Charles Philip Yorke, Fourth Earl of Hardwicke, Vice Admiral R.N. by Lady Biddulph of Ledbury

L >> Lady Biddulph of Ledbury >> Charles Philip Yorke, Fourth Earl of Hardwicke, Vice Admiral R.N.

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I need not pursue the subject of this distressing difference between the
brothers, which no doubt assumed an altogether exaggerated importance in
the sensitive and affectionate, but self-centred, mind of poor Charles
Yorke, shaken as he was by the strain and struggle of these days, but
which was probably the immediate cause of his fatal illness.

'We returned home' (from St. James's Square), writes Mrs. Yorke, 'and
Mr. Woodcock followed in the chariot with the Great Seal. The King had
given it in his closet, and at the same time Mr. Yorke kissed his
Majesty's hand on being made Baron of Morden in the county of Cambridge.
Not once did Mr. Yorke close his eyes, though at my entreaty he took
composing medicines.... Before morning he was determined to return the
Great Seal, for he said if he kept it he could not live. I know not what
I said, for I was terrified almost to death. At six o'clock I found him
so ill that I sent for Dr. Watson, who ought immediately to have bled
him, instead of which he contented himself with talking to him. He
ordered him some medicine and was to see him again in the evening. In
the meantime Mr. Yorke was obliged to rise to receive the different
people who would crowd to him on this occasion, but before he left me,
he assured me that when the Duke of Grafton came to him at night, he
would resign the seals. When his company had left him, he came up to me,
and even then, death was upon his face. He said he had settled all his
affairs, that he should retire absolutely from business, and would go to
Highgate the next day, and that he was resolved to meddle no more with
public affairs. I was myself so ill with fatigue and anxiety that I was
not able to dine with him, but Dr. Plumptre did; when I went to them
after dinner I found Mr. Yorke in a state of fixed melancholy. He
neither spoke to me nor to Dr. Plumptre; I tried every method to wake
and amuse him, but in vain. I could support it no longer, I fell upon my
knees before him and begged of him not to affect himself so much--that
he would resume his fortitude and trust to his own judgment--in short, I
said a great deal which I remember now no more; my sensations were
little short of distraction at that time. In an hour or two after he
grew much worse, and Dr. Watson coming in persuaded him to go to bed,
and giving him a strong opiate, he fell asleep.

But his rest was no refreshment; about the middle of the night he awaked
in a delirium, when I again sent for Dr. Watson; towards the morning he
was more composed, and at noon got up. In about an hour after he was up,
he was seized with a vomiting of blood. I was not with him at the
instant, but was soon called to him. He was almost speechless, but on my
taking his hand in an agony of silent grief he looked tenderly on me,
and said, "How can I repay your kindness, my dear love; God will reward
you, I cannot; be comforted." These were the last words I heard him
speak, for my nerves were too weak to support such affliction. I was
therefore prevented from being in his room, and indeed I was incapable
of giving him assistance. He lived till the next day, when at five
o'clock in the afternoon, he changed this life for a better.'

Lord Hardwicke meanwhile had decided to follow the very friendly and
right opinion of Dr. Jeffreys, 'that he would do his best to support the
part which his brother had taken,' and came to town with that resolution
on 'Friday in the forenoon' but he found that Charles Yorke had been
taken very ill that morning.

'When I saw him on the evening of the 19th he was in bed and too much
disordered to be talked with. There was a glimmering of hope on the 20th
in the morning, but he died that day about five in the evening. The
patent of peerage had passed all the forms except the Great Seal, and
when my poor brother was asked if the seal should be put to it, he
waived it, and said "he hoped it was no longer in his custody." I can
solemnly declare that except what passed at my house on the Wednesday
forenoon, I had not the least difference with him throughout the whole
transaction, not a sharp or even a warm expression passed, but we
reasoned over the subject like friends and brothers.... In short, the
usage he met with in 1766 when faith was broke with him, had greatly
impaired his judgment, dejected his spirits, and made him act below his
superior knowledge and abilities. He would seldom explain himself, or
let his opinion be known in time to those who were ready to have acted
with him in the utmost confidence. After the menacing language used in
the closet to compel Mr. Yorke's acceptance and the loss which the King
sustained by his death at that critical juncture, the most unprejudiced
and dispassionate were surprised at the little, or rather no notice
which was taken of his family; the not making an offer to complete the
peerage was neither to be palliated nor justified in their opinion. It
was due to the _Manes_ of the departed from every motive of
humanity and decorum. Lord Hillsborough told a friend of mine, indeed,
that the King had soon after his death spoke of him with tears in his
eyes and enquired after the family, but it would surely not have
misbecome his Majesty conscious of the whole of his behaviour to an
able, faithful, and despairing subject, to have expressed that concern
in a more particular manner, and to those who were so deeply affected by
the melancholy event.

'A worthier and better man there never was, no more learned and
accomplished in his own profession, as well as out of it. What he wanted
was the calm, firm judgment of his father, and he had the misfortune to
live in times which required a double portion of it. Every precaution
was taken by me to prepare him for the offer, and to persuade him to
form some previous plan of conduct, but all in vain. He would never
explain himself clearly, and left everything to chance, till we were all
overborne, perplexed and confounded in that fatal interval which opened
and closed the negotiation with my brother. With him the Somers line of
the law seems to be at an end, I mean of that set in the profession who,
mixing principles of liberty with those proper to monarchy, have
conducted and guided that great body of men ever since the Revolution.'

Fever, complicated by colic and the rupture of a blood-vessel, caused
Charles Yorke's death, the consequence of the extreme nervous tension
which he had undergone, of which his widow has left a most touching and
graphic description. I wish I could have found room for the whole of her
account of those days. The circumstances of his physical constitution
and the mental struggle he had suffered are quite sufficient to account
for his death without the gratuitous assumption of suicide, which there
is nothing in the family papers to support. There is no doubt that this
idea was prevalent at the time, and allusions to it are to be found in
many subsequent accounts, down to that in Sir George Trevelyan's 'Life
of Fox.' Perhaps it is not too much to hope that this allegation may be
at last disposed of in the light of the papers by his brother and his
wife. We have two clear and positive declarations in these papers:
first, that in the beginning of his illness he declined his physic, and
afterwards took an opiate; second, that there followed the rupture of a
blood-vessel. When Lord Hardwicke saw him for the last time on the 19th
he was 'extremely ill'; 'there was a glimmering of hope on the 20th in
the morning, but he died that day about five in the evening.'

This is the summary of the evidence, which to my mind is conclusive.
Unless one assumes a conspiracy of silence between Lord Hardwicke and
Mrs. Yorke, I do not see that I can reasonably admit any other
hypothesis. I therefore claim that phrase of his brother's as a solution
of the supposed mystery of Charles Yorke's death.

If hereafter the vague rumours which have so long been current should be
supported by any real evidence, my judgment will be disputed, but I am
glad to have this opportunity of asserting my own firm conviction that
the version of the unhappy affair given in the family papers is correct,
and that Charles Yorke's death was due to natural causes.

Charles Yorke was twice married. His first wife was a daughter of
Williams Freeman, Esq., of Aspeden, Hertfordshire, by whom he had a son
Philip. This son succeeded his uncle as third Earl of Hardwicke, he
inherited the Tittenhanger and other estates (which passed away to his
daughters on his death in 1834) from his mother, and he is still
remembered for his wise and liberal administration as the first Lord-
Lieutenant of Ireland after the Union (from 1801 to 1806), the
irritation and unrest caused by which measure he did much to allay.
[Footnote: A recent publication, _The Viceroy's Post Bag_, by Mr.
MacDonagh, gives some curious details of his correspondence from the
Hardwicke Papers at the British Museum.] As a Whig he had always been in
favour of Catholic Emancipation in Ireland, and though he agreed to
postpone it on joining Addington's Administration, he adhered to the
cause till its triumph in 1829; and he gave a qualified support to the
Parliamentary Reform Bill in 1831. He was created a Knight of the Garter
in 1803, [Footnote: Lord Hardwicke married in 1782 Elizabeth, daughter
of James, fifth Earl of Balcarres, the sister of Lady Anne Barnard, the
authoress of _Auld Robin Gray_.] and had the misfortune to lose the
only son who survived infancy in a storm at sea off Lubeck in 1808 at
the age of twenty-four. The succession to the peerage was thus opened up
to his half-brothers, the sons of Charles Yorke's second wife, Agneta,
daughter of Henry Johnston of Great Berkhampsted: Charles Philip (1764-
1834) who left no heir, and Joseph Sydney (1768-1831), father of the
subject of this memoir. I have already alluded to the public career of
their half-brother, the third Lord Hardwicke; and it is interesting to
see how the tradition of political and public work was maintained by the
two younger brothers, who both, and especially the younger of the two,
added fresh laurels to the distinguished record held by so many of the
descendants of the great Chancellor. The Right Honourable Charles Yorke
represented the county of Cambridge in Parliament from 1790 to 1810, and
joined Addington's Government at the same time as Lord Hardwicke, first
as Secretary at War in 1801, and then as Secretary of State for the Home
Department, till the return to office of William Pitt (to whom he was
politically opposed) in 1804. In 1810 he became first Lord of the
Admiralty under Spencer Perceval, with his younger brother Joseph as one
of the Sea Lords, and retained office till Perceval's assassination
broke up the ministry; and when in 1812 Lord Liverpool became Prime
Minister he left the Admiralty and never afterwards returned to office,
retiring from public life in 1818. The splendid breakwater at Plymouth
was decided on and commenced while he was at the Admiralty, and a slab
of its marble marks his tomb in Wimpole Church.

With Joseph Sydney Yorke, afterwards Admiral and a K.C.B., opens a
chapter of family history with which this volume will be mainly
concerned; and the navy rather than the law or politics henceforth
becomes the chief interest of the story in its public aspect. Sir
Joseph, indeed, may be looked upon as a sort of second founder of the
family. Although Wimpole in Cambridgeshire, which the Chancellor
purchased from the Harleys, Earls of Oxford, was for many generations
the principal seat of the family, Sydney Lodge, on Southampton Water,
[Footnote: Attached to Sydney Lodge on the shore of Southampton Water is
a white battery containing guns taken from a French frigate and bearing
an inscription, written by my father, commemorating his last parting
with my grandfather, Sir Joseph. The battery encloses a well, known as
'Agneta's Well,' which has refreshed many a thirsty fisherman. The
inscription is as follows:--

IN MEMORIAM

THESE GUNS WERE THE FORECASTLE ARMAMENT OF THE DUTCH FRIGATE 'ALLIANCE'

OF 36 GUNS

CAPTURED ON THE COAST OF NORWAY IN 1795

AFTER A CLOSE ACTION WITH H.M.S. 'STAG' OF 32 GUNS

COMMANDED BY CAPTAIN YORKE

OF SYDNEY LODGE

THE FATHER OF THE FOURTH EARL OF HARDWICKE WHO ON THIS SPOT IN 1829

PARTED FROM HIS BELOVED PARENT FOR THE LAST TIME

AND SAILED IN COMMAND OF H.M.S. 'ALLIGATOR'

FOR THE MEDITERRANEAN.

HE PLACES THIS STONE TO HIS FATHER'S MEMORY

September 4th, 1871] the charming house which Sir Joseph built out of
prize-money earned during the French wars, has all the associations of a
home for our branch of the family, and the love of the sea is an
inheritance which we all derive from him. His professional ability is
shown by the position he won in the service. Entering the navy in 1780
when he was fourteen, he had plenty of opportunity of active service in
those stirring times. After serving on board one or two other vessels,
Joseph Yorke joined the _Duke_ commanded by Sir Charles Douglas,
whom he followed to the _Formidable_. That vessel was one of
Rodney's fleet in the West Indies, and the boy fought in her at the
famous action of April 12, 1782 in which that admiral completely
defeated the French under De Grasse. He remained in the
_Formidable_ until she paid off in 1783, and spent the years 1784-
1789 on the Halifax station. In the latter year he was promoted
Lieutenant in the _Thisbe_ under Captain Sir Samuel Hood and
returned in her to England. Promotion followed rapidly. Yorke became a
Commander in 1790 and Captain in 1793, in which capacity he served
continuously on the home station, taking part in the blockade of Brest,
until the Peace of Amiens.

During this time he had the good fortune to capture several large
privateers from the enemy; he also took the _Espiegle_, a French
corvette, close to Brest harbour and in sight of a very superior French
squadron. In 1794 Captain Yorke was given command of the _Stag_,
32, and cruised in the Channel later off the coast of Ireland, and later
still, with the North Sea Fleet under Lord Duncan.

'On the 22nd of August 1795, Captain Yorke being in company with a light
squadron under the orders of Captain James Alms, gave chase to two large
ships and a cutter. At 4.15 P.M. the _Stag_ brought the sternmost
ship to close action, which continued with much spirit for about half an
hour, when the enemy struck, and proved to be the _Alliance_,
Batavian frigate of 36 guns and 240 men. Her consorts the _Argo_
36, and _Nelly_ cutter, 16, effected their escape after sustaining
a running fight with the other ships of the British squadron. In this
spirited action, the _Stag_ had 4 men slain and 13 wounded, and the
enemy between 40 and 50 killed and wounded.'

He was at the Nore during the dangerous mutiny of 1798, and he left
among his papers a very stirring address made to his crew on the day
that the mutineers were hung at the yard-arm. When the war broke out
again in 1803 he was again employed in the Channel, and after commanding
the _Barfleur_ and the _Christian VII_ he was appointed a
junior Sea Lord in May 1810, when his brother was First Lord. In this
year he was knighted when acting as proxy for Lord Hardwicke at his
installation as a Knight of the Garter; on July 31 he was promoted to
the rank of Rear-Admiral; and in the following January, with his flag in
the _Vengeur_, he was sent out with reinforcements for Wellington
to Lisbon. These were landed on March 4, 1811, and on the news being
received, Massena broke up his camp in front of the lines of Torres
Vedras and began his retreat. This was Sir Joseph's last service afloat.
In 1814, while still a member of the Board, he was appointed First Sea
Lord under Lord Melville as First Lord, and held that high post till
1818, a period of office which covered Lord Exmouth's expedition against
Algiers in 1816. He became Vice-Admiral and Knight Commander of the Bath
on January 2, 1815, when he also received the freedom of the borough of
Plymouth, and he was made a full Admiral on July 22, 1830. He had been
member for Reigate since 1790, with an interval as member for Sandwich,
from 1812 to 1818.

Sir Joseph married in 1798 Elizabeth Weake Rattray and had a family of
four sons and one daughter, afterwards Lady Agneta Bevan. Lady Yorke
died in 1812, and in 1815 he married Urania, Dowager Marchioness of
Clanricarde and daughter of the twelfth Lord Winchester, who survived
him. During his later years he lived mostly at Sydney Lodge, occupied
with family interests, and in the administration of various charities,
naval and other. My grandfather was a fine type of English sailor, very
handsome in his youth, as Romney's portraits show, affectionate and
high-spirited; altogether one of the most attractive figures in our
family history. Some following chapters will show him in his relations
with his son, and mention the peculiar circumstances attending his
accidental death by drowning.

CHAPTER II

ALGIERS. 1815-1816

Charles Philip Yorke was born on April 2, 1799, at Sydney Lodge, Hamble,
and like his father, was destined from the first for a naval career. He
must have been quite a small boy when Sir Joseph presented him to Lord
Nelson, and the family tradition is that the hero accosted him with a
kind smile and said, 'Give me a shake of your daddle, my boy, for I've
only one to shake _you_ with.'

The boy was sent to Harrow, and after a few years at that school was
entered, in his fourteenth year, at the Royal Naval College at
Portsmouth, where he formed a friendship with John Christian Schetky,
then drawing master at the college, and later Marine Painter to Queen
Victoria, and a man of note in his profession. What little is known of
young Yorke's career at Portsmouth points to diligence and capacity, for
he gained the gold medal in his second year after little more than
eighteen months at the college, a distinction which ensured his
immediate entry into the service. On May 15, 1815, he was appointed
midshipman on board the _Prince Regent_, 98 guns, the flagship at
Spithead, and a training which stood him in good stead in after life was
begun under the commander of this vessel, Captain Fowke. A month later
he was transferred to the _Sparrowhawk_, a brig of 18 guns
commanded by Captain Baines, then under sailing orders for the
Mediterranean.

There was no coddling in the navy in those days, and those who survived
its rigorous life were probably the fittest. I have heard my father say
that at this period the middies' soup was served in the tin boxes which
held their cocked hats, and that one of their amusements was provided by
races round the mess table of the weevils knocked out of the biscuit
which was a part of their daily fare. Young Yorke, however, accepted
this life and its hardships with all cheerfulness; and the spirit with
which he entered the service and the interest he took in his profession
from the first are, I think, abundantly clear from a letter he wrote
home to his father on July 15, 1815 from the Mediterranean, off
Celebrina, after he had been a little more than a month at sea.

* * * * *

'I am afraid you will be surprised at my not writing to you oftener but
I have had no opportunity of sending letters home, as we have spoken no
ships bound for England. I am happy to say that I am in perfect health
and have been so ever since I left you, and the hot country does not at
all oppress me, or make me uncomfortable, as I expected it would at
first, and I have not had a moment's sickness since I have been out. I
can only say that I am in every way so comfortable on the
_Sparrowhawk_ that I have no desire to quit her at all. Perhaps you
may think I am comfortable in her through idleness and not having much
duty put upon me; but I am one of the three Mids in the ship and the
duty is heavy, there being only one Mid in each watch, and he has the
duty of Mate of the watch, there being none; but I like my messmates,
and we have a capital berth. Captain Baines is also a kind friend to me
in every way; whatever may be said of him is nothing to me, his advice
and friendship to me is good and kind; he keeps me in practice with my
navigation, for I work all the observations for the ship and take them
also. It is, as you may perceive by my writing, my wish to remain in
her, but to the will of my Father I submit; and I am also certain that
seamanship and my profession I shall learn by being six months in a
brig. When we get to Genoa I shall see Lord Exmouth, but I will not give
your letter until I hear from you again, but I shall tell him I have
written to you concerning the _Sparrowhawk_, and beg to remain in
her till I hear from you.

'I shall now give you some short description of our voyage. We sailed
from England on the Tuesday after I left you and tided it down channel,
at Yarmouth we went ashore with the Captain and Officers to play cricket
and had an excellent match, _Sparrowhawks_ against Rosarios. In
general we have had calms and fine weather, now and then a few puffs.
Cape St. Vincent was the first land we made, that was on the 9th July,
we anchored off the rock of Gibraltar on the 12th. Captain B. took me
ashore with him to see the place, it is a most extraordinary thing. It
is dreadfully hot, the reflection of the sun being so great; from thence
we sailed the following day and are now off Celebrina in a dead calm. I
think I shall see much of the Mediterranean in this ship, for she will
be always kept cruising and likely to stay out some time. Yesterday we
cleared for action for a large brig that was bearing down upon us, but
to our great disappointment, it proved to be an English brig from Santa
Maria to London with fruit. There is on board the _Sparrowhawk_ a
carpenter by the name of Beach who sailed with you on the _Stag_,
and he wishes to be shifted into a larger ship; if you could at any time
have a thing of that sort in your power, you will be doing him the
greatest kindness. He did not apply to you, because when he was with you
he refused a warrant, not thinking himself fit to hold that situation.
If you could do this, let me know, for I should like to see him get a
larger ship, for he is a most excellent man.

'17th.--Here we are still in the same place off Celebrina detained by
calms and light breezes, just now a breeze has sprung up which is likely
to last. Last night we all went overboard and had a delightful bath.

'29th.--We have just arrived at Genoa after a tedious and unpleasant
voyage, the last six days squalls and heavy gales of wind and lightning.
Genoa is a most beautiful city, and situated most delightfully. Last
night I was at the Opera, and it is exactly the same as our own in
England, it is much larger and a most magnificent theatre. The houses
are mostly of marble and beautifully ornamented, they are immensely high
but the streets very narrow. There are no ships here and we sail for
Marseilles as soon as we have watered. Pray give my best love to Lady C.
and all hands on board.'

* * * * *

It is of interest to note the mention in this letter of Charles Yorke's
first visit to Genoa, and the impression that beautiful city, 'Genova la
superba,' made upon his youthful imagination. As will appear further on
in this memoir, he visited it again some thirty-five years later in very
different circumstances, and that Genoa exists to-day, with much of its
beauty unimpaired, is mainly owing to the part played by Charles Yorke
when, as Lord Hardwicke, he again appeared in a British man-of-war off
that port.

The boy's wish to stay on the _Sparrowhawk_ expressed in this
letter to his father was not fulfilled, for a month after his arrival in
the Mediterranean he was transferred to the _Leviathan_, of 74
guns, commanded successively by Captains F. W. Burgoyne and Thomas
Briggs. In her he remained a little less than a year, during which he
had a serious attack of scarlet fever followed by rheumatism, which left
him very weak, and raised a question as to whether he should be
invalided home. He was, however, exceedingly popular with his superiors,
who were most kind and attentive to him through his illness, and he was
lucky enough to recover without having to return to England. In August
of 1816 he was again transferred, to the _Queen Charlotte_, Captain
Brisbane, a ship of the line of 120 guns, and the flagship of Admiral
Lord Exmouth, commanding in the Mediterranean.

The young midshipman was most fortunate in being stationed under that
command, for it was the one place in the world at that moment where
there was any probability of seeing active service. The supremacy of the
British navy which had been established over the fleets of France and
Spain at Trafalgar, and the recent peace which had followed the defeat
and surrender of Buonaparte, had removed any possibility of collision
with a European State. But, as a matter of fact, the naval Powers,
England in particular, had long been waiting an opportunity to settle a
long-standing account in the Mediterranean with a set of potentates
established on the north coast of Africa, who had for years availed
themselves of the dissensions between the Great Powers to carry on a
system of piracy and rapine of the most insolent and atrocious
character. During the naval wars which had lasted with short intervals
for half a century, the fleets of England, France, Spain, and Holland
had been so much occupied in fighting each other that they had been
unable to bestow much attention on the doings of these petty rulers, who
were known collectively as the Barbary States, individually as the Deys
of Algiers, Tunis, and Tripoli. All of these owned nominal allegiance to
the Sultan of Turkey at Constantinople when it suited them, but in
reality claimed and exercised complete independence when such was
convenient to any purpose they had in hand.

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