The Creevey Papers
Thomas Creevey, Journal entry, 18 November 1809
“Saturday, 18th.—We come down to Brighton. Walk all the morning with
different people, but Sir Charles Pole is
the only politician: shews me a letter from Tierney, saying Parliament does not meet till 20th January, and
that therefore the Ministers were sure of another
quarter’s salary. This a Privy Councillor too! what a low
blackguard. He evidently is writing to Pole and others to
coax them into voting as he does. Pole tells me the way in
which Perceval has sollicited the
assistance of N. Vansittart,
Addington (Lord
Sidmouth), Bragge
Bathurst and others of that party, and of their answers; by
which it appears to me they turn out, as they always have been—shabby
fellows, and Sir Charles himself, I believe, is not much
better.
“Grattan here,
with whom I have frequent long walks. It is impossible to meet with anyone more
* He was then 27, and became Speaker in
1817. |
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amiable and unaffected; and considering his
successful and brilliant publick life, his absence of all vanity is quite
miraculous. His opinions upon present political persons in this country are
worth nothing. He is a kind of stranger in a new country—has no longer
any object of ambition—seems to consider his day as past, and to be
perfectly satisfied with his lot. . . .
“This trial of Wardle’s indictment against Mrs. Clarke and the Wrights being to come
on the first week in December, Western and I
correspond upon the necessity of getting Lord
Folkestone to London, and trying to set everything to right
between him and Wardle before the trial comes on, as well
for both their sakes as for the general cause.* . . .
Charles Bragge Bathurst (1754-1831)
Originally Bragge; educated at Winchester and New College, Oxford, he was a Tory MP who
held high offices as the brother-in-law of Henry Addington.
William Pleydell- Bouverie, third earl of Radnor (1779-1869)
Son of the second earl (d. 1828); educated at Brasenose College, Oxford, he was Whig MP
for Downton (1801) and Salisbury (1802-28), and an associate of Sir Francis Burdett and
Samuel Whitbread.
Mary Anne Clarke (1776 c.-1852)
Having married a Joseph Clarke, she was mistress to the Duke of York (1803-06) and
involved with selling government offices, as came to light in an 1809 House of Commons
investigation. She spent her later years living in Paris.
Henry Grattan (1746-1820)
Irish statesman and patriot; as MP for Dublin he supported Catholic emancipation and
opposed the Union.
Spencer Perceval (1762-1812)
English statesman; chancellor of the exchequer (1807), succeeded the Duke of Portland as
prime minister (1809); he was assassinated in the House of Commons.
George Tierney (1761-1830)
Whig MP and opposition leader whose political pragmatism made him suspect in the eyes of
his party; he fought a bloodless duel with Pitt in 1798. He is the “Friend of Humanity” in
Canning and Frere's “The Needy Knife-Grinder.”
Nicholas Vansittart, first Baron Bexley (1766-1851)
Educated at Christ Church, Oxford, he was a Pittite MP for Hastings (1796-1802), Old
Sarum (1802-12), East Grinstead (1812), and Harwich (1812-23); he was Chancellor of the
exchequer (1812-23).
Gwyllym Lloyd Wardle (1762-1833)
Military officer and MP for Okehampton (1807-1811); with the assistance of the courtesan
Mary Anne Clarke he forced the resignation of the Duke of York as commander-in-chief. She
later turned on Wardle, who retired to Italy where he died.
Charles Callis Western, baron Western (1767-1844)
Of Rivenhall in Essex, politician and agricultural reformer; he was educated at Eton and
Queens' College, Cambridge and was MP for Maldon (1790-1812) and Essex (1812-32). He was a
school friend of Thomas Creevey.
