USA > Pennsylvania > Luzerne County > Wilkes-Barre > A history of Wilkes-Barre, Luzerne County, Pennsylvania : from its first beginnings to the present time, including chapters of newly-discovered early Wyoming Valley history, together with many biographical sketches and much genealogical material. Volume I > Part 91
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* See The New London Gazette, February 24, 1764.
+ WILLIAM MURRAY, first Earl of Mansfield ; a Scot, and at this time Chief Justice of the King's Bench and a prominent member of the Cabinet. He has been called "the founder of English commercial law."
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Wilkes, according to his biographers, does not appear to have lost any friends by the publication of the poem, either among men or women, although the following item from The New London Gazette of February 24, 1764, would indicate the contrary.
"John Wilkes, before the meeting of Parliament, had certainly lost a great deal of his popularity by the restless endeavors of the numerous and powerful enemies he has brought upon himself. His private character was scrutinized and every action of his life that wit, power or malice could represent in a blamable or ridiculous light was exposed to the public. * * The greatest blow to his popularity was a monstrously obscene and blasphemous pamphlet, imputed to him and said to have been printed at his house, with annotations under the name of the Bishop of Gloucester."
Lord Sandwich (who at this time was unfriendly to Wilkes), Lord March and two or three others of the same kidney confederated together and concocted a plot for the overthrow of Wilkes by the aid of the stolen "Essay" in their possession. Parliament met for the first time after its Summer and Autumn recess on the 15th of November, 1763, when an exciting scene took place in the House of Lords. Before the King's speech was read Lord Sandwich arose with the "Essay" in his hand, and, affecting to be deeply shocked, denounced the whole as a blas- phemous, obscene and abominable libel; at the same time entering a formal complaint that "a notorious breach of the privilege of the House had been committed in affixing the name of William Warburton the Bishop of Gloucester to notes upon this most scandalous, obscene and in- famous libel entitled 'An Essay on Woman,' and another printed paper entitled "The Veni Creator Paraphrased.'" An address was then voted to His Majesty, praying him to give directions for the prosecution of the author, "as yet undiscovered."
On this same day there were also exciting scenes in the House of Commons, where Wilkes was present as the Member from Aylesbury. Grenville, by direction of the King, laid before the House a full report of the proceedings against Wilkes by the Government relative to the publication of "No. 45" of The North Briton. Lord North immediately moved that :
"It is the sense of the House that the paper is a false, scandalous and seditious libel, containing expressions of the most unexampled insolence and contumely towards His Majesty, and the grossest aspersions upon both Houses of Parliament ; the most audacious defiance of the authority of the whole Legislature, and most manifestly tend- ing to alienate the affections of the people from His Majesty, to withdraw them from their obediences to the laws of the realm, and to excite them to traitorous insurrection against His Majesty's Government."
The debate on this motion seemed to let loose all the angry pas- sions of the principal members of the House. Among these was Samuel Martin, who had been Secretary to the Treasury under Lord Bute. In "No. 37" of The North Briton he had been described as "a very apt tool of Ministerial persecution, with a spirit worthy of a Portuguese inquisitor looking for carrion"; and in "No. 40" he had been referred to as "the most treacherous, base, selfish, mean, abject, low-lived and dirty fellow that ever wriggled himself into a secretaryship." In the course of the debate Martin arose, and, looking steadily at Wilkes, declared that "whosoever the writer of that paper [The North Briton] was, in that work he was mean enough to stab another man's reputation. He was a coward and a malignant scoundrel !" The next day Wilkes sent Martin a note in these words :
"You complained yesterday before 500 gentlemen that you had been stabbed in the dark by The North Briton, but I have reason to believe that you was not so much in the dark as you affected and chose to be. Was the complaint made before so many gentle-
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men on purpose that they might interpose? To cut off every pretense of your ignorance as to the author, I whisper in your ear that every passage of The North Briton in which you have been named or even alluded to was written by your humble servant,
[Signed] "JOHN WILKES."
To this note Martin sent a prompt reply, in which he desired Wilkes to meet him in Hyde Park with a brace of pistols. A few hours later the two men met in Hyde Park-less than two miles distant from Westminster Palace. Wilkes accepted Martin's weapons (pistols), though he had a right to select the sword, with which he was more skillful. (It was learned afterwards that, in expectation of a duel, Martin had been for several months practising at a target.) The two men walked together some little distance, in order to avoid observation, and then turned aside and faced each other a few paces apart. At the second fire Wilkes received a ball in his groin. He bled very much, and Martin (who was uninjured) came to him desiring to render him assistance. Wilkes replied that he was killed; that Martin, who had "behaved like a man of honor," would better escape. Horace Walpole, writing of this duel, said : "Wilkes has been shot by Martin, and in- stead of being burnt at an auto-da-fe, as the Bishop of Gloucester in- tended, is reverenced as a saint by the mob; and, if he dies, I suppose the people will squint themselves into convulsions at his tomb, in honor of his memory." Wilkes would have been killed by Martin's bullet but for a fortunate accident. He was hit in a very delicate region, but the ball had first struck two of the metal buttons on his coat and waist-coat, and had thus spent its force. An ardent admirer sub- sequently placed those buttons in a silver box, on which was engraved the following inscription :
"These two simple but invaluable Buttons preserved the life of my Beloved and Honest friend JOHN WILKES, in a duel fought with Mr. Martin on the 16th of Novem- ber, 1763, where true courage and humanity distinguished him in a manner scarcely known in former ages. His invincible bravery, as well in the field as in the glorious assertion of the liberty of the subject, will deliver him down, an unparalleled example of public virtue, to all future generations."
Wilkes' wound was really serious, and he was confined to his bed under the care of a physician and a surgeon. But his enemies in the House of Commons, anxious to proceed with the hearing of his case, suspected that he was exaggerating his injuries and attempting to delude the Government ; whereupon the House directed two physicians to visit him and report upon his case. Wilkes declined to receive these phy- sicians, but suggested the attendance of the King's physician and the Serjeant-surgeon, on the ground that if he was to be watched a couple of Scots were the most proper fellows to act as spies.
December 1st the two Houses of Parliament joined in ordering that The North Briton, "No. 45," should be burnt "by the hands of the com- mon hangman" on the following Saturday (December 3d) at the Royal Exchange, and that the printer of the sheet should be placed in the pillory. On the appointed day when the hangman, attended by certain city officers, arrived on the ground he found awaiting him a great mob, who greeted him with a storm of hisses. Some of the mob took the fagots from the pile and beat the constables and the Sheriff (Thomas Harley). As the mob would not allow the fagots to be lighted the Sheriff had the paper burnt at a torch-the mob meanwhile shouting "Wilkes and Liberty !" Later the mob used the fagots in burning a petticoat and a jack-boot-a delicate reference to Lord Bute and the
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Princess Dowager-and then they took The North Briton printer to the pillory in a coach marked "No. 45," and took up a collection for him to the amount of £200.
The House of Commons, after one or two postponements of Wilkes' case, finally appointed the 19th of January, 1764, for a hearing. But Wilkes, who now saw that his ruin had been determined upon, embarked on Christmas-day at Dover for Calais, en route for Paris. On the 19th his case was taken up by the House, and the next morning at four o'clock, after an all-night session, it having been formally resolved that he had published "a false, scandalous and seditious libel, full of insolence and contempt," he was expelled from the House. A few days later George Grenville wrote to a friend : "We have got rid of Mr. Wilkes, who was expelled with only one negative voice, and who will find too late how much too far he has gone." In Paris Wilkes was received as a brother-in-arms by his old school-friend, D'Holbach, and by Diderot, the celebrated philosopher and writer. He was also countenanced by the French Court, and he made a figure in the salons. He became im- mensely popular in the best circles through his agreeable manner, ready wit and high spirits. This charm of address never failed him, even when his fortunes were at their lowest ebb. He spent money freely, as only those can afford to do who live on others, for he was drawing on Lord Temple and other friends the whole time. At Paris, under date of February 25, 1764, Wilkes wrote to Lord Temple as follows* :
"I am not disposed to lose myself in womanish complaints on the hardness of my fate, and the variety of persecutions I have suffered even from those I had most obliged. Nature has given me some philosophy ; books and observation have added greatly to the
O* stock. * * I believe that I have not lost my time here. Besides the business of the day, which I do not neglect, I wish to give posterity an useful book, in which I would, first, at large examine our ideas of political liberty ; in the second part, treat of the Eng- * I will lish Constitution and Government, and in the last, relate my own story. *
only say, in the anguish of my heart, that I owe what I suffer to the neglect of your Lordship's advice ; that I foresee all the consequences of being so entirely at the mercy of an abandoned Administration and vindictive judge, ; and intend never to put myself in their power, though I leave my dear native country and all the charms it ever had for me. I will add one thing more-that I will never make the most distant kind even of what might be interpreted a submission, but will endeavor to act, wherever I am, a great, an honest and a disinterested part."
February 21, 1764, notwithstanding the absence of Mr. Wilkes, the cases against him-one concerning The North Briton and the other the "Essay on Woman"-were tried in the Court of King's Bench before Lord Mansfield, the defendant's personal enemy (owing to some trans- action that had occurred during the Berwick election nearly ten years be- fore). Wilkes was ably defended by his friend Serjeant John Glynn, but in both cases he was found guilty. In view of his absence sentence was deferred for the time. On Sunday, August 5, 1764, a proclamation was made by the Under Sheriff of Middlesex at the great door of St. Margaret's Church, Westminster, in the following words :
"JOHN WILKES, late of the parish of St. Margaret, within the Liberty of West- minster, in the county of Middlesex, Esquire, appear before the Lord the King at West- minster on Tuesday next, after the morrow of All Souls, to satisfy the Lord the King of your redemption, on account of certain Trespasses, Contempts and Misdemeanors where- of you are impeached, and thereupon * you the said JOHN WILKES, you are con- * victed."
For the first few weeks of his stay in Paris Wilkes lodged at the Hotel de Saxe, an expensive place. Then he took apartments in the Rue St. Nicaise, and brought his daughter there to live with him. In
* See "The Grenville Papers," II : 268.
Lord Mansfield, previously mentioned.
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the meantime, in anticipation of his probable outlawry in England, he had settled his entire property on his daughter. Under date of Novem- ber 1, 1764, he wrote as follows to Earl Temple from Boulogne, whither he had gone from Paris to see his friend Churchill-who died there three days after this letter was written.
"I consent to Miss Wilkes' leaving me and coming to England. I will quit the ex- pensive and luxurious Paris, where I have been more fêté than has done me good. I will cross the Alps, live quite alone in some town of Italy, neither seen nor known, visiting nor visited, and I will confine myself to whatever Mr. [Humphrey] Cotes* sends me. I will never exceed it one shilling. I shall employ this active mind in an employment I am not totally, perhaps, unqualified for-I mean the history of my own country since the Revolution.t I will try to equal the dignity of the ancient historians, and as I shall bring it down to my own times, I shall have an opportunity of telling my own story and of doing justice to the very few friends I love and [whom] their country ought to adore. With these resolutions, fixed as fate, I shall not die of the pip. My pen will every day be adding to my fortune, and I will not return to England while I am a shilling in any man's debt. * * * This vile town almost anticipates my outlawry. It is composed of
outlawed smugglers. * * When I think of England I am pretty well weaned from it, and I am not sure that I do not more execrate the Minority than the Majority."
On the very day that the foregoing letter was written, Wilkes, hav- ing failed to respond to the summons to appear in the Court of King's Bench at Westminster and receive sentence, was formally outlawed. A change of Ministry came the next year to flatter Wilkes' hopes of a return to England. Grenville's interminable harangues in the Royal closet had bored the King into giving him his congé, and the Marquis of Rockingham had taken his place. Wilkes, not unnaturally, expected a free pardon, and something more, when his friends got into power, but he soon learned that an inconvenient friend will only receive his reward when he becomes troublesome. Early in May, 1766, Wilkes unexpectedly arrived in England from Paris. His visit-which was made with the intention of attempting to procure a pardon-was un- known to any one connected with the Government. After a very brief stay he returned in haste to Paris. Under date of May 27, 1766, the Bishop of Carlisle wrote :
"The Ministers are embarrassed to the last degree how to act with regard to Wilkes. It seems they are afraid to press the King for his pardon, as that is a subject His Majesty will not easily hear the least motion of ; and they are apprehensive if he [Wilkes] has it not that the niob of London will rise in his favor-which God forbid !"
On the fall of Rockingham in July, 1766, William Pitt was appointed Premier and created Earl of Chatham.} For the Cabinet formed by Lord Chatham the Duke of Grafton was chosen First Lord of the Treasury, but in September, 1767, he became the virtual head of the Ministry on account of the illness of Chatham ; and upon the resigna- tion by the latter of the post of Premier early in 1768, Grafton was pro- moted to the vacancy. On the accession of the Duke of Grafton to the
* A wine-merchant in London who looked after the private business affairs of Wilkes during the latter's residence abroad.
+ This "History of England" was begun in the Winter of 1764-'65 with a great flourish of trumpets and many promises, and from his prospective publisher Wilkes secured £400 in advance. Only the "In- troduction"-consisting of about fifty pages-was written, and this was published in 1768. Not another line was ever written.
į When the Earl of Rosebery was installed as Lord Rector of Glasgow University in November, 1900, he said in his rectorial address : "Had the elder Pitt, when he became First Minister, not left the House of Commons, he would probably have retained his sanity and authority, and he would have prevented or suppressed the reckless budget of Townshend, induced George III to listen to reason, introduced rep- resentatives of America into Parliament and preserved the thirteen Colonies to the British Crown. Is it fanciful to dwell for a moment on what might have happened? The Reform Bill of 1832 would probably have been passed much earlier, for the new blood of America would have burst the old vessels of the Constitution. It would have provided a self-adjusting system of representation, such as now prevails in the United States, whereby the increasing population is proportionately represented. And at last, when the Americans became a majority of the seats, the Empire would, perhaps, have been moved solemnly across the Atlantic, and Britain would have become a historical shrine, the European outpost of the world-empire. What an extraordinary revolution it would have been ! The greatest known, without blood-shed-the most sublime transferrence of power in the history of mankind."
.
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leadership of the Government Wilkes began to think that he might return to England with safety, for the Duke had been one of his boon companions, though the experience he had had in respect to Sandwich might have made him more cautious. The character of Grafton has been drawn for all time by "Junius": "Sullen and severe without religion, profligate without gaiety, you live like Charles II* without being an amiable companion, and for aught I know may die as his father did, without the reputation of a martyr."
In November, 1766, Wilkes quietly made another hasty trip to England, again with the hope of obtaining a pardon ; but he met with no success. In May, 1767, Wilkes was still in Paris, and his daughter was again with him, having returned from her visit to England. Wilkes wrote at that time to Lord Temple :
"Miss Wilkes, who is all I can wish or desire, is on the best terms with her mother's family, with whom she constantly corresponds. They all doat upon her, but I do not choose she should, on the verge of seventeen, be with them ; because I would not have them choose a husband for her, instead of her father. Mr. Jacomb, the attorney of the old folks, told Miss Wilkes that, as an outlaw, I had no right to her-the whole right was in the mother : but nature told her the contrary. I therefore found it too dangerous to let my daughter remain with them, and I preferred the encountering with greater difficulties here. Time has cured me of a thousand follies, which too gay a nature had sowed my youth with. * * I have bought experience, and dearly, too. I am now turned to economy in earnest."
At last impatience and impecuniosity determined Wilkes to end his exile at all costs, and in December, 1767, he set out once more for England. He traveled by way of Holland, and having set sail from Ostend arrived at London February 6, 1768. He took a small house in Prince's Row, in the immediate vicinity of his former residence in Great George Street, Westminster. His presence in London, which must have been known to the Government, seems to have been ignored. He was still an outlaw, but no effort was made either to conciliate him or to bring him before the Courts. Finally, on the 4th of March, he addressed himself to the King; but the course he took must have been intended as an affront, for, instead of presenting in the usual way a formal petition for pardon, he made his application to the King by a letter, which his servant handed in at Buckingham House. It was worded as followst :
"SIRE, I beg thus to throw myself at your Majesty's feet and supplicate that mercy and clemency which shine with such lustre among your Princely virtues.
"Some former Ministers whom your Majesty, in condescension to the wishes of your people, thought proper to remove, employed every wicked and deceitful art to oppress your subjects, and to revenge their own personal cause on me, whom they imagined to be the principal author of bringing to the public view their ignorance, in- sufficiency, and treachery to your Majesty and the nation. I have been the innocent and unhappy victim of their revenge. I was forced by their injustice and violence into an exile, which I have never ceased for several years to consider as the most cruel oppression ; because I could no longer be under the benign protection of your Majesty in the land of liberty.
"With a heart full of zeal for the service of your Majesty and my country, I im- plore, Sire, your clemency. My only hopes of Pardon are founded in the great goodness and benevolence of your Majesty ; and every day of freedom you may be graciously pleased to permit me the enjoyment of in my dear native land, shall give proofs of my zeal and attachment to your service.
"I am, Sire, your Majesty's most obedient and dutiful subject, [Signed] "JOHN WILKES."
Of this letter no notice was taken. Six days later, Parliament hav- ing been dissolved, Wilkes offered himself as a candidate for election to
* This Duke of Grafton was the grandson of the first Duke of that name, who was an illegitimate son of Charles II by the Countess of Castlemain.
t See The New London Gazette, June 10, 1768.
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the next Parliament, to represent the city of London, and "to the worthy Liverymen of the city" he issued the following address* :
"Gentlemen and Fellow Citizens-In deference to the opinion of some very respect- able friends, I presume to offer myself a candidate for my native city of London, at the ensuing general election. The approbation you have been pleased on several occasions to express of my conduct induces me to hope that the address I have now the honor of making you will not be unfavorably received. The chief merit with you, gentlemen, I know to be a sacred love of liberty, and of those generous principles which at first gave and secured to this nation the great charter of freedom. I will yield to none of my countrymen in this noble zeal, which has always characterized Englishmen. I may appeal to my whole conduct, both in and out of Parliament, for the demonstration that such principles are deeply rooted in my heart, and that I have steadily pursued the interests of my country, without regard to the powerful enemies I created, or the manifest dangers in which I must thence necessarily be involved ; and that I have fulfilled the duties of a good subject.
"The two important questions of public liberty, respecting General Warrants and the seizure of papers, may perhaps place me among those who have deserved well of mankind by an undaunted firmness, perseverance and probity. These are the virtues which your ancestors never failed to exert in the same national cause of liberty, and which the world will see renewed in their descendants on every great call of freedom and our country.
"The nature and dignity of the trust, Gentlemen, which I now solicit, strike me very forcibly. I feel the warmest zeal for your interests, and affection for your service. I am conscious how unequal my abilities are, yet fidelity and integrity shall in some measure compensate that deficiency, and I will endeavor, through life, to merit the con- tinuance of your approbation-the most precious reward to which I aspire. If I am honored with so near a relation to you, it will be my ambition to be useful, to dedicate myself to your service and to discharge with spirit and assiduity the various and important duties of the distinguished station in which I may be placed by the favor of you, Gentle- men, the Livery of London.
servant,
"I am, with the utmost respect, Gentlemen, your most faithful and obedient humble [Signed] "JOHN WILKES."
The candidature of Wilkes having been favorably received in the city he issued a second address a few days later, in which he said :
"I cannot express the joy of my heart at the noble and generous manner in which you have shewn your acceptance of the humble tender of my services. So honorable a testi- mony of esteem from my fellow-citizens has made the deepest impression on me. My future life will best prove the sincerity and warmth of my gratitude. It shall pass in every endeavour to promote the interests of this great city, and in a steady attention to preserve our excellent constitution and the cause of liberty in which we are all em- barked. I hope to have the honor of paying my personal respects to you, Gentlemen, on Wednesday next [March 16, 1768], at our Guildhall, and I beg your support and early attendance."
The polling began at the Guildhall on the 16th and continued for several days. When the result was announced Wilkes found himself at the bottom of the poll with 1,247 votes. Nothing daunted he immedi- ately offered himself as a candidate for the county of Middlesex. The polling, which was conducted at Brentford, continued from the 19th to the 28th of March, and the scenes and doings of that period beggar description. Fitzgerald, in his "Life of Wilkes," says "it would be difficult to give an idea of the time of riot and disorder that now set in -intimidation and violence, with the most extraordinary excitement. Wilkes had of a sudden become an almost heroic figure ; his name was on almost every tongue." During the polling mobs lined all the roads that led to Brentford and took particular pleasure in forcing the superior classes to do homage to their idol. "Wilkes and Liberty" was the one topic of the day in letters, newspapers and conversation. Paintings of the head of Wilkes were adopted as signs for public houses, and he him- self told the story of the old lady who, pointing to one of these signs, said, "Aye, there he swings, everywhere but where he ought to be !" Upon the outer walls and doors of numerous churches were posted
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