanoverian neutrality; and concluded
that both flowed from the same attention to the preservation of the
favourite Electorate. The Ministers affected to distinguish the
_naval_ commanders. The Generals were coldly received, particularly
by the King, though he did speak to Conway, who, however, was so
sensible of the injustice done to him, that, if he had not been
overpersuaded by his friends, who foresaw that his resignation would
be represented as a dismission, he would have immediately quitted his
post in the King’s Bed-chamber.
His Majesty had at first been indifferent to the plan; then ridiculed
it to all who came near him. Now, being in a humour of heroism and
criticism, he took it up in the bitterest terms, and did the Generals
the honour of treating them as ill as his own son, the Duke, seizing
every opportunity of casting reflections on the one and the others;
and on the news of the King of Prussia’s success, the Monarch said,
“Yes, people may beat, if they do not always retreat; but there
are so many cowards, I am almost afraid of growing one myself.”
Pitt, though really more hurt, and apt enough to take any step to
illustrate his own measures, behaved with greater decency. He pressed
no violent resolutions against the officers; he prevented the City
from addressing against them; and only took the more sensible, though
not less severe style of punishing the miscarriage, by raising Wolfe
at once over the heads of a great number of officers.[12]
Sir John Mordaunt finding no notice taken of him in any shape, went
to Mr. Pitt, and told him he had waited a week to see what would be
done on his affair: he found he was in disgrace, but found it only by
neglect and silence. He entreated Mr. Pitt to ask the King to permit
an inquiry on it. Pitt told him, this had been thought of; owned they
did blame the first Council of War; but this was always the case when
officers went prejudiced against a measure.
Accordingly, November 1st, a Commission of Inquiry was directed,
composed of the Duke of Marlborough, Lord George Sackville, and
General Waldegrave: a Court that could not be called unprecedented,
for one of the very same nature had been held in the foregoing year,
but most unconstitutional and dangerous; nay, absurd, for they had
neither power to acquit nor condemn. As the Ministers selected whom
they pleased, if the criminal was to be saved, a favourable report
from this Board would exclude a legal trial; if to be condemned,
was not such a preparatory inquisition likely to influence future
judgment? The present Board was indeed artfully constituted. Two of
the Commissioners were attached to Fox; if their majority acquitted,
the odium would fall on Mr. Pitt’s antagonist--and to them he had
joined Lord George Sackville, as much devoted to himself, and more
than a balance to the other two in abilities. But another step Pitt
took, still more novel, and as pernicious for the precedent. He sent
Mr. Blair of the Secretary’s office to the Lord Mayor of London, to
inform the City that an inquiry was appointed. What right the City of
London had to such notification above all other towns in the kingdom
could not well be told. What use they will make of such admission
into the executive part of Government can easily be conceived; and
what confusion may follow from incorporating the mob of London
with the other parts of the Legislature, where they are already
represented, and where they have no title to be more than represented.
The inquiry began on the 12th. The Generals, and Knowles, and
Broderick, utterly disavowing Sir Edward Hawke’s minutes, Lord George
took them to pieces severely, and censured Hay, the composer of them.
The Duke of Marlborough asked many questions, with appearance of
thinking ill of the conduct of the Generals. Waldegrave took no part
at all. Sir John Mordaunt defended himself weakly; Conway most ably;
exposed Clarke; and at last producing his own narrative, it silenced
all further inquiry; yet the resolutions of the Court, which were
not explicit, seemed to say, that they thought more might have been
performed; or at least that there had not been sufficient reasons for
desisting from the attempt. The report of these opinions was made to
the King on the 21st, who, on the 30th, ordered a Court-Martial on
Sir John Mordaunt alone.
The Duke of Cumberland[13] espoused the cause of the Generals,
wished them to make it a common cause, and to pin down their whole
defence to the impracticability of the measure. To this Conway could
not consent. He had too much endeavoured to explore whether it was
practicable or not, to submit to involve himself in the remissness
of those for whose sake he now suffered. Yet the delicacy with which
he avoided whatever might set their failings in a strong light,
the management he used invariably for Sir John Mordaunt, for whom
he drew up every paper he could want, the obstinacy with which he
persisted to sink material articles of his own defence, rather than
charge his colleagues, at the same time that no worthy mind was ever
so wounded with disgrace, these and every instance of his behaviour
made the solidity of his virtue appear most amiable and interesting;
and it was still heightened by not meeting with an equal degree of
tenderness from those in whose protection it was exerted.
The Court-Martial began its session on the 14th of December, and
finished on the 18th; though it was opened again for one day to hear
Sir Edward Hawke’s evidence, who had been at sea. Lord Tyrawley was
President. Mr. Pitt appeared before them, as he said, to authenticate
his own orders, but took the opportunity of making an imperious
speech, and defended Clarke and Thierri, the pilot; who, he affirmed,
had supported their information, though sifted in so extraordinary
a manner. General Cholmondeley interrupted him, reminding him that
he only came thither to authenticate. Pitt replied with haughtiness;
and being asked, who had sifted Clarke and the pilot, he said, the
military men; and often spoke of Mordaunt and Conway by name. There
have been times when a Minister, in less odour of popularity, would
have been impeached for presuming to awe a legal Court of Justice;
but as it did Mr. Pitt no harm, neither did it produce any good to
the cause he favoured. The whole Court treated the expedition as rash
and childish; and acquitted the General with honour. Sir Edward Hawke
reflecting on Thierri as an ignorant _Fanfaron_, General Cholmondeley
asked if there were two Thierris? Surely, he said, this ignorant
_Fanfaron_ could not be the one so applauded by Mr. Pitt!
Thus ended the chimera of taking Rochfort. The public, however,
were entertained for part of the following winter with a literary
controversy, which it produced between General Conway and Mr. Potter.
Mr. Doddington, too, flung in one or two bitter pamphlets against Mr.
Pitt.
I have dwelt so long on the singular events of this year, that I
shall hasten to the conclusion of this book, touching briefly the
other most material passages, the chief of which, relating to the
victories of the King of Prussia, will be found at large in other
histories, and demand a more exalted pen than mine, sullied with the
faults and follies of my countrymen, and though suited perhaps to the
trifling province of catching ridicules, unequal to the lofty compass
of history.
Lord Mansfield was called to the _conciliabulum_, or essence of the
Council; an honour not only uncommon and due to his high abilities,
but set off with his being proposed by Lord Hardwicke himself, who
wished, he said, to get repose for three months in the country: Lord
Mansfield would amply supply his place. It was about this time that
this great Chief Justice set himself to take information against
libels, and would sift, he said, what was the real liberty of the
press. The occasions of the times had called him off from principles
that favoured an arbitrary King--he still leaned towards an arbitrary
Government.
At the end of October came news that our Fleet under Holbourn,
blocking up a French squadron at Louisbourg, had been dispersed by a
great storm, in which the Nassau was lost, the Eagle was driven home,
and ten ships were dismasted.
The year concluded with a torrent of glory for the King of Prussia.
On the 5th of November, he defeated the combined Imperial and French
Armies at Rosbach; and though the Austrians took Schweidnitz, and
beat the Prince of Bevern, the King repaired that disadvantage by a
complete victory over their best Army, commanded by Prince Charles
and Count Daun, at Lissa: a single month intervening between this
and his success at Rosbach. His uncle’s efforts were neither exerted
nor crowned with equal honour. The decline of the arms of France in
the empire encouraged the King to break the convention of Closter
Seven. The Hanoverians were reassembled, and Prince Ferdinand of
Brunswick, a general of repute, appointed to command them. Some
trifling infractions of the neutrality on the part of the French
were pretexted to cover this notorious breach of faith--a monument
to future politicians, in how short a space of time a treaty may be
commanded, concluded, disavowed, made advantage of, and violated!
During these transactions, the unfortunate Queen of Poland died
suddenly at Dresden; a witness of calamities to which she had not
contributed, and which she had in vain remained there to temper.
In England, Sir John Ligonier, to whom the supreme command of the
British armies was entrusted, was created a Viscount of Ireland, and
a Marshal, with his seniors, Sir Robert Rich and Lord Molesworth.
Lord George Sackville succeeded as Lieutenant-General of the
Ordnance; and by that employment escaped the unwelcome command in
America, which he could not with any grace have otherwise avoided.
Colley Cibber, that good-humoured and honest veteran, so unworthily
aspersed by Pope, and whose Memoirs, with one or two of his
comedies, will secure his fame, in spite of all the abuse of his
contemporaries, dying about this time at a very great age, the Duke
of Devonshire bestowed the laurel on Mr. Whitehead, a man of a
placid genius. His Grace had first designed it for Gray,[14] then
for Mason, but was told that both would decline it. In truth, it
was not Cibber’s silly odes that disgraced the employment, but an
annual panegyric venally extorted for whatever King, and with or
without occasion, that debased the office. Gray, crowned with the
noblest wreaths of Parnassus, could not stoop to be dubbed poet by
a Lord Chamberlain; and Mason, though he had not then displayed all
the powers of his genius, had too much sense and spirit to owe his
literary fame to anything but his own merit.
On the 28th of December died the King’s third daughter, Princess
Caroline. She had been the favourite of the Queen, who preferred
her understanding to those of all her other daughters, and whose
partiality she returned with duty, gratitude, affection, and concern.
Being in ill health at the time of her mother’s death, the Queen told
her she would follow her in less than a year. The Princess received
the notice as a prophecy; and though she lived many years after it
had proved a vain one, she quitted the world, and persevered in the
closest retreat, and in constant and religious preparation for the
grave; a moment she so eagerly desired, that when something was once
proposed to her, to which she was averse, she said, “I would not
do it to die!” To this impression of melancholy had contributed the
loss of Lord Hervey,[15] for whom she had conceived an unalterable
passion, constantly marked afterwards by all kind and generous
offices to his children. For many years she was totally an invalid,
and shut herself up in two chambers in the inner part of St. James’s,
from whence she could not see a single object. In this monastic
retirement, with no company but of the King, the Duke, Princess
Emily, and a few of the most intimate of the Court, she led, not an
unblameable life only, but a meritorious one: her whole income was
dispensed between generosity and charity; and, till her death by
shutting up the current discovered the source, the jails of London
did not suspect that the best support of their wretched inhabitants
was issued from the Palace.
From the last Sunday to the Wednesday on which she died, she declined
seeing her family; and when the mortification began, and the pain
ceased, she said, “I feared I should not have died of this!”
Finished August 8th, 1759.
FOOTNOTES:
[10] He himself took a cutter and twenty marines and went to survey
the coast. A battery fired on them; and one of the rowers said,
“Sir, we are in great danger.” He replied, coolly, “Pho, they can’t
hurt us;” and turning to young Fitzroy (Charles, afterwards Lord
Southampton, from whom I received this relation), he said, “Now,
if they would not say I was boyish, I would land with these twenty
marines, to show them we can.” I have already mentioned his gallant
behaviour at Fontenoy, at Laffelt, and at Culloden, at the first of
which battles he was taken prisoner; but I cannot help repeating an
unsuspected, because disinterested testimonial in his favour. When
this miscarriage at Rochfort made so much noise, and the courage of
the Generals was questioned, Lord Chesterfield said to Mr. Fox these
words: “I am sure Conway is brave; I remember when I was praising
George Stanhope (a young man of remarkable spirit, brother of Earl
Stanhope), he replied, ‘Faith, my Lord, I believe I have as much
courage as other people; indeed, I don’t pretend to be like Harry
Conway, who walks up to the mouth of a cannon with as much coolness
and grace, as if he was going to dance a minuet.’”
[11] Lord George Sackville, who was privy to this negotiation, and
who hated the Speaker on former injuries, said, “Ponsonby is a dirty
fellow; we have nothing to do but rub his nose against a Devonshire.”
[12] The conduct of one of his friends was not quite so judicious;
Potter, then ill at Bath, sent the Mayor of the place an account
of a private letter he had received from Mr. Pitt, lamenting his
disappointment, _which had broken his heart_. This letter was left
for public perusal in a bookseller’s shop, till getting into the Bath
Journal, Potter thought proper to advertise that this had been done
contrary to his intention.
[13] The Duke was much diverted on hearing that Pitt, who had drawn
the plan for the Militia, urged against the Generals that there had
been no force on the coast of France, but twenty thousand of the
Militia!
[14] It appears by Mr. Gray’s Letters, published with his Life by Mr.
Mason in 1795, that the laurel was actually offered to Mr. Gray, and
was refused by him.
[15] Eldest son of John Earl of Bristol, and Lord Privy Seal: a great
favourite of Queen Caroline, and a principal object of Pope’s satire.
1758.
_Punch._ Who is that?
_Luckless._ That is an orator, Master Punch.
_Punch._ An orator!--what’s that?
_Luck._ Why, an orator is--egad, I can’t tell what: he is a
man that nobody dares dispute with.
FIELDING’S _Pleasures of the Town_.