by Wendy Moore
10 Elizabeth Parish to Thomas Lyon [no day] May 1786: SPG, box 99, bundle 2.
11 MEB to Thomas Colpitts, 8 January 1787: SPG, volume C.
12 Affidavit ARB, 21 November 1786, George III v ARB, King’s Bench trial: NA KB/1/25/1.
13 A handwritten note by MEB in the SPWB Album in November 1786 states: ‘Mr Bowes bought a share in the Universal Register on purpose to have an opportunity of vilifying my Character in it, & all my Friends as much as he chose.’
14 The World, 4 January 1787, SPWBAlbum; The Times, 16 January 1787.
15 Anon, Allegations against the Countess of Strathmore, in anon, The Trial of Andrew Robinson Bowes, Esq; first heard in the Arches. The allegations, the customary term for the respondent’s reply, were reproduced in several formats at various times before the end of the century.
16 George Walker to anon [Mary Morgan?], 3 February 1787: SPG, box 185, bundle 1.
17 Affidavits Francis Bennett, 29 July 1788, Robert Thompson, 5 February 1787 and James Smith, 27 March 1788, divorce appeal to Delegates: NADEL2/12.
18 Narrative, vol. 2, p. 133; Mary Morgan to Thomas Colpitts, 26 January 1787: SPG, volume C.
19 James Farrer to Thomas Lacey, 9 December 1786: SPG , box 185, bundle 2.
20 Newcastle Journal, 27 January 1787, B M Album.
21 The Times, 24 January 1787. Extract from the Rover’s Magazine, 1 February 1787, BBP DUL, box 71, 241.
22 George Stoney to General Robinson, 17 February 1787, and George Stoney’s will, in Stoney, pp. 59-61.
23 ARB to Duke of Norfolk, 2 March 1787: Arundel Castle Howard Letters 1760-1816, vol. 1, section IV.
24 MEB to Thomas Colpitts, 14 March 1787 and Mary Morgan to Colpitts, 1 April 1787: SPG, volume C. Although Mary thought Bowes had procured bail by 14 March, it was the end of March before the bail was agreed.
25 Affidavit Susannah Church, 25 June 1787, cited in divorce appeal to Delegates: NA DEL 2/12. Since she could not read, it is feasible she had signed the affidavit without understanding its contents.
26 Interrogatories on behalf of MEB to be asked of Revd Henry Stephens, divorce appeal to Delegates: NADEL 2/12.
27 The Times, 8 May 1787.
28 Bowes’s appeal to the High Court of Delegates was lodged on 16 May 1787: NA DEL 2/12.
29 The Times, 28 May 1787.
30 George III v ARB, King’s Bench trial: NA KB/1/25/1. The details of the case were published in various newspapers and several pamphlets. The quotations are taken from anon, The Trial of ARB. . . for a Conspiracy .
31 Foss, vol. 1, pp. 235-40; Simpson, A. W., p. 167; ODNB, vol. 18, pp. 567-77. According to Simpson, writing in 1984, Erskine is still regarded by many as ‘the greatest advocate ever practising in England’. James Mingay is described in Anon, Sketches of the Characters, pp. 63-4; ODNB, vol. 38, pp. 357-8.
32 The sentencing was described in anon, The Trial of ARB. . . for a Conspiracy. Gowland’s and Shields’s evidence is from Affidavits Mary Gowland and Matthew Shields, George III v ARB : NA KB/1/25/3.
33 Morning Post, 13 October 1788, SPWB Album.
34 Thomas Colpitts junior to Mary Morgan, 16 October 1787: SPG, box 185, bundle 3; James Smith to MM, 20 February 1788: DCRO SEA D/St/C2/11/22.
35 MEB to Thomas Colpitts, 17 December 1787: SPG, volume C.
36 Several sources, including Arnold, pp. 146-7, state that Anna was living with her mother in Fludyer Street when she eloped. She was actually living with Mrs Parish at that address as documented by rate books, letters from Mrs Parish and newspaper reports. Parish rates books, St Margaret’s Church, CWAC, 1786 re Fludyer Street; various letters Elizabeth Parish to Thomas Lyon: SPG, box 99, bundle 2; London Evening Post, 29 January 1788 and Newcastle Journal, 2 February 1788: BM Album. The eventual marriage settlement is cited in Invoice signed J. Ord, paying first instalment of marriage settlement of July 1789 to Henry James Jessop, 29 December 1789: SPG , box 99, bundle 3.
37 Full details of the hearing in the Court of Common Pleas are published in anon, A full and accurate report of the trial, which went to three editions in 1788.
38 Gentleman’s Magazine, 58 (1788), p. 459.
39 Doggett, p. 101.
40 William Watson to Frances Bennett, 24 June 1788: SPG , box 185, bundle 1.
41 Farrer.
42 The Times, 16 and 22 December, 1788; Rowe, p. 61.
43 Duncan, passim; Stone (1995), p. 183; Reports of the Commissioners of the Ecclesiastical Courts of England and Wales 1831-2 (1832). According to Stone there were eleven appeals in the thirty years in the mid-eighteenth century while the commissioners’ report states there were ninety-five in the first thirty years of the nineteenth century.
44 NA DEL 2/12.
45 Gentleman’s Magazine 59 (1789), p. 267.
46 The World, 7 March 1789: SPWB Album.
47 MEB, An Epitaph, Lady Strathmore’s Miscells. Verses & Prose: SPG, vol. 335. Foot says MEB sent the poem to ARB in prison after the divorce victory. Foot, p. 147.
CHAPTER 13: OUT OF THE WORLD
Background details on Newington and Southwark are taken from London County Council, vol. 25, pp. 2-19 and 81-3. MEB’s correspondence with Eliza is in Ann (Eliza) Stephens (née Planta) to MEB, 31 October, 20 and 31 December 1789, 3 January and 13 February 1790: SPG, box 185, bundle 3.
1 SPWB Album.
2 Affidavits ARB 30 January 1790 and MEB , 3 February 1790: NA DEL2/12.
3 Schedule of excommunication, 5 February 1790: NADEL 2/12.
4 Mary Morgan [on behalf of MEB ] to anon [?Lacey], 7 March 1790: SPG , box 185, bundle 3.
5 Mary Bowes to MEB, 5 March 1790, copy: BM Archives.
6 Mary Morgan [on behalf of MEB] to anon [?Lacey], 7 March 1790: SPG , box 185, bundle 3.
7 The habeas corpus writ is mentioned in Mary Morgan’s letter of 7 March 1790, ibid, and referred to in the title of a document at DCRO, ‘Brief for Lady Strathmore on a Habeas Corpus to produce the body of Mary Bowes’, her daughter, at the suit of Andrew Robinson Bowes, 1790’, which is among a number of documents currently closed at the family’s request: DCRO SEA D/St/L1/2/16. It must therefore have been served on either 6 or 7 March. However, there appears to be no trace of the writ in King’s Bench records at the NA. No record of the decision in Chancery can be found at N A either but agreement must have been reached by the time of the deed of revocation, which granted allowances for William and Mary, signed on 25 September 1790.
8 MEB to James Farrer, 25 April 1790: SPG,box 185, bundle 3.
9 Deed of revocation and appointment, 25 September 1790: DCRO SEA D/St/D13/4/32.
10 Stone (1993), pp. 35-7. Details on Shelley are from ODNB, vol. 50, p. 206. General information on child custody is from Pinchbeck and Hewitt, vol. 2, p. 370; Stone (1995), p. 173. The remark by Mary Wollstonecraft to Gilbert Imlay, 1 January 1794, is cited in Hill, Bridget, p. 103.
11 Hare, vol. 2, p. 172; Mrs Bland to Miss Heber, 16 February 1793, cited in Arnold, p. 159.
12 English Chronicle, 19 May 1789: BMAlbum.
13 Wills (1995), p. 82. The Gibside household accounts were resumed in 1791.
14 Askham, passim; Swinburne, vol. 2, pp. 86-90; Wheatley, vol. 5, pp. 201-2. Swinburne’s comments are in Henry Swinburne to Sir T. Gascoigne, March 1791, in Wheatley, vol. 5, pp. 86-90. The earl’s activities were reported in The Bon Ton Magazine, 1 (1791), p. 400. The Isaac Cruikshank cartoon was ‘A Strath Spey or New Highland Reel as Danced at Seaton D-l’ (London, 29 December), described in George, vol. 6, 1784-92, no. 7741. Although no year is mentioned on the cartoon, George dates it to 1790 but the sequence of events suggests that it was a year later.
15 Gazetteer, August and December 1791; Star, 24 January 1792: SPWBAlbum.
16 Venn, vol. 1, pp. 342-3. George was admitted on 9 May 1791 and Thomas on 13 December 1792.
17 MEB,‘Tomy son Bowes on his coming of age’, Miscellaneous poems of Lady Strathmore’s written since 1792: SPG, vol. 336.
18 SPWB Album.
19 Farr
ington, p. 261; Captain Farrer’s divorce bill, Journal of the House of Lords, 36 George III, vol. XL (1796), pp. 654 and 709. Captain Farrer died on board the True Briton on 21 May 1800 and was buried at sea. Log book Hindostan: BL India Office, L/MAR/B/267C.
20 The portrait hangs still in the hall of the house at St Paul’s Walden Bury.
21 Foot, pp. 142-56.
22 The Star, 1 April 1793: SPWB Album.
23 Letter MEB, 14 April 1793, in the True Briton and Hampshire Chronicle, 18 April 1793: SPWB Album.
24 Garlick and MacIntyre, vol. 1, p. 176. MEBreferred to Mrs Ogilvy in a note in Miscellaneous poems of Lady Strathmore’s written since 1792: SPG, vol. 336.
25 Morning Post, 25 December 1792.
26 Reading Mercury,15 July 1793: SPWB Album.
27 Dale. All quotes during Mary’s time at Stourfield are from this booklet unless otherwise stated. Richard Dale was born in the year MEB arrived at Stourfield. His text was first published in Notes and Queries in 1876. Stourfield House later became a care home and has since been demolished although its front steps and portico remain, now serving a block of flats, with a blue plaque affixed. The area is now the Southbourne suburb of Bournemouth.
28 Dale, pp. 5-6. My thanks to Dr Donald Stevens, archivist of Priory Church Christchurch, for checking the inscription.
29 House of Lords report, 1796: SPG, volume C; Countess of Strathmore v Bowes in Brown, William, vol. 2, pp. 345-50.
30 MEB to James Farrer, 18 and 20 December 1796: SPG,box 185, bundle 3.
31 News cutting, no title, July 1798: SPWBAlbum.
32 Funeral fee book 1783-1811, Westminster Abbey, p. 157; Chester, vol. 10, pp. 463-4; Will of MEB, NA, prob/11/1374; Obituary, Gentleman’s Magazine 70 (1800), p. 488; note in Chester, vol. 10, pp. 463-4.
33 Will of ARB : NA , prob/11/1514.
34 Cokayne, vol. 12, p. 400.
35 Mosley, vol. 3, pp. 3,281-4.
36 Hare, vol. 2, p. 181.
37 Hardy (1970); Wills, pp. 89-92.
38 Thomas married three times and died in 1846. He had an only child, Thomas, by his first wife, who died in 1834 so that his grandson, also Thomas, became the twelfth earl. Cokayne, vol. 12, p. 401.
39 Thackeray stayed at Streatlam Castle in June and July 1841 and after hearing Mary Eleanor’s story wrote to his publisher: ‘I have in my trip to the country found materials (rather a character) for a story, that I’m sure must be amusing. . .’ He began writing The Luck of Barry Lyndon in October 1843 and it was serialised in Fraser’s Magazine throughout 1844. After a pirated version was published in the US as a book in 1852 it was first published in book form in the UK in Thackeray’s Miscellanies: Prose and Verse in 1856 when it was renamed The Memoirs of Barry Lyndon Esq. of the Kingdom of Ireland. About two-thirds of the book relates imagined events before the marriage. Ray, pp. 271, 339 and 346.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
I. MANUSCRIPT SOURCES
Baker Baker Papers, DUL
Bowes Museum - ‘Memoranda relating to A R Bowes and the Countess of Strathmore’, cited as BMAlbum; correspondence and other material in Bowes Museum Archives
Howard Letters 1760-1816, Arundel Castle
Royal Archives, Windsor
Royal Society of Archives
St Paul’s Walden Bury Album, album of newspaper cuttings collected by MEB at St Paul’s Walden Bury
Strathmore Estate Archives, Durham County Record Office
Strathmore Papers, Glamis Castle (National Register of Scotland 885)
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