Charlotte & Leopold Read Online Free PDF Page B

lovers. Several more names were suggested, and several were left un-named. As with the captains and the portrait painter, there was not enough evidence to prove beyond doubt that any of them was guilty, but that of course did not mean that any or all of them were innocent.
    Although the servants could not confirm any specific allegation, they succeeded in convincing the committee that their mistress’s lifewas neither celibate nor seemly. The tone of their testimony was summed up simply in the words of the handsomest young footman, Samuel Roberts. ‘The Princess’, he said, ‘is very fond of fucking’.
    The committee, which had not allowed the Princess of Wales or any of her alleged lovers to cross-examine the witnesses, submitted its report to the King on 14 July. It had concluded that there was ‘no foundation for believing’ that the Princess of Wales had borne any child since moving to Blackheath, but it felt strongly that there were ‘other particulars respecting the conduct of her Royal Highness, such as must, especially considering her exalted rank and station, necessarily give occasion to very unfavourable interpretations’.
    The Prince of Wales was bitterly disappointed. His father’s ministers had let him down. Their disapproval was not enough. They had found him no grounds for divorce.
    His wife, on the other hand, was self-righteously triumphant. During the ‘Delicate Investigation’ the King had not visited her, and he had not invited her to visit him. But now that she had been acquitted by his arbitrary tribunal, she felt that it was his duty to acknowledge her innocence publicly by inviting her to court again. She wrote to the King asking him to receive her, but the King was not so sure that he should. There was much in the report that could not be condoned. So the Princess of Wales decided to write to him again. Since she had not been allowed to present her defence to the committee in Downing Street, she would present it to the King in Windsor instead.
    With the best but biased legal advice from Spencer Perceval, who had recently resigned the office of Attorney General after the death of Pitt, she laid out her detailed rebuttal of every charge that the Douglases had brought against her. Her letter, dated 2 October, was so long that it became known sarcastically as ‘The Book’.
    Nine weeks later, when she had received no reply, not even an acknowledgement, the Princess wrote to the King again begginghim to receive her and restore her reputation. At the same time, however, in a barely veiled threat, she arranged to have copies of ‘The Book’ printed.
    Nevertheless, it was another seven weeks before the Lord Chancellor’s office informed the Princess that, despite his reservations, the King was now ready to receive her. But week after week went by without any invitation arriving. Eventually, on 5 March 1807, five months after her first letter, the Princess of Wales lifted the veil from her threat. If she did not receive an invitation within the next week, she would publish ‘The Book’.
    By then the gossips in London society had exhausted their imaginations speculating about what ‘The Delicate Investigation’ had discovered and about what might be in ‘The Book’. To the press and the general public, who knew very little about the Princess of Wales and a great deal that they did not like about her husband, she was a wronged woman who deserved their support. The reputation of the royal family sank even further.
    Spencer Perceval believed, and indeed hoped, that publication of ‘The Book’ would bring down the government that had treated the Princess so shoddily. But, as it turned out, there was never any need for publication. A few days later, the coalition government destroyed itself. The Cabinet resigned, bitterly divided over whether or not Roman Catholics should be allowed to sit in Parliament and hold