A Scandalous Life: The Biography of Jane Digby (Text only)

by Mary S. Lovell

  It is not given to many to read their own obituaries, although there are several famous examples, but on Friday 14 March 1873 the Morning Post in London carried a story under the headline ‘A Remarkable Career’:

  From a correspondent at Beyrout.

  I met today an old acquaintance, the camel-driver Sheikh Abdul, and he told me that his wife had died. Abdul’s wife was no common woman; her name was once known throughout Europe. Sheikh Abdul is the ninth husband of Lady Ellenborough, whom I met for the first time 30 years ago in Munich, just after she had eloped with Prince Schwarzenberg from the residence of her first husband. She then went to Italy where … she got married six times in succession. All these unions were dissolved after a short duration.

  In 1848 I met her at Athens where she concluded an eighth marriage with the Greek Colonel, Colonel Thodoki, however only for a short time. Her affections were now bestowed on an old Palikar chieftain, for whom she built a beautiful house at Athens. When her latest marriage was dissolved she went to the Levant. During a journey from Beyrout to Damascas she got pleased with the camel driver Sheikh Abdul and selected him for the ninth husband. She was married to him after the Arab fashion and …

  There was more nonsense in a similar vein. Unfortunately, the story was picked up and reported by other papers including The Times, for Jane’s name had appeared in the press on and off since the death of Lord Ellenborough fifteen months earlier. A new generation had taken an interest in the story of this ‘wild and lovely creature’ who had been once the ‘exclusive Lady Ellenborough’ and who now lived the exotic life of (depending on whose version one read) a camel driver’s wife, a desert princess or an eccentric recluse similar to Hester Stanhope.

  Jane had returned to Damascus on 12 December 1872. Had she been in the desert with the tribe, rumours of her death might have been understandable. But she had been going about in Homs and Damascus visiting people quite normally. She could only think that someone wished her ill when she first heard of the reports, thinking that they were a continuation of the stories run after Lord Ellen-borough’s death.

  But her family, having not heard from her for some months, were anxious. Although they did not believe the reports and sent a notice to this effect to The Times pending definite information from Syria, there was no immediate way of verifying the report of her death. Her English friends such as Emily Beaufort, who had spent months in Damascus and gone to Palmyra with Jane in 1859, were equally concerned. Emily, now Lady Strangford, having married a noble reviewer of her book about Syria, wrote to Edward Digby for confirmation, or otherwise, of the report of Jane’s death.

  62 Montague Square

  April 4th 1873

  Dear Lord Digby,

  You will probably be surprised at receiving this letter as you must long ago have forgotten the visit you and Lady Digby paid me in 1862 shortly after my marriage. I however, well remember the warm kindness with which you expressed yourselves regarding the pages I published about the excellent Arab gentleman (I might say nobleman) your sister had married …

  I have just seen Mrs Burton’s (well meant) letter in the Pall Mall Gazette in which I think she believes [the reports of Jane’s death] to be a fact … When I first knew [your sister] I knew nothing whatsoever of her previous history – she herself told me of it before we parted. But by that time I had learned to love and admire her for what I saw her to be. She was in a difficult situation for one less unselfish, less devoted than she was, to fill worthily. How she did fill it, only a few people truly know.

  She carried out a simple, unaffected, quiet, useful and beautiful life, finding happiness in doing good to all she came near, amply repaid by her husband’s love and the affectionate respect of all who really knew her. I have heard of the lies told of her … and I know the value of each. I know too that some hurt her, and gently she bore them. Her grateful, loving friendship for those who loved and respected her was touching in its tenderness.2

  The letter by Isabel Burton to which Emily Strangford referred had appeared in many leading newspapers and magazines throughout Europe, including The Times and Pall Mall Gazette in London. It was written from Trieste and dated 19 March, when reports of Jane’s death reached Italy. Isabel had rushed to defend Jane, at the same time ensuring that she stamped her proprietorship on a sure-fire bestselling biography of a contemporary figure.

  Sir,

  Will you allow me to contradict the correspondent at Beyrout who writes concerning the late Lady Ellenborough? I scarcely know where to begin, but I must do it to keep my promise to her.

  I lived for two years at Damascus while my husband, Captain Burton was Consul there and in daily intercourse with the subject of this paragraph. Knowing that after her death all sorts of untruths would appear in the papers, very painful to her family, she wished me to write her biography, and gave me an hour a day until it was accomplished. She did not spare herself, dictating the bad with the same frankness as the good. I was pledged not to publish this until after her death and that of certain relatives. But I am in a position to state that there is a grain of truth to a ton of falsehood in the paragraph from Beyrout, and inasmuch as Beyrout is only 72 miles from Damascus the writer must know that as well as I do. It must have come from a very common source when such English as this is used, ‘Between Beyrout and Damascus she got pleased with the camel-driver’! It suggests a discharged Lady’s maid.

  I left Damascus just a year and a half ago, in the middle of the night, and she was the last friend to see me out of the city … her last words were ‘Do not forget your promise if I die and we never meet again.’ I cannot meddle with the past without infringing on the biography confided to me, but I can say a few words concerning her life dating from her arrival in the East about sixteen years ago, as told me by herself and those living there …

  Lady Ellenborough arrived at Beyrout and went to Damascus, where she arranged to go to Bagdad across the desert. A Bedouin escort for this journey was necessary and as the Mezrab tribe occupied the ground the duty of commanding the escort developed upon Sheikh Medjuel, a younger brother of Sheikh Mohammed … on the journey the young sheikh fell in love with this beautiful woman who possessed all the qualities that could fire the Arab imagination. Even two years ago she was more attractive than half the young girls of our time. It ended by his proposing to divorce his Moslem wives and to marry her; to pass half the year in Damascus (which to him was like London or Paris would be to us) for her pleasure, and half in the desert to lead his natural life.

  … She was married in spite of all opposition made by her friends and the British Consulate … according to Mohammedan law, changed her name to the Honourable Mrs Digby el Mezrab and was horrified when she found she had lost her nationality by her marriage and had become a Turkish subject … In Damascus … we Europeans all flocked around her with affection and friendship. The natives the same. She only received those who brought a letter of introduction … but this did not stop every ill conditioned passer by from boasting of his intimacy with the House of Mezrab … to sell his book or newspaper at a better profit.

  She understood friendship in its best and fullest sense and … it was a treat to pass the hours with her. She spoke French, Italian, German, Slav, Spanish, Arabic, Turkish and Greek as she spoke her native tongue … Her heart was noble, she was charitable to the poor … she fulfilled all the duties of a good Christian lady and an Englishwoman … She had but one fault (and who knows if it was hers?) washed out by fifteen years of goodness and repentance. She is dead … let us shame those who seek to drag up the adventures of her wild youth to tarnish so good a memory …

  Isabel Burton

  Jane received anxious letters from her family at roughly the same time that Isabel Burton’s letter was brought to her attention. She was annoyed for the sake of her brothers and their families but felt that the damage was limited, for surely, she reasoned, no one could be interested in such old history. But this letter by Isabel Burton was a different matter. She wr
ote immediately to Isabel denying the reports of her death, and requesting an explanation of the claim that Isabel had been asked to write an official biography. And when she received an answer she wrote to Edward’s wife to explain:

  Damascus

  May 21st 73

  My dearest Theresa

  … You may conceive that I have been intensely annoyed … the announcement of my death was nothing. I am not superstitious and no newspaper will kill me a minute before the appointed time, but the raking up of so much that is painful to all connected with me, so uninteresting to the present generation … A general outcry against the author (whoever he was) has been raised. Mr Green, the Consul, receiving many letters from people of rank not personally known to him expressing … indignation. I myself have received kind letters from Lady Ely, Lord Howard de Walden and others.

  Today I received one from Mrs Burton from Trieste, explaining the reasons for her ‘Defence; the keeping people at bay by telling them that she possessed the real biography, and to prevent any more being said upon the subject’… I certainly always deprecated every idea of publishing anything relating to myself or my former existence, as you can easily believe, and I never spoke to her at all on the subject except to answer some of her general queries as to what the world of that day knew, positively denying some other histories that people have forged. And as to begging her to remember her promise after my death of justifying me, it is pure error; she knew the horror and aversion I have to this kind of thing.

  Isabel Burton suffered the embarrassment of a public denial of her claim in the Pall Mall Gazette by William Wright, formerly one of Richard Burton’s greatest supporters. The Reverend Wright stated that he had received a letter from Jane in her own handwriting, categorically denying that she provided Mrs Burton with information for a biography or extracted any promise in this respect.3

  All summer Jane was alone while Medjuel spent months in Homs negotiating with the new Wali. To her relief, however, compensation was agreed. She spent a great deal of time answering correspondence, since the newspaper stories provoked letters from many old acquaintances. Having been embarrassed, Isabel maintained silence until after Jane’s death, and then – contrary to what she had written to Jane, that her claim had been an attempt to stop others writing lies – she insisted afresh that Jane had given her the story and had made her promise to write her biography.

  With his affairs now reaching some semblance of good order Medjuel decided to sell one of his two houses at Horns. Once he had accomplished that, he began to spend far more time at Damascus with Jane. The pace of life began to slow and, now nearing seventy, Jane did not mind. She still loved to accompany Medjuel to the desert for three or four weeks in the spring and autumn, but remained wary of seeing Ouadjid. Despite this she felt sympathy for the girl when her brother died. ‘Poor Ouadjid, her troubles are certainly great,’ she wrote, imagining how she would feel had she received news of Kenelm’s or Edward’s death.4

  In Damascus, Jane still rode around the city and worked in her garden. She was deeply attached to her little white lap-dog, Petit, and her two cats, the Persian Pitsch-Witsch and the grey Misky. Servants were constantly being reprimanded or dismissed, for laziness, dishonesty, lying or sexual indiscretion, and it is difficult to keep up with the recurring changes in her household that are detailed in her diary. Some retainers who had been with her from the start were becoming too old to work, and these were pensioned off. She frequently lamented having to train a new housekeeper, but no one would ever take the place of Eugénie.

  There were family losses in the years that followed. Among the first was her sister-in-law Theresa, who had taken over from Steely in filling Jane’s commissions, though the shopping lists had grown smaller over the years. Kenelm’s delicate daughter Lucy died, but she had been so ill for years, Emmie wrote, that the poor girl was almost pleased to die.

  Wednesday July 15th, 1874. I received a sad letter from Heribert with (to me) most melancholy intelligence of the Baron’s sudden death on horseback in the Hofgarten at Munich … on Wednesday 10th June at half past eight in the morning … The place where we first met and where we so often rode together in long bygone days! How quickly life passes.

  The baron had remained faithful to the last, writing regularly right up to his death, always keeping Jane up to date with the progress of their children. Bertha had deteriorated over the years and from the age of twenty-five was completely insane, spending the remainder of her life in an asylum with her own suite of rooms and personal servants. Yet of Heribert and his three children Charles was immensely proud. Though Jane’s defection ruined his life, the baron remained loyal, courteous and affectionate. He never remarried and many times told Jane that were she in trouble he would come to her or she could come to him. It was difficult for Jane to imagine him as an old man; she had not seen him for over thirty years and the lasting image was, she wrote, of the handsome, sandy-haired cavalier who had wooed her with such serious ardour that she had finally married him despite herself.5

  But there were happy memories too. In May 1874 Richard Wood, the British consul who had tried so hard to persuade Jane not to travel to Palmyra and not to marry Medjuel, came to visit her. They were both amused when they looked back twenty years. There was a new consul now, a Mr T. S. Jago, who admired Jane and respected her husband. In May 1876 she was delighted to receive a visit from an old friend. She had first met him as a young officer in her father’s command; he had conveyed her by a Naval ship to Italy from Athens after Spiros’ departure from her life, and he had – at her request, when she visited London in 1856 – found a place on one of his ships for her nephew Henry.

  dear, kind old friend Admiral Drummond, now in command of our squadron in the Mediterranean! I gave him a horse to ride, but it was all the civility I could show him, having no cook … I enjoyed a long conversation and heard plenty of news, private and public. [He was] so serious, so sincere, so kindly … I hope the Turkish crisis past he may come here again. How refreshing to see again kind, good friends.6

  A few months later, there came an extraordinary visitor, perhaps fulfilling the prophecy by a fortune-teller in Paris forty years earlier that Jane would captivate three kings.

  Friday 17th. The Emperor of Brazil called on me at the early hour of six in the morning! … Of all the pleasantest royalties I have ever come across he is the pleasantest. We exchanged photographs at his request, but I rather regretted parting with the Cheikh’s by Karl Haag, and hope I may replace it.

  One visitor who would not be put off was a visiting diplomat, Sir Edwin Pears, who longed to see her and ‘determined’ to do so, having heard through Carl Haag of Jane and her unique marriage to Medjuel, who, the diplomat wrote, was ‘utterly devoted to her service’.

  The difficulty which I anticipated was in getting to see her. Happily I was well acquainted with [Mr Heald] the director of a bank who had to go twice a year from Beyrout to Damascus to pay her her private income of, I believe £3,000 a year. My friend … told me that she refused to see any European, and that she had even ceased going to the English Church Service … but he would do his best … [The] Bedouins were devoted to her, and she exercised remarkable influence over her husband and his men.7

  Jane’s banker Mr Heald, accompanied by his diplomat visitor, called on her, sending in his own name only. The two men were shown into the drawing-room but when Jane came in she was affronted to see an unannounced visitor. Mr Heald explained that it was his friend’s first visit to the city and that he could hardly leave him waiting in the street. With her permission, he suggested, Sir Edwin would wait at the other end of the room while they conducted their business. Sir Edwin was a watercolour artist and happily spent the time looking at Jane’s pictures. Later when Jane came to join him out of courtesy, he chatted to her, praising one of the pictures, saying that the artist had caught the atmosphere of the desert.

  She was interested in my criticism and recognising that I knew something of the subject in
formed me that the picture in question was painted by her. That broke the ice. We got into an interesting conversation, which ended by her stating that she would have tea on the table every day at 5 o’clock and would be very pleased to see me any day during the week I proposed to spend in Damascus. She then sent for her husband and introduced us. We became excellent friends and by this means I was able to get into various mosques and see other sights which I should not have seen but for his assistance.

  I found her a close observer, an excellent talker, with keen flashes of insight and wit, and what interested me most of all, with an experience of harem life of which she spoke frankly, of quite an exceptional character. The women of the harem, said she, had about them the delightfulness of children, their employments were simple but genuine. Their passionate love of flowers constantly appealed to her, but there was another side to their character. There was the childishness of children which became imbecility … sudden bursts of anger, swift reconciliation, passionate affection and even hate.

  The worst part of their character related to their sensuality. They had no pleasures corresponding to those in Europe, no music, no literature, no social intercourse with others. The result … was a gross sensuality which showed itself in the language even [superior] ladies would employ. Subjects were spoken of even in the presence of children, about which all Christian races agree to be silent.