The Dukes (64 page)

Abercom did nothing with his life. Politics bored him. He devoted his time to acting the part of a grandee, and entertaining the famous and the beautiful. It comes as a surprise, therefore, to see honours heaped upon him, first a marquessate, then the Garter, then a Privy Councillor, without any obvious merit. The answer is to be found in his friendship with the Prime Minister, Pitt, whom he had known when they were young men at Cambridge, and from whose acquain­tance he now profited as much as he could. Pitt, it was even sug­gested, profited also; he was paid for persuading the King to look upon Abercorn with favour. This is how Wraxall tactfully puts it: "no honours or concession in the power of the Crown to bestow were above the pretensions of a man, who not only descended from the royal line of Scottish kings, but was himself the head and representa­tive of the Dukes of Hamilton in male succession. . . . When, how­ever, as a further augmentation to so many dignities and distinctions conferred on this nobleman, the Garter was finally added by Pitt some years later, there were not wanting individuals who sought for the solution of such extraordinary acts of predilection or friendship by recourse to more concealed causes."
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Wraxall goes on to point out that Abercorn was wealthy and Pitt so poor that he could not pay his taxes or the butcher when he came to the door, and hints darkly that the Prime Minister received £1000 from Abercorn's purse.

He almost went too far, however, when he prevailed upon Pitt to grant the precedence of an earl's daughter to his intended bride. He had already been married once, to a Miss Copley, by whom he had several children. She died in 1791, when he announced his intention of marrying his first cousin, Cecil Hamilton, a parson's daughter. Now that he had a clearer vision of his place in life, there was one obstacle to his plans, namely that "he found it quite impossible to demean himself by marrying anyone who had not the distinction of a title".
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He bullied Pitt and frightened the King into granting her the style "Lady Cecil Hamilton", although there was no way in which either she or her father could have come anywhere near the title, and in spite of her having four older sisters, who were still plain "Miss". Moreover, this story relates to the year 1789, when Aber- corn's first wife was still alive. This implication is that he intended to marry Cecil as soon as his wife was removed from the living, and that he was already her lover. The King was made to ennoble an adulteress. As Wraxall remarks, even Charles II might have hesitated; as it was, the King and Queen showed "strong marks of repugnance" before relenting.

The marriage duly took place, but was not happy; seven years later it ended in divorce. With a touch of the farcical, Abercorn proved that even in distress his pride was paramount. When he heard that his wife intended to elope, he sent a message to her begging that she should elope in the family coach, "as it ought never to be said that Lady Abercorn left her husband's roof in a hack chaise".
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Within months, the whisper was heard in London drawing-rooms that the old Marquess intended to marry again. Nobody could quite believe it and he, well aware of the stir he would cause, determined that Lady Anne Hatton should become his wife in the utmost secrecy. The fiancee was sitting at tea with Lady Bessborough when a porter entered saying, that Lady Anne must hurry, for Lord Aber­corn had just left word that she was to be married at four in the afternoon. "This intelligence
so
communicated surprised them, but compliance and punctuality are indispensable qualities where Lord A. is concerned, therefore they obeyed." After the ceremony, he bowed to the new Marchioness, then went off with a cavalcade of servants to dine with his own family, while she dined with hers.
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Quite apart from pride in rank, old Abercorn had a superabun­dance of normal human vanity. When he was quite aged, he was involved in an accident with the phaeton, which broke both his legs. His first worry was that his beauty and elegance might be impaired. He sought reassurances from the doctor, who unwisely remarked that Lord Abercorn could not hope to escape without
some
consequences at his advanced age. The following day he received his fee and an intimation that his services were no longer required. Bewildered, he turned to a London specialist, Dr Pemberton, for an explanation of the Marquess's conduct. "No one must ever suggest that he is not in his first youth," he said.
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Whatever his eccentricities, the Marquess of Abercorn was not an evil man. Lady Holland had the measure of him. "He is haughty and capricious," she wrote, "with enough of vanity to make him do a generous action, and with a dash of madness to make him do a lively one.' There were instances when he behaved with admirable public spirit. During the flour famine in the early nineteenth century, neither he nor any of his guests, no matter how exalted, were allowed to eat anything made with flour. There can be no excuse to rejoice in the series of disasters which befell him as he grew old. His first wife, Miss Copley, had died of consumption shortly after giving birth to her sixth child. In 1803, the eldest daughter, aged nineteen and engaged to be married, also died of consumption. In 1808 the second son, Lord Claud, died of the disease, followed by the second daughter, Lady Catherine, in 1812. There were two children left, the heir Lord Hamilton, and the youngest and prettiest Lady Maria. The old Marquess devoted all his love now to this last daughter, bringing her every medical attention. The doctors of the day thought, however, that night air was not healthy, and prescribed sleeping with closed windows and curtains drawn round four-poster beds. In such conditions, Maria could not fight against the hereditary curse, and she died at the age of eighteen. Four months later the last child, Lord Hamilton, died of consumption too. Abercorn could hold his head high no longer. Yet he still maintained enough pride to deny that any Hamilton could possibly die of consumption; it was thought to be a disease associated with poverty, with the working classes, and with undernourishment. He bullied the doctors to write a letter to
The Times
announcing that his eldest daughter did not succumb to consumption. But by the end, even he was bound to admit that the Copley curse had carried off his children. Fortunately none of it has passed down to subsequent generations. The present Duke of Aber­corn is a direct descendant of the last child, Lord Hamilton, who died in 18114 at the age of twenty-seven, and whose eldest son was created 1st Duke of Abercorn by Queen Victoria.

None of the dukes of Abercorn has been eccentric, and none has been illustrious. They have tended to remain on the periphery of political life, reserving themselves for the job they do best, in which they are almost unsurpassed, which is to be the monarch's represen­tative in Ireland. The first Duke was twice Lord Lieutenant of Ireland and the 3rd Duke, who died in 1953, held the post of Gover­nor of Northern Ireland for twenty-four years. They have been popu­lar in this role. They carry it off with style, dignity, and panache. Of course, the lowly have been required to keep their place, but they seem to have done so with joy. The first Duke, known as "Old Splendid", was practically worshipped by the locals. One of his sons wrote, "The veneration in which my father was held by the country people around him almost surpassed belief."
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As for the parapher­nalia of a governorship - the entertaining, the balls, the ritual, the glitter, the deference - they performed it as to the manner born (which, indeed, they were). In fact, it was for being so good at entertaining that they most probably received their dukedom. Lord and Lady Abercorn received the Prince and Princess of Wales at their home in Ireland in April 1868. "Bertie" and Alexandra enjoyed themselves so much that they returned to London full of praise for the work of the Lord Lieutenant; the patent creating the dukedom of Abercorn is dated 1 oth August of that year.

The Duke's wife was a daughter of the 6th Duke of Bedford. They had six sons and seven daughters. One daughter became Duchess of Buccleuch and another was Duchess of Marlborough (the idiotic Bertha, who drove her poor husband frantic with her infantile prac­tical jokes). Two of the younger sons brought real literary distinction to the family. There have been dukes who have written books - the dukes of Argyll, Sutherland and Portland - and still more ducal younger sons, but they are for the most part pallid affairs. The books of Lord Ernest Hamilton, however, and to a lesser degree of his brother Lord Frederick, are works of true merit. The former's
Halycon Era
is a model of what a book of memoirs should be, and is mercifully free of Victorian affectation. There are half a dozen books by one brother or the other which are still read with pleasure. This is a unique accomplishment in ducal families.

The daughter who was later to be Duchess of Buccleuch, Lady Louise Hamilton, was received into the Church by the Archbishop of Canterbury when she was four years old. To keep her quiet and still, her mother had given her a sugared almond to suck. When, in the course of the ceremony, the Archbishop picked her up, she took the sweet from her mouth and popped it into his. With both hands occupied, he could not possibly remove it, and could not very well spit it out, so he patiently sucked it, while the congregation, made anxious by the silence, thought he had had a stroke.
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Of the 2nd Duke of Abercorn (1838-1913),
Vanity Fair
wrote: "He has not done much, but he has done nothing badly. ... He has enjoyed the friendship of illustrious persons and, oddly enough, he has deserved it. He is full of tact, agreeable, and endowed with the good manners which oblige even Radicals to admit that blue blood has its advantages."The present Duke, who inherited the title in 1979, is fifth in line. He is the only nobleman to have distinctions in the three peerages of Great Britain, Ireland
and
Scotland, as well as the French dukedom of Chatelherault. His mother, widow of the 4th Duke, has been Woman of the Bedchamber to Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother since 1937. Abercorn is in every way a modern man, devoting himself to the pro­motion of industry and prosperity in Northern Ireland, passionately concerned with the reconciliation of opposing ideas in Ireland, but wise enough to demonstrate his concern quietly and unobtrusively, diffident in manner but firm in resolve. His 'family room' at the ancestral home, Baron's Court in County Tyrone, is the most overtly modern to be found in any ducal seat, delighting some visitors and appalling others, but leaving no one indifferent. The Duke takes his seat in the Lords regu­larly and made his maiden speech within days of being introduced. He is also the first of the Hamiltons to marry outside what he calls the 'charmed circle'; his Duchess is one of the beautiful grand-daughters of Sir Harold Wernher of Luton Hoo,
nee
Alexandra Anastasia Phillips and known as 'Sasha'. Her sister, Natalia Ayesha, is the Duchess of Westminster. The complicated ties of relationship between the Dukes of Abercorn and Westminster illustrate yet again how the dukes leap­frog in and out of each other's families, for Abercorn is Westminster's godfather, second cousin, and brother-in-law.

The most celebrated member of the Abercorn line is the old Duchess, wife of the 1st Duke, who was still alive when the present Ehike was born. In other words, she lived to see her grandchildren's grandchildren. When she died in 1905 she was ninety-two years old; her direct descendants, issued from her body and alive at the time, numbered 16g persons. In 1894 she had posed for a photograph with 101 of them. Nor was the accident of longevity the only distinction which makes this lady worth remembering. She was, by all accounts, a charming, genial, essentially good person. The Duke of Portland said that she was the most genial old lady he ever saw. Her son Lord Ernest said she refused to credit evil in anyone and shed sweetness and kindliness on all around her. She was perfectly happy for nearly a century, was never bored, and her marriage with the Duke was exemplary, romantic. Even after fifty years of marriage, the old couple would sing together the duets of their youth, and played chess together every evening.
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Twice a week, well into old age, she would call at every house in the village. She remembered unfailingly the names of every cottager, the names of their children, whom they had married. She took with her a home-made drink, known as "Her Grace's Bottle", composed of iron-water, old whisky, sal volatile, red lavender, cardamoms, and ginger. Whisky, apparently, was the dominant ingredient. When she had passed eighty, she spent most of her day fishing, with a footman in attendance. He would bait the hook for her, and take the rod from her hand whenever she flicked a fish on to the grass beside her. He would then carefully unhook the

fish and just as carefully place it back in the water, and the ritual would continue thus for hours.'
¹
. When she was eighty-six years old, the old Duchess got on stilts to demonstrate the art to a wobbly great­grandchild. The grand old Duchess of Abercorn appears in the photo­graph albums of more than a few families today. She was the "one golden link that held together some fifty families scattered here and there about the United Kingdom"."

references

1.
    
John Buchan,
Montrose,
p. 42.

2.
   
Rosalind K. Marshall,
The Days of Duchess Anne,
p. 25.