The Dukes (20 page)

All this over-indulgence and flattery in childhood bore ill fruit as
the young Duke of Monmouth grew up. In 1666, when he was
seventeen, Pepys wrote that he was vicious and idle and would never
be fit for anything. As his personality developed, he was seen to be a
weak character, feeble in moral principle, easily swayed, of little
intelligence, dilatory, volatile, a procrastinator. With his inability to
make a decision and adhere to it, he was to be an easy tool in the
hands of unscrupulous politicians. His chief recommendation con­tinued to be grace and personal beauty. But being the acknowledged
favourite son of the King (who by this time had other progeny by
successive mistresses) he thought he could commit any act with
impunity. He cannot escape responsibility for the sorry tale of Sir
John Coventry, who was disfigured for life on Monmouth's orders.
Sir John had made a slighting reference in the House of Commons
to the King's consorting with actresses. Monmouth's response was
vengeful in the extreme; he set a gang of thugs upon Sir John, who
attacked him in the street, pinning him against the wall, and cut off
his nose to the bone. Even allowing for nose-slitting as a fairly
common method of revenge in those brutal times, this was not the
action of a man of responsibility. He was only twenty-one at the time,
and his reputation suffered.

The remainder of Monmouth's life belongs to the history of Eng­land, and there is no room here to rehearse all the vicissitudes of that
sad story. Briefly, the impressionable and malleable Monmouth fell
victim to the Machiavellian plans of Lord Shaftesbury and his
faction, who sought to establish the bastard on the throne and rule
England through him. Charles was bitterly disappointed in him,
loving him as he did above all his other children, and the history of
their relationship shows the conflict between political wisdom and
filial love which beset the astute King. Time and again, Monmouth
was banished and disgraced, then favoured with the King's goodwill
when he showed remorse or contrition. Charles knew what a weak
man his son had become and was always ready to forgive his short­comings. But his patience was tried too often. Involved in the plot to
assassinate his father, the "Rye House Plot", Monmouth confessed,
was forgiven, and the following day retracted his confession and asked
for his letter back. The King told him to go to hell. Monmouth said
he was afraid that his confession would implicate others, but his
changes of mind were always prompted by simple indecision rather
than nobleness of motive.

Monmouth could be seriously entertained as a possible King of
England only as long as rumours supporting his legitimacy persisted.
It was such a romantic notion, and Monmouth such a handsome,
dashing man, that the people
wanted
to believe that Charles II had
married Lucy Walter. So strong was the belief that the King had
twice to swear solemnly before the Privy Council that he had never
married any woman but the Queen. Still the rumours were rife, and
just as they encouraged Monmouth to believe that he was the right­ful heir, so his supporters increased, and the rumours multiplied pro­portionately. They gave rise to Monmouth's disloyalty, and were in
turn fostered by it. There was even a story that the marriage contract
or proof of its existence, lay in a black box in the safe keeping of
the Bishop of Durham, who passed it on to his son-in-law Sir
Gilbert Gerard. But Gerard, summoned before the Privy Council,
denied all knowledge of it, and to this day no proof has been pro­duced that the black box or its contents ever existed.
¹⁰
Nevertheless,
the legend will not die; subsequent events have given it a more
intriguing weight. In the first place, the relevant page in the marriage
register at the Church where the King is supposed to have married
Lucy Walter was found, years later, to have been torn out. Secondly,
there is a story that when the 5th Duke of Buccleuch, a direct des­cendant of Monmouth, was looking through old papers at Dalkeith
House in the time of Queen Victoria, he came across the black box
and the marriage certificate. He summoned his son and heir to his
presence, and said, "I am now going to do something which should
have been done a long time ago. The publication of this document
in my right hand might have severe repercussions. It is something no
loyal subject should possess." He then threw it into the fire.
¹¹

Charles II, whatever his faults, was a man of principle and truth.
He was deeply loyal to the institution of monarchy, and would
envisage nothing which might weaken it or place the lawful right of
succession into disrepute. The heir to the throne was the Duke of
York, his brother (later James II), who was politically and personally
unpopular. He was, however, the heir and Charles would not com­promise with his right to inherit the throne. Steadfastly, he refused
to consider for a moment the legitimising of his son the Duke of
Monmouth, to whom, in spite of everything, he remained devoted
as only a loving father can be. When the King died, Monmouth was
abroad, hatching plots. They both had cause to regret the gulf that
had been erected between them by the easy ambitions of a spoilt child.

With the accession of James II, Monmouth and his followers (the
compliant Duke doing most of the following) prepared to invade. On
20th June 1685 he was proclaimed King of England at Taunton,
with the designation "King Monmouth" to avoid confusion with the
James already on the throne, who was at the same time declared a
traitor, and his parliament at Westminster a traitorous convention.
Meanwhile, there was naturally a price on Monmouth's head, and
he had been stripped of all his English dignities and titles. His
rebellion was as feeble and irresolute as his character. His troops were
routed at a battle on 5th July, and he himself fled. Disguised as a
farmer, with two of his henchmen, he wandered the countryside for
three days until he was discovered by a search party, hiding in a
ditch. The "cowardly and self-seeking traitor"
¹²
was taken directly to
the Tower.

With characteristic remorse, the Duke declared that it was never
his idea to be proclaimed King. He signed a document which was
meant to settle once and for all the question of his birth, but he may
have been coerced, and we know that he was an easy prey to
persuasion. He wrote:

"I declare yt ye Title of King was forct upon mee, & yt it was very
much contrary to my opinion when I was proclaimed. For ye Satis­faction of the world, I doe declare that ye late King told me that
hee was never married to my Mother."

No doubt with this act of contrition Monmouth saved his sons
from the vengeance of the King and thus protected the line of the
Dukes of Buccleuch from extinction. But the wording of the
declaration is curious; he does not disavow his own belief in his
legitimacy, by pointing out that his father had assured him of the
contrary. To a certain extent, the question was left open.
¹³

Hours after signing this document, Monmouth was dead. His end
was harrowing. Pressed by the bishops to repent publicly of his
rebellion, he would not employ the word, implying tacitly that it
could not legally be considered "rebellion", but stated that he was
sorry to have invaded the kingdom, and sorry to have caused blood­shed. In spite of their pestering, he would give no more. "I will make
no speeches," he said, "I come to die ... I shall die like a lamb." No one can deny his courage. He refused to be blindfolded or tied,
but of his own will placed his head on the block. He turned and
asked to see the axe, then ran his thumb along the edge. "It is not
sharp enough," he said, but the executioner reassured him, and he
placed his head ready.

The first stroke of the axe did not sever his head. Monmouth
turned and looked at his executioner, but said nothing. The second
stroke wounded again, but the unfortunate man was still alive. He
crossed his legs. At the third stroke, the deed was still not done, and
the axeman lost his nerve and threw down the axe. The crowd was
furious, and would have torn him to pieces had they been able to reach

him. Finally, Monmouth's head was cut off with a knife.
¹⁴

 
* * *

We must now travel back a few years from 1685, when Mon­mouth died, to 1663, when the next duke who concerns us, Grafton,
was born. The ancestress of the Grafton line was the infamous
seductress Barbara Villiers, later Countess of Castlemaine, still later
Duchess of Cleveland, "the finest Woman of her age".
¹⁵
Charles II
was already the father of three other illegitimate children besides
James Crofts before he encountered Barbara Villiers, but none of his
previous mistresses exerted such influence over him as she was destined
to. She came from a single-minded ambitious family of courtiers with
the determination to see their ambitions realised. They were expert
flatterers, endowed with a beauty of body which they did not hesitate
to use in the pursuit of their aims. The proof of their success lies
in the enormous number of prominent and resourceful people who
were or are descended from them. Barbara's cousin was George
Villiers, 2nd Duke of Buckingham, a favourite with the King; his
father, the 1st Duke, was lover and master of James I. The Dukes of
Marlborough and Sir Winston Churchill are descended from Sir
George Villiers (Barbara's great-grandfather) through his daughter
Elizabeth Villiers. The Dukes of Atholl and Hamilton are descended
from another daughter, Susan Villiers. There is Villiers blood in the
Cecil family (Marquis of Salisbury), and in Lord John Russell and
his grandson Bertrand Russell. Even our present Queen Elizabeth II
is descended from Sir George Villiers through his son Edward. As for
Barbara Villiers herself, she bore the King six children (at least he
acknowledged six of them, though the paternity of some is open to
doubt), and made herself the ancestress of not only the Duke of
Grafton, but of Lord Castlereagh, Lord Melbourne, and Sir Anthony
Eden (Lord Avon). No less than thirteen Prime Ministers trace their
ancestry back to the seventeenth-century Villiers family. With such
dynamic genes coursing through her veins, Barbara Villiers fell upon
the sweet good-natured King as a praying mantis pounces on and
gobbles up its victim.
¹⁰