Mistress of the Elgin Marbles

by Susan Nagel

  Elgin’s career in politics, already in doubt due to Napoleon’s harsh parole terms, was now with certainty truncated. As a man who would bring disgrace to his family, he not only lost any sympathy from the public but also publicly lost honor, and when some of his recriminations were proved unfounded, he lost credibility. Elgin also lost the very thing he was after. As the now sole guardian and, ostensibly, protector of his children, he wanted the court to place Mary’s assets in his trust. Mary was not yet thirty when the court determined that she had no actual possession of these properties until the deaths of her antecedents and therefore refused Elgin’s petition for any kind of fiduciary control over Mary’s eventual inheritance. Mary had battled hard, denying her husband’s charges as “libel,” claiming that they had reconciled any differences they might have had, and made sure the court understood that Elgin was totally irresponsible with money and would be an awful risk as guardian of their children’s financial future. The trial, their ninth anniversary present to each other, resulted in a Pyrrhic victory. Elgin lost his hold on Mary’s money, and Mary lost her children. Robert Ferguson had relinquished his dearly coveted seat in Parliament. On December 22, 1807, after the initial civil trial had taken place in London, Robert Ferguson scribbled, clearly with great emotion, “£10,000!!!!!” in unusually large penmanship when compared with the rest of his journal. The damages, his cost for Mary’s defection, would turn out to be a small sum for the price they would all pay.

  Mary had demonstrated time and again that her breezy manner belied an iron will; Lord Elgin, too, possessed a contradictory nature. As talented a diplomat as he was, which required tremendous self-discipline and restraint, in his personal life he was rash. Elgin and Mary were actually very similar: both were stubborn and ungovernable, and when they confronted each other, the contretemps, like the love they had shared, was explosive. These strong-willed, prodigiously passionate people achieved together an unsurpassed archaeological coup, and if the Earl of Elgin had controlled his impulsive and emotional behavior and had not proceeded with his divorce, there is no doubt that the marble collection removed from the Acropolis would have remained in the private hands of the Bruce family. Without Mary’s fortune, which increased spectacularly in the nineteenth century, Elgin was unable to sustain the mounting costs of excavating, shipping, storing, and paying duties on the marbles, and in dire financial straits, he was forced in 1816 to sell the collection to the British Museum. His family’s inestimable loss, however, was the public’s priceless gain.

  Elgin claimed that when he had been a prisoner in France, he could have at any time offered his collection to Napoleon in exchange for his freedom;4 his refusal to relinquish the marbles certainly caused his family great anguish. When he initiated the divorce trial, whose uncertain outcome would certainly impact the future of his collection, he revealed that there was something more important to him after all. To Elgin, if there was one unpardonable act, it was not Mary’s affair with Robert Ferguson, which, though unsettling, was less important to him than Mary’s refusal to bear him more children. Mary’s singular stand for control over her own body in defiance of her husband was unheard of according to social mores and under British law in 1807.

  The year 1807 was a volatile one as Napoleon marched across Spain, having already placed his brothers on the thrones of Naples and Holland. When the French invaded Portugal, fifteen thousand Portuguese, including the entire royal court, fled to Brazil under the leadership of Elgin’s old adversary adventurer Sir Sidney Smith. The Ottomans were embroiled in yet another war with their longtime antagonists the Russians; Mary’s old friend Selim III was deposed and murdered the following year.

  In 1807, a dialogue on individual freedom pervaded Great Britain, causing political, economic, and ideological upheaval. In that year, Parliament abolished the slave trade and Prime Minister Grenville resigned when King George III interfered with the emancipation of the Catholics in Ireland. In her own life, as the lawyers volleyed for the future of the Elgin family, Mary lived in emotional upheaval as she waged her own war of independence. Her refusal to bear more children was the couple’s real bone of contention, and Elgin’s every attempt to control her bred defiance rather than quiescence. The charges of adultery were a convenient by-product that Elgin thought would result in a profitable divorce for him; Mary, however, who neither initiated nor initially sought freedom, by the end of 1807 wanted nothing else. She never counterclaimed for the value of the marbles, despite her role in financing, shipping, and participating in the initial discussions with Parliament.

  Friday, March 11, 1808, was obviously a significant, memorable day for all parties involved in this triangle. In Mary’s diary, she wrote with uncustomary boldness, marking the day’s singularity in her life: “FREE***s.” Robert, in his own diary wrote in thick, heavy script, “***11th March 1808 on that day she was freed from him for EVER.” If the object of Lord Elgin’s insatiable revenge was the evanescence of the Countess of Elgin, the lovely, complex, and charismatic woman who had presided over adoring crowds, had grabbed the hearts of intrinsically heartless despots, and had been at the nexus of power and historic events, he sadly misjudged the endgame. She had created her own fame; he was solely responsible for creating her notoriety. As Mary had traveled the world and had been exposed to and had reflected on foreign cultures—present and past—she had metamorphosed, during her journey as Countess of Elgin, from a pampered, young member of the aristocracy to a forward-thinking and early champion of women’s property and reproductive rights.

  Ironically, it was not in her own country, considered the most powerful and advanced society in the world, where Mary had witnessed the legally humane treatment of divorced women. It was in Turkey, a place most Englishmen considered barbaric. In Turkey, divorced women were allowed to keep their children and property after separating from their husbands. As early as 1795, when Jane Austen began to write Pride and Prejudice (although it was not published until 1813), the subjugation of women through unfair property laws was not an unknown topic in Britain. The treatment of mothers was equally heinous. In the eighteenth century, if a woman bore an illegitimate child, she was whipped in public. In 1834, Britain amended its centuries-old poor laws to state that the mothers, not the fathers, of illegitimate children would be solely responsible for their care until the age of sixteen, and it was not until 1839, two years after Queen Victoria’s accession, that Great Britain passed the Custody of Infants Act, giving women who were going to live apart from their husbands the right to apply for custody of their own children under the age of seven. In 1882, nearly a century after Austen’s microscopic look at the rights of women in England, the British Parliament would finally pass the Married Women’s Property Law, giving women the legal authority over their own property. When, in 1807-8, Mary, Countess of Elgin, decided to challenge the laws of a so-called civilized society, waging a battle for her own inheritance and her children, refusing to abide by those unjust laws, she judiciously determined her own worth, setting a shining example for the empowerment of women. Her boldness, predating the suffragette movement in England by some one hundred years, freed her to chart her own course for the next part of life’s voyage.

  Lord Elgin’s marbles continued to arrive in London without Mary’s assistance or involvement. In 1810, two years after the divorce, the Dowager Lady Elgin died and Elgin remarried on September 21. His bride was Elizabeth Oswald, the very young, innocent daughter of his longtime friend James Oswald of Dunnikier. Elizabeth was not the social creature that Mary had been, and she was twelve years younger, less than half Elgin’s age. She was the complete opposite of Mary in temperament and would bear Elgin eight more children. Although he was Elgin’s great friend, Mr. Oswald opposed the marriage because of Elgin’s financial irresponsibility. As a cost-cutting economy, Elgin and his new bride would, after a time, move to France for a good deal of their married life. Elgin—and his sister, Charlotte, Lady Durham—infused the first set of Elgin children—Bruce, Mary, M
atilda, Harriet, and Lucy—with daily spoonfuls of brainwashing, instructing them to believe that their mother’s shameful behavior had stained them, damaging their eventual marriage prospects. They grew up hating Mary.

  Ironically, Elizabeth Oswald’s own estate was adjacent to Raith, Robert Ferguson’s home. One day, while out taking a carriage ride, Elizabeth, the new Countess of Elgin, spotted Mary. According to someone in the carriage with the very young countess, Elizabeth eyed her husband’s former wife and, sighing, said, “That poor lady once loved my husband,” and, in fact, after that day in the Edinburgh courtroom on March 11, 1808, Mary Nisbet would never again lay eyes on Thomas Bruce, the 7th Earl of Elgin and 11th Earl of Kincardine.

  Chapter 23

  RESCUED

  After the divorce trial in Edinburgh, Mary went home to Archerfield, where she received a visit from her Aunt Mary Campbell of Shawfield who had, nine years since, encouraged Mary to marry Lord Elgin. Aunt Mary had always been one of Mary’s most reliable supporters, and now, during this time of pubic censure, Aunt Mary stood by her favorite niece. Mary tried to look forward rather than behind her, but she was now without her children. She stayed at Archerfield through the weekend and then on Tuesday, March 15, she left for Berwick, another Nisbet home, a castle in fact, but one that would be passed down through another branch of the Nisbet family. She stayed a few days and then left Scotland for England, where she arrived the day after her thirtieth birthday. Waiting for her at Aunt Bluey’s manor house, Bloxholm Hall, was Robert Ferguson. He wrote in his diary that on April 20, 1808, “[I] married my Mary at Bloxholm Church, her uncle General Manners giving her away.” Gentleman’s Magazine reported simply that on April 20, 1808, the following marriage took place: “At Bloxholm co. Lincoln, Robert Ferguson, esq. of Nottingham place to Mary, only daughter of William Hamilton, esq. of Dirleton.”

  The couple left immediately for London, stopping overnight at Eaton, and arrived in London on the twenty-first, where they stayed at Robert’s house on Nottingham Place. Mary extended invitations to members of her family, Robert’s family, and her longtime Scottish friends. In London for business, Parliament, or pleasure, Robert’s brother, General Ronald Ferguson, Dr. Scott, Mr. Munro of Novar, and others showed no qualms about appearing at the home of the divorced woman and her second husband and, in fact, visited repeatedly. Among all of the people who came to Nottingham Place, however, Mary had one favorite. On Thursday, May 12, “we brought Henry home,” she wrote in her diary. Henry, attending Dr. Glennie’s School in Dulwich, consumed Mary’s attention, and instead of hiding the illegitimate child, as most women would have been forced to according to propriety, in her own conspiracy of outcasts, she took him everywhere and did, as Robert had predicted, treat him as if he were her own child. Mary also understood that her new husband was unaccustomed to married life and remarked with amusement that he continued to do as he pleased: “Ferguson went fishing,” she noted in her diary, and Ferguson went fishing often. Mary would no longer be invited to certain gatherings, though to some she was invited for the fascination factor and was smart enough to avoid them. So Robert went to dinners at his men’s associations, leaving her at home with Henry. She was delighted to remain at home with him; she had not had her own children for almost a year and longed for the joy of taking care of a child.

  That summer, they traveled around some of Scotland’s most beautiful natural sights that would later be known as “Ruskin country,” after the also scandalously divorced Victorian art critic John Ruskin. Devil’s Bridge, the Falls of the Maynock, and other places seized Mary’s imagination as she began to enjoy the simple, God-made pleasures so contrary to the artifice and sophistication she had known in the palaces of Europe and the East. She was genuinely happiest when eleven-year-old Henry joined them on holiday. He and Robert were now her family. Henry grew so attached to Mary that in December, when she had to return him to school after a short holiday, she “carried Henry to Dulwich.” When he returned for the Christmas holidays, he was the center of boisterous family fun that Mary created around him. General Ferguson, Mr. Munro, and other close family members and friends gathered around the little boy, the divorcée, and the scientist to offer them seasonal camaraderie. Mary showered all of her energy, kindness, and sense of fun on this little boy, who had been hidden in a monastery in Italy, raised with so little. Mary, starved for her own children, and Henry apparently needed each other.

  Although many doors were closed to this now notorious woman in London, European friends were unfazed by the scandal that surrounded her. The Fergusons received visits from Comte Grimaldi, Comte Bournon, Comte Sierackowski, Comte General de Krukowiecki, Comtesse de Rumford, Comte de Flahault, and others who continued to pay their respects. On Tuesday, January 17,1809, the Ferguson family made their very public debut at the Olympic Pavilion, and that April, a little over a year after the Edinburgh trial, Mary attended a play at the Opera House, knowing that she would face stares and whispers. Ferguson would often go out for the evening by himself to the Geological Society, the Angling Club, the Royal Institution, the Neapolitan Club, the Alfred Club, and the homes of fellow scientists or Whig politicians. Mary sometimes went out those same nights to her grandmother’s house, sometimes to the house of Lady Roselyn, or she would entertain old friends like Alexander Straton at home. Together, Robert and Mary would often visit Robert’s cousins, the Miss Berrys.

  Both Mary and Robert enjoyed their time in London and remained there for long periods of time to be near Henry. Mary took him to see Dover Castle, and they walked the white cliffs; and she brought him to Canterbury Cathedral. By early 1810, it was clear that Mary and Robert had hatched another plan; London was fine for a time, but they were yearning to put their talents and resources to use in Scotland. The Napoleonic wars had created a boom for Mary’s properties in East Lothian. The British Army was in desperate need of food and clothing; Sidney Smith’s grateful Portuguese settlers opened a profitable trading haven for the British in Rio. New inventions like the spinning jenny, the use of steam, crop rotation, the use of lime as fertilizer, a new plow, and the trend to remove cottars in favor of larger leaseholders were changing the methods of farming, mining, and manufacturing. Both Mary and Robert needed to oversee their considerable assets. Mary’s parents were growing older, and as she had fought hard to keep her inheritance, she wanted to manage it properly. Robert’s father died on October 31, 1810, plunging him now into the life of the country laird he had chaffed against for so many years.

  Mary’s high spirits remained with her all her life, but the peaceful cocoon that Robert fashioned around his beloved wife lent her a new tranquillity. She enjoyed, as always, being the object of praise and tribute, but her emotions began to level to a more even keel. Neither Robert nor Mary, who had displayed her brilliance in Constantinople, could suffer dullness. They began to turn Raith House into what painter Sir David Wilkie called the “Holland House of Scotland,” referring to the house in London, first occupied by Whig prime minister Charles James Fox, and then by his nephew, the third Lord Holland. Robert Ferguson was known to toast a portrait of Fox by Opie that hung in his dining room at Raith. He admired the activity that took place at Holland House, which was the center for all Whig party politics. Holland House salons drew the most respected scientists, artists, and literary figures of the day. A small book published at the time entitled Mystifications, by Graham, reported that dinners at Raith were never less than twenty brilliant minds gathered around one table. Despite the fact that Mrs. Ferguson was a divorced woman, once again, everybody came; Mary always knew how to make people covet her invitations.

  Among the guests at Raith House were inventors like James Watt and Sir Humphry Davy; educators like Dr. Glennie and provosts Ford and Pitcairn; artists like famed animal painter Landseer, who left an amusing gift for his hosts, the Fergusons—two pigs: a pretty English one and an unattractive French pig, clearly underlining sentiments at the time—and literary figures like the Ferguson relative Mary B
erry; and architects like Playfair, who designed the stables at Raith. The same members of the Scottish nobility that Queen Victoria would later host and write about in her own Scottish journals—Wallace, Buccleuch, Montrose, Moncrief, Stirling, Maitland, Roselyn, Erskine, Kinnaird, Dundas, Lauderdale, Hamilton, Oliphant, Baillie, Balfour, and even Bruce, cousins to her former husband—all came to Raith. She entertained the Duchesses of Gordon and Roxborough and Lady Jane Montague at Archerfield. The Russells, who were stepcousins of Mary’s (their antecedent was Catherine Russell, the second Duke of Rutland’s first wife; Mary’s great-grandmother Lucy who had purchased Bloxholm Hall, where she and Robert married, was the duke’s second wife), followed her from Raith to Archerfield to Biel and back again. Sir William Russell, the younger brother of the Duke of Bedford, frequently brought his young nephew Sir John Russell along. Sir John, who held the seat for Tavistock in Parliament, shared his keen interest in politics with Robert Ferguson. Sir John Russell would become prime minister of England in 1846; almost every future prime minister elected by the Whigs would at one time or another visit the Fergusons of Raith. Sadly, William Russell would be murdered by a servant in 1840. Mary was very fond of both Russells, and it was clear by their frequent visits to wherever she was that they adored her company.

  She continued to fascinate. Sir Walter Scott based his 1819 The Bride of Lammermoor on Mary. Although the story was set in the seventeenth century, its heroine, Lucy, the richest girl in East Lothian, is involved in a love triangle. She is the object of affection for both a Jacobite (Tory) and a nouveau riche Whig. Scott was obsessed with the Countess of Elgin’s famous divorce trial, which pitted ideological adversaries against each other, and Mary was the widely known princess of East Lothian. As Mary neither goes mad nor does she kill her husband, it was Scott’s imagination that brought the story to an operatic climax and, in fact, inspired Donizetti to compose Lucia de Lammermoor.