April 8, 1795: Marriage of George, Prince of Wales and Caroline of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel

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Augusta of Great Britain, Caroline of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, King George III of Great Britain, King George IV of the United Kingdom and Hanover, Maria Fitzherbert, Pain and Pleasures Bill 1829, Prince of Wales

George IV (August 12, 1762 – June 26, 1830) was King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and King of Hanover from the death of his father, King George III, on January 29, 1820 until his own death ten years later. He had already been serving as Prince Regent since February 5, 1811, during his father’s final illness.

George IV was the eldest child of King George III and Queen Charlotte (Duchess of Mecklenburg-Strelitz). He led an extravagant lifestyle that contributed to the fashions of the Regency era. He was a patron of new forms of leisure, style and taste. He commissioned John Nash to build the Royal Pavilion in Brighton and remodel Buckingham Palace, and commissioned Jeffry Wyatville to rebuild Windsor Castle. George’s charm and culture earned him the title “the first gentleman of England.”

Prince of Wales as King George IV of the United Kingdom and Hanover

As Prince of Wales the prince became infatuated with Maria Fitzherbert at the age of 21. She was a commoner (though granddaughter of a baronet), six years his elder, twice widowed, and a Roman Catholic.
The prince was determined to marry her. This was in spite of the Act of Settlement 1701, which barred the spouse of a Catholic from succeeding to the throne, and the Royal Marriages Act 1772, which prohibited his marriage without the King’s consent.

Nevertheless, the couple went through a marriage ceremony on December 15, 1785 at her house in Park Street, Mayfair. Legally the union was void, as the King’s consent was not granted (and never even requested). However, Fitzherbert believed that she was the prince’s canonical and true wife, holding the law of the Church to be superior to the law of the State. For political reasons, the union remained secret and Fitzherbert promised not to reveal it.

Maria Fitzherbert

The prince was plunged into debt by his exorbitant lifestyle. His father refused to assist him, forcing him to quit Carlton House and live at Fitzherbert’s residence. In 1787, the prince’s political allies proposed to relieve his debts with a parliamentary grant.

The prince’s relationship with Fitzherbert was suspected, and revelation of the illegal marriage would have scandalised the nation and doomed any parliamentary proposal to aid him.

Acting on the prince’s authority, the Whig leader Charles James Fox declared that the story was a calumny. Fitzherbert was not pleased with the public denial of the marriage in such vehement terms and contemplated severing her ties to the prince.

The Prince of Wales’s debts continued to climb, and his father refused to aid him unless he married his cousin Princess Caroline of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel.

Caroline of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel (May 17, 1768 – August 7, 1821) was the daughter of Carl Wilhelm Ferdinand, Duke of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel and Princess Augusta of Great Britain, eldest sister of King George III.

Caroline was brought up in a difficult family situation. Her mother resented her father’s open adultery with Baroness Luise von Hertefeld, whom he had installed as his official mistress in 1777, and Caroline was later to confide to Lady Charlotte Campbell that she was often tired of being a “shuttlecock” between her parents, as whenever she was civil to one of them, she was scolded by the other.

In an arranged marriage Caroline was engaged to her cousin George in 1794, despite never having met one another.

Caroline of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel

In 1795, the prince acquiesced; and they were married on April 8, 1795 at the Chapel Royal, St James’s Palace. The marriage, however, was disastrous; each party was unsuited to the other. The two were formally separated after the birth of their only child, Princess Charlotte of Wales, in 1796, and remained separated thereafter. The Prince remained attached to Maria Fitzherbert for the rest of his life, despite several periods of estrangement.

George’s mistresses included Mary Robinson, an actress whom he paid to leave the stage; Grace Elliott, the divorced wife of a physician; and Frances Villiers, Countess of Jersey, who dominated his life for some years. In later life, George’s mistresses were the Marchioness of Hertford and the Marchioness Conyngham.

George was rumoured to have fathered several illegitimate children. James Ord (born 1786)—who moved to the United States and became a Jesuit priest—was reportedly his son by Fitzherbert. Late in life, George told a friend that he had a son who was a naval officer in the West Indies, whose identity has been tentatively established as Captain Henry A. F. Hervey (1786–1824), reportedly George’s child by the songwriter Lady Anne Lindsay (later Barnard), a daughter of James Lindsay, 5th Earl of Balcarres.

Other reported children include Major George Seymour Crole, the son of theatre manager’s daughter Eliza Crole; William Hampshire, the son of publican’s daughter Sarah Brown; and Charles “Beau” Candy, the son of a Frenchwoman with that surname. Anthony Camp, Director of Research at the Society of Genealogists, has dismissed the claims that George IV was the father of Ord, Hervey, Hampshire and Candy, as fictitious.

In 1804, a dispute arose over the custody of Princess Charlotte, which led to her being placed in the care of King George III. It also led to a Parliamentary Commission of Enquiry into Princess Caroline’s conduct after the Prince of Wales accused her of having an illegitimate son. The investigation cleared Caroline of the charge but still revealed her behaviour to have been extraordinarily indiscreet.

Despite the investigation which concluded that there was “no foundation” to the rumours, but Caroline’s access to her daughter was nonetheless restricted.

In 1814, Caroline moved to Italy, where she employed Bartolomeo Pergami as a servant. Pergami soon became Caroline’s closest companion, and it was widely assumed that they were lovers. In 1817, Caroline was devastated when Charlotte died in childbirth. She heard the news from a passing courier as George had refused to write and tell her.

In January 1820, George became King George IV of the United Kingdom and Hanover. Hewas determined to divorce Caroline, and set up a second investigation to collect evidence of her adultery.

A legal divorce was possible but difficult to obtain. Caroline returned to Britain to assert her position as queen. She was wildly popular with the British people, who sympathised with her and despised the new king for his immoral behaviour.

On the basis of the loose evidence collected against her, George attempted to divorce Caroline by introducing the Pains and Penalties Bill 1820 to Parliament, but he and the bill were so unpopular, and Caroline so popular with the masses, that it was withdrawn by the Liverpool ministry.

She fell ill in London and died three weeks later. Her funeral procession passed through London on its way to her native Braunschweig, where she was buried.

Family of Charles Wilhelm Ferdinand, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg. Part III.

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Augusta of Great Britain, Caroline of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, Charles William Ferdinand of Brunswick, Divorce, King George III of the United Kingdom, King William I of the Netherlands, Parliament, Prince William VI of Orange, Princess Charlotte of Wales, Queen of the United Kingdom, Royal Marriages Act of 1772

Caroline of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel (Caroline Amalie Elisabeth; May 17, 1768 – August 7, 1821) was Queen consort of the United Kingdom as the wife of King George IV from January 29, 1820 until her death in 1821. She was the Princess of Wales from 1795 to 1820.

Caroline was born a Princess of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel with the courtesy title of Duchess of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, at Brunswick in the Holy Roman Empire. She was the daughter of Charles Wilhelm Ferdinand, Duke of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, and his wife Princess Augusta of Great Britain, eldest sister of George III of Great Britain.

Caroline was brought up in a difficult family situation. Her mother resented her father’s open adultery with Louise Hertefeld, whom he had installed as his official mistress in 1777, and Caroline was later to confide to Lady Charlotte Campbell that she was often tired of becoming a “shuttlecock” between her parents, as whenever she was civil to one of them, she was scolded by the other.

Caroline could understand English and French, but her father admitted that she was lacking in education. According to Caroline’s British mother, all German princesses learned English in the hope that they would be chosen to marry George, Prince of Wales, George III’s eldest son and heir apparent and Caroline’s first cousin.

John Stanley, later Lord Stanley of Alderley, saw her in 1781, and noted that she was an attractive girl with curly, fair hair. In 1784, she was described as a beauty, and two years later, Mirabeau described her as “most amiable, lively, playful, witty and handsome.” Caroline was brought up with an extreme degree of seclusion from contact with the opposite sex even for her own time.

Caroline was given a number of proposals from 1782 onward. Marriage with the Prince Willem VI of Orange, (future king of the Netherlands) Prince Georg of Hesse-Darmstadt, Charles, Duke of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, and the second son of the Margrave of Baden were all suggested, while her mother and father supported an English and a Prussian Prince respectively, but none came to fruition.

Caroline was engaged to her first cousin, George, in 1794 despite the two of them never having met. He was already illegally married to Maria Fitzherbert. George had agreed to marry her because he was heavily in debt, and if he contracted a marriage with an eligible princess, Parliament would increase his allowance. Caroline seemed eminently suitable: she was a Protestant of royal birth, and the marriage would ally Brunswick and Britain. Although Brunswick was only a small country, Britain was at war with revolutionary France and so was eager to obtain allies on the European mainland.

George IV, King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, King of Hanover.

On meeting his future wife for the first time, George called for a glass of brandy. He was evidently disappointed. Similarly, Caroline told Malmesbury, “[the Prince is] very fat and he’s nothing like as handsome as his portrait.”

Caroline and George were married on April 8, 1795 at the Chapel Royal, St. James’s Palace, in London. At the ceremony, George was drunk. He regarded Caroline as unattractive and unhygienic, and told Malmesbury that he suspected that she was not a virgin when they married. He, of course, was not. He had himself already secretly married Maria Fitzherbert; however, his marriage to Fitzherbert violated the Royal Marriages Act 1772 and thus was not legally valid.

In a letter to a friend, the prince claimed that the couple only had sexual intercourse three times: twice the first night of the marriage, and once the second night. He wrote, “it required no small [effort] to conquer my aversion and overcome the disgust of her person.” Caroline claimed George was so drunk that he “passed the greatest part of his bridal night under the grate, where he fell, and where I left him”.

Nine months after the wedding, Caroline gave birth to Princess Charlotte, George’s only legitimate child, at Carlton House on January 7, 1796. Charlotte was second in the line of succession to the British throne after her father.

Gossip about Caroline and George’s troubled marriage began quickly circulating. The press vilified George for his extravagance and luxury at a time of war and portrayed Caroline as a wronged wife. She was cheered in public and gained plaudits for her “winning familiarity” and easy, open nature. George was dismayed at her popularity and his own unpopularity, and felt trapped in a loveless marriage with a woman he loathed. He wanted a separation.

By 1806, rumours that Caroline had taken lovers and had an illegitimate child led to an investigation into her private life. The dignitaries who led the investigation concluded that there was “no foundation” to the rumours, but Caroline’s access to her daughter was nonetheless restricted. In 1814, Caroline moved to Italy, where she employed Bartolomeo Pergami as a servant.

Pergami soon became Caroline’s closest companion, and it was widely assumed that they were lovers. In 1817, Caroline was devastated when Charlotte died in childbirth. She heard the news from a passing courier as George had refused to write and tell her. He was determined to divorce Caroline, and set up a second investigation to collect evidence of her adultery.

In 1820, George became King of the United Kingdom and Hanover. He hated his wife, vowed she would never be the queen, and insisted on a divorce, which she refused. A legal divorce was possible but difficult to obtain. Caroline returned to Britain to assert her position as queen. She was wildly popular with the British populace, who sympathised with her and despised the new king for his immoral behaviour.

On the basis of the loose evidence collected against her, George attempted to divorce her by introducing the Pains and Penalties Bill to Parliament, but he and the bill were so unpopular, and Caroline so popular with the masses, that it was withdrawn by the Liverpool government. In July 1821, Caroline was barred from the coronation on the orders of her husband. She fell ill in London and died three weeks later. Her funeral procession passed through London on its way to her native Brunswick, where she was buried.

Family of Charles Wilhelm Ferdinand, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg. Part I.

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Augusta of Great Britain, Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, Charles William Ferdinand of Brunswick-Lüneburg, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg, Frederick Prince of Wales, Frederick the Great of Prussia, Fredrick Louis, George III of Great Britain, London, Napoleon Bonaparte

Royals are known for living lives of wealth and privilege and that is true. However, that wealth and privilege doesn’t shield one from hardship and tragedy. In this series I will examine the hardships of the family of Charles Wilhelm Ferdinand, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg, his wife, Princess Augusta of Great Britain and their children.

Charles Wilhelm Ferdinand, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg

Charles Wilhelm Ferdinand, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg, Prince of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel (October 9, 1735 – November 10, 1806) was the Prince of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel and Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg and a military leader. His titles are usually shortened to Duke of Brunswick in English-language sources.

He was the first-born son of Charles I, Duke of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel and his wife Philippine Charlotte of Prussia. His father was the ruling prince (German: Fürst) of the small state of Brunswick-Lüneburg, one of the imperial states of the Holy Roman Empire. Philippine Charlotte was the favourite daughter of King Friedrich Wilhelm I of Prussia and sister of Friedrich II of Prussia. As the heir apparent of a sovereign prince, Charles Wilhelm Ferdinand received the title of Hereditary Prince. (Although known by the cumbersome triple name Charles Wilhelm Ferdinand , for the rest of this blog entry I’ll refer to him simply as Charles).

The royal houses of the former Duchy of Brunswick-Lüneburg had traditionally married within the family, to avoid further division of their family lands under Salic law. By the time, Brunswick-Lüneburg had consolidated back into two states, Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel and the Electorate of Brunswick-Lüneburg (Hanover).

The electorate was ruled by the Hanoverian branch of the family in personal union with the Kingdom of Great Britain. It was therefore arranged for Charles to marry a British-Hanoverian princess: Princess Augusta of Great Britain, daughter of Frederick Louis, Prince of Wales and his wife, Princess Augusta of Saxe-Gotha, and sister of the reigning King George III. Augusta was given a careful education. She was not described as a beauty, having protuberant eyes, loose mouth and a long face.

On January 16, 1764, Charles married Princess Augusta of Great Britain, eldest sister of King George III. The couple were second cousins to each other, being great-grandchildren of George I of Great Britain, Elector of Hanover. As such, they were not related in a particularly close degree, yet there had been many bonds of marriage between the House of Brunswick-Bevern and the House of Hanover, themselves both branches of the House of Guelph.

Augusta of Great Britain

Augusta never fully adapted to life in Brunswick due to her British patriotism and disregard of all things “east of the Rhine”. This attitude did not change with time, and twenty five years after her marriage, she was described as: “wholly English in her tastes, her principles and her manners, to the point that her almost cynical independence makes, with the etiquette of the German courts, the most singular contrast I know”.

In 1777, Augusta announced to Charles that she would retire from court life and devote herself to the upbringing of her children and religious studies under the Bishop of Fürstenberg. The reason was her disapproval of the relationship between Charles and Louise Hertefeld whom he, in contrast to his previous mistress Maria Antonia Branconi, had installed as his official royal mistress at the Brunswick court.

Augusta of Great Britain

In 1780, Charles succeeded his father as sovereign prince of the Principality of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, one of the princely states of the Holy Roman Empire. The duke was a cultured and benevolent despot in the model of Friedrich II the Great of Prussia. He was also a recognized master of 18th century warfare, serving as a Field Marshal in the Prussian Army.

In 1806, when Prussia declared war on France, her husband, the Prince of Brunswick-Wolfenbuttel, 71 at the time, was appointed commander-in-chief of the Prussian army. On October 14, of that year, at the Battle of Jena, Napoleon defeated the Prussian army; and on the same day, at the Battle of Auerstadt, he was struck by a musket ball and lost both of his eyes; his second-in-command Friedrich Wilhelm Carl von Schmettau was also mortally wounded, causing a breakdown in the Prussian command.

Severely wounded, the Duke was carried with his forces before the advancing French. Augusta, with the Hereditary Prince and Hereditary Princess, fled to Altona, where they were present at her dying spouse’s side. Because of the advancing French army, they were advised by the British ambassador to flee, and they left shortly before the death of the Prince. He died of his wounds in Ottensen on November 10, 1806.

The Duke and Duchess of Brunswick-Lüneburg

Augusta then went to stay at the Duchy of Augustenborg, where her nephew-in-law was sovereign. She remained there with her niece, the Duchess of Augustenborg (daughter of her sister the late Queen Caroline Mathilde of Denmark), until her brother George III of the United Kingdom finally relented in September 1807, and allowed Augusta to come to London. There she resided at Montagu House, at Blackheath in Greenwich, with her daughter, Caroline the Princess of Wales, but soon Augusta fell out with her, and purchased the house next door, Brunswick House. Augusta lived out her days there and died in 1813 aged 75.

Part II will be a discussion about their children.