Revolution

by Edward Cline

  Sitting also in the pile of read correspondence were some pleas and many more requests from merchants and ships’ captains and masters for Mediterranean passes and special clearances to leave port with “unstamped” cargoes. The undertone in most of these missives varied from desperation to anxiety to restrained surliness, all of them imbued with implicit blame of him for any continued inconvenience, and implying economic disaster if he did not grant permission. He would approve all these requests and had already forwarded to Captain Sterling on the Rainbow in Hampton and his officers on other naval vessels bundles of special clearance certificates, which temporarily waived the necessity of stamped papers. The foreman of the Gazette, on the Lieutenant-Governor’s orders, was still churning them out by the score. The alternative was to have dozens of vessels riding at anchor in the Bay and tied up in so many Tidewater ports, all paralyzed for lack of a piece of paper.

  The Lieutenant-Governor thought his wording of those certificates was a spurt of practical genius. “I do hereby certify that George Mercer, Esq.; appointed distributor of the Stamps for this colony, having declined acting in that character until further orders, declared before me, in Council, that he did not bring with him, or was never charged by the Commissioners of the Customs in England with the care of any Stamps.…” The onus of responsibility was thus placed directly over Mr. Mercer’s head. It was true that Mr. Mercer had not a single stamp on his person when he made that statement, and further, had not signed a receipt for the stamps, which were in fact on the Rainbow itself, in Captain Sterling’s custody. But the better half-truth was that, for all practical purposes, they had not arrived. The blame-exonerating certificates would have to do until peaceful means were found to introduce the stamps into the colony’s course of business. Tempers and passions ought to abate with time, hoped the Lieutenant-Governor.

  Peter Randolph, that sly-boots member of his Council and the Surveyor-General for the Western Middle District, had tried to persuade him, during a confidential discussion in this very office a few weeks before, that he ought to allow commerce to continue without the stamps, and to share with him either the blame or credit for such an extralegal action. Otherwise, that man had gently warned, there might be “difficulties” of the sort that other governors and correspondents were reporting in neighboring colonies, unpleasantness that might call for gubernatorial actions of dubious practicality.

  Fauquier had agreed then only to allow Randolph to act as he saw fit, but would not agree to split the responsibility with him. Then, it was a grave issue of granting official sanction to flouting the law, and of risking the severest of rebukes from the Board of Trade as a consequence, once that body learned of his action. Fauquier was certain that an absence of specific instructions from the Board to deal with the crisis in such a manner would not have been countenanced by that body as either a legitimate excuse or good governorship.

  Now, however, he realized that Randolph’s plan was eminently practical. Because, instead of these harmless, inert missives on his desk to answer, there would too likely be, at this very moment, dozens of angry, determined gentlemen besieging the front door of the Palace, demanding assurances that he would do something, and quickly! Perhaps, he mused, the Crown was responsible for those gentlemen’s assuming that he had the powers of a wizard.

  The Lieutenant-Governor was afraid of Virginians, now. He had witnessed their anger and observed the precipice of violence these men had skirted when the unfortunate Mr. Mercer arrived earlier in the month to assume his appointed duties as stamp distributor. Fauquier thought: If I had not intervened, Mr. Mercer could have suffered a fate worse than humiliation, one perhaps worse than the roughing up he had received in Hampton.

  He thought again: Well, I will condone the resumption of business and commerce without the stamps, for they are simply not available. They are indeed here, but consigned to a netherworld. They may as well have never have crossed the ocean with Mr. Mercer! It was not so incredible a thing, thought Fauquier. After all, London had even neglected to send him a copy of the Act that he was duty-bound to enforce! He knew its particulars only because Mr. Robinson, the Speaker, had deigned to loan him a copy of the Act that had somehow come into the House last May. Well, he thought, they cannot accuse me of being Buridan’s ass, that beast of burden that starved to death because it could not decide which haystack to eat!

  In another special pile of paper assembled by his secretary were memorials from dozens of county courts, in which the undersigned justices declared the Stamp Act to be unconstitutional, asserted their unwillingness to admit the stamps into any of their business, and claimed consequently they were unable to perform their functions. What hubris! thought the Lieutenant-Governor. Then there was the memorial from the justices of the court of Queen Anne County, who had made the same declarations and assertions, but had decided to sit in defiance of the Act.

  He had received letters from other governors reporting the same phenomena in their own colonies. What would London think when it heard of this universal foolery! Accompanying their reports were details of violence against appointed distributors and of the subsequent resignations of those men. Why, the fools had even destroyed the home and library of the Chief Justice of Massachusetts, Thomas Hutchinson, a kinder, wiser man Fauquier did not know. And the same Boston mob had pillaged the home of the man’s brother-in-law, Andrew Oliver, forcing him to resign his commission before he had even received it, and obliging him to repeat his abjuration when he had it in hand!

  The Lieutenant-Governor mused darkly on the fact that every one of the appointed distributors had resigned. Not a single one had stood his ground. They had all either resigned or fled, rendering their commissions useless and without power of enforcement. His information came not only from his correspondence, but also in the town’s coffeehouses and taverns, in the overheard conversations of other patrons, who talked of the phenomenon with amused, grimly gloating satisfaction.

  Even the unfortunate Mr. Mercer, sensing that his life would henceforth be made miserable in Virginia — he very likely shunned, ostracized, and certainly not reelected to his seat in the House by his countrymen — had already left for a return voyage to England, ostensibly to press the claims of the Ohio Company, of which he was a member, but actually because he knew he was now an outcast with a callous future in Virginia. He did not think the man would ever return; during their last interview, he impressed the Lieutenant-Governor as wanting to wish a pox on his fellow Virginians.

  Some of the Lieutenant-Governor’s correspondents were kind enough to send him newspapers from other colonies. The single item in one of them that gave the Lieutenant-Governor a sense of normality and solace was a report that in July that literary prince, Samuel Johnson, had been made a Doctor of Law by Trinity College in Dublin. The papers were otherwise replete with news of the same outrages and violence. Homes and warehouses owned by the stamp distributors were destroyed, effigies were hanged and burned, noisy parades and all-night vigils were staged, liberty trees and faux gallows were erected, loyal recalcitrants were tarred and feathered — all the usual mob violence.

  The raw violence frightened the Lieutenant-Governor more than he wished to contemplate, and certainly more than he could allow himself to express angrily in company, for his concern could be interpreted as a sign of doubt and helplessness. He was grateful that this dangerous foolery had not much occurred in Virginia. He resolved to remain stolidly calm, even when he read such things as a broadside forwarded to him by an official in Pennsylvania, in which some caitiff asserted that the violence against the stamp distributors was “the most effectual and decent method of preventing the execution of a statute, because it was an axe that struck into the root of the tree of tyranny.”

  “Tyranny?” Did these commotions, assaults, and vandalism constitute rebellion, or revolution? the Lieutenant-Governor asked himself. He could not decide. He wondered: If General Gage sent a regiment or two to any of these venues of anarchy to restore order and Crown a
uthority, would the same roving mobs that preyed on defenseless stamp distributors and chief justices and port officials have the arrogance to confront seasoned, disciplined troops? Fauquier thought they might be reckless and bold enough, their fiery confidence stoked by the example of their late successes and with a fatal sense of righteous omnipotence. He mentally commended the general for staying his martial hand. One such incident might provoke the wrath of the Crown, and Virginia would be among the first colonies to feel that particular violence.

  After all, it had been his own House’s ill-considered resolves from last May, illegally broadcast to the other colonies, that precipitated the anarchy and continuing uproar. The role of those resolves would doubtless be noted by His Majesty, by the Board of Trade, by the Privy Council, by the new ministry. Trials for treason would certainly ensue, either here in the colonies or in London, followed by hangings, imprisonments, and fortune-consuming fines, together with the punishment of lesser ringleaders and offenders.

  Fauquier knew, in the deepest part of his political soul, that one such bloody contest of anger and arms anywhere in the colonies between regular troops and colonials would alarm all those powers in London and move them to press vigorously for a complete and explicit reordering of the colonies’ subordinate relationship with the mother country. Then there would be no arguable doubts about that subordination. Charters would be rewritten, legislatures emasculated or altogether abolished, and less wise, less patient, and less prudent men appointed to all the governorships. Very likely he himself would be replaced, dismissed from office in disgrace for somehow having allowed it all to happen.

  The Lieutenant-Governor paused to reflect sadly: Then, no longer would anyone here be able to proclaim with careless confidence, “Procul á Jove, procul á fulmine!” The farther away from Jove, the less to fear his thunder bolts!

  But he knew distance was irrelevant to the gods of Whitehall. He was certain that a reordering was in the works, with or without an incident. It had been an occasional subject of discussion and speculation during those endless card games in London among his closest friends and colleagues, and frequently a topic of bellicose ranting in the clubs he had frequented there. Because he was regarded as something of an authority on Crown financial governance, he had even been privileged to read some proposals authored by a number of subministers. The desire to directly control the colonies existed, and had existed long before the late war. Whitehall would deem it lawful administration and proper due deference. But the people here, he knew, would begin to regard it as conquest and enslavement.

  The Lieutenant-Governor also knew, in the same depths of his soul, that the colonials would not long brook such a radical reordering without defiance and resistance. Then there would be more bloodshed, and tragedy, the clash of two sets of Constitutional premises. He did not think he would live long enough to witness that certain apocalypse, and was glad of it.

  Fauquier read again some of the correspondence, pausing occasionally to take notes for another doleful and obsequious report to the Board of Trade. He could not remember the last time he had composed an optimistic one. How my veiled complaints must fatigue their lordships! he thought.

  Later that day the Lieutenant-Governor, tired of his labors, pushed back his chair in the diminishing light of fall eventide, and ventured into the chilly air for a late dinner in the Palace with his wife and son. As he passed from the annex to that edifice, a servant rushed from it and intercepted him with the news that Joseph Royle, printer of the Virginia Gazette and ill for some time, “was close to passing to his final reward.”

  Fauquier stopped long enough to frown in dismay. He muttered, “Zounds! They may blame me for that, as well!”

  * * *

  A more important personage had already gone to his final reward. Or perhaps to his final punishment, for all the maladies and vices that had plagued him in recent years — near-blindness, abscesses, asthma, obesity, and the collective effects of having led a largely dissolute life — seemed to combine to claim their ultimate due in one sudden, unexpected stroke. The Lieutenant-Governor would not receive news of it for some months. The first reports of the summer and fall disorders from General Gage and several colonial governors had only just then reached London and threaded their way up through the various Crown bureaucracies to the desks of first secretaries and Board of Trade members, together with the remonstrances, memorials, addresses, and resolves from other colonies.

  Nearly a month before, on October 31st, William Augustus, the Duke of Cumberland — who very likely would have recommended to a vacillating Lord Rockingham and his ministers, and to an uncertain but deferential nephew, George the Third, that the best solution to the seditious turmoil in the American colonies was a military one — died of a heart attack an hour or so before a crucial policymaking meeting at his residence at Windsor Great Lodge, at the age of forty-four.

  * * *

  The Lieutenant-Governor married Hugh Kenrick and Reverdy Brune-McDougal in the regal foyer of the Palace on the afternoon of the first Sunday of winter, well into the Advent season. Present at the ceremony were Reverdy’s brother James, Jack and Etáin Frake, and John Proudlocks. The day was cold and overcast, but no snow fell.

  It was a simple Anglican ceremony, performed with sonorous dignity by the Lieutenant-Governor, who finished it in ten minutes. In his letter to Hugh, Fauquier had also invited his party to dine with him in the adjoining visitors’ parlor. Here was set an elegant and generously laden table in that room befitting the coming holiday season. They were joined by Fauquier’s wife, Catherine.

  Fauquier was curious about why the couple did not avail themselves of the services of the minister at St. Stepney’s parish in Caxton, but settled for private speculation. Animosities, he guessed. Reverend Albert Acland had written him a number of times over the years, complaining about Mr. Kenrick and other Queen Anne planters, but Fauquier had limited his replies to that unhappy man to mere acknowledgements. The clergy here were too bothersome for words, pulling him this way and that in their own campaign for sovereignty over the souls and purses of their flocks. He wished that the matter of establishing an episcopate here in the colonies were not so intimately but irrelevantly tied to political matters. A North American episcopate would save him so much contentious business with William Robinson, the Commissary, and all his allies among the Virginia clergy.

  The conversation at the dinner was cordial and sprightly.

  “I have heard you are a singer, milady,” he said to the bride.

  “Yes, your honor,” replied Reverdy, “but I am an amateur only, although I have seen notices of my performances in some of the London papers.”

  “Well, I must envy you on that account. I have not been noticed in the papers at all, except now and then as a devil. Not in London, that is.”

  Reverdy glanced at Etáin, then said, “We are planning to have a Christmas concert and ball at Mr. Vishonn’s place at Enderly on Christmas day, your honor. We would be greatly honored if you and your wife would attend. Mr. Vishonn would be especially honored by your presence.”

  Fauquier smiled. “Well, milady, I thank you for the thought and the invitation. Regrettably, my family and I had planned to spend a quiet Christmas day here.”

  Hugh took Reverdy’s hand and said, “Music! Had I the knowledge of it, I would compose a concerto and entitle it ‘An Ode to Thia.’”

  “Thia?” inquired Etáin.

  The Lieutenant-Governor answered, “She was a Titan, the mother of Helios, and so, by implication, the mother of light.” He addressed Hugh. “You do your bride a great honor.”

  “You gentlemen flatter me,” said Reverdy.

  Hugh shook his head. “No flattery, milady. You know I am not capable of it. Of compliments, yes.” Then he paused, and added, “For a while, though, we were like Thisbe and Pyramus, and talked through walls for the longest time. But the walls have been surmounted, and now we are together.”

  “I am not familiar with that lege
nd, Hugh,” said Reverdy.

  “It is something of a tragedy, milady,” said Fauquier, “the reverse of Romeo and Juliet.” He paused before he continued, and then added ominously, but with muted cheerfulness, “It is one based on an equally sad misunderstanding, if I remember it correctly.”

  “My beloved and I will rewrite those tragedies,” said Hugh.

  The Lieutenant-Governor rose and picked up his glass of madeira. “Well, let us toast the groom and his bride, nonetheless.”

  The dinner concluded two hours later. Jack, Etáin, and Proudlocks prepared to return to Caxton. Hugh and Reverdy had reserved an entire room for themselves at the Raleigh for the next few evenings. Hallam’s troupe of actors was in town, with an announced program of two plays, George Lillo’s The London Merchant and Richard Steele’s The Conscious Lovers. Jack Frake and Etáin thanked the Lieutenant-Governor for his hospitality. When they had gone outside to wait for Hugh and Reverdy, Fauquier remarked to Hugh, “Mr. Frake is a paragon of reticence, sir. Correct me if I am in error, but I believe he uttered no more than twenty words the whole time. Did I not marry that couple at your request, as well?”

  Hugh nodded. “You did, your honor.”

  “But, I have the distinct impression that he does not like me.”

  “Perhaps he does not wish to dislike you, your honor. You are, after all, an amiable gentleman, but unfortunately, you are also the Crown.” Hugh paused. “The Crown has done him many a disservice. I can make the same complaint. However, in these times, Jack and I are Amys and Amylion.”