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THE LETTERS OF THE
DUKE OF WELLINGTON
TO MISS J.
1834-1851
EDITED, WITH EXTRACTS FROM THE DIARY OF THE LATTER,
BY CHRISTINE TERHUNE HERRICK
LONDON
T. FISHER UNWIN
26 PATERNOSTER SQUARE
University Press:
JOHN WILSON AND SON, CAMBRIDGE, U.S.A.
Transcriber's Note: In this e-text, superscripted characters are
represented by being preceded by a carat, e.g., D^r and 13^th.
PREFACE.
The effort of the Editor throughout this volume has been to repress
fancy rather than to exercise it. There has not been a word added to or
taken from the letters of the Duke, even the occasional eccentricities
of orthography and punctuation having been preserved.
The editing that was absolutely necessary to render coherent some
of Miss J.'s lucubrations has been restricted to the excision of
superfluous passages of Scripture that added nothing to the sense of
the text, and the correction of the very erratic punctuation both of
her diary and of the copies she has left of her own letters.
Miss J.'s copies of the Duke's epistles have been verified by
comparison with the originals. In every case where the needful books
and journals of reference were attainable, the Duke's statements in the
letters of his comings and goings and occupations have been
corroborated by contemporary data.
The particulars of Miss J.'s personal history have been derived from
private family sources.
CHRISTINE TERHUNE HERRICK.
BROOKLYN, March 18, 1889.
CONTENTS.
CHAP. PAGE
I. INTRODUCTION 1
II. FIRST INTERVIEWS 10
III. THE FIRST DISCORD 21
IV. SMOOTH WATERS 39
V. FRESH DIFFICULTIES 55
VI. COMPARATIVE CALM 79
VII. ASPIRATIONS AND REBUFFS 98
VIII. A PEACEFUL PERIOD 120
IX. MISUNDERSTANDINGS 149
X. A BREATHING SPACE 166
XI. THE FINAL RUPTURE 183
XII. CONCLUSION 210
APPENDIX 221
THE LETTERS OF WELLINGTON.
CHAPTER I.
INTRODUCTION.
These hitherto unpublished Letters from the Duke of Wellington to Miss
J., and the Diary of the latter, have lain for years in a trunk in the
attic of a country-house within thirty miles of New York city. Their
publication is permitted through the kindness of a friend with whose
family Miss J. was remotely connected. The facts with regard to Miss
J.'s life and character have been in part obtained through those who
knew her personally, but mainly through her own Diary,--a worn volume
once handsome, that at the first glance would be taken for a Bible.
This book is supplied with a spring-lock. Its hundreds of pages are
closely covered with a minute handwriting, and the ink with which they
were traced has faded to a yellowish brown, indistinct in places, but
never quite undecipherable. The Duke's letters are written in a
peculiar, irregular hand, very difficult to read, and becoming more
crabbed as he advanced in years. While the spelling is almost
invariably correct, the construction of the sentences is often
involved, and the punctuation follows no known method.
At the time Miss J.'s correspondence with the Duke of Wellington
opened, she was a very beautiful woman about twenty years of age. Her
parents were from among the smaller English gentry, and in her girlhood
she, with her elder sister, attended one of the best schools in
England. Many of her companions were of noble birth, and the
associations then formed were continued in later years. Miss J.'s
father died while she was little more than a child, and not long after
the mother followed. At her death the daughter writes that a vision was
vouchsafed to her of the heaven her mother was entering.
The elder sister married an American physician and came with him to
this country, leaving Miss J. with a companion and in the nominal care
of her guardian, who seems to have confined himself to supplying her
with the funds accruing from the investments made of the property left
by her mother. Miss J. lived now in lodgings, now in a rented house, in
company with a devoted elderly friend to whom she constantly alludes in
her Diary, and made many visits to the country-houses of former
schoolmates. She appears never to have had any taste for general
society. A woman of deeply devotional nature, her fervor in spiritual
matters had been heightened by associations into which she had been
thrown soon after quitting school, and further strengthened by the
example and precepts of her bosom companion, Mrs. L. But while the
latter evidently possessed strong common-sense and a well-balanced
mind, Miss J. was impulsive, enthusiastic, undisciplined. Whatever she
did was done with all her might. In her sight there could be no middle
course, no half-way measures. By much introspection and pondering of
the Scriptures she developed into a religious zealot, fanatically
anxious for the conversion of those about her. And this conversion was
in her mind nothing less than the turning aside from all worldly
pursuits, and the entire dedication of time and self to religious
avocations. She shrank with horror from what she called "The World,"
and interpreted this to mean public offices, wealth, and honors
conferred by the State. All these she considered as snares to draw the
soul from the contemplation of God and eternity, and bind it down to
the things of time and sense.
While little more than a girl, she had had a love-affair with a young
man, of whom she writes as "Henry," or "H." Although attached to him,
he fell short of her standard in matters spiritual, and she therefore
gave him up. She describes with feeling her deep anxiety for his
salvation, the prayers she offered for him, and her trembling hope that
he might become converted and they might yet be happy together. As the
young man still clung to "The World," she nerved herself to break the
bond between them and to crush down her affection for him. For a while
she seemed to succeed; but the victory over herself was not complete.
In her Diary she writes:--
"A few days ago, while Mary was at the harp, in a moment a feeling
of tenderness seemed to return towards H.; but I could not
certainly say it _was_ so until two days after, when Mary returned
from her visit and alluded to him, adding she had looked at Selby
and prayed it may become an abode of _righteousness_, or words to
this effect,--when I was at once overcome, and burst into tears.
This, indeed, verified my suspicion; and what could I say to such
things but this: 'Thy will, O God, be done!'"
Resolved that she would not let her mind dwell upon one who had "never
known a new _birth_ unto _righteousness_," she devoted herself to good
works, to instructing the school-children in the village, visiting the
poor and afflicted, teaching two gypsy boys, in whom she was much
interested, to read and to pray, writing letters on religious topics to
her friends, and adapting hymns for the harp. She was an earnest
student of the Bible, and held firm faith in the doctrine that even the
most trivial events in one's life are directed by an overruling
Providence. She carried this belief so far that when in doubt as to
what to do in any matter, she would open her Bible at random, read the
first text that caught her eye, and shape her course by the direction
she found there.
That her friends deprecated such fanaticism--for it really amounted to
that--in so young and beautiful a girl, is apparent from passages in
her Diary, where she states, with evident enjoyment, that she had
undergone "persecution for righteousness' sake," and laments that
certain friends should so evidently be "laboring under the power of
Satan."
During the month of June, 1833, while staying with a friend, of whom
she speaks as "Mary," in the village of S., intelligence was brought to
Miss J. of a hardened criminal who was confined in the county jail. He
had been convicted of murder, and was to be executed shortly. Both
Catholic and Protestant clergymen had been with him, and had endeavored
in vain to make some impression upon him by prayers and exhortation.
Here was Miss J.'s opportunity. She and her friend Mary went to the
prisoner, and by their ministrations produced such an effect that he
made full confession of his guilt and professed repentance and
conversion. In her Diary Miss J. tells how she dreaded her first
expedition to the jail, the prayers she uttered for strength, and the
direct answers she received. Of a later visit to "poor Cook" she
writes:
"Oh, what a glorious change was there! The stony heart become a
heart of flesh! Great God, thy mercies are indeed infinite, and thy
ways past finding out!" A few days later she says: "Went again to
S.; found poor Cook rapidly ripening for that eternal kingdom into
which through his Saviour's righteousness he will soon be
gloriously received."
The two girls kept up their visits, in face of a command to discontinue
them from Mary's parents.
"Mary received such an angry letter, prohibiting her visiting poor
Cook,--to whom, notwithstanding, we of _course_ went, saw him, and
the next day were at chapel with him (being Sunday); after which he
said he would like _then_ to fall asleep in the Lord, etc. On
Monday evening we had singing and prayers with him. On Tuesday saw
his chains taken off, and remained with him until he left the
prison. On Wednesday were at court, and left S., feeling our work
was done,--grateful, I trust, for such manifold mercies, and more
anxious than ever to glorify our heavenly Lord. Today, the 10th,
poor Cook suffered; and I can now fancy him a glorious spirit,
hovering near, ministering to those that are to be heirs of
salvation."
The result of Miss J.'s success with this unfortunate man naturally
strengthened her in her devotion to a religious life; and the effect
was deepened by the commendations of her pious friends. It was not so
common then as now to make pets of condemned criminals; and the success
of this young girl in subduing a man with whom priests and parsons had
hopelessly labored, created a sensation and called forth comment from
the press. It would have been almost phenomenal had the girl's head not
been turned. Her devotion to the advancement of the cause of Christ as
she understood it, was strong and genuine. Surrounded by judicious
advisers, she might have manifested her zeal in a different fashion. As
it was, she now felt she had been especially called of God to do a
great work. Looking around her for an object, her attention was drawn
to the Duke of Wellington. She seemed to have known more of him as the
public man than as the soldier; for she expressly states at a later
period that when she first wrote to him she was not aware that he was
the conqueror of Bonaparte, and did not even know when the Battle of
Waterloo took place,--a statement that leads to the inference that
instruction in the fashionable schools of that day dealt more with
playing on the harp and similar showy accomplishments than with a
knowledge of English history.
Miss J. leaves in her Diary a list of the letters received from the
Duke, prefacing them with the following introduction:--
"Seeing that I have adverted in the former part of this book to the
feelings experienced on our return from poor Cook, which induced me
to look up to the Lord, enquiring what next HE would have me to do,
receiving this precious reply, 'Greater things than these, that
they may marvel;' and considering such words must have had a
reference to his condescending dealings a few months afterwards in
influencing me to write to the Duke upon the necessity of a new
_birth_ unto righteousness,--I am solicitous to devote a portion of
this book to his letters, remarking thereon as the list thereof
proceeds: May the Lord be with me, inclining my heart and pen to
perform all his good will and pleasure, be that whatever it may,
for his holy name' sake. Amen."
The Duke of Wellington was at this time (1834) a man sixty-five years
old. He was in the prime of strength and health, with a capacity for
work which the roughing and the hard service he had undergone in
earlier life had not in the least impaired. In spite of the passing
unpopularity due to his opposition to the Reform Bill, that led to his
being publicly hooted in 1832, he had had many high offices bestowed
upon him. He had now been a widower for three years.