Courtiers: The Secret History of the Georgian Court

by Lucy Worsley

79. Cartwright (1883), pp. 459, 470 (26 July 1731).

  80. BL Add MS 22227, Peter Wentworth to his brother (21 August 1729).

  81. SRO 941/47/4, p. 119, John Hervey to Ste Fox (21 August 1730).

  82. Kensington Public Library, ‘Extra illustrated’ edition of Thomas Faulkner, History and Antiquities of Kensington (London, 1820) (3-volume version), Vol. 3, item 326, representation of Jane Kien.

  83. BL Add MS 22227, f. 79r, Peter Wentworth to his brother (31 July 1729).

  84. Daily Advertiser, issue 91 (19 May 1731); Cartwright (1883), p. 469.

  85. Kensington Public Library, ‘Extra illustrated’ edition of Thomas Faulkner, History and Antiquities of Kensington (London, 1820) (3-volume version), Vol. 3, item 335, ‘Chimneys Swept at Kensington Palace’.

  86. BL Add MS 20101, f. 6r.

  87. BL Add MS 78514 E, ‘Journal of Sir John Evelyn Baronet’, f. 33r (2 November 1729).

  88. Impey (2003), p. 38.

  89. TNA Work 6/7, p. 154.

  90. John H. Appleby, ‘Rowley, John (c.1668–1728)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford, 2004).

  91. TNA LS 13/82, f. 7r.

  92. Gaunt and Knight (1988–9), Vol. 2, Chap. 4, p. 506.

  93. Matthew Kilburn, ‘Hervey (neé Lepell), Mary, Lady Hervey of Ickworth (1699/1700–1768)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford, 2004).

  94. RA EB/EB 31, p. 15.

  95. HMC 12th Report, Appendix, Part III, Cowper, pp. 118–20, ‘the memorial of Henry Wise and Joseph Carpenter’ (1717).

  96. BL Add MS 22227, f. 162r, Peter Wentworth to his brother (3 June 1735).

  97. ‘The Basset-Table, an Ecologue’, in Mr Pope, &c., Court Poems (London, 1726), p. 9.

  98. Hervey (1894), Vol. 3, p. 68, Lord Bristol to Lord Hervey (5 August 1731).

  99. Pöllnitz (1739), Vol. 2, p. 463.

  100. BL Add MS 22227, ff. 98–100, Peter Wentworth to Lord Strafford (25 July 1729).

  101. London Evening Post, issue 392 (13 June 1730); Cartwright (1883), p. 468; pp.471–2; BL 22227, f. 94r, Peter Wentworth to his brother (2 October 1729), f. 161, Peter Wentworth to his brother (3 June 1735).

  102. The Gentleman’s Magazine, Vol. 13 (December 1743), p. 629.

  103. For example, Weekly Journal or Saturday’s Post (29 October 1720), issue 100.

  104. Stanhope (1774), Vol. 1, p. 211.

  105. Thomson (1847), p. 240.

  106. Stanhope (1774), Vol. 2, p. 263.

  107. Kroll (1998), p. 216.

  108. William Hone, The Table Book, Vol. 1 (London, 1827; Detroit, 1966), p. 378.

  109. Anon. (1721), quoted in Black (2004b), p. 64.

  110. Pöllnitz (1739), Vol. 2, p. 464.

  111. Henri Misson, M. Misson’s memoirs and observations in his travels over England, trans. Mr Ozell (London, 1719), p. 315.

  112. BL Add MS 61463, f. 88v, Mary Cowper to Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough, Hampton Court (20 August 1716).

  113. Pöllnitz (1739), Vol. 2, p. 449.

  114. TNA LC 5/3, p. 81 (9 December 1728).

  115. BL Add MS 78514 E, ‘Journal of Sir John Evelyn Baronet’, f. 3r (19 July 1728).

  116. Hervey (1894), Vol. 3, p. 37, Lady Bristol to Lord Bristol (16 January 1729).

  117. Gaunt and Knight (1988–9), Vol. 2, Chap. 4, p. 507.

  118. Ross (2006), p. 281 (John Arbuthnot to Henrietta Howard, 30 May 1728).

  119. Hervey (1931), Vol. 2, p. 552.

  120. HMC Egmont, Vol. 1, p. 426 (1920).

  121. Stamford Mercury, Vol. 32, No. 3 (25 July 1728).

  122. London Gazette/The Post Boy No. 3040 (2 November 1714).

  123. Saussure (1902), p. 265.

  124. Black (2004b), p. x.

  125. BL Add MS 22626, f. 91r, Lord Chesterfield to Henrietta Howard (13 July n.y.).

  126. BL Add MS 22628, f. 19, Molly Hervey to Henrietta Howard (31 August 1728).

  127. Pöllnitz (1739), Vol. 2, p. 449.

  128. Lord Berkeley of Stratton, quoted in Aston (2008), pp. 171–93, 182.

  129. Matthews (1939), p. 66 (1 August 1715).

  130. Pöllnitz (1739), Vol. 2, p. 450.

  131. BL Add MS 78514 E, ‘Journal of Sir John Evelyn Baronet’, f. 16r (2 March 1729).

  132. Donald Burrows, ‘Handel, George Frideric (1685–1759)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford, 2004).

  133. BL Add MS 20102, William Burnet, Governor of New England, to Mrs Clayton (Boston, 7 July 1729).

  134. Thomson (1847), Vol. 1, pp. 264–5, Dr Alured Clarke to Mrs Clayton (Kensington Square, 3 August 1734).

  135. Saussure (1902), p. 44.

  136. Thomson (1847), Vol. 1, pp. 264–6.

  137. Matthews (1939), p. 356 (30 October 1716).

  138. Gladys Scott Thomson (Ed.), Letters of a Grandmother, 1732–35 (London, 1943), p. 74, Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough to Diana, Duchess of Bedford (23 September 1732).

  139. Quoted in Wilkins (1901), Vol. 2, p. 103.

  140. BL Add MS 22229, f. 61, Lord Wentworth to his father the Earl of Strafford (15 April 1735).

  141. Quoted in Wilkins (1901), Vol. 2, p. 104.

  142. The Walpole Society, Vol. 22 (1933–4) (Vertue III), p. 68.

  143. Halsband and Grundy (1977), pp. 93–4.

  144. Hervey (1931), Vol. 2, pp. 485, 610.

  145. Stanhope (1774), Vol. 2, p. 266; Coxe (1798b) Vol. 1, pp. 271–2; Lord Hervey to H. Walpole (31 October 1735), quoted in Coxe (1798b), Vol. 1, p. 272.

  146. BL Add MS 20104, ff. 6–7, Lord Hervey to Mrs Clayton (Hampton Court, 31 July 1733).

  147. BL Add MS 75358, Lady Burlington (1730).

  148. Brooke (1985), Vol. 1, p. 117.

  149. Hervey (1931), Vol. 1, p. 42; Vol. 2, p. 380.

  150. BL Add MS 4805, f. 160v, Henrietta Howard to Jonathan Swift (16 August 1727).

  151. Hervey (1931), Vol. 2, p. 490.

  152. Lord Holland (Ed.), Horace Walpole’s Memoirs of the Reign of King George the Second, 3 vols (London, 1846), Vol. 1, p. 140.

  153. HMC Egmont (1923), Vol. 2, p. 53.

  154. Hervey (1931), Vol. 2, p. 496.

  155. Coxe (1798b), Vol. 1, p. 275.

  156. BL Add MS 20101, ff. 60r, 64v, ‘The Inventory of the Curiositys & Medals in the Cabinets in His Majties Librairy of wch Mrs Purcell had the Original’.

  157. Matthews (1939), p. 62 (25 July 1715).

  158. Hervey (1931), Vol. 2, p. 501.

  159. Anon., The Contest: being poetical essays on the Queen’s grotto: wrote in consequence of an invitation in the Gentlemen’s Magazine for April, 1733 (London, 1734), p. 6,‘Essay V, On the Royal Grotto’.

  160. Thomson (1847), Vol. 1, p. 205.

  161. Kensington Public Library, ‘Extra illustrated’ edition of Thomas Faulkner, History and Antiquities of Kensington (London, 1820) (2-volume version) part 2, accounts for Richmond property ending Lady Day 1747, following p. 358.

  162. Hervey (1931), Vol. 2, p. 504; BL Stowe MS 308, f. 4.

  163. BL Add 78468, f. 73v, Mrs Godolphin to Lady Evelyn (13 November 1716); Smith (2006), p. 228.

  164. Sherburn (1956), Vol. 1, Pope to Teresa and Martha Blount (13 September 1717).

  165. David Starkey, ‘Representation through Intimacy: A Study in the Symbolism of Monarchy and Court Office in Early-Modern England’, in Symbols and Sentiments: Cross-cultural Studies in Symbolism, Ed. I. Lewis (London, New York and San Francisco, 1977), p. 219.

  166. John Wade, The Extraordinary Black Book (London, 1931), p. 497.

  167. The Times (24 November 1837), p. 3.

  168. Hervey (1931), Vol. 1, p. 140.

  169. TNA LC 5/158 p. 243 (1 April 1724).

  170. Quoted in E. J. Burford, Royal St James’s, Being a Story of Kings, Clubmen and Courtesans (London, 1988), p. 29.

  171. Stanhope (1774), Vol. 2, p. 59.

  172. Jonathan Swift, The Lady’s Dressing Room (London, 1732), p. 6.

  173. Hervey (1931), Vol. 1, p. 194.

  174. Quoted in Burf
ord (1988), p. 30; SRO 941/47/4, p. 75, John Hervey to Ste Fox (9 January 1728).

  175. Marschner (1997), pp. 34–5.

  176. Stanhope (1774), Vol. 2, p. 59.

  177. BL Add MS 22227, ff.98–100, Peter Wentworth to Lord Strafford (25 July 1729).

  178. Brooke (1985), Vol. 1, p. 117.

  179. Coxe (1798b), Vol. 1, pp. 278–9.

  180. Hervey (1931), Vol. 1, p. 43.

  181. Sherburn (1956), Vol. 2, p. 182, Alexander Pope to John Gay (13 July 1723).

  182. Hervey (1931), Vol. 2, p. 474.

  183. Brooke (1985), Vol. 1, p. 117.

  184. Cowper (1864), p. 19 (19 November 1714).

  185. BL Add MS 22625, f. 27r, John Arbuthnot to Henrietta Howard (30 May 1728).

  186. RA GEO/ADD17/75/46 (1733).

  187. Marschner (1997), p. 31.

  188. BL Add MS 22625, f. 27r, John Arbuthnot to Henrietta Howard (30 May 1728).

  189. RA GEO/ADD17/75/4 (July–September 1730); Joanna Marschner, ‘Queen Caroline of Ansbach: attitudes to clothes and cleanliness, 1727–1737’, Costume, No. 31 (1997), p. 32.

  190. RA GEO/ADD 17/75/44 (1732); RA GEO/ADD 17/75/20 (1730); Thomson (1943), p. 147, Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough to Diana, Duchess of Bedford (21 October 1734).

  191. Jonathan Swift, The Lady’s Dressing Room (London, 1732), p. 5.

  192. RA GEO/ADD 17/75/72 (1733); Marschner (1997), p. 33.

  193. Brooke (1985), Vol.1, p. 117.

  194. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, ‘An Account of the Court of George I’, in Wharncliffe (1861), Vol. 1, p. 122.

  195. Marschner (1997), p. 33.

  196. BL Add MS 22625, f. 27r, John Arbuthnot to Henrietta Howard (30 May 1728).

  197. Hervey (1931) Vol. 2, p. 474.

  198. Ibid., Vol. 1, p. 107.

  199. ‘Song, by the Earl of Peterborough’, quoted in Croker (1824), Vol. 1, p. xlvii.

  200. Sherburn (1956), Vol. 2, p. 401, Pope to Swift (c.20 September 1726); BL Add MS 22628, f. 20r, Henrietta Howard to Molly Hervey (September 1728).

  201. BL Add MS 22626, f. 58v, Henrietta Howard to John Gay (5 September 1731).

  202. Thomson (1847), Vol. 1, p. 243.

  203. BL Add MS 22626, f. 53r, Henrietta Howard to John Gay (29 June 1731).

  204. Thomson (1847), Vol. 1, pp. 242–3.

  205. BL Add MS 22626, ff. 53r–v, Henrietta Howard to John Gay (29 June 1731).

  206. BL Add MS 27777, f. 107v, Peter Wentworth to his brother (1 July 1731).

  207. BL Add MS 22628, f. 100r, George Berkeley to unknown (1735).

  208. Hervey (1931), Vol. 2, p. 381.

  209. Ibid., p. 383.

  210. BL Add MS 22627, ff. 8r, 9r (1734).

  211. Ibid., ff. 9r–v (1734).

  212. Hervey (1931), Vol. 2, p. 601.

  213. Walpole, Reminiscences (1818 edn), p. 82.

  214. BL Add MS 22627, f. 6v.

  215. The Duke of Newcastle to Sir Robert Walpole (13 November, 1734), quoted in Wilkins (1901), Vol. 2, p. 259.

  216. Halsband (1965–7), Vol. 2, p. 57.

  217. Holland (1846), Vol. 1, p. 75; BL Add MS 22627, f.107v, Margaret Bradshaw to Henrietta Howard (n.d.).

  218. BL Add MS 22627, f. 113r, Margaret Bradshaw to Henrietta Howard (n.d.).

  219. Burford (1988), pp. 31–2; Peter Thomson, ‘Cuyler [married name Rice], Margaret (1758–1814)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford, 2004).

  220. Undated letter (Ickworth MSS) from Molly to Dr Arbuthnot, quoted in Stuart (1936), p. 38.

  221. Henrietta Jannsen to Lady Denbigh, quoted in Melville (1927), p. 210; Lewis

  222. Charles Hanbury Williams, The odes of Sir Charles Hanbury Williams (London, (1937–83), Vol. 34, p. 256. 1775), p. 11.

  223. Croker (1824), Vol. 1, p. 49, Mrs Bradshaw to Mrs Howard (April 1720).

  224. Hervey (1931), Vol. 2, p. 385.

  225. Ross (2006), p. 277, John Arbuthnot to the Editor of the London Journal (March 1727).

  226. Ibid., p. 364, John Arbuthnot to Jonathan Swift (5 December 1732).

  227. Hervey (1931), Vol. 2, pp. 477, 389.

  228. ‘Introductory Anecdotes’, probably using information from Lady Bute, in Wharncliffe (1837), p. 69.

  229. SRO 941/47/15, f. 13, John Lord Hervey Maxims.

  230. BL Add MS 22628, f. 23v, Molly Hervey to Henrietta Howard (7 October 1728).

  231. Quoted in Lucy Moore, Amphibious Thing, the Life of Lord Hervey (London, 2000), p. 54.

  232. BL Add MS 22628, f. 28r, Molly Hervey to Henrietta Howard (19 June 1731).

  233. Quoted in Borman (2007), p. 211.

  234. Hervey (1931), Vol. 2, p. 472.

  235. Quoted in Borman (2007), p. 211.

  236. Williams (1963–5), Vol. 4, p. 294, Lady Elizabeth Germain to Swift (13 February 1735).

  237. SRO 941/47/4, p. 486, John Hervey (13 January 1735).

  238. BL Add MS 22626, f. 19, Lord Bathurst to Henrietta (26 November 1734).

  239. BL Add MS 22625, ff. 4–5, Jonathan Swift, ‘Character of the Honorable Mrs [Howard]’.

  240. BL Add MS 22626, f. 19v, Lord Bathurst to Henrietta (26 November 1734).

  241. Williams (1963–5), Vol. 4, p. 362, Lady Elizabeth Germain to Swift (12 July 1735).

  242. Hervey (1931), Vol. 2, p. 471.

  243. Quoted in Borman (2007), p. 220.

  244. BL Add MS 22629, f. 40r, Henrietta to George Berkeley (1735?).

  245. Croker (1824), Vol. 2, p. 125, Thomas Coke to George Berkeley (23 July 1735).

  246. Hervey (1931), Vol. 2, p. 471.

  247. Sherburn (1956), Vol. 3, p. 479, Alexander Pope to Fortescue (2 August 1735).

  SEVEN

  The Favourite and His Foe

  ‘You and I know enough of courts not to be amaz’d at any turns they may take.’1

  (Lady Mary Wortley Montagu)

  Back at the palace, a huge new row was brewing within the royal family. George II had spent years wrangling with his father, and now it seemed that history was repeating itself: ‘it ran a little in the blood of the family to hate the eldest son’.2

  The family’s frightful feuding spelt danger for the whole British nation. In the words of Sir Robert Walpole, ‘divisions in the palace’ would lead inevitably to ‘divisions in the kingdom’, a situation ‘much more terrible to think of than difficult to foresee’.3

  On the night of 31 July 1737, events in the king’s embattled relationship with his own heir, Prince Frederick, came to a head. A ‘very extraordinary quarrel at Court’ saw a heavily pregnant princess being rushed dangerously through the night by coach.4

  It was the culmination of yet another battle royal, and at its centre was yet another royal baby.

  *

  As the story unfolded over the summer of 1737, John Hervey was once again present to record its every twist and turn. By chance he’d also witnessed the very inception of the quarrel, which lay more than twenty years in the past.

  Long ago, Henrietta Howard had gone to Hanover to seek her fortune, and the youthful John Hervey had made a similar journey to Germany. Exactly like her, he’d hoped to make important connections to help along his future court career.

  In 1716, aged nineteen, John set out upon a young aristocrat’s conventional grand tour of the sights of Europe. His first stop was Paris, and Hanover was to be his second.

  Business in the principality had proceeded as usual after George I had decamped to Britain in 1714. The small, dull, provincial state continued to support the two royal palaces, one in the city on the River Leine, the other in the country at Herrenhausen, and there was a rural hunting lodge at Göhrde. The state’s silver mines kept its Elector personally wealthy, while his subjects were stubborn and hard workers in the fields.

  Because of its ruling family’s connection with Britain, Hanover after 1714 had become accustomed to being overrun with English tourists. The sightseers squabbled over the limited lodgings available in the town, while their coaches whipped up the dust that coated
the leaves of the long lime avenue leading out to Herrenhausen.

  John Hervey hurried on his way to Hanover in 1716 so that his visit would coincide with one of George I’s extended holidays at his former home. Soon he had an appointment to wait upon the king (and, with youthful thoughtlessness, neglected to take his tutor with him).5 He also got himself an introduction to the king’s grandson, the then nine-year-old Frederick, Prince of Wales (1707–51). Prince Frederick headed Hanover’s permanent court and generally welcomed royal or other important visitors to the town when his grandfather and parents were away in Britain.

  This meeting with Prince Frederick in 1716, made out of a careful calculation of future gain, would prove an important turning point in John Hervey’s emotional life as well as his career.

  He and the prince immediately took to each other. Hervey’s father advised that he should get to know the boy and leave Hanover only when his ‘foundation in Prince Frederick’s favour’ was laid ‘indelibly’; this proved easy to achieve.6

  Just like his marriage to Molly, though, Hervey’s initially adoring relationship with Prince Frederick would eventually become mired in misunderstanding. Unlike his marriage, this would become one of the most significant relationships of his life.

  In this chapter, for the first time in our story so far, we will see John Hervey in pain.

  *

  Both John Hervey and the boy prince were slight and feminine in appearance. Prince Frederick – also known as ‘Fretz’ by his family – had hair ‘with a yellowish cast’ and a ‘face fair but not handsome; his eyes grey like a cat and very dull’.7 His legs were spindly because he’d suffered from rickets.

  Frederick, Prince of Wales: his ‘face fair but not handsome; his eyes grey like a cat’

  Unable to find much to praise in his appearance, courtiers describing Prince Frederick tended to fall back upon his charm. One observed that he had that certain ‘something so very engaging and easy in his behaviour’, as well as ‘the fine fair hair’ of his mother Caroline.8 Another found him not the least bit handsome but still ‘the most agreeable young man it is possible to imagine … his person little but very well made and genteel’, an indescribable liveliness in his eyes.9 The prince certainly had a captivating and amusing manner: ‘the Lord knows what a mimic!’