The year 1820 unfolds a dark and distressing page in English
history; from which every reader, who honours his king, and loves his country, would gladly
turn away, with an ardent wish that it could be blotted out, as a tale of falsehood or
fiction, for ever. This is the amazing and melancholy story of Queen Caroline, wife of George IV., of
whom posterity will be astonished to read in British annals that, though a sovereign
princess, and the royal consort of England, she was brought to public trial, by the demand,
not of the people, but of the court; and that on the charge, not of a state crime, but of a
civil or moral offence, which, if committed at all, was committed under circumstances,
usually regarded as exculpatory, in the courts of English judicature. More astonished still
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Early in 1814, it is well known, her late Majesty was induced, by no good
advice, to leave the kingdom, with the intention of passing a few years abroad. It was some
time before that period, that Dr. Parr had the honour
of being first introduced to
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Her Majesty continued abroad six years; during which time, she travelled
through many of the principal countries of Europe, Asia, and Africa; but fixed her
residence chiefly at the palace D’Este, on the lake Como, near Milan. It was here,
most of all, that she was surrounded with spies, and beset with snares; that every step of
her conduct was watched; and, not only little unfavourable appearances, but even the most
innocent or meritorious actions, were converted into causes of suspicion, or grounds of
accusation. Tales of scandal, imputing the lowest profligacy, were framed and propagated,it
was said, by hired agents; and the grossest falsehoods, from frequency of repetition, and
boldness of assertion, acquired at length the credit and the confidence of truth. With
these tales, every Englishman visiting Italy was sure, at almost every turn, to be met.
They were perpetually rung in his ears; in many cases he had not the means, or had,
perhaps, no adequate motive to inquire into their truth or falsehood; and, thus deceived
himself, he returned home, full-charged with such reports, as, if well-founded, would prove
the Queen of England to have been one of the vilest and most abandoned of her sex. Such
reports, repeated by a thousand
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On the death of the late King the royal wanderer prepared to return to
England, to assume the high dignity, which now devolved upon her. The writer well remembers
a conversation, which passed between Dr. Parr and
some of his friends, in the library at Hatton, on the credibility of the many reports,
derogatory to her honour, which were, at that moment, put into more active circulation than
ever. With all his favourable prepossessions, he said, he could not help feeling the most
painful apprehensions that so many reports must have their foundation, in some gross
impropriety, if not criminality, of conduct. Still, however, he strenuously maintained,
even in that case, that a public investigation, with a view to degradation and dethronement
would be a measure, equally unwise and unconstitutional. “What!” said
he, “are we going to set up the new and unheard-of principle, that private
misconduct disqualifies for royal dignity?—Why, upon that principle, we should dethrone
more than half the princes that ever reigned.” He loved the British monarchy
far too well, he said, not to dread the effect on the public mind, of tearing down the veil
which it is often prudent to draw around the private life of princes; and throwing open to
the full gaze, the follies and the vices to which they, more than other persons, are ever
exposed. He would admit no
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Impressed with these views, and, at the same time, by no means disposed to confound the distinction between a suspicion and a proof of guilt; when the order of council, dated Feb. 12, 1820, was issued, for the exclusion of the Queen’s name from the liturgy, Dr. Parr instantly, and strongly, and publicly expressed his disapprobation of it. He considered it as a measure at once unwise, unjust, and, after a careful consideration of the statute, illegal: and his solemn protest against it, of which the following is a copy, he has left recorded in the parish Prayer Book of Hatton:—
“Numerous and weighty are the reasons which induce me deliberately
and solemnly to record in the Prayer Book of my parish the particulars which follow. With
deep and unfeigned sorrow, I have read a London Gazette,
dated Feb. 12, 1820, ordering the exclusion of the Queen’s name from the liturgy. It
is my duty as a subject and an ecclesiastic, to read what is prescribed for me, by my
sovereign, as head of the Church of England. But it is not my duty to express approbation,
as well as to yield obedience, when my feelings as a man,
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In another memorandum, on the same subject, inserted in the same prayer-book, are the following words:—
“I have long been convinced, from the statute, that the omission of the Queen’s name was illegal. By a strange oversight, the privy-council did not extend their regulation to what is called the bidding prayer. Not having received any order to omit the name of Queen Caroline in that prayer, I have introduced it, and shall continue to introduce it, before the sermon.—S. Parr.”
Early in the month of June following, it was
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It would be difficult to describe the great and tumultuous agitation,
excited throughout the whole country, by the strange proceedings at St. Omer, followed by
the arrival of the Queen herself in London; where, as if in the presence of the whole
nation, she threw down the challenge to her accusers: proudly disdaining, on the one hand,
their offers of a princely revenue, with a promise of impunity; and scornfully defying, on
the other, their threats of exposure and punishment. Such conduct, under such
circumstances, it was every where loudly asserted and reasserted, could only be accounted
for on one of two suppositions—con-
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From the moment that intelligence of the affair at St. Omer reached him,
Dr. Parr considered it almost, if not quite,
decisive of the point at issue between the royal person accused and her accu-
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In pursuance of this resolution, soon after her Majesty’s return to England, Dr. Parr hastened to London, to offer his congratulations on her safe arrival in this country, and to tender his assurances of continued and devoted attachment to her person and dignity. He was received with all the respectful and grateful regard, due to one of his high
1 “Ille autem sui judicii, potius, quid se facere pavesset, intuebatur, quam quid illi laudaturi forent.”—Corn. Nep. |
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It was in consequence of his recommendation, that the Rev. Robert Fellowes, then so well known to the public by
his many excellent publications on the great subjects of religion and morals, and, since
his accession to the fortune of the late Cursitor-Baron
Maseres, by his public spirit and generosity in the cause of learning and
science, was appointed to the office of domestic chaplain and private secretary to the
Queen. In this latter capacity, the arduous task devolved upon him of enditing the answers
to the numerous congratulatory addresses presented to the Queen, from all parts of the
kingdom, and from all classes of the community, on her first arrival, in the midst of her
loyal subjects; and afterwards, on the happy occasion of the compulsory abandonment of the
charges against her. Though in some of these answers, it was generally considered that the
topics were not very wisely chosen, and that expressions were, in a few instances,
introduced, not well-accordant with the sober dignity of a royal person; yet they were most
of them greatly and
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But there was one extraordinary publication—“the letter addressed by her Majesty to the King”—so much applauded by some, and censured by others, in which both Dr. Fellowes and Dr. Parr declared that they had no participation whatever. It was, indeed, shown in manuscript to her private secretary by the Queen; but it was not submitted to his revision; nor did she think proper to reveal the writer’s name to him. The letter, whoever may be its author, is powerfully written, in a strain of very bold and very bitter invective; and yet is it possible to say, that there was nothing in the wrongs and provocations of the royal person, whose name it bears, which might be fairly urged to excuse, if not to justify it?
After a residence for several months in London, occasionally, in
attendance upon the Queen, towards the end of August, Dr.
Parr returned to Hatton; and resumed the laborious task, in which he had
been for some time engaged; and of which he thus speaks, in writing to a friend:
“I am busied night and day, preparing such a catalogue
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Their very commencement in “a bill of pains and penalties” he
reprobated, as having in it all the iniquity of an ex post
facto law. The charges, as set forth with so much art and effort,
though with so little power, in the opening speech of the attorney-general, some of which
were never even attempted to be proved, seemed to him so monstrous, as to outrage all
probability, to belie our common nature, and, by their own incredibility, to stab, and
almost to destroy themselves. But when the evidence was actually produced, which, in order
to sustain for a moment such charges, ought to have been the best and most unexceptionable,
he largely participated in the general astonishment to find that it was the worst possible;
in itself the most suspicious and unsatisfactory that could be; and in many of its material
circumstances afterwards completely rebutted. Improbable, however, in the extreme, as the
charges,
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Contrasted with the wrongs and the sufferings of Queen Caroline, Dr.
Parr often talked with delight of her personal merits and attractions, which
he represented as extraordinary. He thought that impartial posterity would place her high
in the rank of eminent women, and still higher in the rank of illustrious princesses. He
described her as possessed of a good understanding, of a noble and lofty spirit, of a warm
and benevolent heart; gay, lively, open, unsuspicious in her temper; pleasing, though not
strikingly beautiful in her person; amiable and engaging in her manners, in which, however,
ease and frankness, he owned, prevailed more than dignity. He often, with great
satisfaction, referred to the fair and honourable testimony borne to her character by the
late Foreign Secretary of State; and that,
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It is stated in some published “Recollections” of one of his friends and pupils, that “when hard pressed upon the subject, Dr. Parr acknowledged that the late Queen had, in a few instances, justly incurred the imputation of levity.” To the present writer, he has often, without the slightest hesitation, made the same admission: but it should be understood, that he meant no more than such instances of levity, as transgress the little rules of reserve and propriety, which are thought in this country, and justly thought, to become female decorum, or to befit princely dignity; and by no means such as offend against moral purity. So indeed the Recollector himself rightly puts it. “If Dr. Parr admitted,” says he, “that the Queen, in some few instances, turned aside from the sober austerities and the strict decorums of an English matron, it was only in lesser matters; and even from these she might,” he insisted, “have been recalled by mild remonstrance.”—“But this lady,” said Dr. Parr, “was beset with spies, and surrounded by enemies, whose malignant penetration virtue itself could not escape.”2
Standing conspicuously forward to maintain the cause of an oppressed individual against the designs of her formidable foes, consisting of his Majesty’s ministers, their numerous dependants, and their faithful allies, the clergy, Dr. Parr became, as
1 Dodsley’s Annual Register, 1820, p. 150, &c. 2 New Monthly Mag. Dec. 1826. |
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When the vast power of a government, like that of England, ruling by
influence, is considered; and when, also, the difficulty is fairly estimated, of
obliterating unfavourable impressions of another, which strong suspicion of guilty conduct
has once fixed in the mind, even though the suspicion prove to be unfounded; it will excite
no great surprise to find that, of all the nobility and the higher order of gentry,
convinced of her Majesty’s innocence, there were few who had the firmness of courage,
and the independence of spirit, to appear amongst her friends and adherents. But if almost
all who were elevated in rank or station shrunk away from the presence of an acknowledged,
though not a crowned, queen: some, however, there were, who remained faithfully attached to
her person and her interests even to the last. Among these, none have established for
themselves a stronger claim to the grateful and respectful regards of their contemporaries,
or to the honourable and reverential remembrance of posterity, than Lady Ann Hamilton and Lord and Lady Hood. To them will
indisputably belong a share of the same high and hallowed plaudits, which, for ages to
come, will follow the names of Bishop Juxton and the
Abbé Edgeworth; who, regardless of hazard or
obloquy to themselves, consoled the sorrows of two
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Extreme distress in the present world is never very lasting; and all
excruciating pains, whether of body or mind, soon make an end of themselves or of the
sufferer. The acquittal of the Queen, though it dispersed the clouds of suspicion and
calumny which had gathered over her fair fame, was yet followed with nearly all the
consequences to herself, which would have attended degradation. “I have, indeed,
the empty name,” she truly said,
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Her death was peaceful and pious. There was evidently a deep sense of the
injuries she had suffered; but no trace of that guilt, with which she was charged; and
which, if it existed, must have been felt; and if felt, could not well have been wholly
concealed. No! there was all the peace of a good conscience, and serene hope leaning on
divine favour, and looking to heavenly felicity. Till the last chill touch of death, hers
was a heart glowing with all the best and the kindliest feelings of our nature; affection
to her friends, gratitude to “her faithful English,” and generous
forbearance towards her enemies. “They have destroyed me,” were almost
her last expiring words, “but I forgive them.” On several most trying
and difficult occasions, she exhibited, all must allow, the high spirit and dignity of
conscious integrity and virtue. But if ever she was magnanimous in life; in death she was
heroic. Rarely has dying behav-
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The writer will not trust himself to describe the horrible outrages, which attended the last mournful ceremony of conveying her remains from England, according to her own desire, for interment near those of her family at Brunswick. They are besides too deeply impressed on the remembrance of every reader, to need repetition here. But the feelings on the sad occasion, high-beating in every bosom, not closed up by party prejudice against all sense of common decency and humanity, were forcibly expressed by Dr. Parr, in the following language, which, in communication with his friend, Dr. Wade, burst from his torn and indignant spirit:—
“Even if this unfortunate and injured Queen had violated her duty; the Scriptures furnish us with an instance of the compassion and respect, due to royal persons, upon whom the grave has closed. For when Jehu was on the point of gratifying his vengeance against the wife of Ahab, and had commanded her to be thrown down from the wall, he yet remembered her illustrious birth, and exclaimed, “Go, see now what is become of this unhappy woman, and bury her—for she is a king’s daughter.”—But here, when, on the contrary, the innocence of the accused person has
1 See the New Annual Register, 1821, p. 304, &c. |
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