The Creevey Papers
Thomas Creevey to Eleanor Creevey, 19 October 1812
“Knowsley, 19th Oct.
“. . . We are all mighty gracious here. My lady
[Derby] told me before we went in to
dinner yesterday to sit with my best ear next to her. . . . We sat down 22 to
dinner, all of them Hornbys, except 4
Hortons, 2 Ramthornes, young
Ashton and myself. My
lord was ![]()
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in excellent
spirits, and, for such company, it went off all very
well. . . . I never saw Lady Stanley
looking so well, or in such good spirits. She and her lord are damned attentive to Diddy, so
upon the whole, you know, it is very well he came. . . . I won a shilling last
night, I’d have you know, and then ate some shrimps, and Lady
Derby would have some negus made for me alone; and all the
toadys laughed very much, because my lady did, so it was all very well. . . .
“There is beginning to be damned distress in
Liverpool already, and if the Americans will but continue the war for a
twelvemonth, Masters Canning and
Gascoigne and their supporters will
have enough of it.
“. . . Let me not omit to mention to you that
Col. Gordon,* who you know is with
Wellington, is in constant
correspondence with both Grey and Whitbread, and that his accounts are of the
most desponding cast. He considers our ultimate discomfiture as a question
purely of time, and that it may happen on any day, however early; that our
pecuniary resources are utterly exhausted, and that the [illegible] of the French in recovering from their difficulties is
inexhaustible; that Wellington himself considers this
resurrection of Marmont’s broken
troops as an absolute miracle in war, and in short Gordon
considers that Wellington is in very considerable
danger.† Of course you will not use this information but in the most
discreet manner.”
George Canning (1770-1827)
Tory statesman; he was foreign minister (1807-1809) and prime minister (1827); a
supporter of Greek independence and Catholic emancipation.
Elizabeth Farren, countess of Derby (1759-1829)
Comic actress; she was courted by Charles James Fox but became the lover and later the
wife of the Earl of Derby upon the death of Elizabeth Hamilton in 1797.
Isaac Gascoyne (1763 c.-1841)
After service in the Coldstream Guards he was a Conservative MP for Liverpool (1796-1831)
who opposed abolition of the slave trade.
Sir Alexander Gordon (1786-1815)
The son of George Gordon, Lord Haddo and Charlotte Baird; educated at Eton, he was
aide-de-camp to the Duke of Wellington and died of wounds received at Waterloo.
Charles Grey, second earl Grey (1764-1845)
Whig statesman and lover of the Duchess of Devonshire; the second son of the first earl
(d. 1807), he was prime minister (1831-34).
Edward Smith Stanley, twelfth earl of Derby (1752-1834)
Grandson of the eleventh earl (d. 1776); educated at Eton and Trinity College, Cambridge,
he was a Whig MP for Lancashire, a friend of Charles James Fox, nephew of John Burgoyne,
and a committed sportsman.
Samuel Whitbread (1764-1815)
The son of the brewer Samuel Whitbread (1720-96); he was a Whig MP for Bedford, involved
with the reorganization of Drury Lane after the fire of 1809; its financial difficulties
led him to suicide.
