Queen Anne: The Politics of Passion

by Anne Somerset

  Unsurprisingly Anne was deeply offended by this letter. Having written back that she would refrain from commenting, since ‘everything I say is imputed either to partiality or being imposed upon by knaves and fools’, she opened herself up to Godolphin, making it plain that she believed that her former intimacy with Sarah had gone forever. The Lord Treasurer sought to defend the Duchess, not least because he believed that she made the Queen more manageable. Yet while agreeing ‘that all Lady Marlborough’s unkindness proceeds from the real concern she has for my good’, Anne questioned his belief that the old easiness between them could somehow be recaptured. On the contrary, she confided, ‘I quite despair of it now, which is no small mortification to me; however I will ever be the same and be ready on all occasions to do her all the service that lies in my poor power’.59

  Meanwhile, the more extreme members of the Tory party had hit on a new way of enacting the Occasional Conformity Bill, deciding that they would seek to attach, or ‘tack’ it onto the Land Tax Bill for that year, and send the measure to the Lords in that form. If that happened, the Lords would face the choice of either accepting or rejecting the bill in its entirety, for they could not amend financial measures. If they decided to throw out Occasional Conformity, the money supply for that year would be lost, and those who devised this strategy reasoned that the Upper House would accept they had no option but to vote in favour. This was by no means certain, however, for it was possible that even those Lords not opposed to Occasional Conformity in principle would object to a procedure that arguably violated the constitutional privileges of their House. Yet if as a result the Land Tax did not pass, the consequences would be horrendous, culminating in nothing less than ‘the collapse of the common cause against France’. Despite this, High Church fanatics in the Commons were set on ‘venturing the Parliament and the nation’s falling into any sort of confusion rather than not carry their point’.60

  The motion to ‘tack’ Occasional Conformity to the Land Tax Bill was debated in the Commons on 28 November, and the ministry spared no effort to ensure that it was rejected. Pressure was exerted on office holders and MPs with places at court and in the Prince’s household. However, this had to be done with a degree of subtlety, as being too aggressive might anger even relatively moderate Tories, aligning them with extreme elements in the party, when the aim was to split it apart. Sarah upbraided Godolphin for not cracking the whip more peremptorily. He protested that the ministry was not ‘so unactive as you think’, assuring her that not only would ‘the Tack’ be thrown out, but that those who proved intractable would be dismissed once the parliamentary session finished.61

  The Duchess, however, was infuriated that the matter required such careful management. She considered that on an issue of such importance it should be enough to issue orders to office holders and expect to be obeyed, and she held the Queen responsible for being too indulgent towards the Tories. ‘I can’t resist saying that I think it a most wonderfully extravagant thing that it should be necessary to take pains with your own servants and the Prince’s to save Europe and the crown upon your head’, she fulminated to Anne three days before the vote. ‘I must take the liberty to say that it looks like an infatuation’, and she accused Anne of being so ‘blinded by the word Tory’ that she could not perceive their manifest disloyalty. She asked to be excused from waiting on the Queen for a time, saying that if they met she would regard it as her duty to ‘say a great many things that I know (by sad experiences) is uneasy to you’.62

  The Queen responded briefly that every effort would be taken to ensure that the Prince’s servants were compliant, and that those who remained stubborn could expect to lose their places in due course. She concluded that she was ‘very sorry dear Mrs Freeman will be so unkind as not to come to her poor, unfortunate faithful Mrs Morley, who loves her sincerely and will do so to the last moment’.63 Nevertheless, after the exchanges of recent weeks, being deprived of Sarah’s company cannot have struck Anne as much of a punishment.

  During the Commons debate of 28 November Secretary Hedges made an impressive speech, spelling out why it would be disastrous to vote for the Tack. Others concurred, with one Member warning that supporting the proposal was tantamount to admitting to a desire to bring over the Prince of Wales ‘and to send the Queen to Saint-Germain in his place’.64 In the event, the Tack was defeated by a comfortable margin. The Occasional Conformity Bill itself did pass, but when it was sent to the Upper House to be considered as a separate measure, the Lords had no qualms about rejecting it. Once again Godolphin was among the minority of peers who voted in favour, but this empty gesture was insufficient to earn him the forgiveness of the bill’s more ardent advocates.

  This meant that even after the Tack was defeated, the ministry remained in crisis. Many vengeful Tories were set on bringing down Godolphin, and it seemed they were correct to think that the Whigs would support them if they found the right issue, for one Junto member was heard to boast about having ‘the Lord Treasurer’s head in a bag’. Over a ten-day period a series of debates took place in the Lords on the subject of Scotland and, during these, prominent Tories queued up to condemn Godolphin for having advised the Queen to assent to the Act of Security. One peer roared that thanks to his culpable incompetence, the Scots would find it as easy to overrun England ‘as the Goths and Vandals did the Roman empire’.65

  The Queen demonstrated her support for the Lord Treasurer by following the precedent set by her uncle Charles II, and attending the Lords debates as an observer. In theory she did so incognito and did not wear the robes and regalia that she put on for more formal parliamentary occasions. She began by sitting on the throne, but then, as the weather was cold, moved to a bench by the fire. In years to come she would make a point of frequently being present at debates, often listening attentively for hours on end, and staying long after she was ‘supposed to be sufficiently wearied out’.66

  Although the Queen’s presence was designed to shore up Godolphin, he clearly believed himself in danger, and uncharacteristically was in something of a panic. During the opening debate he ‘talked nonsense very fast, which was not his usual way, either of matter or manner’. Just as things were looking worst for him, the Whigs in the Lords unexpectedly came to his rescue. While Godolphin was sinking under the weight of Tory attacks, the Junto peer Lord Wharton had a whispered conversation with him, and soon afterwards the Whig leaders ‘diverted the whole debate’. They now said that instead of censuring the Lord Treasurer for giving way over the Act of Security, it would be more sensible to apply pressure on the Scots. The former Chancellor, Lord Somers, proposed that unless Scotland made arrangements by Christmas either to appoint commissioners to negotiate a Union, or to adopt the Hanoverian succession, all Scots visitors would be treated as aliens, and Scottish exports to England of livestock, coal, and linen would be blocked. The so-called ‘Alien Act’ was swiftly approved by both Houses of Parliament and the Queen assented to it in March. The Scots had to face the fact that if what they dubbed ‘the dire decree’ came into force, it would be ruinous for their fragile economy, and they had to consider how to respond as a matter of urgency.67 But the development was also significant for the English political scene, for it was evident that the Whigs expected some reward for having saved Godolphin.

  With Godolphin secure once again, the Queen could devote some thought to considering how best to reward the victorious Duke of Marlborough, who returned to England in mid December 1704. Although Sarah would later claim that Anne never gave her so much as ‘a diamond or the value of a fan in the whole time I served her after she was Queen’, Anne had in fact commemorated the Duke’s victory at Blenheim by giving his wife a portrait miniature of him, covered by a flat diamond instead of glass, which would be valued at £800 in Sarah’s will.68 Now, however, the Queen was able to demonstrate her gratitude in a more substantial manner. On 11 January 1705 Parliament requested her to devise a way of perpetuating the memory of Marlborough’s services to the nation. Six
days later Anne sent back a message that she was inclined to grant the Duke the royal estate of Woodstock, in Oxfordshire, and a bill was duly brought in to enable her to do so. Soon afterwards, the Queen undertook that a magnificent palace would be erected there at royal expense, but unfortunately her commitment to pay for it was not set down in writing. This oversight would cause serious trouble in later years, when her relations with the Marlboroughs broke down irretrievably.

  For his architect Marlborough chose John Vanbrugh, who had recently designed Castle Howard for the Earl of Carlisle. Within a short time Vanbrugh constructed a model of the proposed ducal residence, which the Queen approved after it was exhibited to her at Kensington. The immense scale of Vanbrugh’s building appealed to Marlborough, who wanted a grandiose monument to his achievements, but Sarah considered it ‘too big and unwieldy’, and feared the house would be difficult to live in. She claimed she was also bothered about the cost to the Crown, thinking it ‘too great a sum even for the Queen to pay’, but consoled herself by reflecting that Anne ‘would have done nothing with the money that was better’.69

  Marlborough, who was notoriously careful with his own money, was unconcerned about the drain on the public purse. Initially it had been suggested that construction could be financed by selling timber from royal woodland, and Marlborough wrote casually to his wife that all that was needed to start the project ‘is but ordering wood to be cut in several forests’. When Sir Christopher Wren calculated that the palace would cost £100,000 – a major underestimate, it later turned out, for in the end the price was nearly three times as much – the Duke did pause briefly, writing to Godolphin ‘if Lady Marlborough and you are of an opinion that this is not a proper time for the queen to make such an expense … it will be no great uneasiness to me if it be let alone’.70 Godolphin, however, did authorise work to start, and the foundation stone was laid in June 1705.

  Thereafter Marlborough resisted any attempt to slim down the project. In September 1705, Godolphin wrote to the Duchess ’Tis needless … for me to tell you I agree entirely in your notions both as to the expense and unwieldiness of Woodstock’. He said he had made plain his reservations ‘as much as was fit for me, but I can’t struggle very long’ in the face of her husband’s conviction that such an outlay was necessary to create a fitting memorial.71

  Despite her misgivings, Sarah supported and managed the project out of wifely loyalty. Typically, she was ‘extremely prying’ into every detail, and by September 1706 Godolphin was ‘apt to think she has made Mr Vanbrugh a little cross’ with her interference. She rigorously scrutinised costs, querying items such as a bill of sevenpence halfpenny for a bushel of lime, and the price of carting stone. Unfortunately she herself added to the expense in other ways, for example by demanding that the bow-window room on the garden front was torn down and rebuilt to let in more light.72

  Even before the crisis arising from the third Occasional Conformity Bill, Marlborough had come to believe that the Duke of Buckingham was intriguing with the fallen ministers Rochester and Nottingham to obstruct public business, and he had advised Godolphin to replace him. Now they urged this course upon the Queen, but they reportedly found her ‘very loth to part’ with her erstwhile admirer. It was claimed that ‘being unwilling to stand an argument about it with my Lord Treasurer, [she] employed Prince George to dissuade his lordship from insisting upon’ Buckingham’s removal, but Godolphin persevered and gained his point. At the end of March 1705 Buckingham was dismissed and the Privy Seal was awarded to the Duke of Newcastle, a very moderate Whig. To prevent Buckingham from becoming too embittered, he was offered the chance of becoming Lord Keeper of the Great Seal, even though he had no legal qualifications. He turned it down on the grounds that it would be humiliating for him to seek guidance from two judges before making any decision, but the old roué joked darkly that ‘if her Majesty would make him Archbishop of Canterbury he would be obliged’.73

  A general election was now imminent, and Marlborough and Godolphin fervently hoped that many of the more immoderate Tories would lose their seats. To indicate to the electorate that such men were out of favour, eight office holders who had voted for the Tack were removed from their posts. The Queen herself allowed it to be seen that some Tories had displeased her. In the spring of 1705 she visited Cambridge, where she accepted a dinner invitation from the Junto member, Lord Orford, and was present when the University conferred honorary doctorates on several Whig peers. Such gestures prompted one observer to proclaim that a miracle had occurred: ‘Queen Anne is turned Whig’.74

  The elections of May 1705 proved very bitter, with large numbers of seats being ‘disputed with … more than ordinary heat and animosity’. The fiercer sort of Tories ‘took great pains to infuse into the people tragical apprehensions of the Church in danger’, and these fears were exacerbated by their supporters in the clergy, who had been left ‘generally soured, even with relation to the Queen herself’ by the loss of the Occasional Conformity Bill. A pamphlet entitled ‘The Memorial of the Church of England’ attacked Godolphin and ‘our ministers, he and she’ – referring to the Duke and Duchess of Marlborough – accusing them of corruptly monopolising royal favour and undermining the Church.75 On the other side, the Whigs were equally virulent in their condemnation of the Tories, taking no account of the fact that a sizeable section of the party had voted against the Tack.

  After all this activity, the results were somewhat confusing. The Whigs won more seats than in the previous election, although Tories still outnumbered them in Parliament. Far too many high-flying Tories were returned for the government’s liking and, ominously, they had regained the influence they had lost when defeated over the Tack, for the Tory party had reunited in the face of Whig election attacks. The ministry’s hope that ‘moderation’ would prevail in domestic affairs seemed unlikely to be realised.

  The Queen had understood the need to penalise hardline Church supporters prior to the election, but had not wanted things to go so far that their opponents became dominant. On 1 May she had assured Godolphin that although ‘I shall at all times very willingly discourage all violent Tories … I would not have any punished that do not deserve it, nor encourage violent Whigs, and I flatter myself you are of the same mind’.76

  Unfortunately, the election results had convinced Godolphin that a shift towards the Whigs was now imperative and that, if necessary, he must have a confrontation with the Queen on the issue. The Lord Treasurer had been embittered by the way he had been attacked by the clergy during the election campaign, and on 18 May Godolphin told Sarah he would not ‘be quiet under it any longer’. He had, therefore, resolved to make his feelings known to ‘Mrs Morley, though I have little pleasure, God knows, in saying anything that may make her uneasy’.77

  The next day Godolphin told the Queen he wanted Sarah’s son-in-law Charles, Earl of Sunderland, to be despatched as ambassador to Vienna, where the Habsburg Emperor Leopold had just died and been succeeded by his eldest son Joseph. The suggestion that this young man, son of James II’s reviled late minister, should be given such a major diplomatic appointment was deeply unwelcome to the Queen. He was the most partisan Whig imaginable, a radical who before he inherited his earldom in 1702 had not only declared he hoped one day ‘to piss upon the House of Lords’, but was also suspected of republican leanings. In addition he had a fearsome temper, which, as his mother acknowledged, had become still more fiery on account of his allegiance to ‘a party that are of a crucifying temper’.78

  On 19 May Anne had a tense exchange with Godolphin on the question of whether Sunderland should go to Vienna. Following their discussion, he wrote to say that her attitude had caused him considerable ‘uneasiness’, and he complained that she evidently still expected him to depend solely on the Tories. Unnerved by his firm tone, the Queen gave way about Sunderland, insisting in a placatory letter that she did not want to add to Godolphin’s difficulties. ‘I have no thought or desire to have you join yourself to any one party’
, she assured her Lord Treasurer. ‘All I wish is to be kept out of the power of both’.79