Shooting Victoria (83 page)

277:   “He said he did it for the purpose of getting into prison”:
Times
21 May 1849, 5.

277:   He did, however, send word to A Division that Hamilton be placed on suicide watch:
Morning Chronicle
21 May 1849, 5.

278:   “… the routine of a Royal birthday received a vast and visible stimulus from the impulse of public sympathy”:
Times
21 May 1849, 5.

278:   … “the indignation, loyalty, and affection this act has called forth is very gratifying and touching”: Victoria
Letters
(first series) 2:220.

278:   The police searched the area exhaustively for a bullet:
Times
21 May 1849, 5.

278:   The Queen's equerry Wemyss … was unscathed:
Daily News
21 May 1849, 5.

278:   And a thorough search of Hamilton produced a small amount of gunpowder:
Times
21 May 1849, 5.

279:   “I hope that you will not have been alarmed by the account of the occurrence which took place on Saturday”: Victoria,
Letters
2:220.

279:   Hamilton's attempt was designated an “absurdity,” “an exasperating piece of folly”:
Era
20 May 1849, 12;
Times
21 May 1849, 4.

279:   “The man who commits such an act in this country should be flogged at the cart's tail”:
Era
20 May 1840,12.

279:   … the
Daily News …
acknowledged the wickedness of pointing a pistol at “a person every way so sacred, in domestic as in political life, as that of her Majesty”:
Daily News
21 May 1849, 4.

279:   … “it has been found that there is no reason to accuse the person who discharged the pistol of a treasonable attempt”: “Firing at the Queen.”

279:   “The accident, or the fact, of the man Hamilton's being an Irishman may be made the theme of animadversion”:
Daily News
21 May 1849, 4.

280:   The Irish newspapers were particularly adamant in asserting that Hamilton had no intention of killing the Queen:
Freeman's Journal
22 May 1849, 2.

280:   One attempted to claim that Hamilton might not be Irish at all:
Belfast News-Letter
25 May 1849, 2.

280:   The
Limerick Chronicle
investigated and found that though Hamilton claimed to be from Adare, he had no relatives there.
Limerick Chronicle
23 May 1849, rpt. in
Freeman's Journal
25 May 1849, 5.

280:   “Hamilton was a native of Cork, and no relative of any persons at or near Adare”: Limerick Chronicle, rpt. in Morning Chronicle 26 May 1849, 3.

280:   The
Cork Constitution
quickly responded that the secretaries of the Cork Orphan Asylum denied that anyone named William Hamilton had passed through there:
Cork Constitution
, rpt. in
Daily News 2
June 1849, 2.

280:   “The Corkonians are most anxious to disclaim having reared the fellow who fired at the Queen”:
Daily News 2
June 1849, 2.

280:   “… fortunately there are no recent event [sic] which could afford political colour or excitement to a crime of this kind”:
Daily News
21 May 1849, 4.

281:   … “this country enjoys a complete immunity from any of those dreadful conflicts to which the rest of Europe is subjected”:
Illustrated London News
26 May 1849, 342.

281:   “Man shot, tried to shoot dear Mamma, must be punished”: Victoria,
Letters
2:220.

281:   The Attorney General, John Jervis, examined witnesses for three hours:
Belfast News-Letter
25 May 1849, 1.

281:   All of the O'Keefes—Daniel, Bridget, and young Edward—testified, but Hamilton's mysterious young protectress in the milk line was nowhere to be seen:
Times
21 May 1849, 5.

282:   “It is, perhaps, to be regretted that the framers of the bill did not provide that transportation
and
flogging should be the punishment”:
Illustrated London News
26 May 1849, 335.

282:   Victoria and Albert formalized their plans for visiting Ireland, which they both had desired to do as early as summer 1843: James Murphy
77
.

283:   “Since Her Majesty came to the throne, there has been no period more politically propitious for her coming here than the present one”: Martin 2:192.

284:   … their visit would not be a state visit at all, but “one having more the character of a yachting excursion”: James Murphy 79.

284:   … similar indeed to an exhibition in Paris from which Cole had just returned: James 195.

284:   “I asked the Prince … if he had considered if the Exhibition should be a National or an International Exhibition”: Henry Cole 1:124–25.

286:   Hamilton quietly pled guilty:
Preston Chronicle
16 June 1849, 6.

286:   “The Queen might be perfectly assured of her personal safety”:
Morning Chronicle
15 June 1849, 7.

286:   Two years before, Colonial Secretary Henry Gray had completely reconsidered and revised the government's policy on transportation: Hughes 552–53.

287:   Hamilton was finally shipped aboard the convict ship
Ramillies
to Fre-mantle, Western Australia: Convict Transportation Register Database.

287:   … his landlord, Daniel O'Keefe, appeared before the judges at the Old Bailey:
Examiner
16 June 1849, 381.

287:   … “this idolatry of the martyrs of crime and saints of the Newgate Calendar”:
Punch
16:251 (1849).

287:   … surprising the town's inhabitants, who expected them to arrive the next day: Woodham-Smith,
Great Hunger
393.

287:   … the servants of one landowner lost control of their bonfire: Woodham-Smith,
Great Hunger
393.

288:   She landed in Cove the next day, and at the request of local officials, she ordered it renamed Queenstown: James Murphy 88.

288:   “the crowd is a noisy, excitable, but very good humored one, running and pushing about, and laughing, talking, and shrieking”: Victoria,
Leaves
161.

288:   … “balconies were filled as if by magic”:
Illustrated London News
11 August 1849, 88.

288:   “… thousands and thousands”: James Murphy 89.

289:   “Ah, Queen dear, make one of them Prince Patrick and Ireland will die for you”: Woodham-Smith
Great Hunger
397.

289:   “… no escort of dragoons followed”:
Illustrated London News
11 August 1849, 88.

289:   “Arrah! Victoria, will you stand up, and let us have a look at you?”:
Illustrated London News
11 August 1849, 89.

289:   … a “brawny wag” outside Trinity College, who with “enthusiastic attachment” shouted “Bravo, Albert!”:
Illustrated London News
11 August 1849, 87.

290:   “You see more ragged and wretched people here than I ever saw anywhere else”: Woodham-Smith,
Great Hunger
397.

290:   Her first procession through Dublin was “a never to be forgotten scene”: James Murphy 90.

290:   “Mighty Monarch, pardon Smith O'Brien”:
Illustrated London News
11 August 1849, 87.

290:   Members of Dublin secret societies—remnants of the clubs promoted by Young Ireland—came up with a desperate plot to kidnap Victoria: Woodham-Smith,
Great Hunger
387.

290:   … “even the ex-Clubbists, who threatened broken heads and windows before the Queen came, are now among the most loyal of her subjects”: Maxwell 1:302.

290:   The nationalist and Tory press, relentlessly hostile to the Queen during the early part of her visit, finally gave in: Loughlin 504.

291:   … “the more the citizens of Dublin see Queen Victoria, the more she wins their affections”: Woodham-Smith,
Great Hunger
399.

291:   … “swarming around their queen like bees”:
Illustrated London News
18 August 1849,126.

291:   … “ran along the deck with the sprightliness of a young girl”:
Times
13 August 1849, 5.

291:   “… the pealing of cannon and the loudest concert of human voices that ever ascended from a people in praise of any Monarch”:
Illustrated London News
18 August 1849, 126.

291:   John Bright, the radical MP from Birmingham, was there, and was overcome: James Murphy 96.

291:   “There is not an individual in Dublin that does not take as a personal compliment to himself the Queen's having gone upon the paddle-box and order the royal standard to be lowered”: Victoria
Letters
(first series) 2:226.

291:   The
Times
declared that the Queen had put an end to Irish faction and civil discord”:
Times
15 August 1849, 4.

291:   “… as long as Queen Victoria lives (may she live to see her greatgrandchildren!) there will be no disaffection—no disloyalty in Ireland.”
Illustrated London News
18 August 1849, 122.

Chapter 16: Cut and Thrust

293:   The cabmen and tradesmen on the fringe of the Westminster parks, as well as the policemen of A Division, all knew him by sight:
Times
12 July 1850, 7.

293:   … well-appointed apartments on the corner of Piccadilly and Duke Street St. James:
Times
28 June 1850, 8; 29 June 1850, 8.

293:   He always wore the same impeccable suit of clothing:
Times
29 June 1850, 8;
Morning Chronicle
12 July 1850, 5.

294:   The bright colors … marked him as a dandy; Prince Albert described him that way to Baron Stockmar: Martin 2:285.

294:   His gait seemed to defy gravity: “Robert Pate.”

294:   … “it was astonishing how he preserved his equilibrium”: “Robert Pate.”

294:   An inspector from A Division … nicknamed him “cut and thrust”:
Times
12 July 1850, 7.

294:   … abruptly stopping in his tracks, gazing about him, and then, as if suddenly aware he was being watched, running off as fast as he could:
Times
12 July 1850, 7.

294:   “I meet him often in the parks”:
Era 7
July 1850, 9.

294:   Husbands would caution their wives not to draw his attention, for fear of violent consequences: “Robert Pate.”

294:   Those few that acknowledged him earned from him an angry glare and a spasmodic shake of his stick: “Robert Pate.”

295:   When the clock in the tower of St. James's Palace chimed quarter past three, Pate stopped whatever he was doing:
Times
12 July 1850, 7.

295:   In the first pile were nine shillings, each queen's head up: “Robert Pate.”

295:   There, at exactly the same spot, Pate would descend from the cab, jump over a ditch, and disappear through thick gorse bushes: “Robert Pate.”

295:   He would shout conflicting commands to the driver:
Times
12 July 1850, 7.

295:   The cabman, mystified by his daily customer, would spy on Pate through the trap at his feet, and would see him either wholly catatonic or in frantic motion: “Robert Pate.”

295:   “I did not know what performance it was”: “Robert Pate.”

295:   At Barnes Common, Pate would again leap out and shun every path, plunging instead into the deepest undergrowth:
Times
12 July 1850, 7.

296:   The sixpence and penny were for tolls at the bridges:
Times
12 July 1850, 7; “Robert Pate.” The cabman and Pate's manservant differ as to the exact amount.

296:   “Mr. Pate did not want me”: “Robert Pate.”

296:   Robert Francis Pate Senior[,] made his fortune as a corn factor, or grain dealer, in Wisbech, Cambridgeshire:
Times
28 June 1850, 8.

296:   He accepted nomination eagerly, provided the invitation was “the unanimous desire of the University”: James 173.

297:   Peel persuaded him to stay in: James 173–4.

297:   Cambridge welcomed the two deliriously:
Times
6 July 1847, 5.

297:   Victoria … fought breaking into a smile of mingled joy and embarrassment at the “almost absurd” position she found herself in when Albert … welcomed her: Bolitho 182; Bunsen 2:136; Martin 1:396.

297:   She replied, assuring the university “of my entire
approbation
” of Cambridge's choice of Chancellor, laying particular emphasis on that last word:
Times
6 July 1847, 5; Jerrold,
Married Life
299.

297:   Albert turned out to be the one of the best Chancellors Cambridge ever had, guiding the university's curriculum into the modern age: Gill 244.

297:   And Robert Francis Pate Senior … was on that day introduced to both Prince and Queen: Walford 228.

297:   … sending him to be trained as a gentleman at a school in Norwich:
Times
29 June 1850, 8.

297:   Pate set his son up in the Queen's service as a cornet in the prestigious 10th Hussars:
Times
28 June 1850, 8; 12 July 1850, 7.

298:   He was odd from the start, but was at first tolerated and even liked by his fellows:
Times
12 July 1850, 7.

298:   … Pate threatened to “make a hole in the river”:
Times
12 July 1850, 7.

298:   He avoided mess with his fellows and instead took long and solitary walks:
Times
12 July 1850, 7.

298:   … the cook and the messman, he convinced himself, were trying to poison him:
Times 12
July 1850, 7; “Robert Pate.”

298:   Pate fled instead London with little more than the clothes he wore:
Times
12 July 1850, 5;
Morning Chronicle
12 July 1850, 5.

298:   To his astonished father, he explained that he was a hunted man:
Times 12
July 1850, 5.