The different places of residence which belonged to the
Duchess—Holywell-house, Wimbledon, Blenheim—Account of the old
mansion of Woodstock—Its projected destruction—Efforts of Sir John
Vanburgh to save it—Attack upon the Duchess, relative to Blenheim,
in the Examiner.
Having given a short sketch of those associates in whose conversation
the Duchess delighted, or on whose aid, public or private, she depended,
it remains now to describe those stately abodes where she lived in sober
grandeur, but the splendour of which could not procure her peace of
mind, nor ensure her even the attentions due to her rank and years.
The earliest, and perhaps the favourite residence of Sarah Duchess of
Marlborough, was Holywell, the spot where she first saw the light, and
the scene with which her youthful associations were connected. The site
of the house in which Richard Jennings of Holywell, as he is designated,
resided, when his daughter Sarah was born, has already been described.
The dwelling was, in modern days, inhabited by Dr. Predy, rector of St.
Alban’s Abbey, but now, like some other traces of its celebrated inmate,
it is levelled to the ground.[360]
Near the tenement, comparatively humble, in which the Duchess was born,
the Duke of Marlborough built a mansion of many rooms, and of handsome
external appearance. Its extensive gardens, laid out in the
old-fashioned style, are well remembered by the inhabitants of St.
Albans; and Holywell was endeared to them, not only by revered
associations with the Duke and Duchess of Marlborough, but by more
recent recollections connected with a respected descendant by marriage
of the Spencer family, who long dwelt at Holywell. Travellers who passed
near the pile which John Duke of Marlborough erected, regarded that
early abode with interest. Of infinitely less elegance than Wimbledon is
reputed to have been, of far less splendour than Blenheim, it presented
the true features of a respectable and substantial English mansion; it
bore the aspect of comfort; it appeared like an emblem of the Duke’s
early prosperity—a sort of stepping-stone to Wimbledon and Blenheim.
Perhaps, had he rested there, his lot in life might have been more
peaceful, though less distinguished.[361]
At all events, Holywell was a spot replete with interest, and the boast
of St. Albans, for there the Duke of Marlborough lived as a private
gentleman; sufficiently near to the town for its inhabitants to claim
his grace as a neighbour, yet distant enough for dignity, and, if
desirable, even for seclusion.
That the Duke and Duchess felt no small pride and pleasure in St. Albans
is evident; and probably at one period of their lives, the height of
their ambition, as far as residence was concerned, was to build a house
at the place where their humble fortunes could be progressively traced.
A spacious and costly pew in the Abbey, adorned with beautiful carving,
still attracts admiration on entering that venerable edifice.
These remarks might induce the traveller through St. Albans to search
with some interest for Holywell-house. Unfortunately it exists no
longer. Several years ago it passed from the Spencer family into other
hands; and although the house was not in a dilapidated state, and
appeared to be a fitting residence for a gentleman of a good
establishment; although even higher considerations might have had some
weight with the parties concerned; who must, one would suppose, have
deeply regretted the expediency of destroying the old place; yet it
_was_ destroyed. The work of devastation terminated with a sale; and the
materials were disposed of by auction.[362]
The House at Wimbledon, in which the Duchess lived, has also perished,
though from a different cause. The manor of Wimbledon is of considerable
celebrity. Sir Thomas Cecil purchased it from Sir Christopher Hatton,
whilst he was in possession under the grant from Queen Elizabeth, and in
1588 rebuilt it in a most magnificent manner.
In 1599, Queen Elizabeth is said to have visited the Lord Burghley here,
and to have staid three days; after which she proceeded to Nonsuch.[363]
In 1628, the house received considerable damage by the blowing up of
some gunpowder. It was afterwards repaired and beautified. The outside
was painted in fresco by Francis Cleyne. Fuller calls Wimbledon-house “a
daring structure,” and says that by some it has been thought to equal
Nonsuch, if not to exceed that far famed royal residence.[364]
The estate was afterwards purchased for Henrietta Maria, Queen of
Charles the First, and here the King and she sometimes resided. “The
mansion at Wimbledon,” says Mr. Lysons, in his work on the Environs of
London, “is mentioned among the houses as belonging to the crown, in the
inventory of the jewels and pictures of King Charles the First. It is
remarkable that that monarch was so little aware of the fate preparing
for him by his enemies, that, a few days before he was brought to trial,
he ordered the seeds of some melons to be planted in his garden at
Wimbledon. It was afterwards sold to Baynes, and by him probably to
Lambert, the parliament’s general. When he had been discarded by
Cromwell, he retired to this house, and turned florist, having the
finest tulips and gillyflowers that could be got for love or money. He
also excelled in painting flowers, some specimens of which remained for
many years at this house.”
A fate seems to hang over certain estates and houses. The Restoration
gave back Wimbledon to Queen Henrietta, who sold the house to Lord
Bristol, and he to the Marquis of Carmarthen, whose trustees sold it to
Sir Theodore Janseen. Sir Theodore, for what reason does not appear,
pulled down the magnificent house in which Charles and his Queen had
resided, and began to build a new one, probably on a smaller scale than
the old building. The South Sea business involving Sir Theodore in the
general ruin, the estate was purchased by the Duchess of Marlborough.
She, in her turn, destroyed what Sir Theodore had built, and erected a
new house on the north side of the knoll on which the present house
stands, after a design of the Earl of Burlington.[365]
This fabric was not doomed long to stand, for the Duchess, not approving
of the situation, desired his lordship to give her a design for a house
on the south side; and having obtained a plan, she pulled down her
partly-erected house, and constructed another. But this mansion was
destined to destruction also; it was bequeathed by her to John Spencer,
Esq., from whom it came to his son, Earl Spencer, in whose time, and on
Easter Monday, 1785, it was almost entirely burnt down by accident. The
ruins were cleared away, and the grounds levelled and turfed, so that
scarcely a trace even of the foundation was left. Such was the fate of
this abode of the Duchess, which, in her later days, she preferred to
all others. The present house was built in 1798. It stands in a park
seven miles in compass, containing about twelve hundred acres, (laid out
by Browne,) which affords a beautiful home prospect, with a fine piece
of water towards the north, and an extensive view over Surrey and Kent
to the south.
The Duke and Duchess of Marlborough, could they have foreseen these
occurrences, might have been excused if superstitious fears had assailed
them, when on the eve of devoting a portion of their wealth to some new
structure. The desire of Marlborough, so feelingly expressed, that he
might live at Blenheim in peace, was not to be gratified. The progress
of that structure was attended by difficulties and vexations truly
inimical to quiet; and various accounts have been given of the cause and
details of those wearying disputes and disappointments which embittered
Marlborough’s associations with Blenheim. Upon the proposal of Queen
Anne, and the vote of Parliament, it had been determined, in 1704, that
the British nation should build the Duke of Marlborough a structure
suitable to the residence of their great and wealthy general, and
emblematic of national gratitude and of royal munificence. Half a
million was voted for the building, and on the eighteenth of June, 1705,
the first stone of the Castle, as it was called, was laid.[366]
Notwithstanding the vote of parliament, the Duke of Marlborough,
considering, as he well might, the uncertainty of public favour, and the
slender nature of that cobweb entitled public honour, deemed it prudent
never to issue any orders for the building except through the
Treasury.[367] There is a manuscript letter of his extant, which
expressly enforces this caution. The architect selected for the great
work was Sir John Vanburgh, probably appointed from interest, when we
reflect that Sir Christopher Wren was in all his strength and fame, and
actually made a plan of one side of the building, of which Lord
Godolphin approved much more highly than of anything that was
subsequently done by Vanburgh; adding to his commendations, that he was
sure nothing that was designed by Vanburgh or Hawkesmoor would please
him so well. Wren was afterwards employed in the construction of
Marlborough-house.
No sooner was the work commenced, than we find, by the manuscript
letters, that the Duchess took a considerable share in the management of
the works, combating stoutly against the extravagances and impositions
of Sir John Vanburgh in detail, though she was wholly unable to check
the gross amount of his charges.
On a contract for lime to build Blenheim, made, in 1705, between the
Duke and Vanburgh, the Duchess wrote these characteristic words: “Is not
that, sevenpence-halfpenny per bushel, a very high price, when they had
the advantage of making it in the park? besides, in many things of that
nature, false measure had been proved.”[368] It is no wonder that Sir
John Vanburgh, very soon afterwards, began to call the Duchess very
“stupid and troublesome,” and ended by venting upon her grace the
coarsest terms of abuse that anger, unmitigated by good breeding, could
devise.
In 1709, the works at Blenheim had progressed so far as to enable
Vanburgh to flatter the Duke with a hope that the house would be ready
for his grace’s reception soon after his return from the continent,
where Marlborough then was. In the same letter in which this intimation
was given, a minute detail of all the offices was also set forth; so
that notwithstanding the difficulty of procuring stone, of which
Vanburgh complained, and other hindrances, there seemed to be every
prospect of a favourable termination to the long-deferred hopes of the
noble owners of Blenheim.[369]
And now a question arose, in which, without any partiality to Sir John
Vanburgh’s conduct, we must acknowledge that his taste and judgment were
conspicuously displayed, and that to him we owe an effort (fruitless,
unfortunately,) to preserve and restore one of those remains, truly of
English character, which are so fondly prized by all British hearts.
The manor-house, or ancient palace of Woodstock, was, in 1709, before
the ravages of improvement, and the chimeras of the landscape gardener,
attacked and laid it low, still standing in tolerable repair. It
appears, from an old print,[370] to have been a picturesque building,
with a quadrangular court, and towers at each corner. It occupied a
slightly elevated spot near the river Glyme, then a narrow stream, at a
short distance from the grand bridge now thrown across the lake. The
situation was extremely beautiful, for art had not then lowered the
rugged hill, of which Vanburgh in his letters complains. Rich coverlets
of wood concealed the old house, whilst in front flowed the gentle
stream on whose banks Chaucer wandered. The manor was not only
distinguished as the scene of several parliaments which were held there,
but had still more romantic claims to respect and preservation. It was
within its precincts that a bower, or retired dwelling, was erected by
Henry the Second for his Rosamond, in whose gentle name, seclusion, and
misfortunes, we are apt to forget her error, and the cause of her fate.
The fabled labyrinth is said to have derived its origin from being
confounded with the structure of the palace gardens, which were formed
of the Topiary work—twisted alleys resembling a maze. A gate-house in
front of the palace gave dignity to the whole tenement, and enclosed at
one time Elizabeth of England, the captive inmate of the manor, from a
window of which she is said to have viewed with envy a milkmaid, and to
have written on a shutter, with some charcoal, those beautiful lines
expressive of her wishful desire for freedom, which are extant.
These legends are familiar to us all; yet it is impossible, in
describing the fate and fall of the manor, to revert to them without
regret. Such associations, combined with the recollection of Chaucer,
who resided in an old house at Woodstock, and who, in his “Dream,” has
described the Bower, must be called up with pleasurable though
melancholy sensations. In later days, the manor formed an abiding place
for those daring Roundheads, whose concealments, and the stratagems of
which they made use to maintain their privacy, have been woven into a
tale of such powerful interest, that it requires few other arguments to
enhance regret for the old manor, than that it has been a subject for
the pen of Walter Scott.
In 1709, the manor became the subject of correspondence between the
Duchess of Marlborough and Vanburgh. The Duchess had, it seems,
repeatedly visited Blenheim in company with Lord Godolphin, who
represents her as “extremely prying,” and not only detecting many errors
in that part of the building of the Castle which was finished in 1706,
but as well mending such as could be rectified without waiting for the
Duke’s opinion. “I am apt to think,” adds the Lord Treasurer, “that she
has made Mr. Vanburgh a little +,[371] but you will find both pleasure
and comfort from it.”[372]
It is worthy of remark, however, that the friendly Lord Treasurer dwells
much upon the forward state of the garden and the grounds, but passes no
opinion upon the building.
When the subject of taking down or leaving the old manor came to be
debated, Sir John Vanburgh temperately, and to his credit, explained his
reasons for wishing to retain so beautiful an object within view of
Blenheim. The arguments which he advanced were excellent and such as
would readily present themselves to any intelligent mind. But he
addressed himself to one who had far more pleasure in adding up a sum of
compound addition in her own curious, but infallible way, than in gazing
upon any beautiful ruins. To her the recollection of fair Rosamond was a
vain fancy; the notion of Sir John’s keeping the old manor in
preservation, a whim; and besides, there was a yet more cogent reason
for sacrificing, than for preserving the ruins. Already had an attempt
made by Vanburgh, to convert the manor into an habitation, caused an
expenditure, according to the Duchess, of three thousand pounds; from
the acknowledgment of Vanburgh, eleven hundred pounds; and the shrewd
Sarah began to suspect, when the architect became anxious upon the
subject, that he designed the manor as an habitation for himself, and
had some sinister motive for the perseverance which he showed on the
subject. After many discussions, in the course of which Godolphin, on
being applied to for his opinion, said “that he might as well hesitate
about removing a wen from his face, as delay taking down so unsightly an
object from the brow of the hill,” the old manor was demolished; and the
work of devastation was finished with the chapel, which Vanburgh made
one final struggle to save, but which was condemned.[373] Several
curious relics were found when the ground was levelled, for the hill
behind it was of a rugged, intractable shape, as Vanburgh described it.
Amongst other things, a ring, with the words inscribed on it, “Remember
the Covenant,” was given by the masons to Lady Diana Spencer.
The main work at Blenheim proceeded very slowly. In 1710, it was very
abruptly, and as Vanburgh thought, very unceremoniously, stopped by the
Duchess, who sent directions to the workmen that the orders of the
architect were to be wholly disregarded. The Duchess’s disgrace at court
had possibly, however, some share in this unexpected proceeding. During
that year Vanburgh’s estimate of the expenses of the house was, that
they would not exceed two hundred and fifty thousand pounds. In October,
1710, he had received two hundred thousand pounds from the Treasury.
Letters between him and the Duchess, the one remonstrating, the other
justifying the enormous sums which were laid out, are to be found in the
Manuscript Correspondence. By a warrant from Godolphin, Sir John
Vanburgh was authorised to make contracts, &c., and to lay them before
the Lord Treasurer.[374] Every expectation might reasonably be formed,
that the government would complete the building at its own cost. In
October and November, 1710, it appears that Vanburgh received, in
addition to the assistance of eight thousand pounds, the sum of one
thousand pounds weekly to pay the workmen.[375] In 1712, the building
expenses were put a stop to by the Queen, who alleged, among other
reasons, the puerile excuse that the Duchess of Marlborough having taken
away slabs and locks from her rooms at St. James’s, she would not build
her a house. The fact was, the Queen, as well as the Duke’s enemies,
were startled at the immense sums which had been spent, without the
interminable structure being nearly completed.
In 1714, a statement being sent in by Sir John Vanburgh, two hundred and
twenty thousand pounds were found to have been received from the
Treasury, and the debts due by the crown for the building amounted to
sixty thousand pounds.[376] After this crisis in the affairs of
Blenheim, the Duke of Marlborough took the completion of the work into
his own hands, and desired that an estimate of the expense might be
given by Vanburgh. At this time even the shell of the building could
not, it was calculated, be completed without many thousand pounds more.
It was also necessary to get an act of parliament passed, devolving the
responsibility of the debts already incurred, on the crown; a measure
which was, happily for the Duke and his heirs, carried in the first year
of George the First. Affairs now seemed to be placed on a safe footing;
but Blenheim was never, at that period, likely to be finished for
Marlborough to inhabit. “Besides,” adds the Duchess, writing to her
friend Mrs. Clayton, “all without doors, where there is nothing done, is
a chaos that turns one’s brains but to think of it; and it will cost an
immense sum to complete the causeway, and that ridiculous bridge in
which I counted thirty-three rooms. Four houses are to be at each corner
of the bridge; but that which makes it so much prettier than London
Bridge is, that you may sit in six rooms, and look out at window into
the high arch, while the coaches are driving over your head.”[377]
The Duchess, as it may be perceived by this satirical description, was
not very well pleased with Vanburgh. In fact, upon a previous
examination of the accounts, many charges grossly extravagant were
detected; as well as abundant errors of design.
In the course of the fabrication of the palace, nervous fears seem to
have assailed the Duke and Duchess, concerning the immense income
requisite to maintain an establishment in such an overgrown palace. It
is amusing to find Sir John Vanburgh thus consoling the Duchess by his
parallel of Castle Howard, respecting the size of which the noble owners
had had the same fears. After discussing some other matters, he writes,
in 1713, thus:—[378]
“He (Lord Carlisle) likewise finds that all his rooms, with moderate
fires, are ovens, and that this great house does not require above one
pound of wax and two of tallow candles a night to light it more than his
house at London did; nor, in short, is he at any expense more whatsoever
than he was in the remnant of an old house; but three housemaids and one
man to keep the whole house and offices in perfect cleanliness, which is
done to such a degree, that the kitchen, and all the offices and
passages under the principal floor, are as dry as the drawing-room; and
yet there is a great deal of company, and very good housekeeping. So
that, upon the whole, (except the keeping of the new gardens,) the
expense of living in this great fine house does not amount to above a
hundred pounds a year more than was spent in the old one.
“If you think the knowledge of this may be of any satisfaction to my
Lady Marlborough, pray tell her what you hear; and (if you think it
proper) as from yourself, I could wish you to say what you know to be
true, that whether I am quite convinced or not of my having been so much
in the wrong in my behaviour to her as she is pleased to think me, yet,
while she does think me so, I can’t but set the greatest value upon her
_generosity in urging my Lord Marlborough in my favour_. I must own to
you, at the same time, that her notion, that I had not done what I did,
but upon her declining at court, has been no small inducement to me to
expose myself so frankly as I have done in my Lord Duke’s and her
particular cause; for though I could have borne she should have thought
me a _brute_, I could not endure she should think me a _rascal_.”
At his decease, the Duke left, as has been stated, “ten thousand pounds
a year” to the Duchess, according to Sir John Vanburgh, “to spoil
Blenheim her own way; and twelve thousand pounds a year to keep herself
clean and go to law.” Be that as it may, the Duchess had the credit and
satisfaction of completing the palace, which was nothing like an
habitation in Marlborough’s time, at the cost of half the sum which had
been entrusted to her out of his estates for the purpose. The triumphal
arch, and the column on which the statue of Marlborough stands, were
erected at her own expense. The united sums paid by government, and by
the Duke and his widow, are computed to amount to three hundred thousand
pounds.[379]
Of the enjoyment of law, the Duchess had indeed abundant opportunities.
In 1721, she and the Duke’s executors were sued by Edward Strong, sen.
and jun., for debts incurred on Blenheim, but were defended so
successfully that they came off triumphant. It was on an occasion of
this nature, either in this suit, or in the action brought against her
by her grandson, that she sat in court during the trial, and was so much
delighted with the address of Mr. Murray, afterwards Lord Mansfield, who
was her counsel, that she presented him, immediately after the
termination of the trial, with a fine sword, as a perpetual retainer in
her favour.[380]
The feuds which had commenced between the Duchess and Vanburgh never
subsided. Some years after all communication between them had ceased, it
was the wish of the architect to visit Blenheim, which his patroness,
Lady Carlisle, and some of her family, were desirous to inspect. Sir
John stayed two nights at Blenheim, but there was an order issued to the
servants, under the Duchess’s own hand, not to let him enter the castle,
and lest that should not mortify him sufficiently, having heard that his
wife was to be one of the party, she sent an express the night before
they came to Woodstock, with orders that if Lady Vanburgh came to
Blenheim, the servants should not suffer her to see the house and
gardens. The enraged architect and his lady were therefore obliged to
remain at the inn whilst the Castle Howard ladies viewed the
building.[381]
Such petty revenge augured a miserable old age; but the Duchess gloried
in the storm. With all her immense revenue, computed to be about forty
thousand pounds a year, she continued to wrangle about the building
debts of Blenheim, and obtained an injunction against Sir John Vanburgh
in Chancery, on the score of a sum which she could much better afford to
lose than the poor artificers, or even the architect, whom she refused
to pay, alleging that they were employed by government, and not by the
Duke of Marlborough. Upon this, Vanburgh produced Godolphin’s warrant,
and for once his interests and those of the Duchess coincided. Long and
curious details of this cause are to be found in the Coxe manuscripts;
but, however agitating and anxious the subject may have been to the
Duchess and to her enemy, the litigation to which they were obliged to
have recourse has lost its interest in modern eyes.
There is, however, no doubt but that Vanburgh was justly accused by the
Duchess of extravagance in many instances, and of exceeding his
commission in others. She even taxed him with building one entire court
at Blenheim without the Duke’s knowledge. She detected his bad taste and
grasping spirit, and despised his mismanagement,—of which latter the
best proof was, that when, upon the death of the Duke, the whole charge
of the building fell into her hands, she completed it in the manner, and
at the reduced expense, which has been described.
That “wicked woman of Marlborough,” as Sir John Vanburgh termed the
Duchess, had perhaps no greater error in his eyes than the penetration
with which she discovered his narrow pretensions, his inadequacy, and
wanton waste, not to say peculation.
It may not be deemed impertinent to sum up the foregoing account of all
the perplexities and errors which attended the building of Blenheim, by
an extract from the Duchess’s opinions of the whole affair, written many
years after the virulence of her animosity may be reasonably supposed to
have ceased.
Regarding the attack upon herself in the Examiner, which gave an account
of the sums which had been exhausted on Blenheim, the Duchess observes:
“Upon the subject of Blenheim, which every friend I have knows I was
always against building at such expense, and as long as I meddled with
it at all, I took as much pains to lessen the charge every way, as if it
had been to be paid for out of the fortune that was to provide for my
own children; for I always thought it too great a sum even for the Queen
to pay, and nothing made it tolerably easy to me but my knowing that as
she never did a generous thing of herself, if that expense had not been
recommended by the parliament, and paid out of the civil list, she would
have done nothing with the money that was better. But I never liked any
building so much for the show and vanity of it, as for its usefulness
and convenience, and therefore I was always against the whole design of
it, as too big and unwieldy; whether I considered the pleasure of living
in it, or the good of my family that were to enjoy it hereafter; besides
that the greatness of the work made it longer in finishing, and
consequently would hinder Lord Marlborough from enjoying it when it was
reasonable to lose no time; and I made Mr. Vanburgh my enemy by the
constant disputes I had with him to prevent his extravagance, which I
did effectually in many instances, notwithstanding all the follies and
waste which, in spite of all that could be said, he has certainly
committed.”[382]