The Third George: (Georgian Series)

by Jean Plaidy

  Miss Vansittart was humble and admired him whole-heartedly. She made no demands and that was very pleasant.

  First they had talked and then it seemed so natural that they should become lovers in a quiet rather desultory way, which suited her nature and Lord Bute’s declining years.

  He told her that the King had turned against him and she was incredulous that the King could be so lacking in gratitude.

  She soothed him and he told her that the Princess Dowager was as devoted to him as ever and that theirs was too strong a relationship for the King to stop it, although he might try.

  ‘But I trust the Princess. She would never wish to part from me.’

  Miss Vansittart plainly adored him and he told her that he would speak to the Princess, and when there was a vacancy in her household it should go to Miss Vansittart.

  Miss Vansittart shivered with delight at the prospect of serving the woman who for so many years had been a wife in all but name, to the wonderful Lord Bute; and he soothed the hurt the King had done him by basking in her admiration and explaining to her all the perquisites which fell into the laps of those who served in royal households. She would learn, for he would teach her, how to come by these rewards.

  When he left her he felt better, but when he returned to his house his wife, that most accommodating of women, demanded to know if he had been visiting Miss Vansittart.

  He admitted this was so, for since she had never complained of his relationship with the Princess Dowager why should she with Miss Vansittart?

  But it seemed this was different. ‘This will have to stop,’ she told him. ‘This woman is no Princess Dowager. This is quite a different matter.’

  ‘I believe you are jealous,’ replied his lordship.

  ‘Of course I’m jealous.’

  ‘Of this poor young woman?’

  ‘Exactly. What has this poor young woman to offer but herself? With the Princess Dowager it was different.’

  ‘What a sordid view,’ he commented with distaste.

  But his wife laughed at him and said that she was not prepared to have to listen to gossip about her husband and Miss Vansittart.

  Lord Bute felt melancholy. Life had ceased to smile on him.

  *

  Four days after William Pitt had received the King’s letter he was asking for an audience with His Majesty.

  ‘Bring him in, bring him in,’ cried George. ‘Don’t you know I wouldn’t wish Mr Pitt to be kept waiting, eh, eh?’

  So Mr Pitt came hobbling in and the King looked at him with emotion. The greatest mistake he had ever made, thought George, was to allow Bute to persuade him to banish Mr Pitt.

  But Mr Pitt bore no grudges. The King asked after his family and gave news of his own.

  ‘Young George is growing more bumptious every day. Frederick is imitating his brother; and I doubt not young William will be the same. As you know, the Queen is expecting another in September, ha! Well, well, we shall soon have a quiverful, eh? What?’

  Mr Pitt, elegant in spite of his afflictions, gracious and ceremonious, made a little speech about the blessings of family life and added that the royal family set an example to all the families in the land.

  This pleased George whose eyes filled with tears at the thought of his and his wife’s virtues and how well they filled their roles to the glory of England.

  Then the conversation turned on the reason for Mr Pitt’s being in London and the King made it very clear that he placed himself in Mr Pitt’s hands.

  He was disappointed in the Rockingham ministry; in fact ever since Mr Pitt had ceased to lead the Government he had been disappointed.

  Pitt’s eyes gleamed with triumph when he heard this. He had come prepared to compromise; now he saw that there would be no need. It would be as he, Pitt, wished it to be.

  He told the King that he would have great pleasure in forming a government which he would submit to His Majesty for his approval.

  George warmly shook his hand and said: ‘It is a great relief. You understand, eh? A great relief.’

  ‘I do understand, Sir. I trust Your Majesty will have no reason to regret your decision. Your Majesty knows full well that I shall use all my powers to make this ministry a success.’

  The King said: ‘Yes, yes, yes. I have never doubted that, eh? What? What?’

  Mr Pitt bowed himself from the presence. The King had changed and he could not help feeling a little uneasy. The quick way of talking with the inevitable. ‘What? What?’ was already being noticed. And the change had come with his recent indisposition … that mysterious illness which no one quite understood, and about which there were so many rumours.

  A Regency? thought Pitt. He grimaced inwardly. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof. He would deal with such a contingency when and if it arose. In the meantime he had carte blanche to form a ministry.

  *

  Pitt presented his choice of a ministry to the King and it was accepted. The First Lord of the Treasury was the Duke of Grafton – a rather reckless choice perhaps, not because the Duke lacked ability and could not be trusted to support him, but because of the life he led. Descended from Charles II, Grafton had inherited many of that king’s characteristics – chief of which was his love of women. His existing liaison was one of the scandals of the Court. This was with Nancy Parsons, a notorious courtesan, the daughter of a Bond Street tailor who had first lived with a West Indian merchant named Horton with whom she had gone to Jamaica; Jamaica did not suit her however and she soon returned to London where she took many lovers; chief of whom was the Duke of Grafton. The Duke’s open dalliance with her – he was constantly seen with her at the races and in public places – his devotion to horse racing, his neglect of his wife, the mother of his three children, meant that his affairs were widely known and discussed. It was said by Horace Walpole, the wit and raconteur, that Grafton ‘postponed the world for a whore and a horserace’ and he went on to voice some pointed criticism against ‘The Duke of Grafton’s Mrs Horton, the Duke of Dorset’s Mrs Horton, everybody’s Mrs Horton.’ And such was the man whom Pitt had chosen to be First Lord of the Treasury.

  The Lord President was the Earl of Northington; the Chancellor of the Exchequer Mr Charles Townsend; and the position of Lord Privy Seal Pitt reserved for himself.

  When the news was out there was rejoicing through the City. Bonfires were lit in the streets. The Mayor decided that a banquet in honour of Mr Pitt, the Great Commoner, be held at the Guildhall. There was a great deal of talk about the prosperity which Mr Pitt had brought to the City when he had first become Prime Minister. Mr Pitt had brought an Empire to England and the City knew that Empires meant trade and prosperity.

  In the streets they shouted for Mr Pitt. They waited for his carriage; if they saw it they gathered round it, cheering.

  A great wave of optimism swept through London.

  ‘Everything will be all right now,’ it was said. ‘Mr Pitt is back.’

  *

  Sewing, reading, walking a little in her apartments at Kew, going to see the children in their nursery, receiving visits from them, the trying months of pregnancy were passing slowly for Charlotte.

  Though, she thought, I should be used to it by now. And there was one blessing: the more children she had the easier it became to give birth to them.

  She saw little of her husband. He was occupied with the new Ministry and Mr Pitt.

  When he did come to see her she asked him questions, for there was so much excitement about that matter that the news had come to Kew. She wanted to know what had brought Mr Pitt back and what his terms had been, because she knew that he had retired from the front bench because of some disagreement with the King and the majority of his ministers.

  When George came to see her they walked together in the gardens. He wanted to know the minutest details. He always did. Why had roses been planted there? He would send for the gardeners and ask. They always had their answers ready and were prepared for him.

 
But when she asked him about government affairs he grew pink and he said: ‘Oh, state affairs … state affairs.’

  ‘Everyone seems so excited about this new turn.’

  ‘Shouldn’t talk so much. Wait and see, eh?’

  ‘Mr Pitt must have many new plans.’

  ‘Don’t doubt it, don’t doubt it. Now are you taking regular exercise? Necessary. Very necessary, eh? Feeling well are you? Feel the heat, eh? What? Usual in the circumstances, eh?’

  ‘I’m as well as I always am at these times, but I should like to know …’

  ‘Take care. Don’t worry your head about matters outside your knowledge. Not good for the child. Not good for you, eh? I think a path would be good here. What do you think, eh?’

  And so it went on.

  At times Charlotte felt like a prisoner – a pampered prisoner who was to have all her comforts, most material things that she asked for, but never her freedom.

  I am like a queen bee in a hive. I am looked after that I may go on bearing my young.

  *

  A few days after he had formed his ministry William Pitt made one of the greatest mistakes of his career. He accepted a peerage and became Viscount Pitt of Burton-Pynsent in the County of Somersetshire and Earl of Chatham in the County of Kent.

  What possessed him to take such a step his friends could not be sure. He was suffering acutely from the gout; the first excitement of being in harness again was wearing off; he knew that the old enemy Gout was not going to allow him to carry out his plans; he felt old and tired; and as most of his colleagues possessed high-sounding titles, it seemed only right and proper that he, who had done so much more in the service of his country, should have one too.

  In any case he accepted the titles and by doing so lost the one which had counted for so much in the eyes of the people. He might now be the Earl of Chatham but he was no longer the Great Commoner.

  ‘Illuminations for my Lord Chatham!’ cried the people of London. ‘A banquet at the Guildhall! Not likely. They were to honour Mr Pitt, not Chatham. He’s as self-seeking as the rest. He’s not there to serve the country and us. He’s there to get a fine handle to his name and what goes with it.’

  There was no enthusiasm now in the streets. No one called Hurrah for Pitt. The people were sullenly silent.

  Everyone was commenting on the change.

  Lord Chesterfield wrote to his son: ‘He has had a fall upstairs and has done himself so much hurt that he will never be able to stand on his legs again.’

  But it was the shrewd Horace Walpole who summed up the position and pointed out that in accepting the title the new Earl had done more harm to the country than to himself. ‘While he held the love of the people,’ said Horace, ‘nothing was so formidable in Europe as his name. The talons of the lion were drawn when he was no longer awful in his own forest.’

  A sick man, driven almost to distraction by the pain of his gout, Pitt sought to defy public opinion which had previously wholeheartedly supported him and tried to govern with his ministry which had been made up from both parties; but because he had set Whigs and Tories, friends and enemies to work together and because he himself had ruined his own public image by his title, and chiefly because he was an extremely sick man, he was doomed to failure.

  Edmund Burke was later to describe the Ministry as ‘a tessellated pavement without cement; here a bit of black stone and there a bit of white; patriots and courtiers, kind friends and republicans; Whigs and Tories; treacherous friends and open enemies … a very curious show, but utterly unsafe to touch and unsure to stand on.’

  That year there was a bad harvest and Chatham was obliged to lay an embargo on the importation of corn.

  It was a very uneasy session and as the summer passed into autumn, the gout began to plague him more than ever.

  *

  In September Charlotte moved to Buckingham House to prepare for her confinement. It was necessary for the royal child to be born in London, but now that Buckingham House had become such a popular royal residence, Charlotte need not go to that grim old palace of St James’s.

  Although she was not allowed to meddle, of course, she knew what was happening. She had heard that Mr Pitt had become Lord Chatham and that the people were not very pleased with him because of this.

  How she wished George would consult her. What a pleasure it would be if they could talk politics together. After all she was not exactly stupid. She was only ignorant because she was not allowed to learn.

  She believed that the Princess Dowager was at the bottom of the plot to keep her away from affairs. That woman was downright jealous; and she was pleased to hear that her lover Lord Bute was out of favour with the King, and that George seemed at last to have escaped from his mother’s apron strings.

  What a blessing it was to be able to understand English. Now she could glean all sorts of interesting conversation from her women. Miss Chudleigh was really a most indiscreet woman. So much the better, thought Charlotte.

  But on reflection she agreed that life in England was very different from what she had imagined. She had thought she was coming to England to rule with her husband; and here she was doing scarcely anything but being pregnant and bearing children.

  Well, she had her three boys, and when she thought of them she could not help being delighted with them. It was after all so much more gratifying to be a mother than a great politician, though some women had managed to be both.

  The leaves on the trees were beginning to turn russet. She could not be bothered to ask what all the shouting in the streets was about. The shortage of corn? The defection of Lord Chatham? It all seemed rather unimportant when a new life was about to begin.

  I want a girl this time, she told Miss Chudleigh, and Miss Chudleigh replied that she was sure it would be a girl. It was the way Her Majesty was carrying and after three boys a girl often followed.

  And on 26 September Charlotte’s child was born. A little girl. So she had her wish.

  She was called Charlotte Augusta Matilda; and the Queen, delighted, happy now to be nothing but a mother, said that the child was her little Michaelmas Goose.

  Domesticity at Kew

  GEORGE HAD MADE up his mind to be a king and those about him had to learn to accept this fact. The Princess Dowager had reluctantly released her hold on him, although she still refused to believe that she had lost her influence over him entirely.

  She had thought it would be enough that Charlotte should be prevented from usurping her place; this had been easy to achieve for Charlotte’s ability to furnish the royal nurseries was really phenomenal. It seemed that no sooner had she been delivered of one child than another was on the way. After Charlotte Augusta Matilda, Edward had followed; and almost immediately she was pregnant again. Nor did she seem to suffer from this continual childbearing; in fact she seemed to thrive on it.

  ‘She was intended for it,’ said the Princess Dowager to Lord Bute when he called on her. ‘And I will grant her this; she does it with remarkable speed and efficiency.’

  It was pleasant to reflect, was Lord Bute’s comment, that the Queen could please the Princess Dowager in some respects.

  ‘Oh, yes,’ said the Princess. ‘She is adequate. And as long as she does not attempt to meddle in politics I have no complaint to make.’

  She smiled benignly. She still doted on this man. He was as a husband to her and she was a woman who needed a husband. She was not promiscuous; she was not sensuous; but she needed the companionship, the at-oneness which was only to be found in a devoted husband; and Lord Bute had provided that, more so than her real husband the Prince of Wales had ever done; although she had had nothing to complain of in Frederick.

  She had taken Miss Vansittart into her household recently, and the young woman had made herself very useful in the rather delicate matter of selling honours. She was a most discreet young woman; and the Princess Dowager needed the little money these sales brought in and could not of course be concerned in the sordid business of s
elling.

  Since Miss Vansittart was a friend of Lord Bute’s she knew she could absolutely rely on her. And if Lord Bute did visit her regularly, they never betrayed in her presence that there was anything between them but the most platonic friendship.

  She loved Lord Bute with a wifely devotion; they had been together now for many years and she regarded their union as a true marriage.

  Recently, however, she had been feeling a painful restriction in her throat which had alarmed her. She had said nothing of it, for she wanted no doctors telling her some unpleasant truth. The trouble would occur and then subside; but she was constantly aware of it; and she had uneasy suspicions, having heard of such symptoms before.

  If she were going to die – oh not yet, but perhaps in a year or so – she would like to know that Lord Bute would have someone to comfort him; and nice, discreet, quiet Miss Vansittart would be the very one.

  So far from discouraging that friendship, she kept Miss Vansittart beside her. Her love for this man, who had dominated her thoughts for so many years, was too deep, too abiding to be selfish.

  In the meantime no one – not even Lord Bute – must guess of this thing which was there in her throat and which she fancied became a little more painful every time she was made aware of it.

  *

  George was impressing his personality on the Court which many declared was dull, dreary, unimaginative and completely devoid of the trappings of royalty. There was nothing royal about George – nor about Charlotte. George might have been a farmer, for he had a great interest in agriculture; Charlotte might have been any squire’s lady sitting there in her country house breeding.

  There was another characteristic which was beginning to be noticed and which was considered unkingly: the King was constantly concerning himself over trifling sums of money; he wanted to know the cost of things and would often shake his head and say this and that was too costly. They must economize. Although there had been many complaints of extravagance in kings in the past, George’s carefulness was even more deplored. As for Charlotte, she was, said her ladies-in-waiting, becoming downright mean.