Queen on Trial (eBook)

The Affair of Queen Caroline

E. A. Smith (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2016 | 1. Auflage
256 Seiten
The History Press (Verlag)
978-0-7509-8166-8 (ISBN)

Infos

Chronicling as it does the breakdown of George IV's marriage to his loathed cousin Caroline, and his futile attempt to divorce her and deprive her of her royal rights and status, A Queen on Trial throws up fascinating parallels with Diana and Charles' acrimonious separation and comes as a timely reminder of the cyclical, repetitive nature of history.

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TWO

CAROLINE CLAIMS HER RIGHTS

ing George III died on 29 January 1820. The new King George IV was proclaimed on the 31st, the 30th being the anniversary of the execution of Charles I, and he at once determined to exclude his estranged wife from the position of Queen, demanded that her name be left out of the Anglican liturgy, and indicated his determination to seek a divorce. He refused to listen to his ministers’ protests and even appeared to be ready to dismiss them if they did not do as he wished.

Charles Greville, Clerk to the Privy Council, recorded these events in his diary.

February 4th – . . . On Sunday last arrived the news of the King’s death. The new King has been desperately ill. He had a bad cold at Brighton, for which he lost eighty ounces of blood; yet he afterwards had a severe oppression, amounting almost to suffocation, on his chest. . . . Yesterday afternoon he was materially better for the first time. . . .

February 14th – The Cabinet sat till past two o’clock this morning. The King refused several times to order the Queen to be prayed for in the alteration which was made in the Liturgy. The Ministers wished him to suffer it to be done, but he peremptorily refused, and said nothing should induce him to consent, whoever might ask him. . . .

February 20th – The Ministers had resigned last week because the King would not hear reason on the subject of the Princess. It is said that he treated Lord Liverpool very coarsely, and ordered him out of the room. The King, they say, asked him ‘if he knew to whom he was speaking’. He replied, ‘Sir, I know that I am speaking to my Sovereign, and I believe I am addressing him as it becomes a loyal subject to do.’ To the Chancellor he said, ‘My Lord, I know your conscience always interferes except where your interest is concerned.’ The King afterwards sent for Lord Liverpool, who refused at first to go; but afterwards, on the message being reiterated, he went, and the King said, ‘We have both been too hasty.’ This is probably all false, but it is very true that they offered to resign.

John Wilson Croker, a Tory Member of Parliament, also kept a diary:

Jan. 31st – The hurry and agitation of all these great affairs has made the King worse. He was proclaimed exactly at 12 o’clock at Carlton House inside the screen, with a good deal of applause of the people, but more of the soldiers. A very fine day.

Feb. 5th – The King would be better but that his anxiety about the Queen agitates him terribly.

Feb. 6th Sunday – The King was better, but unluckily last night he recollected that the prayers to be used today were not yet altered. He immediately ordered up all the Prayer-books in the House of old and new dates, and spent the evening in very serious agitation on this subject, which has taken a wonderful hold of his mind. In some churches I understand the clergy prayed for ‘our most gracious Queen’; in others and I believe in general, they prayed for ‘all the Royal Family’.

Feb. 10th – Came in [to town] to breakfast with Lowther1 We talked over the difficulty about praying for the Queen. It struck me that if she is to be prayed for, it will be, in fact, a final settlement of all questions in her favour. If she is fit to be introduced to the Almighty, she is fit to be received by men, and if we are to pray for her in Church we may surely bow to her at Court. The praying for her will throw a sanctity round her which the good and pious people of this country will never afterwards bear to have withdrawn. Lowther said that in all the discussions he had never heard the matter argued from this religious point of view, and he advised me to communicate my opinions to the King. We accordingly went over to Carlton House, and saw Blomfield [sic],2 and, strange to say, this view of the subject was as new to him as to Lowther. It made a great impression upon him. He said it never had occurred to the King to argue the question in that way; that it had been discussed as a mere matter of civil propriety and expediency, but that this was a new and clear view, and quite decisive. ‘If she was fit to be introduced as Queen to God she was fit to introduce to men. Yes, yes; the King is to see the Ministers today on it, and he shall in half an hour be in possession of this unanswerable argument.’ On my return I repeated this line of reasoning to Lord Melville, and, wonderful to say, it appeared that the religious and moral effect of the prayer had been overlooked by the Cabinet also. They had considered it only as to its legal consequences. Three or four of the Cabinet are for praying for her as Queen, but they will be outvoted. This question is of great importance, and I do not see the end of it.

Feb. 12th – A [Privy] Council held today, and it is finally settled not to pray for the Queen by name. An order to this effect will appear in to-night’s Gazette. The Archbishop was for praying for the Queen. . . .

Feb. 13th – A new and most serious difficulty has arisen. The King wants the Ministers to pledge themselves to a divorce, which they will not do. They offer to assist to keep the Queen out of the country by the best mode, namely, giving her no money if she will not stay abroad; but this will not satisfy the King. He is furious, and says they have deceived him; that they led him on to hope that they would concur in the measure, and that now they leave him in the lurch. It looks like a very serious breach. . . . The Cabinet offer all but a divorce; the King will have a divorce or nothing. His agitation is extreme and alarming; it not only retards his recovery, but threatens a relapse. He eats hardly anything – a bit of dry toast and a little claret and water. This affair becomes very serious on a more important account than the plans of the Ministers, but the King has certainly intimated intentions of looking for new and more useful servants.

Lord Colchester, a former Speaker of the House of Commons, was touring the Continent at the time of George IV’s accession. Two of his friends at home, both Members of Parliament, sent him news.

Henry Bankes to Lord Colchester, 15 February

Dear Colchester, – Your kind letter of Jan. 29th (the day of our poor King’s death) reached me last week. . . .

His present Majesty, who, by-the-bye, was in the most immediate danger of following, instead of succeeding, his father on the second and third day of his reign, is most firmly bent on a divorce from his odious and infamous consort. This, we must agree, is natural enough for him to wish, but as those who must carry his project into effect very naturally cast about and calculate their means, his Ministers report to him unanimously that it is not feasible, and neither can, nor ought to be, attempted. He perseveres. He insists most obstinately. The Ministers positively refuse. He threatens to dismiss them all, to which they reply that they are ready and willing to retire from his service. Written papers and argumentations of considerable length pass between them upon the subject of marriages and divorces. . . . This is our actual state of political uncertainty. . . .

Henry Legge to Lord Colchester, 16 February

My dear Lord Colchester . . . Three days after the good old King’s death his successor was so alarmingly ill that serious apprehensions began to be entertained that the longest reign in our annals would be followed by the shortest known in history. His appearance at the Council on Saturday last was that of a person very much reduced by illness, very pale, very weak and tottering. . . .

The death of the Duke of Kent, of the King, and the danger of His present Majesty, and a divorce, have put minor subjects into the background. That some process is intended I have good reason to believe. What it is to be, or what shape it is to assume, I do not know. There seems to be a general expectation that the lady will return to this country. . . .

The evidence of criminality is, I am told, conclusive; if so, it is not to be expected that she will be permitted quietly to assume her new dignity and exert its privileges. . . . It is an unpleasant subject in whatever light it is viewed, and can hardly fail to make a disturbance. . . .

Caroline had now taken matters into her own hands and determined to go to England to claim her rights. She announced her decision in a letter to the Prime Minister from Rome on 16 March (the spelling and phraseology of the letter are her own).

Rome, the 16th of March, 1820

The Queen of this Relams wishes to be informed through the medium of Lord Liverpool, First Minister to the King of this Relams, for which reason or motife the Queen name has been left out of the general Prayer-books in England, and especially to prevent all her subjects to pay her such respect which is due to the Queen. It is equally a great omittance towards the King that his consort Queen should be obliged to soummit to such great neglect, or rather araisin from a perfect ignorance of the Archbishops of the real existence of the Queen Caroline of England.

The Queen is also very anxious that Lord Liverpool should communicate this letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury.

Lord Liverpool will be not able to believe, I am sure of it, how much the Queen was surprised of this first act of cruel Tyranne towards her, as she had been informed through the newspapers of the 22nd of February, that in the cours of the Debbet in the House of Common on that evening, Lord Castlereagh, one of the best friends of Lord Liverpool, assured the Attorney-General to the Queen Caroline, Mr Brougham, that the King’s Servants would not omitte any attentions or use any harrsness...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 21.10.2016
• Verlagsort: London
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Biografien / Erfahrungsberichte
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Romane / Erzählungen
• Themenwelt: Sachbuch/Ratgeber ► Geschichte / Politik
• Themenwelt: Geschichte ► Allgemeine Geschichte ► Neuzeit (bis 1918)
• Themenwelt: Geisteswissenschaften ► Geschichte ► Regional- / Ländergeschichte
• Themenwelt: Sozialwissenschaften ► Soziologie ► Allgemeines / Lexika
• Schlagworte: adultery • affair • affairs • british royals • Caroline of Brunswick • Divorce • geogian era • george iv • georgian • investigation • king & queen • King and Queen • King George IV • lovers • Monarch • Queen Caroline • queen caroline, divorce, separation, royal marriage, caroline of brunswick, king george iv, george iv, affairs, affair, lovers, investigation, adultery, trial, georgian, geogian era, women in history, women's history, royals, british royals, monarch, king and queen, king & queen, regency era • Regency • regency era|regency • regency, the affair of queen caroline, caroline of brunswick • regency, The Affair of Queen Caroline, caroline of brunswick, • royal marriage • Royals • Separation • The Affair of Queen Caroline • Trial • Women in History • Women's history
• ISBN-10: 0-7509-8166-0 / 0750981660
• ISBN-13: 978-0-7509-8166-8 / 9780750981668