The Dawn of the XIXth Century in England

Yet another death: the great Statesman, William Pitt, who had been sinking for some time, paid the debt of Nature on the 23rd of January. Parliament voted him, by a majority of 258 to 89, a public funeral, and sepulture in Westminster Abbey; and also a sum not exceeding £40,000 was voted, without opposition, to pay his debts.

He lay in state, in the Painted Chamber of the Palace of Westminster, on the 20th and 21st of February, and people flocked to the sight – 19,800 persons passing through in the six hours the doors were kept open; or, in other words, they entered and went out at the rate of fifty-five a minute. This average was exceeded next day, when the number of visitors rose to 27,000, or seventy-five a minute.

Of course the accessories of this funeral, which took place on the 22nd of February, were nothing like so gorgeous as at that of Nelson; but there was a vast amount of State, and the Dukes of York, Cumberland, and Cambridge, were among the long line of the Nobility who paid their last respects to William Pitt. The cost of the funeral was £6,045 2s. 6d.

It would be without precedent to allow the year to pass without a Fast, so one was ordered for the 26th of February. The Houses of Lords and Commons attended Church, so did the Volunteers. Also “The Lord Mayor, Sheriffs, &c., attended Divine Service at St. Paul’s, from whence they returned to the Mansion House —where they dined.”

The Copper Coinage having, during the King’s long reign, become somewhat deteriorated, a proclamation of His Majesty’s appeared in the Gazette of the 10th of May, for a New Coinage of 150 tons of penny pieces, 427½ tons of halfpenny pieces, and twenty-two and a half tons of farthings. The penny pieces were to be in the proportion of twenty-four to the pound, avoirdupois, of copper, and so on with the others. It was provided that no one should be obliged to take more of such penny pieces, in one payment, than shall be of the value of one shilling, or more of such halfpence and farthings than shall be of the value of sixpence.

This year witnessed the singular sight of a Parliamentary Impeachment. Lord Melville was accused on ten different counts, and his trial commenced on the 29th of April; Westminster Hall being fitted up for the occasion. The three principal charges against him were – “First, that before January 10, 1786, he had applied to his private use and profit, various sums of public money entrusted to him, as Treasurer of the Navy. Secondly, that in violation of the Act of Parliament, for better regulating that office, he had permitted Trotter, his paymaster, illegally to take from the Bank of England, large sums of the money issued on account of the Treasurer of the Navy, and to place those sums in the hands of his private banker, in his own name, and subject to his sole control and disposition. Thirdly, that he had fraudulently and corruptly permitted Trotter to apply the said money to purposes of private use and emolument, and had, himself, fraudulently and corruptly derived profit therefrom.”

Of course Lord Melville pleaded “not guilty,” and this was the verdict of his peers.

On the 10th of June, the Abolition of the Slave Trade again passed the House of Commons, by a majority of ninety-nine. On the 24th of June the Lords debated on the same subject, and they carried, without a division, an address to His Majesty, “praying that he would be graciously pleased to consult with other Powers towards the accomplishment of the same end,” which would afford another opportunity to those who were anxious again to divide upon this question.

On the 13th of September of this year died Pitt’s great rival, Charles James Fox, a man who, had he lived in these times, would have been a giant Statesman. For him, however, no public funeral, no payment by the nation of his debts – this latter probably because in the accounts for the year figure two items of expenditure: “For secret services for 1806, £175,000,” and “For the seamen who served in the Battle of Trafalgar, £300,000.” He was buried on the 10th of October in Westminster Abbey, and the funeral, under the direction of his friend, Sheridan, was a very pompous affair – though, of course, it lacked the glitter of a State ceremonial. Still there were the King’s Trumpeters and Soldiers, whilst the Horse and Foot Guards and Volunteers lined the way. So he was carried to his grave in the Abbey – which, curiously, was dug within eighteen inches of his old opponent, Pitt. The relation between the two is well summed up by a contemporary writer. “We may pronounce of them, that, as rivals for power and for fame, their equals have not been known in this country, and perhaps in none were there two such Statesman, in so regular and equal a contention for pre-eminence. In the advantages of birth and fortune they were equal; in eloquence, dissimilar in their manner, but superior to all their contemporaries; in influence upon the minds of their hearers equal; in talents and reputation, dividing the nation into two parties of nearly equal strength; in probity, above all suspicion; in patriotism rivals, as in all things else.”26

It must not be thought that the year passed by without attempts being made to stop the war. They were begun by a charming act of international courtesy and friendship on the part of Fox, which cannot be better told than in his own words, contained in a letter to Talleyrand.

“Downing Street, February 20, 1806.

“Sir, – I think it my duty, as an honest man, to communicate to you, as soon as possible, a very extraordinary circumstance which is come to my knowledge. The shortest way will be to relate to you the fact simply as it happened.

“A few days ago a person informed me that he was just arrived at Gravesend without a passport, requesting me at the same time to send him one, as he had lately left Paris, and had something to communicate to me which would give me satisfaction. I sent for him; he came to my house the following day. I received him alone in my closet; when, after some unimportant conversation, this villain had the audacity to tell me, that it was necessary for the tranquillity of all crowned heads, to put to death the Ruler of France; and that, for this purpose, a house had been hired at Passy, from which this detestable project could be carried into effect with certainty, and without risk. I did not perfectly understand if it was to be done by a common musket, or by fire-arms upon a new principle.

“I am not ashamed to tell you, Sir, who know me, that my confusion was extreme, in thus finding myself led into a conversation with an avowed assassin. I instantly ordered him to leave me, giving, at the same time, orders to the police officer who accompanied him, to send him out of the kingdom as soon as possible.

“It is probable that all this is unfounded, and that the wretch had nothing more in view than to make himself of consequence, by promising what, according to his ideas, would afford me satisfaction.

“At all events, I thought it right to acquaint you with what had happened, before I sent him away. Our laws do not permit us to detain him long; but he shall not be sent away till after you shall have had full time to take precautions against his attempts, supposing him still to entertain bad designs; and, when he goes, I shall take care to have him landed at a seaport as remote as possible from France.

“He calls himself here, Guillet de la Gevrilliere, but I think it is a false name which he has assumed.

“At his first entrance I did him the honour to believe him to be a spy.

“I have the honour to be, with the most perfect attachment,

“Sir,

“Your most obedient servant,“C. J. Fox.”

I have given this letter in extenso, to show how a Gentleman of the grand Old School could act towards an enemy – feeling himself dishonoured by even conversing with a murderous traitor. It was chivalrous and manly, and well merited Napoleon’s remarks, contained in Talleyrand’s reply: “I recognize here the principles of honour and of virtue, by which Mr. Fox has ever been actuated. Thank him on my part.”

This episode is the most agreeable one in the whole of the papers in connection with the negotiations for peace at that time. The King fully entered into the reasons why these proposals did not come to a successful issue, in a Declaration, dated October 21st, which, with many other papers, was laid before Parliament on December 22nd.

If “Rien n’est sacré pour un Sapeur,” it is the same with the Caricaturist. Here were men presumably doing their honest best to promote peace, and do away with a war that was exhausting all Europe; yet the satirist takes it jauntily. Take only one, the Caricature by Ansell (August, 1806). “The Pleasing and Instructive Game of Messengers; or, Summer Amusement for John Bull.” Balls, in the shape of Messengers, are being sent and returned, in lively succession, across the Channel; their errands are of a most extraordinary character. “Peace – Hope – Despair. No Peace – Passports – Peace to a certainty – No Peace – Credentials – Despatches, &c.” Napoleon and Talleyrand like the game. “Begar, Talley, dis be ver amusant. Keep it up as long as you can, so that we may have time for our project.” John Bull merely looks on, leaving Fox, Sheridan, and the Ministry, to play the game on his behalf; and, in reply to a query by Fox, “Is it not a pretty game, Johnny?” the old man replies, with a somewhat puzzled air, “Pretty enough as to that – they do fly about monstrous quick, to be sure; but you don’t get any more money out of my pocket for all that!”

The failure of these pacific negotiations with France, brought a rejoinder from the French Emperor, which, to use a familiar expression made John Bull “set his back up.” It was no less than a proclamation of Napoleon’s, dated Berlin, November 21, 1806, in which, he attempted, on paper, to blockade England. The principal articles in this famous proclamation are as follow: —

1. The British Isles are declared to be in a state of blockade.

2. All trade and communication with Great Britain is strictly prohibited.

3. All letters going to, or coming from England, are not to be forwarded, and all those written in English are to be suppressed.

4. Every individual, who is a subject of Great Britain, is to be made a prisoner of war, wherever he may be found.

5. All goods belonging to Englishmen are to be confiscated, and the amount paid to those who have suffered through the detention of ships by the English.

6. No ships coming from Great Britain, or having been in a port of that country, are to be admitted.

7. All trade in English Goods is rigorously prohibited.

Besides these startling facts, the time allowed for the delivery of all English property was limited to the space of twenty-four hours after the issue of the Proclamation; and if, after that time, any persons were discovered to have secreted, or withheld, British goods, or articles, of any description, they were to be subjected to military execution. The British subjects who were arrested in Hamburgh, and had not escaped, were ordered to Verdun, or the interior of France, as Prisoners of War.

This was enough to close all hopes of reconciliation, and, although the English Newspapers took a courageous view of the blockade, and attempted to laugh at its ever being practicable to carry out, yet it undoubtedly created great uneasiness, and intensified the bitter feeling between the belligerents.

This, then, was the position of affairs at the end of 1806. Consols, during the year, varied from 61 in January to 59 in December, having in July reached 66½.

The quartern loaf was fairly firm all the year, beginning at 11¾d. and ending at 1s. 1d. Average price of wheat 52s.

CHAPTER XIV

1807

Passing of the Slave Trade Bill – Downfall of the “Ministry of all the Talents” – General Fast – Election for Westminster – Death of Cardinal York – Arrival in England of Louis XVIII. – Copenhagen bombarded, and the Danish Fleet captured – Napoleon again proclaimed England as blockaded.

THE YEAR 1807 began, socially, with the Abolition of the Slave Trade, the debate on which was opened, in the Lords, on January 2nd, and many were the nights spent in its discussion. On February 10th, it was read a third time in the Upper House, and sent down to the Commons, who, on March 15th, read it a third time, and passed it without a division. On the 18th, it was sent again to the Lords, with some amendments. It was printed, and these amendments were taken into consideration on the 23rd, and the alterations agreed to on the same date; and exactly at noon on March 25th, the bill received the Royal Assent by Commission, and became Law. This Act, be it remembered, did not abolish Slavery, but only prohibited the Traffic in Slaves; so that no ship should clear out from any port within the British dominions after May 1, 1807, with slaves on board, and that no slave should be landed in the Colonies after March 1, 1808.

This Act was somewhat hurried through, owing to the downfall of the Coalition Ministry, which will ever be known in the political history of England as the “Ministry of all the talents,” or the “Broad-bottomed” Cabinet. While this Ministry was in existence, it afforded the Caricaturists plenty of food for their pencils. One of the last of them is by Gillray (April 18, 1807), and it is called “The Pigs Possessed, or, The Broad-bottomed Litter rushing headlong in the Sea of Perdition.” Though the subject is hackneyed, the treatment is excellent. “Farmer George,” as the King was familiarly termed, has knocked down a portion of his fence, which stands on the edge of a cliff, and, with brandished dung-fork, and ready heel, he speeds the swine to their destruction, thus apostrophizing them: “O, you cursed ungrateful Grunters! what! after devouring more in a twelve month, than the good old Litters did in twelve years, you turn round to kick and bite your old Master? but, if the Devil or the Pope has got possession of you all – pray get out of my Farm Yard! out with you all; no hanger-behind! you’re all of a cursed bad breed; so out with you all together!!!”

Of course there was the Annual Fast, which was fixed, for February 25th. This time “the shops were all shut, and the utmost solemnity prevailed throughout the day.” Their repetition, evidently, was educating the people as to their implied meaning.

Sir Francis Burdett wished to retrieve his former defeat, and we consequently find him, at the General Election in this year, putting up for Westminster. Paull, who had contested the seat with Sheridan, was one candidate, Lord Cochrane, and Elliott the brewer, at Pimlico, were the others. This election is chiefly remarkable in illustrating the manners of the times, by a duel which took place between two of the candidates, Paull and Burdett, the latter of whom had squabbled over his name having been advertised as intending to appear at a meeting, without his consent having been first obtained. They met at Combe Wood near Wimbledon, and both were wounded. Sir Francis was successful, and a short account of his “chairing” – a custom long since consigned to limbo– may not be uninteresting. Originally, as the name implies, the successful candidate was seated in a chair, and carried about on the shoulders of his enthusiastic supporters, as the winner of the Queen’s prize at Wimbledon is now honoured. But Sir Francis’s admirers had improved upon this. The procession and triumphal car started from Covent Garden, and worked its way to the baronet’s house in Piccadilly, where he mounted the car. How he did so, the contemporary account does not state, but it does say that “the car was as high as the one pair of stairs windows,” and “the seat upon which the Baronet was placed, stood upon a lofty Corinthian pillar.” On this uncomfortable elevation, he rode from Piccadilly, down the Haymarket, up St. Martin’s Lane, and so into Covent Garden, where a dinner was provided.

On the 31st of August died, at Rome, Henry Benedict Maria Clement Stuart, Cardinal York – the last of the Stuarts. The feeble little attempt he made to assert his right to the throne of England, would be amusing if it had been serious; the coining of one medal, in which he styled himself Henry IX., was his sole affectation of royalty. With him died all hope, if any such existed, of disturbing the Hanoverian Succession. Curiously enough, events made him a pensioner on George the Third’s bounty, and the annuity was granted by the one, and received by the other, not as an act of charity, but as of brotherly friendship; and this annuity of £4,000 he duly received for seven years before he died.

In this year, too, England gave shelter to another unfortunate scion of royalty – Louis XVIII. – who came from Sweden in the Swedish Frigate the Freya. He travelled under the name of the Comte de Lille, and landed at Yarmouth. He rather ungraciously declined the Palace of Holyrood, which was placed at his disposal, on the ground that he had not come to England as an asylum, or for safety, but on political business as King of France. Wisely, he was allowed to have his own way, and he settled down at Hartwell, in Buckinghamshire, a seat of the Marquis of Buckingham, and here he abode until the fall of Napoleon, when, of course, he went to Paris.

The year ends stormily. After having bombarded Copenhagen and captured all the Danish fleet, war was proclaimed against Denmark on the 4th of November. On the 8th of the month, Portugal was compelled by Napoleon to confiscate British property, and shut her ports against England.

Nor was he content with this. Probably he thought the effect of his former proclamation of blockading England, was wearing out, so he fulminated a fresh one on the 11th of November from Hamburgh, and another from Milan on the 27th of December; in both of which he reiterated his intention of prohibiting intercourse between all subjects under his control, and contumacious England, and that this should be properly carried out he appointed commercial residents, at different ports, to attend strictly to the matter.

This, of course, was met promptly by an Order in Council, allowing neutral Powers to trade with the enemies of Great Britain, provided they touched at British ports, and paid custom dues to the British Government.

Consols this year began at 61⅜, and left off 62⅞.

Wheat varied during the year, from 84s. to 73s., the highest price being 90s.; and the quartern loaf varied in proportion from 1s. 1¼d. to 10¾d.

CHAPTER XV

1808

Gloomy prospects of 1808 – King’s Speech – Droits of the Admiralty – Regulation of Cotton Spinners’ wages – Riots in the Cotton districts – Battle of Vimiera – Convention of Cintra – Its unpopularity – Articles of the Convention.

THE YEAR 1808 opened very gloomily. Parliament met on the 21st of January, and was opened by Commission. The “King’s Speech,” on this occasion sketches the political situation better than any pen of a modern historian can do. I therefore take some portions of it, not sufficient to weary the reader, but to give him the clearest idea of the state of Europe at this period.

The King informed Parliament,27 “that, no sooner had the result of the Negotiations at Tilsit,28 confirmed the influence, and control, of France over the Powers of the Continent, than His Majesty was apprized of the intention of the enemy to combine those Powers in one general confederacy, to be directed either to the entire subjugation of this kingdom, or to the imposing upon His Majesty, an insecure and ignominious peace. That for this purpose, it was determined to force into hostility against His Majesty, States which had hitherto been allowed by France to maintain, or to purchase, their neutrality, and to bring to bear against different points of His Majesty’s dominions, the whole of the Naval Force of Europe, and specifically the Fleets of Portugal and Denmark. To place these fleets out of the power of such a confederacy became, therefore, the indispensable duty of His Majesty.

“In the execution of this duty, so far as related to the Danish Fleet, his Majesty has commanded us to assure you, that it was with the deepest reluctance that His Majesty found himself compelled, after his earnest endeavours to open a Negotiation with the Danish Government had failed, to authorize his commanders to resort to the extremity of force; but that he has the greatest satisfaction in congratulating you upon the successful execution of this painful but necessary service.

“We are commanded further to acquaint you, that the course which His Majesty had to pursue with respect to Portugal, was, happily, of a nature more congenial to His Majesty’s feelings: That the timely and unreserved communication, by the Court of Lisbon, of the demands, and designs of France, while it confirmed to His Majesty the authenticity of the advices which he had received from other quarters, entitled that Court to His Majesty’s confidence in the sincerity of the assurances by which that communication was accompanied. The fleet of Portugal was destined by France to be employed as an instrument of vengeance against Great Britain; that fleet has been secured from the grasp of France, and is now employed in conveying to its American dominions29 the hopes, and fortunes, of the Portuguese monarchy. His Majesty implores the protection of Divine Providence upon that enterprize, rejoicing in the preservation of a Power so long the friend, and ally, of Great Britain, and, in the prospect of its establishment in the New World, with augmented strength and splendour.

“We have it in command from His Majesty to inform you, that the determination of the enemy to excite hostilities between His Majesty, and his late Allies, the Emperors of Russia and Austria, and the King of Prussia, has been but too successful, and that the ministers from those Powers have demanded, and received, their passports. This measure, on the part of Russia, has been attempted to be justified by a statement of wrongs, and grievances, which have no real foundation. The Emperor of Russia had, indeed, proffered his mediation between His Majesty and France: His Majesty did not refuse that mediation; but he is confident you will feel the propriety of its not having been accepted, until His Majesty should have been able to ascertain that Russia was in a condition to mediate impartially, and, until the principles, and the basis, on which France was ready to negotiate, were made known to His Majesty. No pretence of justification has been alleged for the hostile conduct of the Emperor of Austria, or for that of his Prussian Majesty. His Majesty has not given the slightest ground of complaint to either of those sovereigns, nor even at the moment when they have respectively withdrawn their ministers, have they assigned to His Majesty any distinct cause for that proceeding.”

On the other hand, the King congratulates his people on still retaining the friendship of the Porte, and the King of Sweden; and that he had concluded a “Treaty of Amity, Commerce, and Navigation” with the United States of America: but these were hardly fair offsets against the powerful European Confederation. Virtually, England was single-handed to fight the world; but there was no flinching – and history records our success.

War takes money, and taxation makes every one feel the burden, directly, or indirectly, so that it must have been with a sigh of relief that the nation read that portion of the King’s Speech which related to finance. “Gentlemen of the House of Commons, His Majesty has directed the Estimates for the year to be laid before you… His Majesty has great satisfaction in informing you, that, notwithstanding the difficulties which the enemy has endeavoured to impose upon the commerce of his subjects, and upon their intercourse with other nations, the resources of the country have continued, in the last year, to be so abundant, as to have produced both from the permanent, and temporary, revenue, a receipt considerably larger than that of the preceding year. The satisfaction which His Majesty feels assured you will derive, in common with His Majesty, from this proof of the solidity of these resources, cannot be greatly increased, if, as His Majesty confidently hopes, it shall be found possible to raise the necessary supplies for the present year without material additions to the public burdens.”

This, the Chancellor of the Exchequer was enabled to do, by taking half a million of money from unclaimed Dividends, and by other means, shown by the following resolutions of the Court of Directors of the Bank of England: