Richard Temple, Marquess of Buckingham, writes to his London confidant and fixer, William Henry Fremantle:

The date of my letter compared with that of the receipt of it will have shewn you that you ought to have got it a day sooner. But the poor wretch who carried my post bag on Sunday night was thrown from his horse & killed on the spot & my bag lay with him all night in the road.

It was unlucky indeed for the poor postman, whose name history has not recorded. It could have been more unlucky for the Duke of Wellington if the letter the postman was carrying had been stolen from the corpse.

The letter, marked “Confidential”, offered advice to be conveyed by Fremantle to Arthur Wellesley, the Duke of Wellington, the nation’s conquering hero on the battlefield—and in the bedroom.

Five or six years earlier, the Duke had an encounter with Lady Westmeath. Beautiful, dark eyed and rapacious, Emily was struggling through a tempestuous, sometimes violent marriage. Now, as tortuous divorce proceedings got under way, there seemed no hope that the Duke of Wellington’s name could be kept out of it.

One accusation made by Emily was that her mother had suggested she sleep with the Duke to advance the family fortunes. Perhaps she did so on this occasion in the winter of 1815/16, or on others that presented themselves. She would not have been the first woman to fall for the Duke’s advances. Whether she dallied or not, her husband saw it as an opportunity to lay a trap for his wife and to drag the Duke of Wellington into the divorce proceedings.

It took a while for the bitter Westmeath affair to unravel. Although the Duke of Wellington was mentioned in court documents, his reputation came to no harm as by then his reputation as a womaniser was well established. This satirical print drawn by Isaac Cruikshank in 1819 leaves little to the imagination:

The ladies are saying:

“Bless what a spanker! I hope it won’t fire it at me, I could never support such a thing!”
“It can't do any harm, for he has fired it so often in various Countries, that it is nearly wore out!” 

 As I said, it leaves little to the imagination.

Andy Boddington

Our friend, Betsey Wynne records a unusual meeting in her diary. She travelled to London with her husband, Captain Thomas Francis Fremantle. My mother called on Betsey :

Lady Buckingham called to take us to see Count Barlowsky, the little polish dwarf who is only three feet two inches & 69 years of age, he is a little horror, tho’ better proportioned than dwarfs are in general, but his manners & conversation exceedingly done.

There is a spelling error in the published edition of the Wynne Diaries and it may have been Betsey’s error. Józef Boruwłaski, born in 1739, was a Polish-born dwarf who toured European and Turkish courts, ending his days in Durham, England.

He was never a Count of course. That was a title adopted by a man of great wit and intelligence, a talented dancer and musician, to ease his way through European society. Just 8 inches tall at birth, he grew to 3 feet 3 inches in adulthood. He arrived in Britain in 1782 and retired to Durham in 1791.

In Durham, he was great friends with Stephen Kemble, an actor of Falstaff proportions. They strolled the banks of the River Wear together, the original Little and Large!

For all his lack of height, Boruwłaski did not lack in longevity. He died in Durham in 1837, aged 97.

Betsey of course did not mean “horror” in the way the word is used today. She meant “oddity” rather than “disgraceful” or “terrifying”.

Chandos Temple

With her husband sailing towards Copenhagen as Captain of the Ganges, and soon to fight alongside Nelson in the glorious battle of that port, Betsy Fremantle was busy keeping house at Swanbourne in Buckinghamshire. The following diary account of a party at Swanbourne would not be out of place in Jane Austen's novels.

Swanbourne, 13th February. Monday. Lady Buckingham arrived soon after nine o’clock with Lord George, Lady Mary and Mr. Martin. We breakfasted in the Library and she admired much the House. She saw all my brats and was very civil to old Mrs Fremantle who had not seen her for some years. She left us at eleven and the moment she was gone I was busy in clearing my room for this evening’s dance, preparing the supper table &c. We dined in Capt. Fremantle’s dressing room. Miss Chaplin came in the morning and little Harriet Howard who I asked to please her Mamma and is the ugliest little ape I ever saw.

Did Betsy Fremantle ever expect her diaries to be read? If she did she might not have called poor little Harriet Howard "the ugliest ape I ever saw"! Lady Buckingham is my mother, Lord George and Lady Mary my brother and sister. Mr Martin is Abbé Martin, an exiled French catholic priest. My mother, sister and the Wynne sisters are all Catholics (Betsy Fremantle was Betsy Wynne before her marriage).

The party began at eight:

We all dressed after dinner and our company began to assemble at eight o’clock—Miss Heslop, Miss Bennett and her brother, five Miss Pouletts and their brother, General Poulett was ill but paid me a great compliment by sending all his children—Mr. and Mrs. Howard, Dr. Millner, Wodley, the Blicks, Capt. Brown, Mr. and Mrs. Harman, five Lowndes, a Mr. Oddy and another friend they brought, in all we were thirty-four. Dancing was kept up with much spirit and thirteen couples had just room enough in the Library. We supped at twelve, our table in the dining room held twenty-two, the rest were in the Dressing room. Supper was very good and all went off better I expected. Dancing soon recommenced and was kept up till half-past four; I was so lame I could not dance and played Casino with Mrs. Fremantle. Everybody seemed much pleased with the party… Mr. Wodley was a great treat.

It is amusing that a Miss Bennett is mentioned as this might have been a scene out of Pride and Prejudice. Among the five Miss Pouletts was Anne Lucy who was falling in love with my brother Lord George.

Chandos Temple

My father, George Grenville, the first Marquess of Buckingham, is a strong supporter of the deposed French monarchy and gave them shelter at our house in Gosfield, Essex. Our “French colony” comes to visit in January 1808 and oak trees are planted around the Keeper’s Lodge, which is now known as the Bourbon Tower. The King is anxious to reward the labourers, but he cannot have anticipated the comic result, which Betsey Fremantle records in her diary:

Louis XVIII having ordered wine and ale to be distributed to the Labourers who had planted the Oaks yesterday, they all passed before the House in their way to the Clumps, forming a ludicrous Procession, some with Spades, forks, or rakes, some driving wheelbarrows, and with other gardening implements, the Band playing before them, they marched into the Park where ministers had assembled, to drink the King’s health, I walked to the spot with Ly. Buckingham, but was caught in a violent storm of rain.

Richard Temple

I write to Sir Thomas Fremantle, now Commander-in-Chief of Mediterranean no less. I congratulate him on his new command. And I do desire him a favour, as my cousin will benefit from a cruise on his 74-gun man-o-war for her health:

I have now a request to make to you, which I shall feel much gratified if you can comply with. You are aware that my Cousin Charlotte Shipley & her family are in Minorca, or Majorca. I believe the latter. Her health is very failing & bad, & she is convinced that a Month’s cruize would set her up. Now my dear Fremantle have you any means of letting any one of the Vessels under your command, take her, her husband & a little girl, 8 years old, a cruize any where, for that period, not before the 1^st week in May an account of the cold which will be too severe for her cough. M^r Shipley would lay in his own stock, wine &c which would remove any delicacy you might have in proposing this to any of your Captains, & it might be the saving of the poor woman. Should you be able to manage it, the Ship need only water for a couple of days, either at Palma or [?] & the Shipleys if they had notice, could be sure to be there ready to embark. Excuse my mentioning this request, which I am sure that you will comply with if you can, & reject without ceremony if you cannot.

Fremantle has his flag aboard HMS Rochfort. 

Chandos Buckingham