King's Mistress, Queen's Servant: The Life and Times of Henrietta Howard

by Tracy Borman

  Henrietta’s work as a Woman of the Bedchamber was not hard as such, and was certainly less physically demanding than her years of serving her husband, but it was constant and often unpredictable, depending as it did upon the whim of the Princess. The hours were also very long, and she would have had precious little time to herself. Even when she was not actively attending to the Princess, she would have been surrounded by the other Women and Ladies of the Bedchamber who were in waiting. Although friendships did develop between them, these were overshadowed by the fierce rivalry that dominated Caroline’s household, as each member of it vied for favour. There was more or less constant bickering, and heated arguments could flare up over the most trivial of matters. Lady Cowper, whose diary is rich in gossip and scandal from the court, described one such occasion: ‘This day was passed in Disputes amongst us Servants about the Princess’s kissing my Lady Mayoress, and quoting of Precedents.’3 Henrietta tended to keep out of these petty disputes, anxious to avoid anything that might jeopardise her newly won position. Her neutrality and discretion won the admiration and respect of the other ladies, and while they might quarrel among themselves, they rarely quarrelled with her.

  There was one exception. Charlotte Clayton, another Woman of the Bedchamber, was a favourite of the Princess, but sensed that in Mrs Howard she had a rival. She knew that Henrietta’s association with Caroline went back further than her own, to the court in Hanover, and she was suspicious of the way in which Henrietta held herself aloof from the bickerings of the household. Part of Mrs Clayton’s insecurity no doubt sprang from her own rather obscure background. Her husband was a lowly clerk of the Treasury, and she had only risen to the position in the Princess’s household thanks to her acquaintance with the Duchess of Marlborough. She had won Caroline’s admiration by affecting to share her views on religion, and had steadily increased her influence over her mistress.

  Mrs Clayton was a woman of considerable cunning, and used her advantageous position to win titles and riches for both herself and her family. She once received a pair of diamond earrings as a bribe for securing a prestigious post at court for the Earl of Pomfret. Decked out in these jewels, she went to visit the Duchess of Marlborough, who was entertaining Lady Mary Wortley Montagu. As soon as Mrs Clayton had left them, the Duchess exclaimed: ‘What an impudent creature, to come hither with a bribe in her ear!’, to which Lady Mary replied: ‘Madam, how should people know where wine is sold, unless a bush is hung out?’4

  Henrietta struggled to hide her dislike for Mrs Clayton, and as her own influence in the Princess’s household grew, the rivalry between them intensified. Their animosity did not escape the sharp eye of John, Lord Hervey, who claimed that at its root lay not just rivalry, but a profound difference in character. ‘Mrs Clayton and Mrs Howard hated one another very civilly and very heartily, but not in equal constraint,’ he wrote, ‘for whilst Mrs Clayton was every moment like Mount Etna, ready to burst when she did not flame, Mrs Howard was as much mistress of her passions as of her limbs, and could as easily prevent the one from showing she had a mind to strike, as she could the other from giving the blow. Her passions, if I may be allowed the comparison, were like well-mannered horses, at once both hot and tractable.’5

  Her influence with the Princess may have been inferior to Mrs Clayton’s, but in terms of popularity among the ladies at court, Mrs Howard far outstripped her rival. As well as the Ladies and Women of the Bedchamber, she also befriended the Maids of Honour – the unmarried ladies who were the Princess’s main companions at court. These well-born young ladies were amongst the liveliest and most vivacious at St James’s – if not in the whole of England. Most were still in their teens, and their beauty and giddiness lent a much-needed brightness to life at court. Principal among them was Mary Bellenden, daughter of John, 2nd Lord Bellenden. Her voluptuous beauty and high spirits made her the darling of the court. Horace Walpole talked of the ‘universal admiration’ for her, adding, ‘Her face and person were charming, lively she was even to etouderie,6 and so agreeable that she was never afterwards mentioned by her contemporaries but as the most perfect creature they had ever seen.’7

  Mary Bellenden’s closest rival at court was Mary (‘Molly’) Lepel, who combined beauty and charm with a lively wit and intellect. Her more poised style and ability to please won her the admiration of some of the greatest intellectuals of the day, including Voltaire, who wrote a poem in her honour. Lord Chesterfield said of her: ‘She has been bred all her life at Courts, of which she has acquired all the easy good breeding and politeness without the frivolousness. She has all the reading that a woman should have, and more than any woman need have.’8

  Among Miss Lepel’s many admirers was the waspish courtier Lord Hervey. Hervey was handsome in a delicate sort of way, and his slender, mincing figure bordered on the effeminate. He had a voracious sexual appetite that was satisfied by both men and women, and he was described as being as much a fop as a rake. Alexander Pope excoriated his immorality and christened him ‘Lord Fanny’, who ‘now trips a lady, and now struts a lord’. Hervey’s acerbic wit and love of gossip found full expression in his memoirs, which recorded – and often exaggerated – the daily round of events and scandal at the Georgian court. Despite his sexual ambivalence, Hervey married Molly Lepel – apparently for love, for she had no fortune – and she bore him eight children.

  The eldest among the Maids of Honour was Mary Meadows, who did her best to keep her unruly companions in order. She had quite a task, especially with Sophia Howe. This young lady owed her position at court to the fact that she was the great-granddaughter of Prince Rupert, brother of old Electress Sophia. Miss Howe was exceedingly gay and flighty, and her irrepressible humour frequently bordered on the coarse. On one occasion, she had a fit of giggles during a service in the royal chapel at St James’s, earning her a severe reprimand from the Duchess of St Albans, who told her she could not have done a worse thing. ‘I beg your Grace’s pardon,’ Miss Howe tartly replied. ‘I can do a great many worse things.’9

  Sophia Howe was not the only Maid of Honour to fail in her religious devotions. The Chapel Royal soon became a magnet for all the beaux at court, and a great deal of ogling and giggling went on, especially during Bishop Burnet’s long sermons. The situation became so intolerable that he complained to the Princess, who eventually agreed to his suggestion that the Maids of Honour’s pew should be built up so high as to shield them from their admirers. This sparked one such admirer to lament:

  And now Britain’s nymphs in a Protestant reign

  Are boxed up at prayers like the Virgins of Spain.10

  The liveliness of Princess Caroline’s household, and that of the Prince of Wales, formed a sharp contrast to the general tenor of life during the early years of George I’s reign. The new King was fifty-four when he ascended the throne, by which age his habits and principles of thought were firmly entrenched. He was not inclined to change either for the sake of his new court, and instead continued the routines that he had established as Elector. These had been simple in Hanover and remained so in England. He wanted very few of the innumerable rights and courtesies to which he was entitled. He was a shy and reserved man, and the notion of traditional royal ceremonies such as the levée, during which the King invited members of the court into his bedchamber to observe his dressing, were abhorrent to him. He would have none of them.

  George I hated fashionable society and shunned it whenever possible. He rose early but did not emerge from his bedchamber until noon, when he went into the adjoining closet to receive his ministers and other visitors. These audiences generally lasted until three o’clock in the afternoon, when the King again retired to his bedchamber. He ignored the Stuart tradition of dining in public, choosing instead to take his meals in private, waited on by his faithful Turkish servants. Late in the afternoon, he would venture out to take a walk alone in the gardens of St James’s. On Sundays he was forced to spend more time in public because of the requirement to attend chapel. But
even then, few courtiers would catch more than the briefest glimpse of him as he hurried back to his private apartments after the service, and he rarely spoke to any of the dense throng lining the corridors.

  The King spent most of his leisure hours in the apartments of his two favourite mistresses, Mesdames Schulenburg and Kielmansegg. These were situated as far apart in the palace as possible, with George’s apartments in between, because the two women hated each other. One of the more innocent pleasures that he enjoyed with Madame Schulenburg was to sit and watch her cut figures out of paper, an occupation that would hold him in thrall for several hours.

  But George was not a total recluse. In the evenings, he sometimes slipped out of St James’s and went to the theatre or opera with a small party of intimate friends. He shied away from the royal box, however, preferring to watch the performances incognito. Since he knew little English, he favoured ballets and pantomimes. His companions were almost always women, and despite his reserve, he enjoyed flirting with them. His dalliances occasionally attracted unwanted attention, however. One evening, in a moment of impetuosity, he kissed the hand of the Dowager Duchess of Ancaster, who was sitting next to him. In her surprise, she rose and made a low curtsey, which unfortunately drew the attention of the ladies nearby, who ‘clapped their fans to their faces, and tittered’. It was reported that ‘The whole house was astonished’, and that the King’s display of gallantry was ‘pretty near to a declaration of love’.11

  Very occasionally, George would join the Princess’s evening parties for half an hour, but he always resisted her invitation to take part in the card tables. This was not due to any aversion to gambling: George loved to play cards, but he preferred to do so with a select group of friends in private houses.

  The new King’s reluctance to show himself in public did nothing for his popularity. His English subjects grew increasingly disdainful of him, and of his mistresses, whom they thought resembled more the ugly sisters of pantomime than the beauteous creatures they were accustomed to in the royal court. One day Madame Kielmansegg was taking a ride in a carriage when she was accosted by a jeering mob. Leaning out of the window, she called: ‘Goot people, why you abuse us? We come for all your goots!’ To which a voice from the crowd shouted back, ‘Yes, damn ye, and for all our chattels too!’12

  A rather more serious indication of a lack of public support for the new regime came less than a year after George I’s accession. His preference for German habits and customs over English ones also extended to his views on foreign policy. He persuaded Parliament to release funds for the military campaigns in which he was engaged on Hanover’s behalf. He also implemented a foreign policy that was almost entirely dictated by his desire to augment Hanover’s status, even though it sacrificed British interests – and coffers. This sparked widespread resentment among both his ministers and his subjects.

  The Jacobites, who had been steadily gaining support on both sides of the border, seized the chance to further their own cause at the expense of the King’s, and started to gather their forces. They planned three risings: ‘James III and VIII’, who was in exile on the Continent, was to land in the south-west of England and lead a march to London. At the same time, Jacobite forces in the Borders and Scottish Highlands were to be mobilised. This was the people’s chance to rid themselves of ‘German George’ and restore the rightful Stuart king to the throne. James’s health was drunk in public and at private dinners by passing the wine glass over the water bottle to signify ‘the King over the water’. There was a flurry of pamphlets and ballads denouncing the Hanoverian regime and urging people to rise up in support of their rightful king. Meanwhile, George I doggedly persisted with his pro-Hanover policy, flying in the face of public opinion, and either refusing to believe in the threat to his crown or caring little for it.

  In the event, the Jacobite risings came to nothing. Poor leadership and indecision, coupled with effective government intelligence, nipped the south-west rebellion in the bud. On the Borders, the Jacobite forces advanced as far as Cumbria and captured Preston, but were then outnumbered and obliged to surrender. The rising in Scotland was initially successful, and both Perth and Aberdeen were captured. But again lack of leadership prevented them from pushing home the advantage. If the Jacobite risings had failed to achieve their objective, however, they had provided a very clear demonstration of the anti-Hanoverian feeling across the country at this time. Thenceforth, George would ignore public opinion at his peril.

  With the popularity of the King at an all-time low, the Prince and Princess were quick to seize the advantage. They made themselves as affable and visible as George was dour and reserved. While he stubbornly pursued his German habits and interests, they loudly expressed their love for all things English. The Prince proclaimed: ‘I have not von drop of blood in my veins dat is not English.’ This may have been a little more convincing if it had not been expressed with such a strong accent, and had it not been well known that he in fact had even more German blood in his veins than his father. He went further still by announcing at a reception one evening that he thought the English were ‘the best, handsomest, the best-shaped, best-natured and lovingest people in the world, and that if anybody would make their court to him, it must be by telling him that he was like an Englishman’. This delighted the English courtiers but horrified their German counterparts, who ‘could not contain themselves, but fell into the violentist, silliest, ill-mannered invective against the English that was ever heard’. They had further cause for complaint when Caroline took up her husband’s theme and declared that she would ‘as soon live on a dunghill as return to Hanover’.13

  How sincere these expressions were is uncertain, but the fact that the Prince and Princess voiced them and made an effort to understand and speak English (admittedly not very competently) gave them a huge advantage over the King. What really swung the tide of popular opinion in their favour, though, was not their words but their actions. Spying the gap that George I had created by refusing to enter into court ceremonials and other formal occasions, they threw themselves headlong into the full round of engagements offered by fashionable society, determined to add some much-needed glamour and vitality to the Hanoverian court. As Lord Hervey observed: ‘the pageantry and splendour, the badges and trappings of royalty, were as pleasing to the son as they were irksome to the father’.

  The Princess gave a series of balls and masquerades at Somerset House and St James’s Palace, to which all of London’s most elegant noblemen and women flocked. She also held formal drawing rooms two or three evenings a week, where guests were treated to lively conversation, music and cards. The latter became all the rage, and before long the whole court was gripped by gambling fever. Lady Cowper recounted that on one occasion ‘There was such a court I never saw in my life. My mistress and the Duchess of Montagu went halves at hazard and won six hundred pounds. Mr Archer came in great form to offer me a place at the table, but I laughed and said he did not know me if he thought I was capable of venturing two hundred guineas at play, for none sat down to the table with less.’14 High play was accompanied by deep drinking, and things occasionally got out of hand. At a drawing room one evening, a gentleman present, who had evidently taken great advantage of the royal hospitality, fell out with another guest, and in the fray ‘pulled him by the nose’. He was promptly thrown out for being ‘drunk and saucy’.15

  The Prince and Princess did not confine their entertainment to the court, but made sure that they were seen in all of London’s most fashionable retreats. The capital was at that time a city built for entertainment: assembly halls, pleasure gardens, coffee houses and gambling rooms were springing up everywhere, and the great aristocratic mansions were being transformed to suit the new social tastes of the privileged classes. There was greater vibrancy in the arts, and a host of new theatres were opening up in London’s West End. The royal couple were very fond of operas and plays, and were often to be seen in full state at the Haymarket or Drury Lane, enjoying every
thing from Shakespeare to the latest farce. Caroline even caused a scandal at court by going to see a risqué new comedy called The Wanton Wife – much to the horror of the Duchess of Roxburgh, who claimed that it was ‘such a one as nobody could see with a good reputation’.16

  On the evenings when there was no formal court occasion or play to divert them, the Prince and Princess would dine at the houses of great noblemen and women. Frequent mention is made in the newspapers and diaries of the time of a dinner at the Duchess of Shrewsbury’s, a supper at my Lady Bristol’s, or a ball at the Duchess of Somerset’s. The couple always made sure that they were at their most affable and charming on such occasions, conscious that with the nobility rested one of the surest routes to good opinion among the population at large.

  Their social pursuits did not stop during daylight hours. In the early months of the reign, they walked in St James’s Park every day, accompanied by a fashionable crowd and those seeking to be so. Later on, the Princess discovered the gardens at Kensington Palace, which she greatly admired, and they soon became a popular destination for London’s socialites. Entrance was by ticket only, so the general public could only watch from behind the gates, eager for a glimpse of the glamorous young royals.

  In the fashionable world, dinner was taken in the middle of the day, and, unlike the King, Caroline and George upheld the Stuart tradition of dining in public. Ordinary people would flock to watch the spectacle of the royal couple and their guests eating, and would endure many hours of being squeezed and jostled in the galleries that lined the dining room. This became such a popular pastime that a ticketing system had to be introduced.