Nelson & His World

I have swung backwards and forwards on this issue over the years.

But I have just been reading a section from a book written by a clergyman named Erskine Neale circa 1839.

His brother William married Frances Nisbet - one of Josiah's daughters (and therefore granddaughter of Lady Nelson). So he obviously had close and intimate contacts with the Nelson family.

He wrote of Horatia:



On the assumption that Hazlewood is quoted correctly - what possible reason could he have had for making these statements if they were untrue.

And on that basis how could Emma possibly be Horatia's mother.

If I am being gullible here, and Neale is just grinding some personal axe, please feel free to shoot me down in flames.

MB

Mark, did the section on Horatia only appear in the second edition, published in 1850? – after Pettigrew had named Emma as Horatia’s mother and had refuted Haslewood’s similar statement to Nicolas.

According to Flora Fraser, in 1815 Haslewood had professed to know nothing of the identity of Horatia’s mother.


I would suggest various possible motives for Haslewood, some more honourable than others. An honourable one is that previously, in earlier years, the attempts to obtain Government aid for Horatia, in accordance with Nelson’s wishes, had more chance of success if it was believed she was not Emma Hamilton’s daughter. Another is that after Nelson’s death, Haslewood had been William Nelson’s solicitor, and during that time it would have been in Haslewood’s interest to toe the family line, which was not to acknowledge Emma as Horatia’s mother. Once William Nelson and others were dead, Haslewood may have been tempted to claim he knew more than he did (and his approach to Nicolas on this and the marriage break-up suggests he wanted his name public), or maybe he just thought his story was either in Horatia's best interests or better preserved Nelson's honour.

But then I have a suspicious mind...

Tony

Thanks for your comments.

Neale's writing is definitely post-Pettigrew and basically counters the arguments he puts forward.

So these authors are indeed batting the thing backwards and forwards.

Yes she is. No she isn't. Yes she is. No she isn't.

The problem with me is that when I read each one in isolation it seems to be the definitive answer - until I read one of the others and change my mind again.

I have never got my head round the fact that Emma was not universally declared to be pregnant when she would have been expecting Horatia.

I know the argument that her increasing weight disguised the pregnancy but it has never totally convinced me.

So frustrating.

Is there a consensus amongst modern day experts?

What about Nelson and his World members. Are you in the Emma camp? Or the "unnamed lady of considerable consequence" camp? Or the confused and bewildered camp like me?

MB

Mark,

I am no Emma expert, but agree with Tony on this. I wonder if this was also something that Emma and Hazelwood may have concocted between them, if Emma herself was looking towards some sort of financial settlement? To have admitted that whe was Horatia's mother would have made any pension, etc., that she might have been expecting in the hard times after Nelson's death, the less likely – not that this would have been forthcoming in any case. I wonder that there no-one else in whom Horatia could confide, or was it the case that she believed him implicitely?

Perhaps the fact that nobody declared Emma to be pregnant, was that nobody dared speak it – at least officially. I think that practically most guessed she was, certainly amongst the ladies and despite the draperies she wore to hide the fact, but that nobody wanted to speak the obvious.

Finally, have we all (historians, writers, enthusiasts, etc.) been getting it wrong all these years? Perish the thought, but were Emma and Hazlewood actually correct in saying that Horatia was not her daughter? I can't believe that noted historians and others can have been so wrong-footed over this over so great a period of time. Or were Emma and Hazlewood cleverer than we give them credit?

Kester

I think it was Neale's matter-of-fact presentation of his case that got to me.

As Tony pointed out - this was a second edition of his book and he added a chapter entitled "Nelson's Widow and Nelson's Daughter". There is no doubt that he had seen the argument put forward by Pettigrew in his own book and felt so strongly that he had to present his own version to the world!

There still seems to be so much mystery and uncertainty surrounding this issue.

Do we know when William Has(z)lewood died? (anyone?) I am just wondering what is the latest date that Horatia might have written to him. Whenever it was you would have thought that there were others that she could have contacted. I am thinking even of servants who were in Emma's employ in the year 1800. Surely she could have quizzed them as to whether their mistress was pregnant or not??!!

I just glanced through the chapter about Horatia which is in Volume VII of Nicolas's letters.

Included in that chapter is a transcript of a will written by Emma in October of 1806. She refers several times to "my dear mother." On the contrary she refers simply to "Horatia Nelson" - never calling her "my daughter" - but in one instance "my ward." I can imagine hoaxes going on in other situations - but I would have thought that the last place you would want to put a factual inaccuracy is in a will!

I wonder what the current generation of Nelson's descendants think about this issue.

It would be intriguing, although I guess inappropriate, to ask Anna Tribe what she and her relations believe to be the truth about her g.g.grandmother.

MB

(Just going to apply a cold compress to my forehead!!)

I think there can be no doubt that Emma was Horatia’s mother. Whatever the public discussions, doubts, arguments and counter-arguments, the fact remains that Nelson and Emma’s private communications about Horatia are incontestable and irrefutable. Nelson acknowledged his paternity in the private letter intended for public consumption in which he declared he was her ‘affectionate father’. Moreover, Emma herself, in a letter to Horatia, revealed herself as her mother, albeit an angry and reproachful one:

Listen to a good, kind mother, who has ever been to you affectionate, kind, and who has neither spared pains nor expense to make you the most amiable and most accomplished of your sex…..I have weathered many a storm for your sake, but these frequent blows have killed me! Listen then, from a mother who speaks from the dead….I shall tomorrow look out for a school, for your sake and to save you, that you may bless the memory of an injured mother…’ Morrison, letter no. 1047, dated April 18th 1813.

So we have Nelson and Emma’s letters to each other, Nelson’s letter to Horatia, and Emma’s letter to Horatia, all confirming her parentage, none of which modern scholarship regards as a fake.

The reasons for subterfuge by Nelson and Emma are numerous and obvious. What is curious is why Horatia maintained this fiction that Emma was not her mother when she had the evidence of Emma’s letter to her that made it clear that she was. There are numerous possibilities, all speculative, but worth considering, nonetheless. By the time Nicolas was published, the high Victorian age of prudery and repression was in full swing. Horatia was the wife of a respectable clergyman. Lady Hamilton was still a by-word for wantonness. The Victorian age was also deeply focused on the notion of inheritance, particularly ‘bad blood’. Madness, disease, sexually transmitted diseases in particular, as well as criminal tendencies and 'moral turpitude' were all believed to be hereditary, but the fears were suppressed, discussed in horrified whispers and were consequently magnified in the contemporary imagination to a remarkable degree. Horatia could not deny, and did not wish to deny, that she was Nelson’s daughter. A man’s excesses could be overlooked, and Nelson was, in any event, The Hero; but to a respectable Victorian matron, the thought that the blood of a wanton woman flowed in her veins must have been deeply disturbing. Moreover, (this is not an original thought, but I don’t know who said it first), by recognising Lady Hamilton as her mother, she would be thereby confirming to the world that Nelson had not only fathered an illegitimate child, but with the wife of a friend while under that friend’s roof, which moved the offence onto an altogether different level. It may well be that Sir William condoned the liaison, but that was not the view then, and Nelson’s conduct would appear doubly heinous - this at a time when the cult of the stainless hero was carefully nurtured.

There is also Horatia’s personal relationship with Emma to consider. In the early days, this was clearly affectionate. There are numerous letters in the NMM from Emma to members of Nelson’s family in which her maternal pride glows from the page. Horatia was a bright and engaging child and Emma’s delight in her intelligence and gaiety was transparent. Emma was determined that Horatia would have the education she lacked and devoted herself to that end to her death. But during the later years, when Emma was sick and desperate, and Horatia was a spirited adolescent, there were frequent clashes – not unusual, as any mother of a teenage daughter will confirm. (Though soon after the letter quoted above, Emma was writing in proud and affectionate terms about Horatia once again.)
However, Horatia’s final months with Emma must have been traumatic: to be alone in a foreign country with a dying and increasingly unstable and distressed woman, and then to be whisked back to England to begin a new life of uncertain status but certain dependency amongst Nelson’s family must have been deeply troubling and very de-stabilising to a young girl. It is not surprising that Horatia chose to block out any blood association with the woman with whom she had shared that depressing, maybe terrifying ordeal.

Whether Horatia accepted in her heart that Emma was her mother but devoted her energies to persuading the world that she was not, for whatever reason, or whether she was so deeply traumatised by her experiences in adolescence that she was ‘in denial’, as the modern phrase has it, is open to question. Her motives are, and possibly will always remain unknown. But her parentage is not.

Anna,

Thanks for your thoughtful reply. I thought you might post something on the subject, and a good point re. Horatia's point of view and that of the Victorians.

Anna

As I say I have swung backwards and forwards on this over the years.

You can see where my head is at this precise moment. Very possibly it will move again - but help me with one initial issue.

i.e. Is there one single contemporary record outside of letters between Emma and Nelson of Emma being pregnant or giving birth?

Surely it is inconcievable that one person amongst the wags, the cartoonists, the writers for the down market newspapers would not have picked up on it?

Likewise tittle tattle amongst the servants that might have "got out"?

A friend or family member who realised it just from her demeanour?

SWH grudgingly accepting the situation but mentioning it in confidence to a friend?

A midwife or doctor who assisted in the birth?

It seems like there was NOTHING - then a baby delivered at the door of a wet nurse.

My mind is totally open - honest! - but dear old Neale has put me in mind to bat this subject around again.

SORRY!!

MB

P.S. A few more questions I am minded to raise but help me with this one first please.

Kester:

another point, which I hesitate to mention as I can't give an authoritative reference offhand, but which is quite significant I think, is the comment Horatia made once she understood that Nicolas would include an appendix to the Letters and Dispatches in which any illicit relationship between Lord Nelson and Lady Hamilton was dismissed: 'Nothing now can sully his name.' Nicolas made clear that Lord Nelson's paternity was indisputable. So it was not this that 'sullied' his name, but the connection with Lady Hamilton, now 'disproved'. I think this gives a pointer to part of Horatia's motivation: to protect Nelson's good name.

Mark:

there was, of course, much tittle-tattle in salons and screeds in the scandal sheets about the relationship between Emma and Nelson. I've never come across any reference to Emma's pregnancy, but there are many contemporary comments on her increased size. I wonder whether 'embonpoint', accompanied by a raised eyebrow and a smirk, perhaps, might have been a euphemism for pregnancy? Emma's height and statuesque figure, coupled with the fashion of the day, could have gone some considerable way to concealing a pregnancy. So there was widespread suspicion, but none that dare speak its name, other than in circumlocutions.

Contemporary records? One of the most convincing, I think, is in the notorious Memoirs of Lady Hamilton, whose author Mira brilliantly exposed. He was writing in 1815, but his contact was almost certainly Francis Oliver. Nobody could have been closer to the family than this man who had been in Sir William's service since boyhood, and who was privy to the details of Horatia's birth When he became disaffected, and threatened to publish, it was George Matcham who dealt with him - an indication that the family was aware how much he knew. He was silenced for a time, but not for ever.

Here is Watkins on the subject of Horatia's birth:

'It was in this interval [i.e. January 1801] that the child was born about whose origin so much mystery is supposed to exist. The birth took place in Sir William Hamilton's own house, where every care and precaution had been adopted to keep the matter as secret as possible from him, and from one or two other prying members of his own family, though less scruple was observed with respect to another, that had at least an equal interest in the event. Professional attendance was not necessary, where a well-practised mother resided on the spot: as soon as the patient was capable of moving about, which, owing to her remarkable constitution, was tolerably early, the infant was conveyed by her in a large muff, and in her own carriage, to the house of a person who had been provided to take charge of it in Little Titchfield Street. On this occasion her Ladyship was accompanied by Lord Nelson's confidential agent, Mr Oliver, who had been brought up from the age of twelve years in the house and under the protection of Sir William Hamilton at Naples. The condition of the infant, when brought to the appointed nurse, plainly showed the hurried process by which it came into the world; and from all these circumstances the reader may judge whether anyone but a mother would have conveyed a new-born babe in her own carriage to the house of a woman with whom she had no acquaintance, and that too accompanied by an old, confidential steward.'

Watkins' contention that the birth was kept 'as secret as possible' from Sir William does not necessarily mean that he was unaware of Emma's pregnancy; indeed, couldn't one infer that 'as secret as possible' meant that he knew about the pregnancy but was to be protected, as far Emma could manage, from knowing the full details of the infant's arrival to allow him to affect ignorance.

Anna,

Thanks for that, but your quote raises another question.

Watkins says that 'Professional attendance was not necessary...' However has it ever been inferred, seeing both the circumstances and his subsequent remark, ie: 'the condition of the infant, when brought to the appointed nurse, plainly showed the hurried process by which it came into the world...' that Horatia was in any way induced? Or was that just the way he put it – and I'm reading too much into it?

Kester:

the circumstances of Horatia's birth are shadowy, of course, but it is very possible that Horatia had a twin - Nelson makes a reference to the possibility of twins 'again' being born in the future. Twins can often be born in rapid succession, sometimes only a matter of minutes between them; and anyone who has looked into a nursery of very new babies in a hospital will testify that some of their heads are the most amazing shapes at first. I suspect that was the case with Horatia. Emma's strong constitution and rapid recovery suggests an uncomplicated delivery - despite the loss of one twin - and if Horatia arrived quickly, her head might well have looked rather battered and mis-shapen as a result. Pure speculation, of course!

Anna

You nudged me back slightly in the other direction.

But we now have 2 diametrically opposed statements (Has(z)elwood and Oliver). Only one can be right. It might be either.

I promise I won't keep banging on about this but please consider this.

January 29th 1801 is Horatia's generally acknowledged DOB. (The date in the baptism register deemed to be falsified)

Therefore at Christmas 1800 Emma was seemingly 8 months pregnant. Well as we all know Nelson and the Hamiltons journeyed to Fonthill Abbey (home of William Beckford) just a few days before Christmas 1800. That is approx. 80 miles, by coach, in mid-winter, and back a few days later. Doubtless at that time of year the roads would be rutted and generally in poor shape.

We have a contemporary description of the festivities at Fonthill, written from there on 28th December and printed in the Gentleman's Magazine in early 1801.

Extracts read as follows.



and then




I know pregnancy is not an ILLNESS but this whole scenario - the journey - the singing - the attitudes - just doesn't suggest to me a woman who is 8 months pregnant. (Don't even mention twins!)

I keep looking at the dates to make sure I haven't got something wrong here - but of course I haven't.

Comments anyone?

And then I promise I will shut up.

MB

Mark:

you're talking to someone who was in the merciless scrum of Harvey Nichols' sale in Knightsbridge when she was eight months pregnant, and who got her hands on the bargains, too.

The journey to Fonthill would have been wretched but Emma was tough - she survived a storm in Vanguard, remember, when everyone else, including Sir William, was dropping like a stone. And I am sure she would have been perfectly capable of singing and performing her attitudes - attention would have been focused on her face, with its changing expression; on the elaborate headdresses she changed so rapidly. Dressed in classical garb, with, I suspect, a flowing (concealing) cape, she could have carried it off. Emma had an amazingly powerful personality, a profound dramatic flair, and a strong survival instinct.

It's amazing what an audience will accept from a convinced and convincing performer. I once saw Rachel Kempson at 89 relive her role as a young Juliet of 19, and it was magical. Totally believable.

It's called 'star quality' - and whatever else she didn't have, Emma had that!

My in-utero trip to Harvey Nicks clearly hardened me up. I'm not far off 8 months pregnant and in the past week have cleared a patch of brambles, painted our living room wall, done a Pilates class and managed a pretty creditable hundred-yard dash across the yard after my escaping toddler.

I reckon I could pull off a song and dance routine given the right circumstances (and costume).

I can't match Belladonna’s authoritative reply, but it might also be worth asking who wrote the piece for the Gentleman’s Magazine. Was the author an under-cover reporter determined to root out the truth, or a bewitched admirer, or a friend happy to try to help dispel the rumours that were flying around?