Memoir of Francis Hodgson
Augusta Leigh to Francis Hodgson, 8 July 1824
St James’s Palace: July 8, 1824.
Dear Mr.
Hodgson,—I am sure that it will be most gratifying to
everybody concerned that you should ![]()
| BYRON’S ALTERED FRAME OF MIND. | 147 |
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attend,1
and more particularly so to me; and I hope that Hucknall Torkard being the
place will render it not very inconvenient to you. I can only tell you that it
is two or three miles from Newstead and fourteen from Nottingham. The funeral
sets out on Monday, and Thursday or Friday will be the day. If I can ascertain
beforehand which of the two, I will write to you. Mr. Hobhouse, Mr.
Kinnaird, Col. Leigh,
and, I conclude, Mr. Hanson, will
attend. I shall probably see Mr. Hobhouse to-day and will
mention your wish.
I have not yet been able to see Fletcher, as he has been detained on board the
ship to attend to the effects till the Custom House should release them; but I
believe I did not tell you that I could not resist seeing the Remains. He was
embalmed, so it was still possible; and the melancholy comfort that it bestowed
on me never can be expressed. There are few who can
understand it, I believe; for my own part, I only envy those who could remain
with and watch over him till the last. Such are my feelings, but I know there
are many who could not bear it. It was awful to behold what I parted with
convulsed, absolutely convulsed with grief, now cold and inanimate, and so
altered that
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| 148 | MEMOIR OF REV. F. HODGSON. | |
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I could scarcely persuade myself it was him—not a
vestige of what he was. But God’s will be done! I hope I shall resign to
it. I hear that Fletcher says that for the last year his
mind and feelings appeared to be changed much for the better. He expressed
concern at having written ‘Don
Juan’ and other objectionable things. He talked latterly with
great affection of his child, and in kind terms of Lady
B. This is all comfort, dear Mr. H.; and I
tell it you, for I know how truly you loved him and his best interests. I long
to see Fletcher to judge for myself. He has been
cautioned, from the first, to restrain his communications; there will, of
course, be so much curiosity.
I have seen Lady B.,
which was a great trial. She was much agitated. I believe I told you how
handsomely she has behaved to my cousin the
present Lord B. I am glad indeed to hear you approved of
what I had done about the Memoirs. . . . God bless you, dear Mr. H.
George Anson Byron, seventh Baron Byron (1789-1868)
Naval officer and Byron's heir; the son of Captain John Byron (1758-93), he was lord of
the bedchamber (1830-1837) and lord-in-waiting (1837-1860) to Queen Victoria.
William Fletcher (1831 fl.)
Byron's valet, the son of a Newstead tenant; he continued in service to the end of the
poet's life, after which he was pensioned by the family. He married Anne Rood, formerly
maid to Augusta Leigh, and was living in London in 1831.
John Hanson (1755-1841)
Byron's solicitor and business agent.
John Cam Hobhouse, baron Broughton (1786-1869)
Founder of the Cambridge Whig Club; traveled with Byron in the orient, radical MP for
Westminster (1820); Byron's executor; after a long career in politics published
Some Account of a Long Life (1865) later augmented as
Recollections of a Long Life, 6 vols (1909-1911).
Francis Hodgson (1781-1852)
Provost of Eton College, translator of Juvenal (1807) and close friend of Byron. He wrote
for the
Monthly and
Critical Reviews, and was
author of (among other volumes of poetry)
Childe Harold's Monitor; or
Lines occasioned by the last Canto of Childe Harold (1818).
George Leigh (1771-1850)
Officer in the 10th Light Dragoons, gambler, and boon companion of the Prince of Wales;
he married Augusta Byron in 1807.
George Gordon Byron, sixth Baron Byron (1788-1824)
Don Juan. (London: 1819-1824). A burlesque poem in ottava rima published in installments: Cantos I and II published in
1819, III, IV and V in 1821, VI, VII, and VIII in 1823, IX, X, and XI in 1823, XII, XIII,
and XIV in 1823, and XV and XVI in 1824.
