Wedlock

by Wendy Moore

  It was inevitable then that reports of Mary’s excursions flaunting her new lover would reach the ears of Thomas Lyon in Streatlam. Still discovering his brother’s unpaid debts and grimly selling off land and chattels to balance the books, he knew that a second marriage by his brother’s widow could compromise the future fortunes of Lord Strathmore’s children. A new heir, for example, could certainly confuse the inheritance. For the moment he scrutinised the reports and kept his powder dry. The gossip piqued the interest of others with a pecuniary interest too. Coquettishly playing the field, Mary exchanged locks of hair with a suitor she enigmatically called ‘Mr C. W.’ and sent a short but flirtatious refusal to a certain ‘Mr MacCallaster’.22

  Less easy to dismiss with a keepsake or a brusque rebuff was James Graham, who arrived unexpectedly on her doorstep in London that summer, having heard of her husband’s demise. Now a lieutenant, although at twenty still only just out of boyhood, Graham hoped to revive their carefree youthful passion. Still stung by his neglect, Mary refused to see him, even when he attempted to throw himself in her way on further occasions. For all his youth, he was the only man she would ever truly care for, yet her pride and a justifiable fear of further heartache prevented her from admitting her feelings. She would later say that ‘having, at the risk of my life, conquered my headstrong passion, I was determined not to expose myself to another conflict, with one whom I had so much reason to be afraid of.’23 She did indeed preserve herself from the pain of future loss. Less than three years later, in January 1779, James Graham would die, of unknown causes, in Naples.

  By July 1776, even as the American colonies declared their independence from the British Crown, Mary had resigned herself to wedlock once again. While she would never feel more for Gray than lust and friendship, she had convinced herself that he would make a dependable husband, a dutiful stepfather and - since she was probably pregnant again - a loving natural father. Certainly they shared common interests in poetry and drama while Gray slotted in well with the ever-expanding social circle that congregated in the drawing room of 40 Grosvenor Square. For regardless of the fact that she was still officially in mourning, Mary’s gatherings in the splendid four-storey house in the south-west corner of the square had become popular and animated events within London’s tight-knit scientific fraternity.

  Conversation at Mary’s salons in the summer of 1776 would almost certainly have focused on the treasure trove of botanical delights which had recently been shipped back from the Cape by Francis Masson; the Kew gardener had submitted an account of his explorations to the Royal Society which had been read during three meetings in February. Having linked up with the Swedish naturalist, Carl Peter Thunberg, for one of his expeditions, Masson informed the society that they ‘like true lovers of science thought themselves richly overpaid, by the ample collection of curious & new plants, as well as animals which they found in their way’.24 Since Masson had just set sail again, this time headed for the Canary Islands, the prospect of further discoveries waiting to be plucked in the enticing Cape region naturally enthralled those he left behind. Among the Royal Society fellows who enlivened Mary’s scientific discussions, Daniel Solander, the Swedish botanist, was impatient for further plant specimens while his friend, John Hunter, was always in the market for exotic new animal species, like the long-necked, spotted ‘camelopard’ which was fabled to live in southern Africa.

  The fact that Mary was denied entrance to the exclusively male Royal Society, despite her extensive knowledge and devotion to botany, did nothing to quell her interest in reports from Africa nor her desire to further scientific enlightenment as a patron. Inspired by tales of Masson’s voyage, and probably encouraged by Hunter and Solander, she now laid plans to finance an ambitious mission to send an explorer into uncharted parts of the Cape in search of new flora for her own burgeoning collection. It may well have been Solander who introduced her to William Paterson, a genial twenty-year-old Scottish gardener with little formal education but a huge sense of adventure who agreed to undertake her expedition the following spring. Certainly Solander had escorted Paterson to a Royal Society meeting in May that year and the pair would remain friends.25 Other scientific enthusiasts within Mary’s orbit included Richard Penneck, superintendent of the British Museum’s reading room, and Joseph Planta, younger brother to Mrs Parish, who had taken over as librarian at the museum upon his father’s death in 1773. Having just been appointed one of the two secretaries to the Royal Society, the ambitious 32-year-old Planta was rather more immune to Mary’s attractions than many of his fellow guests - and had no doubt been kept abreast of her nocturnal activities by the ousted Mrs Parish.

  Alongside Mary’s earnest discussions on botany there were jovial breakfasts, languid dinners and musical suppers, frequent opera and theatre trips, and frivolous excursions about town on any number of pretexts with a host of less illustrious guests. These included James Mario Matra, a thirty-year-old naval officer who had sailed around the world with Banks and Solander in the cramped cabins of the Endeavour. Born Magra - he later changed his name - and originally from New York, he was suspected by Captain Cook of slicing off parts of the ears of a drunken shipmate. Despite the fact that Matra was subsequently cleared of the brutal deed, the affable Cook nevertheless described his midshipman as ‘one of those gentlemen, frequently found on board Kings Ships, that can very well be spared, or to speak more planer good for nothing’.26 The bespectacled Matra had been introduced into Mary’s set by his fellow voyager Solander and his own brother, a decidedly more shadowy character, Captain Perkins Magra. Having enlisted with the army as an ensign in 1761, Magra had fought for British forces in America but was on leave in London in the summer of 1776. One more constant companion who could not be left out of any social outing was the children’s new governess, Eliza Planta. No sooner had Elizabeth Planta packed her bags and bade the children farewell than Mary had employed her younger sister - for the Planta family had a seemingly endless supply of talented daughters - in her stead.27 Wily, flighty and promiscuous, in stark contrast to her prim elder sister, nineteen-year-old Eliza - baptised Ann Eliza - quickly established herself as an indispensable ally and eager confidante of her mistress.

  Intoxicated by her liberty, whether it was to debate the finer points of science with fellows of the Royal Society, practise her skill for languages with her intellectual equals or flirt outrageously with the stream of sycophants who clamoured to her door, Mary was living life to the full. It was her year of behaving badly. Carelessly courting scandal, she flaunted her lover, abused her body, spent extravagantly and jeopardised her relationship with her children, especially the neglected young earl. She would be judged forever on the reckless excesses of this one year - in reality little more than nine months - and come to regret bitterly her waywardness. According to Foot, who would become one of Mary’s harshest critics: ‘Her judgement was weak, her prudence almost none, and her prejudice unbounded.’28 In a view that would stand as a lasting image of the Countess of Strathmore, the surgeon described Mary’s house as a ‘temple of folly’ and declared that her undoubted talents and intellect were ‘that sort which required to be under the controul of some other’. That Foot regarded the control Mary apparently needed to be male went without saying; that he also, as an avowed enemy of his professional rival John Hunter, was never likely to gain access to Mary’s ‘temple’ was equally left unsaid. Later, mostly male, writers would dispense similarly severe criticism and suggest that Mary’s future trials were simply just desserts for her licentious behaviour. Even Mary would subscribe to the view that the miseries in store were all divine punishment for her adulterous affair with Gray. For even as she appeared to be in charge of her life for the first time, in reality she was edging closer to an ever-tightening trap. ‘God blinded my judgement,’ she later explained, ‘that I could not discern, in any case, what was for my children’s and my own advantage; but in every thing where there were two expedients, I chose the worst.’29 The worst, howev
er, was still to come.

  Living with Gray effectively ‘as his wife’, scandalising strait-laced society as a merry widow and a neglectful mother, her home had become an open house to a growing band of unwholesome characters bent on selfish ends. Whenever a trip to the opera or a supper party was planned, the attentive Captain Magra would always be on hand as a ready escort. Whenever she desired a friendly ear for whispered confidences, Eliza Planta was at her side. And when the debonair Irish soldier arrived in London that July, Mary welcomed him into the fold with open arms.

  Since Hannah Newton’s death on 11 March, conveniently just four days after that of the Earl of Strathmore, Andrew Robinson Stoney had wasted little time grieving. Pocketing the £5,000 which he had inherited through his wife’s will, while attempting to hang on to Cole Pike Hill in the face of furious protests from the rightful heir, Sam Newton, the merry widower headed south for the top entertainment spots of Georgian England. As the busy summer season approached, Stoney squandered his money and his idle hours at the gaming tables, race courses and cockpits with disreputable hard-drinking friends from his army past. With his bounty slipping rapidly through his fingers, supplemented only by his paltry army half-pay of about £40 a year, the former lieutenant was becoming anxious to secure a more reliable source of income to maintain his indulgent lifestyle.30 Accompanied by his valet, Thomas Mahon, the self-promoted ‘Captain’ Stoney made for Scarborough, the fashionable Yorkshire seaside and spa town to which wealthy and well-bred families repaired during the summer months. Eyeing up the gentry enjoying the sea-bathing and the horse-racing along the sandy beach, Stoney hunted for another gullible heiress to lure down the aisle. It was not long before he chanced upon Anne Massingberd, the 28-year-old daughter of William Burrell Massingberd, a cultured and respected gentleman who lived in South Ormsby in Lincolnshire where he fulfilled the post of sheriff.31

  Having lost her mother when she was young, Anne had helped to bring up her five younger sisters and two brothers in the family home of Ormsby Hall. Her industrious but sheltered life had scarcely prepared her to withstand the dazzling charms of the tall and genial army officer who now plied her with gifts and flattery at every opportunity. Convinced that Anne’s father would offer a substantial portion to speed his eldest daughter to the altar, Stoney worked his customary magic. Swayed by his promises of marriage, Anne was quickly infatuated, and almost certainly bedded - judging by her later remorse - by her impatient suitor in the early summer months. Anne’s poignant letters to Stoney, which have survived despite her appeals for him to return them, provide a highly revelatory picture of the irresistible allure which the Irish soldier exerted on women. In one typically desperate letter Anne proclaims, ‘to describe the feelings of my heart is impossible, & I should think the attempt unnecessary, for you have known me too long not to be assured that my Love & Regard for you is beyond any thing to me’.32 Yet even as he fuelled countryside chatter by appearing as Anne’s constant escort - and by the rigid rules of eighteenth-century courtship ruining her chances of forming an alternative match - Stoney realised his expectations of her fortune had been overly optimistic. With two sons and six daughters to provide for, Anne’s father was in no position to offer Stoney anything but the most meagre of marital enhancements. So as the sheriff and his eldest son, Charles, grew increasingly alarmed at reports of the Irish officer’s predilections for bad company, Stoney shrewdly gauged that it was time to move on. Employing the well-worn delaying tactic, that his father was reluctant to settle sufficient fortune on him, Captain Stoney cooled his ardour. By July he was heading for London with an altogether more promising prey in his sights.

  Stoney would have heard of Lord Strathmore’s death - and the availability of his wealthy young widow - soon after the news had reached England. A death notice in the Newcastle Chronicle on 13 April helpfully pointed out that the deceased earl had married into ‘one of the most opulent fortunes in this Country’. Having already snared one Durham heiress, the prospect of capturing another endowed with even greater riches was too tempting to resist. Yet since coffee-house gossip asserted that the countess was already being pursued by an ardent nabob and was carefully watched by the vigilant Strathmores, Stoney knew that capturing this prize would demand all the guile and wit in his power. Courting Anne Massingberd was a useful fallback plan - and he continued to maintain her interest through wheedling letters and the occasional visit - but by early July, the gains from his first marriage were fast disappearing. Although he would later maintain that he possessed £7,500 in ready cash on top of £4,000 annual income in 1776, a more reliable source would suggest that the ‘half-pay lieutenant’ was ‘great distressed in his Circumstances, and possessed of little or no Property’.33 Other reports would even claim that he was bankrupt although this was almost certainly untrue. Straitened but ebullient as ever, Stoney now set out for London purely - Foot would later attest - with the aim of seducing the Countess of Strathmore. Plainly he was not the first, nor would he be the last, to make this attempt. Yet the sheer intricacy of Stoney’s scheming would mark him out as quite extraordinary.

  Moving into lodgings in St James’s Coffee House, a short stroll from Mary’s home in Grosvenor Square, Stoney established himself as a well-heeled, up-and-coming man about town, charming everyone he met with his good-humoured repartee and gambling for impressive stakes at the Cocoa Tree Club. Tall, lean and impeccably presented - his valet would say he owned ninety shirts at the time - Stoney was fully conscious of his magnetic appeal to women.34 Aware that time was short, he quickly engineered an introduction into Mary’s circle, most probably through Captain Magra, who happened to be an old army friend. It was Magra, in fact, who had picked out the scarlet uniform and a frocksuit from a tailors in the Strand and had them sent up to his friend in Newcastle the previous year.35 Having gained entry into the Grosvenor Square sanctum, Stoney skilfully laid siege to its mistress. With Captain Magra already working as his undercover ally, Stoney recruited Eliza Planta, the new governess, as his spy within the household. There is little doubt that Stoney achieved this conquest with his usual oleaginous flattery, and it is likely that she became his lover too, although he could always fall back on simple bribery when required. It was Eliza’s job to report on her mistress’s activities, divulge Mary’s weaknesses and her interests, praise her secret master’s attributes and help deploy his plans. So as Stoney dined and supped with the guests in Mary’s set that July, he was well primed to fawn over her beloved cats and speak kindly of her children, especially her favoured daughters.

  With her self-confessed partiality for Celtic men, her weakness for flattery and her perpetually disastrous judgement of character, Mary was intrigued by the urbane Irish officer who was only two years her senior. Although rumours alleging that Stoney had cruelly mistreated his late wife had percolated down to Grosvenor Square, Mary briskly dismissed these as ‘only county of Durham malice’ and encouraged - or at least did not discourage - the officer’s advances.36 By the end of July, Stoney was sufficiently emboldened to send Mary a daring declaration of his interest - the first surviving correspondence between the pair - which entirely dispensed with the usual formal address and obsequious homage due to a countess. Bluntly labelled ‘It is for you’, and evidently hand-delivered, the note was a masterpiece of Stoney’s art:I have taken some liberties for which your Ladyship can find no excuse unless you apply to the powerful pleading of Inclination - for such freedom I wish to make every apology, but I cannot get the better of a passion which has taken the intense possession of my Heart.

  I presume to flatter myself that I am deserving your confidence & my future conduct shall be directed [to] you, for whatever my suffering may be your pleasure only shall direct the conduct of him who can be nothing less than

  Your devoted

  Andrew37

  Whatever Mary’s reply it is likely to have been equally indiscreet, for soon afterwards Stoney was heard bragging about his conquest and sharing Mary’s letters with a ga
ggle of friends in a coffee-house in Bath.38

  Nevertheless, Stoney’s brash confidence was premature. Although she was obviously attracted to the hot-headed ‘captain’, by the late summer - pregnant by Gray for the third time - Mary had resigned herself to marrying her Scottish suitor. Despite having previously declared that she would never again ‘engage myself indissolubly’, in August or September she became formally betrothed to Gray in St Paul’s Cathedral with Eliza Planta and Richard Penneck as witnesses.39 Although an impromptu ceremony, this was no casual undertaking since such an engagement - actually referred to by Mary as ‘marriage’ - was regarded as legally binding. Indeed, one jilted fiancée in 1747 successfully sued a vicar for ‘breach of promise’ after he reneged on his pledge to marry her, winning £7,000 damages for her pains. Now wearing Gray’s ring, Mary hastily set off for Hertfordshire to break the news to her mother. Meanwhile, she laid plans to marry Gray the following spring before leaving for the Continent - or even to marry abroad - so that she could give birth in secret if necessary and stay in Europe until all hint of a scandal had faded. She even tendered ambitions to visit France, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Hungary and Bohemia - in a Bohemian version of the grand tour - before returning with her new husband and child.

  While most rivals would have gamely abandoned the chase at news of such an engagement, and perhaps moved on to an easier subject, this was not in the nature of Andrew Robinson Stoney. Obstacles and opposition merely sharpened his determination to succeed. As Foot shrewdly commented: ‘There was no antiquated, dissipated, impudent, and profligate nabob a match for him.’40 Briskly severing all ties with Anne Massingberd, who enjoyed her last liaison with her errant lover at the beginning of September, Stoney now focused all his energies, intelligence and remaining funds on ensnaring his prize quarry in a breathtakingly convoluted series of schemes. As the anti-hero of Thackeray’s Barry Lyndon, would argue: ‘Who can say that I had not a right to use any stratagem in this matter of love? Or, why say love? I wanted the wealth of the lady.’41