DUCHESS OF KINGSTON

Lake Wakatip Mail, Issue 4325, 3 August 1937, Page 2

DUCHESS OF KINGSTON

A SCANDAL OF THE 18TH CENTURY RISE OF A COLONEL'S DAUGHTER The announcement that Kingston House, at Kensington, built in 1770 by the Duchess of Kingston, is to be demolished may excite the curiosity of many as to the identity of that ladj (writes Mr Frederic Mead, in the London ‘Observer’). She was the notorious Elizabeth Chudleigh, the daughter of Colonel Chudleigh, and was born in 1726, On reaching adolescence she. was no doubt very attractive, and, obtaining the position of maid of honour to the Princess of Wales, became con spicuous in society. After a futile love affair with the Duke of Hamilton she became acquainted with Augustus John Hervey, a grandson of the Earl of Bristol, and then serving as a lieutenant in the Navy. This friendship culminated in a marriage in the extra parochial chapel of Lainston at 11 at night by the light of a taper. Such secrecy was desirable as if the marriage became known Elizabeth might have forfeited her position as maid of honour. In 1746 the lieutenant returned from his voyage in the West Indies and lived with his wife, a child being born in 1747, short lived, however, after there had been a quarrel between the pair and a permanent rupture of their matrimonial relations.

CHURCH REGISTER MISSING. In 1759 the probability arose that Hervey would become Earl of Bristol, so that it seemed to be to Elizabeth’s interest that there should be some official record of the wedding; but as there had been no registers at that church at all a new book was procured and an entrv of the wedding inserted. Later, however, it was the wish of both parties to be rid of the burden of their wedlock, so the present frequent practice of collusive divorce was so far anticipated tHat Hervey suggested that solution, but she declined to make the necessary shameful avowal, however true.

Another expedient was therefore adopted—that > is, a jactitation suit, whereby it was declared that Hervey boasted wrongfully that Elizabeth was his wife. He made a discreetly weak reply, and, the cause being reached, it was heard by the Vicar-General of the Bishop of London and Official Principal of his Consistory Court, and he, negligently it would seem, if not corruptly, decided that Elizabeth “ was and is a spinster.” She, fortified with this “ sentence,” on March 8, 1769, married the Duke of Kingston, with whom irregular relations had already existed.

NEPHEW’S MOVE. This dukedom does not figure conspicuously in history, but an earldom of Kingston (upon Hull) had been in existence since the reign of Charles 11. To show that the modern alleged sale of titles was not a novelty, a law report discloses that in 1681 a legacy of £IO,OOO was left by one of the family “ to procure by lawful means a dukedom for the next earl.”

It is not surprising that such a legacy should have been held to be void, but subsequently the immediate predecessor of Elizabeth’s husband was ' so distinguished a statesman that he was I created a duke, quite incorruptly one I may assume. In 1773 the duke died, the j title becoming extinct, and judging 1 from the liberality of his will, his married life must have been a success, for he left his real estate to Elizabeth for life and the whole of his personalty absolute, but Mr Meadows, an expectant nephew, gave effect to his spleen by instigating a prosecution of the widow for bigamy. As Elizabeth, if not legally the Duchess of Kingston, was the Countess of Bristol, it was clear that she had : the status of a peeress, and so entitled 1 to be tried by the House of Lords.

The trial took place with all the essential pomp and circumstance on such an occasion, more than a hundred peers in their robes marching to and fro between the ancient chamber of the House of Lords and Westminster Hail, the scene of the drama. Upon the prisoner pleading “ Not Guilty,” the following obsolete quaint dialogue between her and the clerk of the court, passed, “Culprit! how will you bo tried?” “By God and my country.” “ God give your grace a good deliverance ”

Naturally, the chief point taken in defence was the existence of the “ sentence,” whereby it was judicially decided that the Hervey marriage' was void. The Lords took the opinion of His Majesty’s judges as to the law, and they adjudged that as the Crown was not a party o hat proceeding, the prosecution was not bound by it, but even if it wore so, if the proceeding was collusive, it won Id fail on that ground. The Lords acted upon this advice, and each of them, upon being asked by the Lord High Steward whether the prisoner was guilty or not guilty, laying his right hand upon his breast, answered “ Guilty upon my honour.”

ONE DISSENTING PEER. The only dissenting peer was the Duke of Newcastle, whose answer was “ Guilty erroneously, but not intentionally, upon my honour.” In a sense ibe prosecution was futile as no punishment followed, for such a crime as bigamy was “clergyable,” there being in ordinary cases on a first offence only the penalty of being branded on the brawn of the thumb with the initial of the offence, but peers, by legislation, were free of such an indignity. The Lord High Steward, in concluding the case, tried to atone for the futility of the trial by address ing the prisoner as follows : —“Although very little punishment or none can now be inflicted, the feelings of your own conscience will supply that defect. And let me give you this information likewise, that you can never have the like benefit a second time, but another offencc of the same kind will be capital.” Unfortunately, such a sermon had little effect upon her character, for the early lightness of her conduct was continued after her conviction. She seems so soon as 1749 to have anticipated the nude cult of the present day, as she appeared at a masked ball as Ipiugenia “so naked that she might have been taken for Andromcdo.”