Queen Victoria was a devoted dog lover and owner throughout her life and raised more than 15 different breeds of canines.
Perhaps the most famous of these dogs remains Dash, who was her faithful companion during her childhood. The artist Sir Edwin Landseer first won Victoria’s favour when he painted Dash, a King Charles spaniel. Dash had been presented to Princess Victoria in 1833 by the vile Sir John Conroy, personal secretary to her mother, the Duchess of Kent. No doubt Conroy hoped that Dash would mitigate the ill feelings Princess Victoria harbored towards him due to his machinations. Princess Victoria and Dash were soon inseparable and he lived by her side, with the Princess dressing him in scarlet jacket and blue trousers, and at Christmas she gave him three India-rubber balls and two bits of gingerbread decorated with holly and candles. There is a scene in the movie, Young Victoria, which illustrates how the newly crowned Queen returned home from her coronation in order to bathe Dash. Dash also appears in a garden scene in the film.
When Dash died in 1840, three years after she became Queen, Victoria buried him herself at Adelaide Cottage, and had inscribed on his tombstone: `Profit by the example of Dash, whose attachment was without selfishness, his playfulness without malice, and his fidelity without deceit.’
A bronze statue of Islay stands in Sydney, Australia
Then there was a Skye terrier called Islay, the little dog Victoria came to love most of all. She taught him to beg for treats. Combined with a pair of wet, soulful eyes, Islay’s gentle begging earned him treats galore from the household and visitors alike. Once again, Landseer was inspired to capture one of the Queen’s dogs, sometimes in the act of gathering tasty morsels.
Islay was the inspiration for Landseer’s painting entitled `Dignity and Impudence‘, one of his most successful works.
Islay also features prominently in a painting Landseer created in order to amuse the Queen at Balmoral. It shows the terrier doing his begging act before a macaw, who sits high on his perch holding a large biscuit, which he is feeding two lovebirds. Next to Islay at the bottom of the painting is Tilco, a Sussex spaniel, who nurses a wound on his nose inflicted upon him by the macaw after he’d tried to take the biscuit away. When Landseer unveiled the work before the Queen at Balmoral, Lord Melbourne was said to have commented, “Good God! How like!”
“Queen Victoria at Osborne” painted by Sir Edwin Landseer
Queen Victoria and Sharp
In later years, Queen Victoria’s favorite dog and constant companion was Sharp, a smooth-coated Border Collie, born in 1854. A statuette of Sharp in silver gilt dominated her dining table.
Sharp lived for 15 years. A statue of him stands over his grave in Windsor Home Park, Berkshire, England. After Sharp, Queen Victoria was given another Collie named Noble.
From Queen Victoria’s Journal of a Life in the Highlands – Sunday, September 14, 1873:
My favorite collie Noble is always downstairs when we take our meals, and was so good, Brown making him lie on a chair or couch, and he never attempted to come down without permission, and even held a piece of cake in his mouth without eating it, till told he might. He is the most “biddable” dog I ever saw, and so affectionate and kind; if he thinks you are not pleased with him, he puts out his paws, and begs in such an affectionate way.
My Dearest Uncle,—We live in the midst of sorrow and death! My poor good Uncle Cambridge breathed his last, without a struggle, at a few minutes before ten last night. I still saw him yesterday morning at one, but he did not see me, and to-day I saw him lifeless and cold. The poor Duchess and the poor children are very touching in their grief, and poor Augusta,1 who arrived just five hours too late, is quite heart-broken. The end was most peaceful; there was no disease; only a gastric fever, which came on four weeks ago, from over-exertion and cold, and which he neglected for the first week, carried him off.
The good Prince of Prussia you will have been pleased to talk to and see. Having lived with him for a fortnight on a very intimate footing, we have been able to appreciate his real worth fully; he is so honest and frank, and so steady of purpose and courageous. Poor dear Peel is to be buried to-day. The sorrow and grief at his death are most touching, and the country mourns over him as over a father. Every one seems to have lost a personal friend.
As I have much to write, you will forgive my ending here. You will be glad to hear that poor Aunt Gloucester is wonderfully calm and resigned. My poor dear Albert, who had been so fresh and well when we came back, looks so pale and fagged again. He has felt, and feels, Sir Robert’s loss dreadfully. He feels he has lost a second father.
May God bless and protect you all, you dear ones! Ever your devoted Niece, Victoria R.
William IV, the Sailor King, died on 20 June 1837. He was the third son of George III and younger brother and successor to George IV and was the last king and penultimate monarch of the House of Hanover. While William’s reign was much more sedate than that of his brother, George IV, with less scandal and spending and more attention being paid the business of running the country, William IV did have one bane to his existence – his sister-in-law the Duchess of Kent, mother to Princess Victoria.
King William’s problems with the Duchess began early in his reign – in fact, at his coronation, as related in a book called When William IV was King By John Ashton:
During the procession to the Abbey (for the Coronation of William IV) the weather was fine, and the sight a brilliant one; but, soon after one o’clock, a very heavy rain descended ; the wind, too, blew with great violence, and occasioned rattling and tearing among the canvas canopies of the newly erected stands. It ceased for a short time, between two and three, when it broke out afresh, and was particularly lively when the ceremony was over, at half-past three. It quite spoilt the return procession, some of the carriages driving straight away, and those that fell into rank had their windows up.
In spite of the weather, London was brilliantly illuminated, and the theatres and Vauxhall Gardens were thrown open free. There was a display of fireworks in Hyde Park, at which many were more or less hurt by the falling rocket-sticks, six so seriously as to have to be taken to St. George’s Hospital. Throughout the country the festivity was universal. One little thing marred the universality. The Duchess of Kent was not present at the coronation, neither was the Princess Victoria. It was an open secret that the King and the Duchess were not on friendly terms, but it was thought very bad taste on her part not to be present.
Though more contretemps between the King and the Duchess were to come (as will be shown in future posts), for the time being, all was well in the land. In his Memoirs, Charles Greville included the following entry for July 18th.— King George had not been dead three days before everybody discovered that he was no loss, and King William a great gain. Certainly nobody ever was less regretted than the late King, and the breath was hardly out of his body before the press burst forth in full cry against him, and raked up all his vices, follies, and misdeeds, which were numerous and glaring enough.
The new King began very well. Everybody expected he would keep the Ministers in office, but he threw himself into the arms of the Duke of Wellington with the strongest expressions of confidence and esteem. He proposed to all the Household, as well as to the members of Government, to keep their places, which they all did except Lord Conyngham and the Duke of Montrose. He soon after, however, dismissed most of the equerries, that he might fill their places with the members of his own family. Of course such a King wanted not due praise, and plenty of anecdotes were raked up of his former generosities and kindnesses. His first speech to the. Council was well enough given, but his burlesque character began even then to show itself. Nobody expected from him much real grief, and he does not seem to know how to act it consistently; he spoke of his brother with all the semblance of feeling, and in a tone of voice properly softened and subdued, but just afterward, when they gave him the pen to sign the declaration, he said, in his usual tone, “This is a damned bad pen you have given me.” My worthy colleague, Mr. James Buller, began to swear Privy Councillors in the name of “King George IV.—William, I mean,” to the great diversion of the Council.
A few days after my return I was sworn in, all the Ministers and some others being present. His Majesty presided very decently, and looked like a respectable old admiral. The Duke [of Wellington] told me he was delighted with him— “If I had been able to deal with my late master as I do with my present, I should have got on much better”—that he was so reasonable and tractable, and that he had done more business with him in ten minutes than with the other in as many days.”
Recently, I was reading a royal biography and, as so often happens, it led me to another title, The Quest for Queen Mary, by James Pope-Hennessy (2018). The mention of this book described how screamingly funny the Queen Mary book was in parts. Of course, I went straight to Amazon Books online and searched for it, when I found other, similar quotes on the book jacket:
“One of this year’s funniest and most eccentric books.” Mail on Sunday.
“. . . Arguably the most riotously funny volume published this year.” The Sunday Times.
“Illuminating, intriguing and boundlessly entertaining.” Country Life
Naturally, I clicked the buy now button.
The Quest for Queen Mary is not a biography (find that here), but a compilation of the notes Pope-Hennessy wrote up regarding the people he met and the interviews he conducted while researching the biography, the whole edited by Hugo Vickers.
James Pope-Hennessy by Cecil Beaton
I was familiar with P-H (Pope-Hennessy) through the various inter-war diaries, letters and biographies I had read. He was a mainstay of the Bright Young Things set, socializing with the likes of the Mitfords, Cecil Beaton, Lord Berners, Rex Whistler, Duff and Diana Cooper, et al. For the life of me, I couldn’t recall that anyone had ever said that P-H had been particularly funny.
At one time, Richard James Arthur Pope-Hennessy had been editor of The Spectator. He was also a travel writer and a biographer whose book on Lord Crewe led to his being commissioned by the Queen in 1955 to write the biography of Queen Mary. His brother was Sir John Pope-Hennessy, who had served as the Director of both the V&A and British Museums.
Friends did describe P-H as being two different people inhabiting one body. He could be a brilliant and talented work horse of a writer, but he was also known to have a darker, somewhat brooding side. James Lees-Milne once wrote of Pope-Hennessy that ‘the devil got a firm grip of him in his twenties and early thirties.’ He spent the money of older women whilst frankly discussing his homosexual life to them.
At one time, P-H had been in a relationship with Harold Nicolson, the former diplomat, writer and MP, and had also once shared a flat with the disgraced spy, Guy Burgess. His friends knew that he often sought the company of shady individuals and on occasion P-H paid for the services of ‘rent boys,’ one of whom lived at P-H’s flat at the time that newspapers reported that P-H had received $150,000 to write a book about Sir Noel Coward (1974). Believing that the money was in the flat, the rent boy recruited two friends and the trio bound P-H, who was then 57, and viciously beat him. P-H’s valet, Leslie (Walter) Smith, 25, returned to the property during the course of the attack and was stabbed. He managed to make it out into the street and summon help. Smith survived, Pope-Hennessy did not.
What makes The Quest for Queen Mary funny are P-H’s wonderfully drawn descriptions of the places he visited and the people he interviewed. His razor sharp perceptions and eye for both detail and the absurd all contribute to the laugh out loud moments in his book.
Prince Albert Victor, Duke of Clarence, who died 14 January 1892 at Sandringham.
Regarding Sandringham – Across the head of the main stairs is situated a truly sinister warren of small rooms . . . You go through and down two or three steps in a very narrow carpeted passage; the first door on the left is where the Duke of Clarence died. This dim and cheerless hole is surprisingly small: opposite the door a window, to the right of the door a fire-place and immediately on the r-hand wall the brass bedstead, so that you could touch the mantlepiece with your hand if lying on the bed. . . How 14 people, including the (rather fat) Duchess of Teck crammed into this room on the morning of 14 January 1892 foxes me completely . . . To sum up: this is a hideous house with a horrible atmosphere in parts, and in others no atmosphere at all. It is like a vast morgue . . . .
Pope-Hennessy related how he’d told Sir Owen Morshead (Royal Librarian) about being introduced (to Princess Alice, Countess of Athlone) as Mr. Poke-Henderson. Sir Owen duly addressed his next letter: “My dear Poke-Henderson . . . “ and told him that he had been called every possible name, including “Alan Horsehead.”
The Duke and Duchess of Gloucester in 1935
P-H was invited to stay with the Duke and Duchess of Gloucester at Bramwell in order to conduct his interviews with them – I returned to the drawing room, having seen my very comfortable room, and observed with pleasure a small, framed notice on the dressing table . . . ‘Guests are particularly requested not to offer gratuities to the indoor or outdoor staff as they are NOT allowed to accept them.’ I sat down, waiting for the next episode and looking at the drink tray, and smoking. There was a huge, high, Coromandel screen with six folds hiding the door, so that it was rather exciting, like a good play with new characters, waiting to see who was going to enter next. There was a good deal of heavy breathing and heavy martial shuffle, and the Duke of Gloucester, eyes bulging and his hair standing on end from the wind, entered, wearing corduroys, a jersey, a Guards tie and a tweed coat. . . he veered off like a tacking sailing ship towards the drink tray and began delicately dropping angostura bitters out of a tiny silver-topped bottle into a large glass. He then took the gin bottle out of the three bottle canister on the table and said: “Haven’t you had a drink?” . . . He struggled to get the ice, which was a half moon shape I had never seen anywhere before, out of the silver ice pincers. “Oh, damn.” There was a long silence while we stood by the window and looked at the floor.
Staying with the Duke and Duchess of Beaufort at Badminton – P-H joined the Duke and Duchess at the breakfast table on the morning after his arrival. The Duchess was busy giving the dogs their porridge out of plastic saucers coloured pink and pale green. They related how when Lord Digby stayed for three days during the Badminton Horse Trials, he had eaten the dogs’ porridge by mistake one morning and none of them knew how to break it to him, so he went on doing it throughout his stay.
Lady Reid, Maid of Honour to Queen Victoria and widow of James Reid, Queen Victoria’s doctor, told P-H how as a new Maid of Honour, she accompanied Queen Victoria while she was out for a drive at Osborne – Miss Baring (as she was then) trotted beside the pony-carriage. These were the only times one was alone with her, and could speak of anything, but it was all rather breathless, ‘keepin’ up with the pony.’ Her first real outing with the Queen was soon after her arrival for first duty. Miss Phipps explained to her that the Queen liked to distribute her Christmas presents herself at Osborne, and off they set in a great high royal carriage, the Queen and Miss Phipps facing the horses, Miss Baring with her back to them and a pile of presents beside her. At the first cottage a woman came out and stood on the steps of the carriage (‘poor woman it was agonizing for her to hold on’); Miss Baring took the appropriate parcel and handed it to the Queen, saying, “It’s a rug, your Majesty.”
The Queen said nothing and turned to Miss Phipps. “What an odd thing to say, a rug, a r-r-r-rug! I have never heard it called that before. A rug is something which one stands on. It can be called a plaid, or a shawl, or even a wrap. But not a rug. And Susan calls it a r-r-r-rug. I have heard it called a plaid or a wrap, but never a rug. This monologue went on for several minutes, over and over again while the woman was clinging to the steps; and Miss Baring, overcome by it all, laughed and laughed till she nearly died.
The Duke and Duchess of Windsor
About the Duke and Duchess of Windsor, with whom P-H stayed twice at their house in France while conducting interviews – The Duke of Windsor is, on first sight, much less small than I had been led to believe; he is not at all a manikin, but a well-proportioned human being. . . I was soon startled to find that, except for occasionally repeating a complete story (which the Duchess stops when she can), he is not only the one member of the Royal Family for whom one needs to make no allowances whatever, but that he is exceedingly intelligent, original, liberal minded and quite capable of either leading a conversation or taking a constructive part in one. He is also one of the most considerate men I have ever met of his generation. Like the Duchess, he is perhaps too open and trusting towards others; or else he was determined to be specially helpful to me.
On the Duchess of Windsor – This is one of the very oddest women I have ever seen . . . Like her house, she is tremendously American, and specifically Southern – it was like being back in Montgomery, Alabama, without the tree moss. I should therefore be tempted to classify her simply as An American Woman par excellence, were it not for the suspicion that she is not a woman at all. She is, to look at, phenomenal. She is flat and angular, and could have been designed for a medieval playing card. The shoulders are small and high; the head very, very large, almost monumental; the expression is either anticipatory (signalling to one, ‘I know this is going to be loads of fun, don’t yew?) or appreciative – the great giglamp smile, the wide, wide open eyes, which are so very large and pale and veined, the painted lips and the cannibal teeth. . .
There’s royalty galore in this book, on both sides of the Channel, and they are infinitely amusing whether being interviewed or being spoken about by the interviewee. If you’re a fan of royalty, or Queen Mary or historic houses or the period in general, I highly recommend this book.
Oddly, no one P-H interviewed once mentioned Queen Mary’s alleged habit of pinching things from the homes she visited.
From The Letter-bag of Lady Elizabeth Spencer-Stanhope
March 1st. (1805)
“Your father is very well. He was sorry for the fate of the Slave Trade Bill last night. The Elopement and distress in the House of Petre has been the chief subject of conversation for the last few days. Miss Petre made her escape from her father’s house in Norfolk with her Brothers’ tutor on Monday last. It is said they are at Worcester and married only by a Catholic Priest. However, Lord and Lady P. are gone there and it is expected she will be brought back to-night. They can do nothing but get her married to the man at Church. She is 18, he 30, and no Gentleman. She was advertised and 20 guineas reward offered to anyone who could give an account of the stray sheep. It is a sad History. What misery this idle girl has caused her parents, and probably ensured her own for life.
Marianne Stanhope to John Spencer Stanhope.
March 3rd. (1805)
“You have doubtless read in the papers the account of Miss Petre’s elopement with her brother’s tutor, Mr Philips. He is a very low man, quite another class, always dined with the children, never associated the least with the family, a sort of upper servant. Lady Petre thought him rather forward, he was to have left them at Easter. She had seen her daughter at twelve the night before, and only missed her at breakfast . Her clothes were all gone. A friend of his, a brandy merchant, accompanied her in the chaise, the tutor rode first. A clergyman refused to marry them some time ago at Lambeth, but they have since been married at Oxford by a Mr. Leslie, a Catholic priest, which is not enough. They are not yet discovered.”
The Miss Petre referred to above was Maria Juliana, daughter of Robert Edward, 9th Baron Petre. She was born 22 January 1787, married on 30th April 1805, to Stephen Philips, Esq., and died 27th January 1824. I have been unable to find much else concerning her life, but here is her obituary, as it appeared in The Catholic Spectator: “The Hon. Mrs. Philips, wife of Stephen Philips, Esq. of H. M. Customs, and eldest daughter of the late Rt. Hon. Edw. Lord Petre, and Lady Mary, surviving, of a decline, aged 37. To the ardent and unremitting zeal of this Lady, in her personal and most charitable attentions to the Female Catholic Charity School, at Stratford, Essex, may principally be attributed her lamented and premature decease. She has left five children and a husband to deplore the loss of a model for the Christian wife and mother.”
However shocking his daughter’s elopement may have been for Lord Petre, there was more disappointment ahead. Like many other aristocrats before and after, Lord Petre’s home, Thornton Hall, was chosen as a base for a royal visit in October of 1778 by King George III and Queen Charlotte. And, like others, Lord Petre went to great expense to prepare for his royal guests. We have the following account of the preparations and the visit from Reminiscences For My Children by Catharine Mary Howard (1838) –
General Lord Amherst
September 22nd—General Lord Amherst was commanded by his Majesty to inform Lord Petre, that he was graciously pleased to accept of his offer to make Thorndon his residence, during his intended review of the troops encamped on Warley Common, on or about the 5th of October. Lord Petre, anxious to receive his sovereign with every mark of respect, duty, and affection, becoming an attached and loyal subject, set about immediately making every necessary preparation for his entertainment, which the vicinity of Thorndon to the capital enabled him to do with more expedition. His lordship sent for Mr. Bracken, his upholsterer, and asked him whether it was possible, in so short a time, to re-furnish the drawing-rooms, the state bed-room, and dressing-rooms —the drawing-room being forty feet by twenty-five, and twenty-three feet high, which is the height of all the rooms on the first floor. He replied, it might be done if a sufficient quantity of damask, of English manufacture, (as was ordered,) could be procured to cover those spacious apartments. Among other things ordered, were fifty tabourets to be covered with damask, as only kings and queens upon such occasions sit upon chairs. In a few hours he sent down patterns, of which a beautiful light green was chosen for the drawing-rooms and the King’s dressing-room, and a red and white damask for the state bed-room and the Queen’s dressing-room.
copyright thorndonhall.co.uk
“Mr. Davy, the house-steward, was despatched the next day to town, to procure trades-people of every description, who arrived at Thorndon in various conveyances, both public and private, amounting to one hundred, and who were all lodged and fed in the house. He was also daily employed in providing every luxury for the King’s table; and was empowered by Lord Petre to order a service of gold, in addition to the family plate, which was very considerable. Much, also, was hired, and a quantity borrowed from the Duke of Norfolk, assisted by some families in the neighbourhood— Lord Waldegrave, Lady Mildemay, and Mr. Conyers. Every thing went on briskly, but no decided day had been named for the King’s arrival.
“October 3rd—An express came from Lord Amherst, to announce that his Majesty would not be at Thorndon before the 19th instant. The cooks and confectioners were therefore sent back to London; and three large dinners were given to the neighbours, to which the officers and their ladies were invited, who partook of the good things that had already been prepared, while the workpeople went on more leisurely, and with less fatigue.
“On the 15th, the fourteen additional men-cooks and confectioners returned, and re-commenced their culinary labours with great spirit, so that all was in readiness, in every department, by the 18th October.
George III, Queen Charlotte and their six eldest children by Johan Zoffany
“October 19th, three o’clock Behold! in the avenue, the finest sight of the kind that ever was seen !—The sun bright—troops drawn up on each side—innumerable people—the King and Queen appearing with their numerous equipages, horse guards, attendants, etc. and numberless horsemen sent by Lord Petre to meet them, headed by his land-steward, with all the people he could collect— the park of artillery saluting, which was re-echoed in the woods with the shouts of the people—the rapidity with which the King’s chaise ran on, scarcely five minutes having elapsed, from the time of its appearance at the top of the rising avenue, (a full mile and a half from the house,) to their Majesties coming up to the door—the lawn in one instant covered with horsemen—and the horses panting—all contributed to resemble the work of enchantment! From Brentwood, a double row of carriages had placed themselves behind the troops, the horses being taken off to prevent accidents.
“Lord and Lady Petre received their Royal Visitors at the door. Lord Petre handed the Queen up stairs, while the King, with Lady Petre, walked on together through the entrance-hall— carpeted for the occasion up to the carriage-door— towards the first drawing-room, into the great drawing-room, which shall henceforth be designated by the presence-chamber, where two state chairs were placed on a raised platform. Lord and Lady Petre then kissed their Majesties’ hands, who soon shook off all form by their easy manner. They asked directly to see the house, and, followed by their suite, went through all the different apartments. On their return to the presence-chamber, the King desired to see Miss Petre, whom he played with, and afterwards took a great deal of notice of.
King George III by Ramsay
“At four o’clock, dinner was announced, when Lord Petre handed the Queen to the dining-room. Her chair alone was placed at the table, but her Majesty desired the ladies to sit down; and tabourets were immediately brought forward for Lady Egremont, lady of the bed-chamber, Lady Amherst, and Lady Petre. On no other occasion excepting at commerce, were they asked to sit down.
“His Majesty dined in the great hall, a couvert being laid only for him. He also desired the gentlemen to sit down; and stools were immediately placed near the table for Lord Lothian, gold stick, Lord Carmarthen, chamberlain to the Queen, General Carpenter, equerry to the King, Colonel Harcourt and Colonel St. John, aides-decamp, Lord Amherst, General Pearson, Majorgeneral Sir David Lindsay, as commanding officer of the day, Major-general Morrison, and Majorgeneral Fawcett. Lord Petre sat on the left hand of the King, and acted as cup-bearer. After the first glass was drunk, his Majesty ordered the wine round to his right, that he might not take the trouble to get up again.
Queen Charlotte 1779
“. . . . . In rising from table at eight o’clock, Lord Petre poured rose-water upon his Majesty’s hands, from a golden ewer and basin which were given by Mary, Queen of Scots, to the Earl of Derwentwater, his maternal grandfather. He then conducted his Majesty to the presence-chamber, bearing lights before him.
“After coffee, the King conversed for half an hour with the gentlemen in the outer drawingroom, to whom he talked of the army, and, with Lord Petre, chiefly about the camp. All the company then took their departure, leaving only the attendants.
“The King immediately proposed playing at commerce, and made the following party:—Lady Egremont, Lady Amherst, Lady Petre, Lord Lothian, Lord Carmarthen, Colonel St. John, and Colonel Harcourt. The latter won the first pool, and Lord Petre the second.
“Supper was prepared in the great hall at twelve o’clock. The Queen only sat down to supper, around whose chair the King, with the gentlemen, and a great number of attendants, stood at the bottom of the table. At one o’clock, their Majesties retired. Lord Petre carried lights before the King, and Lady Petre before the Queen, to their apartments.
“Here a little occurrence caused some disappointment. As their Majesties always carried their own little beds with them, the state bed had to be removed to make place for them, from within the gilt-iron guard that surrounded it. Fortunately, the tester was fastened from above, with the curtains, independent of the bedstead, and remained to form a stately awning to the two ordinary red and white check tent-beds.
“The next morning their Majesties breakfasted alone in the presence-chamber. Between nine and ten o’clock, they sent for Lord and Lady Petre, with whom they walked about the house, and up and down the south portico of the great saloon, until the carriages were ready to convey them to Warley Common. Here Lord Petre had prepared a stand, tacked and furnished in a very sumptuous manner, which was placed in the most advantageous position for seeing the sham-fight and the military movements, with which the King expressed his approbation in the strongest terms, but which were reported in the Gazette in an ordinary style.
“All passed on in the same manner as on the preceding day, excepting that the peers, and colonels of the regiments encamped at Warley, were asked to dine at the King’s table, making a party of thirty. One hundred and thirty dishes were served up, besides high ornamental decorations in the centre. Among the dainties gathered from all parts of England, I observed in the poulterer’s bill, a bustard, marked five guineas.
“His Majesty was in high spirits, conversed with cheerfulness and freedom, and did not rise from table till ten o’clock ; after which he proposed another pool at commerce, which his Majesty won, and in the course of the game drew kings twice. The second time he threw them on the table, he said, `Here are these things again, here are these things again.’
“At twelve, their Majesties retired to rest; and next morning they breakfasted in the presencechamber, as they had done on the preceding day. At ten o’clock, Lord and Lady Petre, with their little daughter, were sent for by the King, who throwing open one of the windows, that the whole party might be seen by the populace, who had collected from all parts in great crowds in front of the house, remained a considerable time—the King holding Miss Petre before him, and Lord Petre standing on his right, with Lady Petre on the left of the Queen. Their Majesties then, in the most obliging manner, expressed their thanks for the kind and handsome reception they had met with at Thorndon, which they condescendingly repeated several times.
“Lord and Lady Petre had the honour to kiss their Majesties’ hands, as they had done on their arrival. Lord Petre then handed the King and Queen into their carriage—drawn by six beautiful greys—who drove off for Navestock, to dine with Lord and Lady Waldegrave, where Lord and Lady Petre were commanded to meet their Majesties; and they went up to town the following day, to attend the drawing-room at St. James’s.
“As vails were not then abolished, the King left a hundred guineas for the servants, as also money for the poor.”
And so he might in return for such lavish entertainments. The People’s History of Essex by Duffield William Coller (1861) provides further details into the entertainments organized for the King: “The street and roadway from the London entrance of the town, down to the park gate, a distance of nearly two miles, were lined with soldiery; and the royal pair passed beneath a triumphal arch to the hull door, where they were received by Lord and Lady Petre. A royal levee, a grand dinner party, a concert, and a display of fireworks, filled the roll of festivity at the baronial hall; while the loyalty of Brentwood blazed forth at night in a general illumination, as brilliant as it could be made at a time when gas as yet lay slumbering undiscovered in its heap of coal dust. The following day his Majesty reviewed the little army which lay encamped at Warley, and afterwards held a levee upon the ground for the reception of the military officers and county gentry. While this was passing upon the green turf of the common—while the cannon were thundering out in mimic fight, troops of horse flying across the plain, and columns of infantry crashing through the neighbouring woods to show royalty how a battle was lost and won—a fairy-like surprise was preparing at Thorndon Hall. At the west end of the magnificent dining-room, a noble orchestra rose as if by magic. On the front was emblazoned the royal arms, with Fame sounding her trumpet, and underneath, in large characters, were the words —” Vivant Bex et Regina.” On each side were finely-executed portraits of their Majesties, and guardian angels crowning them with laurel. The orchestra itself was filled with artists of firstrate talent The whole was carefully concealed till the royal party and the other guests were seated, and the course had been served, when on the first flourish of the royal fork, the screen was suddenly removed. The fine strains of ” God save the King” bursting out from the midst of this flash of light and these things of beauty, gave it the air of an enchanted scene; and general expressions of delight greeted the noble host.”
We now return to Reminiscences For My Children for the sorry aftermath of the Royal visit and to learn what Lord Petre, who had spent so much, on so many levels, received for his pains.
“From that period no particular mark of attention in any manner was ever shown to Lord and Lady Petre, by their Majesties King George III. and Queen Charlotte. On the contrary, they were not even asked to the Queen’s concerts or private parties the following winter, or to any other entertainment ever after, solely on the plea of their religion (they were Catholics); and in 1798, his Majesty refused to sign Lord Petre’s son’s commission to a volunteer corps he had raised, because, his Majesty said, he could not help being aware that he was a Roman Catholic, having been in the chapel at Thorndon House.”
It seems odd that the King should claim to only have discovered that Lord Petre was a Catholic after his visit, as Lord Petre had been a force in the move for Catholic Emancipation, all neatly laid out in this entry from Wikipedia.
As a side note, the Thorndon Hall website relates the following: “At the Battle of Waterloo in 1815 Lord William Petre (11th Baron 1793 to 1850) is said to have captured Marengo, the grey Arabian horse of Napoleon I of France, although in talking with his decendent the current Lord Petre he does not believe that his ancestor would have been at the battle being a Catholic. However whether or not the Baron was present at the battlefield it is believed that he acquired the horse and brought it back to the Thorndon Hall, later selling it to Lieutenant-Colonel Angerstein of the Grenadier Guards for stud. Marengo lived on for another 11 years and died at the age of 38. The horse’s skeleton was preserved and is now on display at the National Army Museum in Chelsea, London.”
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