SIR WILLIAM HOTHAM'S REMINISCENCES.•
SIR Wrr.t.rAst HOTRAM belonged to one of those families which, as' "Bennet Copplestone " tells us, are dedicated to the service of the sea. His uncle, another Sir William, commanded in the Mediter- ranean ; it was largely owing to the vigilance of his cousin Sir Henry, another distinguished Admiral, that Napoleon was inter- cepted after Waterloo ; and a hundred years later the name of Hotham is still to the fore in the Navy. The author of these " pages and portraits " was born in 1772, four years before his father, Colonel George Hotham, accepted the arduous and thankless post of sub- . governor to the Prince of Wales and the Duke of York. As a boy William Hotham saw a great deal of Court life, and his reminiscences of the King and his numerous family are intimate and minute. He was educated at Westminster, entered the Navy in 1786, and served in the West Indies under Lord Gardner, in the Mediterranean under Lord Hood and his uncle William, wide; Duncan during the Mutiny at the Nore and at Camperdown. He was a temporary Post Captain at twenty-four and obtained a permanent commission at twenty-six. He served at the Cape under Curtis, and on his return to England declined further active employment on the score of his deafness, and was appointed to the command of the ` Royal Sovereign ' yacht till he was promoted Rear-Admiral in 1813, becoming Vice- Admiral in 1821 and Admiral in 1837. During the period of his active service there was hardly a single sailor of note with whom lie was not personally acquainted. After Waterloo he travelled a good deal in France and Switzerland, where he was the guest and intimate friend of " dear Madame de Steel," and for the latter half of his life was in the habit of recording his impressions of his friends and contemporaries in the form of estimates and appreciations, gener- ally suggested by the news of their deaths. These character-studies, which nine times out of ten take the form of obituary notices, labour under tho proverbial drawback of the maxim de mortuis. They are also influenced to a great extent by his upbringing and his prejudices, for ho was a great Conservative, hostile to the Reform Bill, distrusting Nonconformity, opposed to Catholic emancipation and the anti- slavery agitation. Yet he was an honest and chivalrous antagonist, who associated on the friendliest personal terms with men like Wilberforce and Sir Francis Burdett, of whose views on politics and religion he cordially disapproved, and his balancing verdicts, when one reads between the lines and allows for his cautious euphemisms, often contain a great deal of sound and discriminating criticism.
With the most commanding figure of all his contemporaries- Napoleon—he had no directp ersonal contact, yet the impressions de- rived from his cousin Sir Henry and others who saw the Emperor at close quarters on his surrender, on the voyage to St. Helena, and during his exile are remarkably interesting. They bring out Napoleon's magnetism, his charm, his omnivorous curiosity, his contempt for women, his calculated insincerity. He was always playing a part, and he was not a gentleman. But Sir William uses the word " gentle- man " in a special connotation, implying a certain polish and regard for formal observance which might be combined with positive brutality to inferiors—as in Captain Bligh of the ` Bounty,' of whom there is a most vivid sketch. So he denies it to Nelson, while admitting his transcendent genius as a commander, but concedes gentlemanliness in areelsis to the Regent. The things he could not forgive in Nelson were his treatment of Caraccioli, in whose integrity he had, with his uncle, the highest confidence, and his infatuation for Lady Hamilton. His explanation of the liaison is worth quoting. He did not believe that passion was the para- mount incentive :— " I consider that ambition was her inducement, vanity his She was proud of having a Hero in her chains. He was vain at having so beautiful and extraordinary a woman attached to him. Of the two his conduct was in every way the most culpable. . . . He should have remembered that his victories, had they been even more numerous or brilliant than they were, would never have justified an insult from him against the established usages of general Society, and the religious and moral considerations to which he was bound."
The standard that Sir William Hotham applies to George IV. in his relations with Queen Caroline and to the. Duke of York in the Mrs. Clarke scandals is different. Though he admits that the King had showed " malevolence," his final verdict is that he was the less to blame. To put it crudely, the King was a gentleman, and the Queen no lady.
Sir William Hotham's account of his experiences in the Mediter- ranean before and after the capture of Corsica makes very good reading. The operations against the Toulon fleet did not redound to our naval prestige, but the combined land and sea operations against the Revolutionists in Corsica were boldly carried through. The position of Sir Gilbert Elliot (afterwards Lord Minto) as Viceroy was not easy ; it was at his instance that both General Paoli and Colonel—afterwards Sir John—Moore were removed. The traits
• Pages and Portraits from the Past : •
Admiral of • being the'Primte Papers or Sir with"' 1"tham. f the Bed. By A. H W. With 22 illustratiOna 2 vols. London Herbert Jenkins. 124s. net.l.
of the Corsicans remained unchanged from the days when Seneca penned his famous epigram down to Merimee's picture in Colombo. But Hotham even as a young man was impressed by the remark- able ability and energy of Pozzo di Borgo, Napoleon's implacable antagonist and compatriot.
Historically viewed, the account of the Mutiny at the Nore is the most important part of the book, since the Admiralty destroyed all the papers relating to this painful episode, and Hotham was an eyewitness. The Adamant,' of which he was in temporary com- mand, was the only ship in Yarmouth Roads, except Admiral Duncan's, which refused to join the mutiny, and Hotham's services in keeping his " people " out of it were largely instrumental in enabling the Admiral to put to sea against the Dutch and bluff them into believing that Ile was supported by his whole fleet, until rein- forcements arrived from Portsmouth. Hotham strongly confirms Pitt's remarkable tribute to Duncan—that he had deserved even better of his country by his services in the mutiny than at the battle of Camperdown. In particular, his refusal to employ force in suppressing the mutiny is commended. The disaffection was general, and it was engendered by long-standing and genuine grievances as well as by the vicious system of relying on the quota men, impressed men, and vagrants sent by Magistrates.
For the rest, perhaps the most remarkable thing in the book is the light that it throws on the conduct of war more than a hundred years ago. Horrors there were and must have been, but they were mostly inevitable. The calculated brutalities and abominations with which Germany has appalled the world in the last four years were conspicuously absent. At any rate, as between us and the French, even at a time when the Revolutionists were indulging in orgies of carnage at home, the practice of Generals and Admirals was marked by chivalry, courtesy, and humanity. Hotham's relations with the Governors of Mauritius, General Malartie and his successor, the Marquis Magallon de la Moliere, and with Captain, afterwards Admiral, l'Hermite, show us not merely " gentlemanli- ness " as Hotham understood it, but magnanimity on both sides. He tells us a charming story of how he availed himself of the first flag of truce, while cruising off the coast, to send a beautiful copy of the Fables of La Fontaine as a present to Magallon's new-born child " from a friend who is now upon duty as an enemy but hopes ere long to be relieved from it."
Sir William Hotham's circle of friends and acquaintances was extensive and peculiar, ranging from Sovereigns, statesmen, and heroes to Waincwright the poisoner, at whose house he dined with a Bishop. Of all his character-studies none is more curious than that of the brilliant, erratic, and romantic Sir Sidney Smith, who shared with Pozzo di Borgo the distinction of harbouring the greatest animosity against Napoleon. The portrait by Hennequin of him, when a prisoner in the Temple, is the most attractive of the many excellent illustrations which embellish these pages. The most grotesque are the silhouettes of George IV. and the Duke of York at Brighton, enormously stout dandies with frogged frockcoats, padded behind and before. Mrs. Stirling has pieced together and readjusted her materials with skill and sympathy. There are, however, several incorrect dates.
Previous page
