“What was her husband?”
“I always understood he was a man of fortune.”
“Did you live with her at Tavistock Place?”
“I never lived with her at all.”
“Did you never sleep in the house?”
“Yes, occasionally.”
“You took her to be a modest, decent woman, while she lived in Tavistock Place?”
“She lived with her mother, I knew nothing to the contrary.”
The witness was now in tears. Murmurs of indignation rose from the Opposition benches. The Attorney-General took no notice.
“At whose request do you attend here tonight?”
“At the request of Mrs. Clarke.”
“Do you know Mr. Dowler?”
“Yes.”
“Did Mrs. Clarke tell you she represented Mr. Dowler to the Duke of York as her brother?”
“No, never.”
“How long is it since you heard the conversation you spoke about between Mrs. Clarke and His Royal Highness respecting Colonel French?”
“I can’t exactly say. It was when she was at Gloucester Place.”
“Did you ever see Colonel French in Gloucester Place?”
“I have heard him announced. I cannot say I was ever introduced to him.”
“And after an interval of five years you recollect a particular expression without any intervening circumstance calling it to your remembrance?”
“I thought of it since, but I did not mention it.”
“What brought it into your thoughts?”
“I was curious about a man I was not allowed to see.”
“What time of year was it?”
“I don’t recollect.”
“Winter or summer?”
“I don’t recollect that either.”
“Yet your memory is not defective about the expressions used?”
“No.”
“Doesn’t that seem to you extraordinary?”
“No.”
“Are your father’s affairs in a state of embarrassment?”
There was a moment’s hesitation, and then the witness replied, in a low voice, “Yes.”
“How many scholars have you in Cheyne Row?”
“Twelve.”
“What is the age of your youngest scholar?”
“Seven.”
Loud cries of “No, no…” rang through the House, as Miss Taylor was seen to be in deep distress. The Attorney-General shrugged his shoulders and sat down. Miss Taylor was told she could go.
Mrs. Mary Anne Clarke was next recalled for further examination by Mr. Croker. For over an hour he questioned her on the establishment at Gloucester Place, the number of menservants employed, whether they slept in the house, who paid their wages, how many carriages had been in her possession, how many horses, what jewels had she worn, had she pawned her diamonds. Then, glancing at a note passed to him by the Attorney-General, Mr. Croker enquired:
“Did you at any time live at Hampstead?”
There was a pause on the part of the exhausted witness, and then she answered, “I did.”
“In what year?”
“Part of the year 1808, and the end of the year 1807.”
“In whose house did you live?”
“A Mr. Nicols’.”
“During the whole of that time did you pass under your own name?”
“Yes.”
“Did you ever assume the name of Dowler?”
“No, I did not.”
“How many times have you seen Mr. Dowler since his return from Portugal?”
“I saw him that Sunday in my house, and I have seen him here in the witnesses’ room.”
“That is the whole number of times you have seen him since his arrival in England?”
“I believe that the honorable gentleman can tell quite well, for his garret window is very convenient for his prying disposition, as it overlooks my house.”
There were whistles and loud applause from the Opposition benches.
“You are certain those are the only number of times you have seen Mr. Dowler?”
“If the honorable gentleman wishes it, I will say I have seen him oftener, if it will tend to anything. I have no wish to conceal that Mr. Dowler is a very particular friend of mine.”
“At what other places have you seen Mr. Dowler since his arrival?”
“I have seen him at his own hotel.”
“When?”
“The first night he came home, but which was to have been a perfect secret, as I did not want my own family or anyone to know that I saw him that night.”
“Were you in company with Mr. Dowler for a considerable time on that occasion?”
“I have stated that I was in company with Mr. Dowler; and I beg leave to ask the Chair whether this is a proper question, whether it is not unbecoming to the dignity of this House?”
Mr. Wilberforce rose, protesting that it was perfectly incorrect and immoral for the Committee to enter into a detail of the private concerns of the witness. But he was shouted down, and Mr. Croker repeated his question.
“Did your visit last through Thursday after midnight?”
“My visit continued until the Friday morning.”
To the disappointment of all sides of the House, Mr. Croker had no further questions, and the day’s proceedings were declared over.
As Mrs. Mary Anne Clarke went to her carriage in Old Palace Yard, a messenger touched her shoulder and handed her a note. She read it, and said to the messenger, “No answer.” When she arrived home at Westbourne Place she stuck the note in her mirror, beside the many valentines that had already come her way. It was signed with the well-known initials of a prominent Tory member: “How about three hundred guineas and supper tonight?”
4
The Investigation in the House of Commons now had the entire country fascinated. The Peninsular War was forgotten and thrust aside, and day after day the leading newspapers quoted the full proceedings in their columns. Napoleon and Spain had secondary importance. Pamphleteers ran riot, cartoonists and lampooners cashed in on the Great Discussion, and trade was brisk. Articles of china appeared by magic—Staffordshire jugs with Mrs. Clarke adorned in widow’s weeds, in her hand a list of officers’ names; gross colored portraits of the Duke of York, clad in a nightshirt, climbing out of bed; caricatures of Dowler and other witnesses. Lives of all of them, smudged and hastily printed, calling themselves “authentic,” were sold at street corners. Comic songs by the dozen were whistled in theaters. And finally, as a gesture to the fashion, when a coin was tossed in the air on sporting occasions the call was not “Heads or Tails,” but “Duke or Darling.”
At London parties no other subject was mentioned. At coffeehouses and taverns there was one single topic of conversation. Mrs. Clarke had taken the bribes, but had the Duke known? Opinion was evenly divided, but in between the two opposing sides—the parties who said he had pocketed bribes himself and the other faction declaring him pure and unsullied—stood a stolid middle brigade, who shook their heads and said the liaison itself was what really mattered. A prince of the blood, who was married, had kept a mistress, given her houses and diamonds—while people starved. Men and women toiled in factories, soldiers fought, the mass of the British people led decent lives; but the Commander-in-Chief, the King’s own son, kept a whore. This was the point that rankled. Here was the rub. Tub-thumpers and street-corner orators let themselves go, and so did plain John Citizen at home. “We’re supposed to look up to the Brunswicks. They set the example. If that was the way the Bourbons behaved in France small wonder the Frogs chopped their heads off…” The mood was infectious and fanned by those it most suited—the stirrers of trouble.
Will Ogilvie, sitting alone at the desk in his office, smiled as the match lit the straw, as the straw burst to flame, as the flame caught the gust of the monster—public opinion. This was what he had planned from the beginning, and the straws that were burned in the blaze had served a purpose. May Taylor
was one of the straws. The parents of all her pupils removed their children, and her landlord in Cheyne Row told her to quit. He gave her three days to get out; half an hour in the House of Commons had ruined her life. She did not run a boarding school, so Government pamphlets sneered, but a bawdy house where street girls learned their trade.
Do we win? Do we lose? Every day Mary Anne asked this question. She did not know of the notes dispatched to Windsor by the Leader of the Commons, who sensed, as she could not, the mood of the House. He knew the doubts among his own supporters, he felt the growing coolness towards the Duke. So, from the House of Commons to Windsor Castle, “I think it only right to warn your Majesty that the situation is becoming serious…” The Duke knew what she was doing, and shut his eyes—this was the murmur heard on all sides of the House. Government spokesmen made a poor impression. Adam, Greenwood—of Greenwood and Cox, Army agents—Colonel Gordon, Military Secretary, and his assistant, produced papers, documents, files, all proving nothing but that promotions had taken place and had been gazetted. And still the single weapon the Government used was that of disparaging the chief witness, Mrs. Clarke, so that her character, by being smirched, should throw doubt on her testimony.
Among the witnesses who were called to discredit her, in the second week of the Investigation, were Mr. John Reid, proprietor of the hotel in St. Martin’s Lane, and Samuel Wells, waiter. Both declared that the lady who was with Mr. William Dowler on Friday sennight had always called herself Mrs. Dowler—until now, they swore, they had been totally ignorant that she had no right to the name. Next came Mr. Nicols, baker, to testify to the same effect. Mr. Dowler was frequently in his house while Mrs. Clarke lived there. She had first represented herself as a widow, but later told him that she had married Mr. Dowler. She had never paid him any rent, but he had in his possession some musical instruments belonging to her, and also some letters, which had once been sent down to be burned, but had been forgotten in a cupboard. These, however, he would not wish to produce unless by request of the House.
He was directed to withdraw while the House discussed whether the letters should be read or not. Some rapid thinking had to be done by the Leader of the House. If the letters should discredit Mrs. Clarke the cause of the righteous would triumph and all would be well. If the letters concerned the Duke, the matter was different. They might be damaging evidence, backing the charges. Mr. Perceval, after consideration, decided the risk was too great, and announced that there was no reason to examine letters merely because they belonged to Mrs. Clarke. Colonel Wardle suspected that these letters might in fact contain matter valuable to the Opposition, and he vigorously disputed the Leader’s decision. After much wrangling the letters were procured and read from the Chair.
The first turned out to be from Samuel Carter. Poor Sammy, in the West Indies, happily ignorant that his letter, written from Portsmouth in 1804, asking for leave of absence to buy his tunic, would ever be read aloud in the House of Commons. A second letter from Sammy, and then a third. The House sat stunned and shocked at the new information, disclosed merely by chance, that Mrs. Clarke’s footman had been commissioned an ensign.
Two letters from the Baroness Nollekens—a name well known in diplomatic circles—thanking Mrs. Clarke for favors received and asking for thanks to be passed to His Royal Highness.
Three letters from General Clavering asking for interviews and begging Mrs. Clarke to intercede with the C.-in-C. about raising some new battalions. The Government benches looked glum, the Opposition jubilant. The letters, saved from destruction by the merest hazard, though not bearing specifically on the charges, helped to establish the fact that favor was given. They were read in silence. Then Colonel Wardle called Mrs. Clarke to identify handwriting, which she did with every one, having long forgotten the contents of all the letters, believing them burned.
Colonel Wardle seized his advantage to question her at length about the occasion of the letters. Did she get Samuel Carter his commission? Did she apply for it to the Duke? Was His Royal Highness aware that it was the same person who waited at table at Gloucester Place? Did the Duke see him after he had been commissioned? Had she applied to the Duke in respect of the Baroness Nollekens? Her answers were in the greatest degree satisfactory to him.
“Do you,” he continued, “recognize the handwriting of General Clavering?”
“Yes, and in a letter from the Duke I found this morning there is mention of Colonel Clavering and his battalions.”
The letter was handed over and read to the House, the reading interrupted by bursts of laughter.
“Oh, my angel, do me justice and be convinced that never was a woman adored as you are. Every day, every hour convinces me more and more that my whole happiness depends on you alone. With what impatience do I look forward to the day after tomorrow. There are still however two nights before I shall clasp my darling in my arms. Clavering is mistaken, my angel, in thinking that any new regiments are to be raised; it is not intended. Only second battalions to the existing corps; you had better therefore tell him so, and that you are sure there would be no use applying for them.
“Ten thousand thanks, my love, for the handkerchiefs, and I need not assure you of the pleasure I feel in wearing them, and thinking of the dear hands that made them for me.
“Nothing could be more satisfactory than the tour I have made and the state in which I have found everything. The whole of yesterday was employed in visiting the works at Dover, reviewing the troops there, and examining the coast as far as Sandgate. I am now setting off immediately to ride along the coast to Hastings, reviewing the different corps as I pass. Adieu, therefore, my sweetest, dearest love.”
The letter was addressed, rather oddly, to George Farquhar, Esq., and not to Mrs. Clarke—a fact which escaped the attention of members.
The revelations in the Hampstead letters considerably shook the confidence of Government supporters, and on the 16th of February the Leader of the House, hoping to reestablish faith in the Duke of York, rose to make an important announcement regarding the appointment of a Major Tonyn. Mrs. Clarke had testified in her evidence some days ago that the agent who gave her Tonyn’s name was Captain Sandon. Captain Sandon had admitted this, but had suppressed in his evidence a certain vital fact that had since come to light outside the House of Commons. The fact was this—and discovered by Mr. Adam—that Captain Sandon had in his possession, among his baggage, letters from Mrs. Clarke; and one note in particular had been mentioned, alluding to Major Tonyn and his promotion, this note purporting to be from the Duke himself. Mr. Adam had spoken of this to His Royal Highness, who declared at once the note was a forgery.
“My point is this,” said the Leader of the House. “If this note can be produced and proved a forgery, it will show that Mrs. Clarke knew how to impose, not only by word, but by falsification of signature. If, on the contrary, the note is authentic, it will tend to countenance the charges before us. I find myself so convinced in believing the former that I have no hesitation in bringing the matter before the House tonight to be discussed, and suggest that Captain Sandon be brought to the bar.”
Colonel Wardle agreed. He had never heard of a note, nor of any other letters in Sandon’s possession. But let them be shown—he was sure they would back the charges, and could certainly do no harm to Mrs. Clarke.
Captain Sandon appeared; and, greatly to the astonishment of the Leader of the House and the whole Committee, denied all knowledge of the note in question. There may have been a note. He did not remember. The note did not now exist. It had been destroyed. He did recollect a note but it had vanished. He could not remember the contents. The note had gone. His state of abject guilt was so apparent, not only to Mr. Perceval but to the House, that after a tense half hour of examination he was ordered to withdraw in custody, and the House agreed without a single dissenting voice that he should be conducted to his lodging by the Sergeant, and a search made for the missing note. While the House awaited his reappearance Mrs. Clarke was once
more called, and examined by Mr. Perceval.
“Do you recollect Captain Sandon’s coming to you upon the subject of Major Tonyn in 1804?”
“I recollect that Captain Sandon was employed by Major Tonyn; I am confident as to that.”
“Do you recollect ever having sent any message to Major Tonyn by Captain Sandon?”
“I cannot recollect that I did; perhaps it is likely, but it’s a long while since.”
“Do you recollect ever having sent any paper to Major Tonyn by Captain Sandon?”
“What sort of paper?”
“Any written paper, either by you or someone else?”
“I don’t think I did. I was always very cautious of giving any written paper out of my hands.”
“If you had sent such a paper by Captain Sandon to Major Tonyn, is it possible that you could have forgotten it?”
“No, I’m sure I should not have forgotten anything of that sort belonging to the Duke of York.”
“Was Captain Sandon to have any percentage of the profit arising from the success of Major Tonyn’s application?”
“I believe he was, for I understood Major Tonyn was a generous sort of man, and Captain Sandon would not have interested himself so much as he did for him without a reward.”
“Before you came to the bar just now, had you any information of the substance of the examination of Captain Sandon before the Committee here tonight?”
“Not the least.”
The witness’s manner had been frank and natural throughout. Had there really been such a note it was obvious that she had forgotten it. The House waited in impatience for the return of Captain Sandon and the Sergeant at Arms. After more than an hour had passed he was brought once more to the bar, and immediately examined by the Leader of the House.
“Have you found the paper?”
“I have.”
“Have you got it with you?”
“The messenger has it, and every other paper that I had connected with it.”
The messenger was directed to give up the papers, which consisted of a bundle of letters, and on top was the missing note. In complete silence Mr. Perceval handed the note to the Chairman, who read it aloud to the House: “I have just received your note, and Tonyn’s business shall remain as it is. God Bless You.” The note was unsigned, but it was addressed to George Farquhar, Esq., 18, Gloucester Place.