The Duchess

by Amanda Foreman

  He read her character well; Georgiana had placed all her hopes on conceiving a son.

  To everyone’s surprise the peaceful atmosphere and therapeutic waters of Spa worked their magic and at the end of September she discovered she was pregnant. “The symptoms are all the same,” she wrote excitedly to Lady Spencer; “I have no Wednesday feels, but some that show that great care must be taken—I have been entirely free from headache this last three weeks which seems to be a sign of being with child, as I should imagine liable as I am to headache, the stoppage of the Prince would give them me sadly.”26 The pregnancy was a last-minute reprieve. Georgiana was so relieved that the first person she informed was Coutts, two days before she wrote to her mother. “The aim of my journey, I hope, is answer’d. . . . I am in hopes I am with child. . . . I shall consecrate all my time to quiet of body and mind, that I may not lose the advantage of giving the Duke a son; and before I lie in (if I really am with child), I shall lay everything before him. In the meantime . . . I send an order to Beard to pay you 300. This will, I hope answer all demands . . .”27

  The Duke was so excited at the prospect of an heir that he immediately cancelled their plans to return to England, fearing that the Channel crossing might cause his wife to miscarry. Bess confided to Lady Melbourne that she dreaded another girl; for her own sake as much as Georgiana’s she was praying for a boy. Georgiana acquiesced to his decision because “in sacrificing all to my situation I am pleasing the Duke—who is extremely anxious—I believe he had given up hope of my breeding—for I could not have expected him to be as anxious as he is.”28 But the situation in Belgium was hardly safe: revolutionary fever had spread to Brussels and there was rioting in the streets against Joseph II. “You know that I am a good Royalist in France,” Georgiana told Calonne; “well, in Brussels I am a good Patriot.”29 Unencumbered by ties of friendship, her Whig principles reasserted themselves. This was a great help with regard to receiving mail, since letters addressed via their royal connections mysteriously disappeared while those which came via the patriots did not. Yet, in spite of Georgiana’s well-known sympathy for the patriot cause, which was fighting for Belgium’s independence from the Austrians, her carriage was peppered with bullets.

  Whenever the fighting on the streets grew too dangerous the Devonshires retreated to Lille, just west of the French border, returning when it abated. The Spencers and Cavendishes were bewildered by the Duke’s decision to remain abroad; Lady Spencer wondered if Bess was pregnant. Their concern increased when the Duke departed for England at the end of December, leaving Bess and Georgiana behind. Neither woman was happy at the prospect—Georgiana had not seen her children for six months and she missed them terribly, “but from circumstances too long for a letter, it is impossible for me to urge him,” she told Lady Melbourne.30 Bess dreaded the Duke’s absence in such lawless times, but “I shall stay with her to the last,” she wrote melodramatically.

  The Duke had left them not to attend to business matters in England, as they claimed, but because Duncannon had initiated divorce proceedings against Harriet. He had discovered her affair with Sheridan nine months earlier, in March: “The accusations against me quite bad, told Ca. . . .” Harriet scribbled in her diary.31 Although she had promised not to see Sheridan again they continued to meet in secret until Duncannon found out that she had lied. Georgiana may have had misgivings about Harriet’s trust in Sheridan, knowing his vanity and penchant for conquests, but she had not interfered. But others, notably Betsy Sheridan, his sister, were determined to stop the affair, and it was probably she who informed Duncannon. Writing in June to her sister in Ireland, she had expressed the hope that Sheridan might be tiring of Harriet. Seeing them together at a private supper of the Prince’s with Lady Jersey, Mrs. Fitzherbert, and the Duchess of Rutland, she thought that Harriet “was casting many tender looks across the table [at Sheridan] which to my great joy did not seem much attended to.”32 But she was mistaken about Sheridan’s feelings. He loved Harriet and the coldness he displayed towards her in public was probably a late and clumsy attempt to protect her from calumny.

  The Duke of Devonshire reached England just as the bill for the divorce was about to enter the first stage of proceedings. He found Harriet in a state of nervous collapse, and Duncannon more determined than he had ever seen him before. Sheridan had already sworn an oath never to see Harriet again, which had not changed Duncannon’s mind. Eliza Sheridan was so distraught by her husband’s behaviour that she, too, was demanding an immediate separation:

  I don’t know in my Life that ever I pass’d so many Miserable Hours [she wrote to a friend on February 5], S[heridan] had so completely involved himself with Ly D. in that a suit was actually commenced against them in the Doctors Commons—and if the Duke of Devon had not come over to England, and exerted his influence with Ld D., by this time S would have been an Object of Ridicule and abuse to all the World—however, thank God! the business is hush’d up—I believe principally on old Ld Bessborough’s account—and She is going abroad very soon I believe to her Sister. You will imagine this affair gave me no little uneasiness. . . . S was pleading forgiveness to me, on this Account, before it was certain that it would be hush’d up . . . swearing and imprecating all sorts of Curses on himself, on Me and his Child, if ever he was led away by any Motive to be false to me again. . . .33

  Once Duncannon realized that his father and all the Cavendishes were taking Harriet’s side against him he dropped the suit. The Duke, however, was not prepared to take any chances while Georgiana was still liable to miscarry. He forced Duncannon to agree to accompany Harriet to Brussels and stay with them. As soon as they left Sheridan had a fling with the governess at Crewe Hall, Caroline Townsend, an intelligent but plain woman. It happened, Eliza Sheridan recorded indignantly, “at the very time when S was pleading forgiveness to me.”*

  The Duncannons arrived at Brussels a short time after the Duke, not in the least reconciled and their future together as bleak as the winter prospect around them. “I envy your chère soeur going to see you,” Dorset wrote to Georgiana from England. “I am sure nobody has more sincerely lamented your absence from London than myself.”34 Harriet’s presence gave Georgiana something to think about other than her own problems. For the past few months she had been desperately trying to raise money to satisfy her creditors. She asked the Duke’s personal banker Cornelius Denne to advance her £5,000 in secret, which he sent over despite grave reservations.35 She kept part of it and sent the rest to William Galley at the Lottery Office to lay bets for her on the Oaks, the Oatlands, and Derby races “as the risk is so little and the gain might be so much.”36 She also extracted money from the Prince of Wales:

  Part 2 start from here (for linking) I look upon your secrecy my dearest brother, as the great test and trial of your affection and friendship. I am most afraid of Weltje, Jack Payne or Sheridan. I do entreat you for God’s sake not to disclose it in any way to them. I should die were they to know it in any way* . . . If you find you cannot get £2000 without its being known, write me a letter telling me so, and enclose it to Mr Baker. . . . If you can get the 2,000 get it in common notes . . . I am quite mad and distracted at what I am doing. . . . I don’t dare read over what I have written and if I did not think I could depend on you I should go quite mad. God bless you—what trouble I give you. I don’t sign my name in case of accidents.37

  She was sickened by herself:

  If I have no son I have no right to expect he [the Duke] should do anything for my children [she wrote distractedly to Lady Spencer], if I have a son, I shall have perhaps the misery of seeing him impoverished and my poor little girls very poor and of accusing myself that it is owing to my imprudence and to the ill opinion my husband’s relations have of me. I have earnestly entreated the D. to permit me to establish myself at Chatsworth for 5 or 6 years after my lying in, and if I must come to London, to come occasionally to Chiswick and St Albans. Perhaps this may restore me in their opinions. . . .38

 
Georgiana’s talk of retiring from London convinced Bess that the Duke could no longer be kept ignorant of the true state of affairs. So many people knew that the situation had almost become farcical. The Duke failed to understand what Bess was saying at first, and assumed that a significant sum meant a few thousand. “I think the best thing that can happen is that she should not be able to pay the interest of her debts regularly at present,” he wrote, “as that will make her creditors more willing to settle their accounts with her upon fair terms.”39 Gradually, he realized from her hints that the sum was much greater. But despite everyone—Coutts, Calonne, Hare, Harriet, and Bess—urging her to confess before it was too late, Georgiana once again lied when he confronted her. She wrote him a letter in March which was as subtle as it was sad in its contortions to avoid a disclosure. “Why do you force me, my dear Ca, to an avowal to you which agitates me beyond measure, and which is not necessary now?” she asked, not mentioning that the circumstance which made it unnecessary was the money she had borrowed from the Prince and Denne. She also played on the Duke’s fear of her miscarrying: “This is a request made from the bottom of my heart, and I trust you will not refuse it me indeed after my various agitations. Your granting it is of more importance than I can express to me and my child.” All she asked was that he wait a little longer. “Could I tell you, pay this for me, I owe no more, I should not hesitate to expose myself to all your reproof—But as I am still further involved I dread the opening of an explanation I should not dare encounter in my present situation.”40 She implored him not to confront Calonne and Denne: the true extent of her debts would, she knew, send him into a rage.

  The Duke‘s suspicions should have been aroused by Georgiana’s glib assurance that her income more than amply covered the interest on her debts. By the time the baby was due she had borrowed almost £20,000 and was still being persecuted by her creditors. In May she begged a further loan from the Prince, falsely claiming that it would clear all her debts:

  But my dearest brother, the state of my mind operates sadly on my body. As to the business of Calonne, I am determined to tell that to the Duke, but with this intention I am afraid of pressing him for some more money I want before I lie in, which will finish all my debts except Calonne’s, yours and a trifling one to Mr Coutts. This determined me to write to you by Baker and if you once more can enclose 3,000 to him by Aberdeen my tranquility during my lying in is secured. But, my dearest brother and friend, how can I ask it of you? I have told my sister your kindness and generosity, therefore you may talk to her freely about it.41

  Harriet, who had no more to spare, tried to help by paying some of the smaller creditors herself. Like everyone else, she dreaded Georgiana becoming agitated and losing the baby. The Duke even agreed to allow the children to be brought out from England because she missed them so much. It was a dangerous and complicated venture which involved the transport of over thirty adults in various capacities as outriders, footmen, nurses, nannies, maids, and grooms.42 As a consequence little Georgiana and Harryo met their half-sister Caroline much earlier than planned. Georgiana had prepared the ground with her mother before they arrived. “Charlotte, as I mentioned before,” she wrote, “will be out of the way except occasionally, and Mll de St Jules is, tho’ very lively, a remarkably orderly little creature and will be of great assistance to their French.”43

  Caroline’s presence among the Cavendish children did invite speculation, which all three were quick to put down. “She is a poor little thing,” Bess claimed disingenuously to Lady Melbourne. There were other rumours; some people actually claimed Georgiana was not pregnant at all, which made her indignant: “If those who say I am not with child were to see me, they would, I believe, have an evident answer to that, as well as many other infamous lies.”44 It was not only their remaining abroad which caused talk; their choice of a young doctor named Croft seemed obscure. In fact he was the son-in-law of Dr. Denman, who had attended Georgiana’s previous births. Denman had felt he was too old to make the arduous journey, whereas Croft was a gifted and ambitious obstetrician sensitive to his patients yet robust enough to withstand the rigours of Continental travel.45 However, Georgiana was his first notable client, and people wondered why the Duke would allow someone so relatively inexperienced near his wife, unless the Devonshires were planning something to ensure that whatever happened they returned with a son. Lady Spencer joined the party at the beginning of May partly to help quash these rumours.

  After the initial turmoil most of their eight-month stay in Brussels was quiet. Georgiana’s contacts with the patriots were of great use in this respect. “The revolution has taken place here,” she wrote in late December; “the most perfect quiet is established; all the troops have left the country. . . . The Patriots have been as humane as brave, and the revolution here was really astonishing.”46 But the Belgians did not understand her royalist links, and after some of her letters were intercepted the entire party was ordered to leave Brussels.

  I suppose you have heard [wrote Lord Erskine to Mrs. Montagu] that it was with great difficulty her Grace was allowed to stay at Brussels till Lady Spencer arrived. The Duchess was put to bed, and it was pretended that she was in labour, yet even that plea was but just able to suspend the search of the House and turning the family out of the Town; at last the favour was obtained to allow them to wait until Lady Spencer arrived, on promise they would then depart immediately, which they did. It seems some letters of her Grace’s were intercepted in which there were political offences, what business she had to meddle in the affairs of the Brabantines [part of Belgium] I cannot imagine.47

  They mobilized as quickly as was possible with four children and a hundred adults to organize. Georgiana was so large she had difficulty walking, her discomfort aggravated by chronic cystitis. Lafayette promised they would not be molested if they returned to France. Nevertheless, George wrote in consternation to Lady Spencer, “everybody here is open-mouthed about the idea of their going to Paris.”48 They did not know where they would stay until by chance the unwieldy caravan bumped into the Duc d’Ahrenberg, who was fleeing in the other direction. He offered them his house at Passy, just outside Paris. They reached the city on May 19 and found it “perfectly quiet.” Georgiana began to experience pains almost immediately. Lady Spencer would not allow her to give birth in a public hotel and she forced the party to hurry on. “We are thank God got safe into a magnificent house here,” she wrote to George when they reached Passy, “where I trust it will not be many days before we shall be relieved from the load of anxiety.”49

  Within a few hours of their arrival Georgiana went into labour. Lady Spencer took charge of the situation. She ordered Bess to ride back to Paris and show herself at the Opéra in order to dispel the speculation about which of the women was actually pregnant. She also wrote to the secretary of the British embassy, Lord Robert Fitzgerald, and to the dowager Duchesse d’Ahrenberg, both persons of impeccable respectability, asking them to come and be independent witnesses to the birth. Bess did as she was asked and appeared in Lord St. Helen’s box so that everyone might see her slim figure. She arrived back at Passy just before the birth. The message had not got through to the embassy but the Duchesse d’Ahrenberg was there. They waited outside Georgiana’s door.

  Just before two in the morning on May 21, 1790, the nurse lifted Georgiana’s head so that she could see the tiny body in Dr. Croft’s arms. It was a boy, the Marquess of Hartington. As arranged, the Duchesse d’Ahrenberg entered the room before the family and verified the newborn baby; her cries brought the rest of the family rushing in. “There never was a more welcome child,” recorded one of the servants.50 Everyone wept and clasped each other—except Bess and Lady Spencer. Messengers were immediately dispatched to England. Church bells rang continuously in Derbyshire to relay the news across the county. The Cavendish clan could hardly believe that Georgiana had at last delivered them an heir. Lord George wrote to commend her efforts, adding ruefully, “it is not too often that I have th
e opportunity of doing it.”51

  For two weeks after Hartington’s birth the joy at his arrival was muted by the fear that Georgiana might die. Duncannon was impatient to return to England, but Harriet refused to leave until she could be sure about her sister. It was not until mid-June that Lady Spencer was able to tell George, “since Thursday there has been a regular and gradual amendment and she is at this moment expressing with a sweet affectionate countenance her gratitude to everybody for their care and tenderness—the extraordinary instability of her nerves and the great debility of her whole frame are the difficulties we yet have to encounter but thank God, they both grow less every hour.”52 Within days Georgiana was organizing a round of parties to celebrate. Their Parisian friends descended on Passy, pleased to have any excuse to leave the city. Although it was quiet there were worrying signs of what was to come. On June 19, 1790, the Assembly issued a diktat against the display of heraldic insignia. All aristocrats hastily ordered the arms on their carriages to be painted over. However, other aspects of life remained the same, commerce went on uninterrupted, and as soon as Georgiana felt well enough she enjoyed the attentions of Paris’s finest couturiers—a gift from her grateful husband. “My hair is doing by Bezier, my picture drawing by Guérin, Mlle Bertin and her diamond chimère in one room—Mlle Gaussé and her bill in another. . . .” For the first time in many months she could relax and enjoy herself.53

  But Georgiana was not insensible to the plight of her friends. Since October the royal family had been virtual prisoners in the Tuileries, where they were subjected to the scrutiny of crowds who came daily to stare and insult them. Marie Antoinette still had some freedom of movement and was enjoying a short respite from Paris in the beautiful gardens at Saint-Cloud when Georgiana took her children and Bess to visit her. Lack of sleep and continual fear made the Queen resemble the care-worn women who taunted her at the Tuileries. She cried when they talked of the Duchesse de Polignac in Switzerland. “Tell her,” she choked, “that you have seen a person who will love her to her life’s end.”54