GEORGE II.
Before coming to the year 1746, when the old fortress was the scene of
the imprisonment and death of the Jacobite leaders of the rebellion of
1745, it will be necessary to enter at some length into the treatment
of some obscure Scotch prisoners who, shortly before the great outbreak
in Scotland, were put to death in the Tower. The story of the deaths of
these unfortunate men has never appeared in any account of the Tower
and its prisoners, and I am therefore all the more anxious to give
as full an account as I have been able to find of that event. It was
owing to the kindness of Mr Gardiner, who placed in my hands a pamphlet
with illustrations of the time, describing the fate of the brothers
Macpherson and Shaw, that I became aware of this tragic story.[6]
This triple execution, which, as I have said, took place shortly
before the Jacobite rising in Scotland in the “’45,” may have had
something to do with the strong feeling against the English Government
which prevailed in the North; it was certainly one of those acts by
which governments make themselves and their ministers odious. And the
execution on Tower Green in 1744 may well have caused the unpopularity,
not to say hatred, amongst the Scotch of the English Government.
The only reference I have been able to find to this event are two
short passages in Hume and Smollett’s “History of England” (vol. xi.
page 164), and the other in a letter from Horace Walpole to Sir Horace
Mann (“Walpole’s Letters,” vol. i., Letter LXXIV.).
[Illustration: _Published according to Act of Parliament 1753_
_A North West View of the Tower of London._ | _Vue du coté du
Nord-ouest de la Tour de Londres._]
“King George was in Germany,” writes Hume, “the Duke of Cumberland, at
the head of the British army, was employed in Flanders, and great part
of the Highlanders were keen for insurrection; their natural feelings
were, on this occasion, stimulated by the suggestion of revenge. At
the beginning of the war, a regiment of those people had been formed
and transported with the rest of the British troops to Flanders.
Before they were embarked, a number of them deserted with their arms,
on pretence that they had been decoyed into the service by promises
and assurances that they should never be sent abroad; and this was
really the case. They were overtaken by a body of horse, persuaded to
submit, brought back to London, pinioned like malefactors, and tried
for desertion; three were shot to death _in terrorem_, and the rest
were sent to the plantations. Those who suffered were persons of some
consequence in their own country, and their fate was deeply resented by
the clans to which they belonged. It was considered a national outrage,
and the Highlanders, who are naturally vindictive, waited impatiently
for an opportunity of vengeance.”
So far, the historian upon the subject. This is the letter-writer’s
account of the matter. “We are,” writes Walpole to Mann on the 19th
May 1743, “in more confusion than we care to own. There lately came
up a highland regiment from Scotland to be sent abroad. One heard of
nothing but their good discipline and quiet disposition. When the day
came for their going to the water-side, one hundred and nine of them
mutinied, and marched away in a body. They did not care to go to where
it would be equivocal for what King they fought. Three companies of
dragoons are sent after them. If you happen to hear of any rising,
don’t be surprised—I shall not, I assure you. Sir Robert Monroe, their
Lieutenant-Colonel, before their leaving Scotland, asked some of the
Ministry: ‘But suppose there should be any rebellion in Scotland, what
shall we do for these eight hundred men?’ it was answered, ‘Why, there
would be eight hundred fewer rebels there.’”
It seems to have been a scandalous act on the part of the Government
to have drafted these Scottish soldiers to Flanders immediately upon
their arrival in London, after they had promised that they should not
be taken on foreign service. And the cruelly harsh treatment meted out
to the deserters, and the execution of the three men, must have stirred
up a strong feeling of hatred in Scotland against George the Second’s
Government—a hatred which burst into open flame in the “’45.”
The next event in the history of the Tower is the imprisonment and
execution of the Scotch Jacobite lords after the rebellion of 1745. For
more than a score of years the old fortress had been free of political
prisoners, and Tower Hill had seen no more executions. The blood of the
“Rebel Lords,” as they were called, was the last that dyed the scaffold
in England. These “Rebel Lords” were the Marquis of Tullibardine, the
Earl of Cromarty, and Lords Kilmarnock and Balmerino. Tullibardine
had already taken up arms for the cause of James in 1715, and when he
was taken prisoner after the “’45,” was a broken-down, elderly man
whose life was drawing to a close, and who was so feeble that, when
the standard of Prince Charles was unfurled at Glenfinnan, he had to
be supported by men upon either side whilst he held the flagstaff. His
father, the Duke of Athol, had obtained leave from George I. to will
his title and estates to his second surviving son, James, who succeeded
to the dukedom in 1729. Tullibardine had meanwhile fled to France, but
in 1719 made a desperate attempt to raise the clans at Kinsale. He was
defeated by General Wightmore at Glenshiel, and a proclamation was
issued for his apprehension, together with the Earl Marischal and
the Earl of Seaforth. A reward of two thousand pounds was promised for
the capture of any of these noblemen. During the next twenty-six years
Tullibardine’s life was passed in France. On the 25th of July 1745,
he landed with Prince Charles at Borodale, and, as it has been said,
it was he who unfurled the Prince’s standard on the 19th of August at
Glenfinnan.
[Illustration: _Scotch Prisoners entering the Tower 1742_]
After the defeat of the Pretender’s forces at Culloden, Tullibardine
fled to Mull, but he was too broken in health even to attempt escape
from the English troops sent out for his capture, and finally
surrendered himself to Buchanan of Drumskill. Taken first to Dumbarton
Castle, and then to Edinburgh, he was sent from the latter place to
London by sea. On his arrival at the Tower, Tullibardine was in an
almost dying state, and Lord Cornwallis, the Governor, was allowed
by the following order, to send a Dr Wilmott to attend “the person
formerly called Marquis of Tullibardine, a prisoner in your custody,
from time to time as he shall desire during his indisposition, provided
the same to be in the presence of you or the Lieutenant.” On the 9th
of July this staunch Cavalier died in the Tower, thus escaping a
public execution; he was only fifty-eight years old. He was buried in
St Peter’s Chapel. William, Earl of Kilmarnock, who was head of the
family of Errol, had fought at Culloden, and was taken prisoner with
Lord Balmerino. These, together with the Earl of Cromarty, who had
been captured at the castle of Dunrobin, in Sutherland, were brought
to London by sea, the warrant which committed them to the Tower being
dated the 28th of July.
The following letter from Mrs Osborn, the famous Dorothy Osborn’s
great-niece by marriage, and a daughter of the first Lord Torrington,
and wife of John Osborn, of Chicksands, in Bedfordshire, to her son,
Sir Danvers Osborn, dated 9th December 1745, gives an interesting
picture of the state of public feeling. She writes of the “most
shameful panick” which had seized London on the news of the advance
of the Scottish army. People were hurrying from their country houses
for shelter in the capital, and bringing their plate with them wherever
they could. This “panick” lasted for four days, and then came the news
of the retreat from Derby northwards, and people went home again. She
says: “The Prisoners come to the Tower a fryday, ’tis not yet clear if
the Pretender’s brother is there. They have strong suspicion still, but
the Ministry don’t choose to talk about it.” In the following June,
Mrs Osborn writes from Kensington: “’Tis thought ’twill be August
before the Lords can be try’d. After some forms are past, the Peers
must have 20 days notice. Lady Cromarty is in town, has been at the
Tower to enquire after her lord. She was at Williamson’s, and cryd most
bitterly, but no one is suffered so much as to look up at the windows.
They were all brought into Williamson’s, and from there one by one
conducted to their apartments. No one knows where the other is, and
they are kept very strict, since the King of France has ordered a most
insolent Letter, and takes himself to be King of England to forbid us
punishing the Rebels. Is the Prelates got off or not?” asks Mrs Osborn,
adding rather cold-bloodedly: “I wish they could have been beheaded at
Edinburgh, and not make such a long piece of work as the forms will do
here.”
The trial of these “Rebel Lords” took place at Westminster Hall
with much ceremonial. The Lord High Steward, Philip Yorke, Earl
of Hardwicke, arrived from Ormond Street, attended by a train of
gentlemen-at-arms, Black Rod and Garter King at Arms supporting him.
He was received by the guard in Old Palace Yard, “by drums beating as
to the Royal family.” The peers were in their robes, and the grand old
Hall was filled to its utmost limits with a vast crowd of spectators.
Horace Walpole, writing to Mann, says: “I am this moment come from the
conclusion of the greatest and most melancholy scene I ever saw; you
will easily guess it was the trial of the rebel Lords. As it was the
most interesting sight, it was the most solemn and fine. A coronation
is a puppet show, and all the splendours of it idle; but this sight
at once feasted one’s eyes, and engaged all one’s passions. It began
last Monday; the three parts of Westminster Hall were enclosed with
galleries, and hung with scarlet; and the whole ceremony was conducted
with the most awful solemnity and decency, except in the one point
of leaving the prisoners at the bar amidst the idle curiosity of the
crowd, and even with the witnesses who had sworn against them, while
the Lords adjourned to their own house to consult. No part of the
Royal Family was there, which was a proper regard for the unhappy
men, who were become their victims. One hundred and thirty-nine Lords
were present, and made a noble sight on their benches, frequent
and full. The Chancellor was Lord High Steward, but though a most
comely personage with a fine voice, his behaviour was mean, curiously
searching for occasion to bow to the Minister (Henry Pelham) that is no
Peer, and consequently applying to the other Ministers in a manner for
their orders: and not even ready at the ceremonial. To the prisoners
he was peevish; and instead of keeping to the humane dignity of the
law of England, whose character it is to point out favour to the
criminal, he crossed them, and almost scolded at any offer they made
towards defence. Lord Kilmarnock is past forty, but looks younger. He
is tall and slender, with an extremely fine person; his behaviour a
most just mixture between dignity and submission; if in anything to be
reprehended, a little affected, and his hair too exactly dressed for
a man in his situation. But when I say this, it is not to find fault,
but to show how little fault there is to be found. For Lord Balmerino,
he is the most natural, brave old fellow I ever saw; the lightest
intrepidity, even to indifference. At the bar he behaved like a soldier
and a man; in the intervals of form with carelessness and humour. He
pressed extremely to have his wife, his pretty Peggy, with him in the
Tower. When they were brought from the Tower in separate coaches, there
was some dispute in which the axe must go, old Balmerino cried, ‘Come,
come, put it with me!’ At the bar he played with his fingers upon the
axe, while he talked with the gentleman gaoler; and one day, somebody
coming up to listen, he took the blade and held it like a fan between
their faces. During the trial a little boy was near him, but not tall
enough to see, he made room for the child, and placed him near himself.
When the trial began, the two Earls (Kilmarnock and Cromarty) pleaded
guilty, Balmerino not guilty, saying he would prove his not being at
the taking of the Castle of Carlisle, as was said in the indictment.
Then the King’s Counsel opened, and Serjeant Skinner pronounced the
most absurd speech imaginable. Then some witnesses were examined,
whom afterwards the old hero shook cordially by the hand. The Lords
withdrew to their house, and returning, demanded of the judges whether,
one point not being proved, though all the rest were, the indictment
was false? to which they unanimously answered in the negative. Then
the Lord Steward asked the Peers severally whether Lord Balmerino
was guilty. All said, ‘Guilty upon honour,’ and then adjourned, the
prisoner having begged pardon for giving them so much trouble. On
Wednesday the prisoners were again brought to Westminster Hall, at
about eleven o’clock, to receive sentence; and being asked what they
had to say, Lord Kilmarnock, with a fine voice, read a very fine
speech, confessing the extent of his crime, but offering his principles
as some alleviation.”
The executions were fixed to take place on the 18th of August, the
news being broken to Lord Kilmarnock by his friend, Mr J. Foster,
a clergyman. When old Balmerino was told by the Lieutenant of the
Tower, General Williamson, of the fatal day, he was at dinner with
his wife (Margaret, daughter of Captain Chalmers). “Lady Balmerino,”
writes Williamson, “being very much surprised, he desired her not
to be concerned at it, his lady seemed very disconsolate, and rose
immediately from table, on which he started from his chair, and said
‘Pray, my Lady, sit down, for it shall not spoil your dinner.’ ‘The
brave old fellow,’ as Walpole calls Lord Balmerino, and with justice,
turned upon the General, ‘Lieutenant,’ he said, ‘with your damned
warrant you have spoiled my Lady’s dinner.’”
The following account of the execution of the Jacobite leaders is taken
from the _Gentleman’s Magazine_ for the month of August 1745, and
appears to have been the most accurate and the most detailed:—
At six o’clock a troop of lifeguards, and 1000 of the
footguards—being fifteen men out of each company, marched from the
parade in St James’s park thro’ the city to Tower-hill, to attend
the execution of the Earl of Kilmarnock and the Lord Balmerino,
and being arrived there were posted in lines from the Tower to
the scaffold, and all around it. About 8 o’clock the Sheriffs of
London, and their under sheriffs and their officers, _viz._ six
sergeants at mace, six yeomen, and the executioner, met at the
Mitre Tavern in Fenchurch Street, where they breakfasted, and
went from thence to the house, lately the Transport Office, on
Tower-hill near Catherine’s Court, hired by them for the reception
of the said lords, before they should be conducted to the scaffold
which was erected about thirty yards from the said house.
At ten o’clock the block was fixed on the stage and covered with
black cloth, and several sacks of sawdust up to strew on it;
soon after their coffins were brought, covered with black cloth,
ornamented with gilt nails, etc. On the Earl of Kilmarnock’s
was a plate with this inscription, “Guliemus Come de Kilmarnock
decollatur 18 Augusti 1746. Etat suae 42,” with an Earl’s coronet
over it, and six coronets over the six handles; and on Lord
Balmerino’s, was a plate with this inscription, “Arthurus Dominus
de Balmerino decollatur 18 Augusti 1746. Etat suae 58,” with a
baron’s coronet over it, and six others over the six handles. At a
quarter after ten the Sheriffs went in procession to the outward
gate of the Tower, and after knocking at it some time, a warder
within asked, “Who’s there?” The officer without replied, “The
sheriffs of London and Middlesex.” The warder then asked, “What
do they want?” The officer answered, “The bodies of William, Earl
of Kilmarnock, and Arthur, Lord Balmerino,” upon which the warder
within said, “I will go and inform the Lieutenant of the Tower,”
and in about ten minutes the Lieutenant of the Tower with the Earl
of Kilmarnock, and Major White with Lord Balmerino, guarded by
several of the warders, came to the gate; the prisoners were then
delivered to the Sheriffs who gave proper receipt for their bodies
to the Lieutenant, who as usual said, “God bless King George!”
to which the Earl of Balmerino assented by a bow, and the Lord
Balmerino said, “God bless King J——s.” Lord Kilmarnock had met Lord
Balmerino at the foot of the first stairs, he embraced him, who
said to him, “My lord, I am heartily sorry to have your company in
this expedition.” Soon after the procession, moving in a slow and
solemn manner, appeared in the following order:—
1. The Constable of the Tower.
2. The Knight Marshal’s men and Tipsters.
3. The Sheriffs’ Officers.
4. The Sheriffs, the prisoners, and their chaplains. Mr Sheriff
Blachford walking with the Earl of Kilmarnock, and Mr Sheriff
Cockayne with the Lord Balmerino.
5. The Tower Warders.
6. A guard of musqueteers.
7. The two hearses and a mourning coach.
When the procession had passed through the lines within the area
of the circle formed by the guards, the passage was closed, and
the troops of horse who were in the rear of the foot in the lines
wheeled off, and drew five feet deep behind the foot, on the south
side of the hill facing the scaffold. The lords were conducted into
separate apartments in the house, facing the steps of the scaffold;
their friends being admitted to them. The Earl of Kilmarnock was
attended by the Rev. Mr Foster, a dissenting minister, and the Rev.
Mr Hume, a near relative of the Earl of Hume; and the chaplain
of the Tower, and another clergyman of the Church of England,
accompanied Lord Balmerino; who on entering the door of the house,
hearing several of the spectators ask eagerly “Which is Lord
Balmerino?” answered smiling, “I am Lord Balmerino, gentlemen, at
your service.” The parlour and passage of the house, the rails
enclosing the way thence to the scaffold, and the rails about
it, were all hung with black at the sheriff’s expense. The Lord
Kilmarnock in the apartment allotted to him, spent about an hour
at his devotions with Mr Foster, who assisted him with prayer and
exhortation. After which Lord Balmerino pursuant to his request,
being admitted to confer with the Earl, first thank’d him for the
favour, and then ask’d, if his lordship knew of any order signed by
the Prince (meaning the Pretender’s son) to give no quarter at the
battle of Culloden! And the Earl answering No, the Lord Balmerino
added, nor I neither, and therefore it seems to be an invention to
justify their own murders! The Earl replied he did not think this
a fair inference, because he was informed, after he was prisoner
at Inverness, by several officers, that such an order, signed by
George Murray, was in the Duke’s custody; “George Murray!” said
Lord Balmerino, “then they should not charge it on the Prince!”
Then he took his leave, embracing Lord Kilmarnock, with the same
kind of noble and generous compliments, as he had used before,
“My dear Lord Kilmarnock, I am only sorry that I cannot pay the
reckoning alone; once more, farewell for ever!” His persone was
tall and graceful, his countenance mild, and his complexion pale;
and more so as he had been indisposed. He then returned to his
own room. The Earl then, with the company kneeling down, join’d
in a prayer delivered by Mr Foster; after which having sat a
few moments, and taken a second refreshment of a glass of wine,
he expressed a desire that Lord Balmerino might go first to the
scaffold; but being informed this could not be, as his lordship
was named first on the warrant: he appeared satisfied, saluted
his friends, saying he would make no speech on the scaffold,
but desired the minister to assist him in his last moments, and
then accordingly with other friends, proceeded with him to the
scaffold. The multitude who had long been expecting to see him on
such an awful occasion, on his first appearing upon the scaffold,
dressed in black with a countenance and demeanour, testifying great
contrition, showed the deepest signs of commiseration and pity; and
his lordship at the same time, being struck with such a variety of
dreadful objects at once, the multitude, the block, his coffin,
the executioner, the instrument of death, turned about to Mr Hume,
and said, “Hume, this is terrible,” tho’ without changing his
voice or countenance. After putting up a short prayer, concluding
with a petition for his Majesty King George, and the royal family,
in vindication of his declaration: in his speech, his lordship
embraced and took a last leave of his friends. The executioner, who
before had something administered to keep him from fainting, was
so affected by his lordship’s distress, and the awfulness of the
scene that, on asking his forgiveness, he burst into tears. My Lord
bade him take courage, giving him at the same time a purse with
five guineas, and telling him that he would drop his handkerchief
as a signal for the stroke. He proceeded, with the help of his
gentlemen, to make ready for the block, by taking off his coat,
and the bag from his hair, which was then tucked up under a napkin
cap, but this being made up so wide as not to keep up his long
hair, the making it less caused a little delay; his neck being
laid bare, tucking down the collar of his shirt and waistcoat, he
kneeled down on a black cushion at the block, and drew his cap
over his eyes, in doing which, as well as in putting up his hair,
his hands were observed to shake; but either to support himself,
or as a more convenient posture for devotion, he happened to lay
both his hands upon the block, which the executioner observing,
prayed his lordship to let them fall, lest they should be mangled,
or break the blow. He was then told that the neck of his waistcoat
was in the way, upon which he rose, and with the help of a friend
took it off, and the neck being made bare to the shoulders, he
kneeled down as before. In the meantime, when all things were ready
for the execution, and the black bays which hung over the rails
of the scaffold having, by direction of the Colonel of the Guard,
or the Sheriffs, been turned up that the people might see all the
circumstances of the execution; in about two minutes (the time he
before fixed) after he kneeled down, his lordship dropping his
handkerchief, the executioner at once severed the head from the
body, except only a small part of the skin, which was immediately
divided by a gentle stroke; the head was received in a piece of red
baize, and, with the body, immediately put into the coffin. The
scaffold was then cleansed from the blood, fresh sawdust strewed,
and, that no appearance of a former execution might remain, the
executioner changed such of his clothes as appeared bloody.
[Illustration: _J. M. del. et Soulpe_ _Publish’d according to Act of
Parliament_
_The Governor of yᵉ Tower delivering the Prisoners to the Sheriffs of
London at the Barr for Execution_
_The View of the scaffold with the Guards Surrounding at the time of
Execution_
_A PERSPECTIVE VIEW of TOWER HILL and the Place of EXECUTION of the
LORDS KILMARNOCK and BALMERINO on Monday 18 of August 1746_]
In the meantime Lord Balmerino was waiting for his own end with
that imperturbable courage which never seemed to desert him. He
talked cheerfully with his friends, and drinking a glass of wine,
blithely asked them to drink to his “ain degrae ta haiven.” When
the under-sheriff came to summon him to the scaffold the old lord
interrupted him by asking how the executioner had done his work
upon Lord Kilmarnock, and remarking that it was well done, turned
to his friends and said, “Gentlemen, I shall detain you no longer,”
immediately proceeding to the scaffold, “which he mounted with so easy
an air as astounded the spectators.” He wore the uniform in which
he had fought at the battle of Culloden, a blue coat turned up with
red, with brass buttons, and a tie wig. Having walked several times
round the scaffold, he bowed to the people, and going up to the coffin
lying ready to receive his body, he read the inscription, saying, “It
is right”; then he carefully examined the block which he called his
“pillow of rest.” He required his spectacles to read the speech he had
prepared, and “read it with an audible voice, which, so far from being
filled with passionate invective, mentioned his Majesty as a prince
of the greatest magnanimity and mercy, at the same time that, thro’
erroneous political principles, it denied him a right to the allegiance
of his people.” This speech was duly handed over to the Sheriff, and
when the executioner came forward to beg Lord Balmerino’s pardon, as
was the custom, the staunch old nobleman said, “Friend, you need not
ask me forgiveness, the execution of your duty is commendable!” Then
he gave him three guineas, adding, “Friend, I never was rich, this is
all the money I have now, and I am sorry I cannot add anything to it
but my coat and waistcoat.” These he himself placed upon his coffin,
together with his neckcloth, and putting on a plaid cap, declared
that he died a Scotchman. He next bade farewell to his friends, and
then looking down upon the crowd said to a gentleman who stood near
him, “Perhaps some may think my behaviour too bold, but remember,
sir, that I now declare it is the effect of confidence in God, and a
good conscience, and I should dissemble, if I should shew any signs
of fear.” As he passed the executioner he took the axe from his hand
and felt the edge, and, returning it to the man, clapped him on the
shoulder to encourage him. Turning down the collar of his shirt he
showed the man where to strike, bidding him “do it resolutely, for
in that would consist his kindness.” After giving the Tower warders
some money, he asked which was his hearse, and ordered the driver to
bring it nearer. “Immediately,” says the writer in the _Gentleman’s
Magazine_, “without trembling, or changing countenance, he again knelt
at the block, and having with his arms stretched out, said, ‘O Lord,
reward my friends; forgive my enemies—and receive my soul,’ he gave the
signal by letting them fall, but his uncommon firmness and intrepidity,
and the unexpected suddenness of the signal, so surprised the
executioner, that though he struck the part directed, the blow was not
given with strength enough to wound him very deep; on which it seemed
as if he made an effort to turn his head towards the executioner, and
the under jaw fell and returned very quick, like anger and gnashing
the teeth; but it could not be otherwise, the part being convulsed. A
second blow immediately succeeding, the first rendered him, however,
quite insensible, and a third finished the work. His head was received
in a piece of red baize, and with his body put into the coffin, which,
at his particular request, was placed on that of the late Marquis of
Tullibardine in St Peter’s Chapel Church in the Tower, all three Lords
lying in one grave.”
[Illustration: _A -True- Representation of TOWER-HILL, as it Appear’d
from a rais’d point of View on the North side, Augᵗ. yᵉ 18ᵗʰ. 1746,
when the Earl of Kilmarnock and the Lord Balmerino were Beheaded._]
At the close of that year the brother of the ill-fated Earl of
Derwentwater, Charles Radclyffe, was also executed on the same spot. He
came very gallantly to the scaffold dressed “in scarlet trimm’d with
gold, a gold laced waistcoat, and white feathers in his hat.” He was
actually Earl of Derwentwater, his coffin in St Giles’s in the Fields
bearing the inscription, “Carolus Radclyffe, Comes de Derwentwater,
decollatur, 8 Dec. 1746, Ætis 53. Requiescat in Pace.” But although the
Derwentwater estates had only been confiscated to the Crown for his
life a clause in a later Act of Parliament directed that “the issue
of any person attainted of High Treason, born and bred in any foreign
dominion, and a Roman Catholic, shall forfeit his reversion of such
estate, and the remainder shall for ever be fixed in the Crown, his
son is absolutely deprived of any title or interest in the fortune of
that ancient family to the amount of better than £200,000.” Charles
Radclyffe, was the younger brother of James, Earl of Derwentwater,
and with him had been taken prisoner at Preston, and condemned to
death after trial and conviction. But he had been respited, and it
was thought would ultimately have been pardoned, had he not escaped
from his prison in Newgate. He went to France, and following the
Pretender to Rome, was given a small pension by that prince, and this
was literally all that he had to live upon. Later, he returned to
Paris, and there he married the widow of Lord Newburgh, by whom he
had a son. He came to England in 1733, but went back again to France
and accepted a commission from Louis XIV., “to act as officer in the
late rebellion.” But before he could reach Scotland on board the
_Esperance_, he, his men, and several other Scotch and Irish officers
were captured by an English vessel, and Charles Radclyffe ended his
unfortunate career as intrepidly as he had lived it, on Tower Hill.
By this time the axe had almost done its work in England, and Tower
Hill was to see only one more head laid upon the block—that of Simon
Fraser, Lord Lovat, who was the last of the Jacobite lords to be
executed. Lord Lovat’s long life had begun in 1667, and it had been
as wild and vicious as it had been lengthy. Like the Regent Orléans,
he might very justly have been called a “fanfaron de vice.” In his
youth he had lived in Paris, where he had become a Roman Catholic, if
such a man as Lovat could be said to have any religion. He enjoyed
what was probably a unique experience in that he was imprisoned both
in the Bastille and in the Tower, for although there is no authority
for saying that he was the only man who underwent imprisonment in the
great State prisons of England and of France, on the other hand, there
is also no authority for saying that he was not. He had been in the
Bastille in 1702, on the charge of having betrayed a Jacobite plot to
the English Government. Although not actually in arms during the “’45”
rebellion, Lovat had kept up a correspondence with the Young Pretender;
and this correspondence cost him his life. When captured at the Isle
of Moran, after the Battle of Culloden, he was so infirm that he had
to be carried to Edinburgh in a litter, and thence in the same way to
Berwick, and so to London.
[Illustration: _The_ =Effigie= _of the late =CHARLES RATCLIFFE Esqʳ.=
who was beheaded on little Tower Hill, Monday Decemʳ 8ᵗʰ. 1746. for
being concern’d in the Rebellion in the Year 1745._]
It was at the White Hart at St Albans that Hogarth met him, and there
it was that great artist painted the admirable little full-length
portrait of the old Jacobite, which is now in the National Portrait
Gallery. Hogarth used to say that he painted Lovat as he sat counting
up the numbers of the rebel forces on his fingers. The engraving of
this portrait, taken by the artist himself, had an immense success at
the time, the printing press being kept employed day and night, and for
a considerable time Hogarth made twelve pounds a day by its sale.
Lovat arrived at the Tower on the 15th of August 1746, and according
to the account given in the _Gentleman’s Magazine_ for that month,
came “in an open Landau driven by six horses, guarded by a party of
Liguier’s Horse, and accompany’d in the Landau by an officer—as he
passed through the streets he seemed very unconcerned, but coming
on the hill, he turn’d his eyes towards the scaffold erecting for
beholding the execution of the lords, and lifting up his hands, said,
‘A few days, and it will be my awful fate!’”
The whole aspect of Tower Hill, with the exception of the appearance
of the old fortress and its outer walls, has been entirely changed
since Lovat saw it with the huge scaffoldings being erected for the
spectators of his companions’ executions—and for his own a few months
later. The house into which they were led to await their death no
longer exists. It occupied the north-east corner of Catherine’s Court,
and was formerly the Transport Office. From a raised platform, which
was flush with the scaffold, the Jacobite lords walked from the house,
which stood immediately opposite to the spot where so many remarkable
men have perished by the axe of the headsman. During the last few years
the actual site of the scaffold has been marked by a tablet in the
garden that now surrounds the place of execution, where the axe had
done its work from the time of Edward Plantagenet, Earl of Warwick,
the son of the Duke of Clarence, to that of Simon Fraser, Lord Lovat.
With the latter ended the long list of State executions on Tower Hill,
which, during five centuries, had stained its soil with some of the
noblest blood in the country.
On the 18th of December, Lovat was taken from the Tower to the House of
Lords, where the articles of his impeachment were read to him. The best
account of the trial is undoubtedly that contained in one of the many
letters written by Horace Walpole to Sir Horace Mann. Writing on the
20th of March 1747, Walpole says: “I have been living at old Lovat’s
trial, and was willing to have it over before I talked to you about
it. It lasted seven days; the evidence was as strong as possible; and
after all he had denounced he made no defence. The Solicitor-General
(Sir William Murray), who was one of the managers of the House of
Commons, shone extremely. The Attorney-General (Sir Dudley Ryder),
who is a much greater lawyer, is cold and tedious. The old creature’s
behaviour has been foolish, and at last indecent.
[Illustration: _Execution of the Rebel Lords 1746_]
“When he came to the Tower, he told them that if he were not so old
and infirm, they would find it difficult to keep him there. They
told him they had kept much younger. ‘Yes,’ said he, ‘but they were
inexperienced; they had not broke so many gaols as I have.’ At his own
home he used to say, that for thirty years of his life he never saw
a gallows but it made his neck ache. His last act was to shift his
treason upon his eldest son, whom he forced into the rebellion. He told
Williamson, the Lieutenant of the Tower, ‘We will hang my eldest son,
and then my second shall marry your niece.’ He has a sort of ready
humour at repartee, not very well adapted to his situation. One day
that Williamson complained that he could not sleep, he was so haunted
with rats, he replied: ‘What do you say, that you are so haunted with
Ratcliffes?’ The first day, as he was brought to his trial, a woman
looked into the coach, and said: ‘You ugly old dog, don’t you think
you will have that frightful head cut off?’ He replied: ‘You ugly old
——, I believe I shall!’ At his trial he affected great weakness and
infirmities, but often broke out into passions; particularly at the
first witness, who was his vassal. He asked him how he dared to come
thither; the man replied, to satisfy his conscience. The two last days
he behaved ridiculously, joking, and making everybody laugh, even at
the sentence. He said to Lord Ilchester, who sat near the bar: ‘Je
meurs pour ma patrie, et ne m’en soucie guère.’ When he withdrew, he
said: ‘Adieu, my Lords, we shall never meet again in the same place!’
He says he will be hanged, for his neck is so short and bearded that
he should be struck in the shambles. I did not think it possible to
feel so little as I did at so melancholy a spectacle, but tyranny and
villany, wound up by buffoonery, took off all edge of concern.”
Thursday, April 9th, was the day fixed for Lovat’s execution, and
shortly before he arrived on Tower Hill one of the scaffoldings built
for the spectators of his execution, and which held nearly a thousand
people, suddenly collapsed, eight or ten persons being killed outright,
whilst many others had broken legs and arms. Whatever may be thought of
the action of the Hanoverian Court in beheading the rebellious Jacobite
lords, there is no doubt that a richly-deserved punishment was meted
out to Lovat. Forty years before, at the last session of the Scottish
Parliament, previous to the union of the two countries, Lord Belhaven
had declared in a memorable speech, that Captain Fraser, as Lord Lovat
then was, “deserved, if practicable, to have been hanged five several
times, in five different places, and upon five different accounts at
least, as having been a traitor to the Court of St James’s, a traitor
to the Court of St Germains, a traitor to the Court of Versailles, and
a traitor to his own country of Scotland; that he deserved to be hanged
as a condemned criminal, outlaw, and fugitive, for his treatment of the
widow of the late Lord Lovat’s sister. Nay, so hardened was Captain
Fraser, that he erected a gallows, and threatened to hang thereon the
lady’s brother, and some other gentlemen of quality who accompanied
him, in going to rescue her out of that criminal’s cruel hands.” This
was in 1706, and to judge by all accounts of Lovat’s career in the
next forty years, he deserved to be hanged yet five times more, “if
practicable.”
[Illustration: _The north west prospect of the Tower of LONDON_
_at the time of Execution of the rebel Lords, in 1746–7 with a
particular View of the falling of a Scaffold, whereby above fifty
lost their lives and were disabled at the Execution of Lord Lovat_.]
Lovat waked about three o’clock on the morning of his execution, and
was heard to “pray with genuine emotion.” He was very cheerful, and
having ordered his wig to be sent to the barber, “that he might have
time to comb it out genteely, he sat down to a breakfast of minced
veal,” ordering coffee and chocolate for his friends, whose health he
drank in wine and water. When the Sheriff of London came to demand
his body, he responded to the call with alacrity, saying, “I am ready”;
and on his way downstairs accepted General Williamson’s invitation to
rest in the Lieutenant’s room, and asked him in French if he could
“take leave of his lady, and thank her for her civilities. But the
General told his lordship in the same language that she was too much
affected with his lordship’s misfortunes to bear the shock of seeing
him, and therefore hoped his lordship would excuse her.” From the
Lieutenant’s house, Lord Lovat was conveyed in the Governor’s coach
to the Outer Gate, where he was delivered over to the Sheriffs, who
took him in another coach to the house which had already served as the
last resting-place of Lords Balmerino and Kilmarnock on the way to the
scaffold. Here a room had been got ready for him, hung with black cloth
and with sconces. At first his friends were denied admittance, but upon
Lord Lovat applying to the Sheriffs, leave was granted. During the time
of waiting Lovat thanked the Sheriffs for “their favours,” and desired
that his clothes might be given up to his friends with his body, also
asking that his head might be received in a white cloth, and put into
the coffin. This was promised, as well as that the holding up of the
head at the corner of the scaffold should be dispensed with. Lord Lovat
was assisted up the steps of the scaffold by two warders, and looking
round on the great multitude of people, exclaimed, “God save us! why
should there be such a bustle about taking off an old grey head, that
cannot go up three steps without three bodies to support it.” Then
seeing that one of his friends looked very unhappy, he slapped him on
the shoulder, saying: “Cheer up thy heart, man, I am not afraid, why
should you?” Like old Lord Balmerino, he felt the edge of the axe, and
examined his coffin, upon which was inscribed: “Simon Fraser Dominus
de Lovat, Decollat April 9, 1747. Ætat Suae 80.” After repeating some
lines from Horace and Ovid, according to the _Gentleman’s Magazine_,
“he called his solicitor and agent in Scotland, Mr Wm. Fraser, and
presented him with his gold-headed cane, and said: ‘I deliver you
this cane in token of my sense of your faithful services, and of my
committing to you all the power I leave upon earth,’ and then embraced
him. He also called for Mr James Fraser, and said, ‘My dear James, I
am going to Heaven, but you must continue to crawl a little longer
in this evil world.’ And taking leave of both, he deliver’d his hat,
wig, and clothes to Mr William Fraser, and desired him to see that
the executioner did not touch them; he ordered his cap to be put on,
and unloosing his neckcloth and the collar of his shirt, he kneeled
down at the block, and pulled the cloth which was to receive his head
close to him. But being placed too near the block, the executioner
desired him to remove a little farther back, which, with the warders’
assistance, was immediately done; and his neck being properly placed,
he told the executioner he would say a short prayer, and then give the
signal by dropping his handkerchief. In this position he remained about
half a minute, and then, throwing his handkerchief upon the floor,
the executioner at one blow severed his head from his body, which was
received in the cloth, and together with his body put into the coffin,
and carried in the hearse back to the Tower, where it remained until
four o’clock, and was then taken away by an undertaker, in order to
be sent to Scotland, and deposited in his own tomb in the church of
Kirkhill; but leave not being given, as was expected, it was again
brought back to the Tower, and interred near the bodies of the other
lords. Lord Lovat, in a codicil to his will, had ordered that all the
pipers from John o’ Groats to Edinburgh were to play before his corpse,
for which they were to have a handsome allowance, and though he did
not expect this wish to be complied with, yet he said that he hoped
that the good old women of his country would sing a ‘coronach’ before
him.” The legend that Lovat’s ghost, in a monk’s dress, appeared during
a tempest with its head under its arm, probably had its origin in
this desire of his to have a great Scottish wake at his funeral, and
also to his once having worn the dress of a Jesuit priest in one of his
adventures at St Omer; of this there is a curious contemporary print.
[Illustration: A REPRESENTATION _of the Execution of Lord LOVAT_.
A. _The scaffold._
B. _Lord Lovat’s head on yᵉ Block._
C. _Cloth to receive the Head._
D. _The Executioner with yᵉ Axe._
E. _The Coffin._
F. _The House from which he came on the Scaffold._
_Execution of Lord Lovat 1746_]
Lord Cromarty was pardoned, owing to the exertions of his wife, who
petitioned every member of the Privy Council, and had fallen in a swoon
at the feet of George II. at Kensington, in the very act of presenting
him with a petition for mercy. Her prayer was more graciously received
by that sovereign than Lady Nithsdale’s petition had been by his
father. It is said that a son born to Lady Cromarty about this time had
the mark of an axe upon its neck.
The block, now in the Armoury of the Tower, is undoubtedly the one
upon which Lovat was beheaded, and is declared to have originally been
made for his execution. The axe which stands beside it was used to
behead him, as well as the other Jacobite lords who suffered death in
1746, but whether it was used previous to these executions cannot be
ascertained with any certainty.
Although Lord Lovat was the last person beheaded in England, a peer was
hanged at Tyburn after being imprisoned in the Tower in the last year
of the reign of George II. This was Lawrence Shirley, Earl Ferrers,
who had murdered his steward, Johnson, in cold blood. Probably if
this crime had been committed in these days Lord Ferrers would have
benefited by a more merciful dispensation. That he had been insane on
several occasions is certain, and he had been wilder and more reckless
in his manner of life than could be accounted for by anything short of
madness, his fits of wild rage clearly pointing to a disordered brain.
He had married a harmless and amiable woman, the daughter of Sir V.
Meredith, and she, unable to live with such a brutal husband as Ferrers
proved himself to be, had obtained a judicial separation. Ferrers was
wildly extravagant, and it was owing to his debts that the unfortunate
lawyer, Johnson, who had been appointed by a special Act of Parliament
to manage the Shirley estates, was made the steward of the property.
Ferrers had repeatedly sworn that he would rid himself of this agent
and steward, and having enticed him to his house, deliberately shot the
poor man as he knelt begging for his life. Ferrers was arrested, and
brought to the Tower under a guard of constables. A stranger procession
than that of Lord Ferrers to his prison can scarcely be imagined.
He was in his own carriage, a landau drawn by six horses, and was
dressed in “a riding frock, wearing boots, and a jockey cap.” In this
costume he appeared before the House of Lords in February 1760. He was
imprisoned in the Middle Tower, two warders being in an adjoining room,
whilst two sentries kept guard at the foot of the Tower stairs. There
he remained for the two months which elapsed before his trial. On the
5th of May he was hanged at Tyburn, with all the pomp and circumstance
that in those days clung to the death of a criminal if he were a
nobleman. Being an Earl, Lord Ferrers was allowed to be strangled out
of existence by a silken instead of a hempen rope, and although the
sentence of his execution included the order that his body was to be
dissected, the order was dispensed with.
Lord Ferrers was taken from the Tower in his own carriage, drawn by
six horses, to the gallows. He wore a superb dress, a pale-coloured
silk coat edged with silver lace, and was accompanied by grenadiers,
and horse and foot guards, his carriage being followed by some of the
coaches of members of his family, and his hearse, which was also drawn
by six horses. The streets were so crowded to see this unusual sight,
that it took the procession three hours to reach Tyburn from the Tower.
Lord Ferrers went out of the world in a far more becoming manner than
he had lived in it. He regretted, he said, not to have been allowed
to be executed on Tower Hill, where his ancestor, the Earl of Essex,
had been beheaded. If he actually made this remark, he could not
have been aware that his ancestor had not been beheaded on Tower Hill,
but within the Tower walls, on the Green. To judge by his portrait,
painted by the French portrait painter, Andran, Lord Ferrers had a
bullet-shaped head, and must have closely resembled the ordinary type
of jockey when he appeared in his riding-boots and jockey cap before
his peers at his trial.
[Illustration: _Waggons going into the Tower with treasure taken from
the Spaniards (temp. George II.)_]
One of the greatest naval achievements of the last century must not be
omitted from the story of the Tower during George the Second’s reign.
The great Spanish treasure, worth a million and a half of dollars,
captured by Lord Anson, with his ship, the _Centurion_, on the 20th of
June 1743, was brought to the Tower the following year. Two rare old
engravings are here reproduced, in which the treasure-laden waggons
are being haled by the joyous crowd up Tower Hill. Since the days of
Elizabeth, when the ships of Drake and Raleigh despoiled the fleets
and merchantmen of the Spaniards, no such spoil as this had rewarded
British prowess.