The Tragedy of St. Helena

by Baron Walter Runciman Runciman

Writers of anti-Napoleonic history who take in the St. Helena period are filled with wonder and contempt of the Emperor, who, according to their refined and accurate judgment of the fitness of things, should have been eternally grateful to the British Government that they did not have him shot. Why should he complain in the fretful way he does of his treatment and his condition? A great man would have shown his appreciation of all the money that was being spent on the needs for his existence and for the better security of his person. It ill becomes him to complain of improper treatment after all the trouble and commotion he has caused at one time and another. Indeed, a great man would bear the burden of captivity with equanimity and praise the men who gave him the opportunity of showing how a great soldier could carry himself in such unequalled adversity.

This in effect is what these high-minded men of letters say should have been the attitude of England's guest. He should have received his treatment, harsh and arbitrary though it was, with Christian fortitude, and ought to have borne in mind that he was in the custody of a Christian King and a Christian people. Dr. Max Lenz, who has written a most interesting and on the whole moderate account of Napoleon, considering his nationality, drifts into the same stereotyped closing phraseology of how Napoleon worried and almost wore out the good Sir Hudson Lowe, who only did his duty, and gave in to Napoleon whenever he could see his way to do so.

But on the authority of Gourgaud, whom Lord Rosebery would appear to regard as the most truthful of all the St. Helena chroniclers, this eulogy is totally unwarranted, for truly there is no reliable contemporary writer who would have risked his reputation by making so reckless a statement that could so easily be proved to be a deliberate fabrication. This is not to say that fabrication was an uncommon trick, but the Governor's reputation in relation to Napoleon was so well and widely known, that no person who claimed to have a clear, balanced judgment could defend his silly, vicious conduct.

Napoleon never altered his opinion of Lowe's perfidy towards him. On one occasion, in conversation with the truthful Gourgaud, he exclaims, "Ah! I know the English. You may be sure that the sentinels stationed round this house have orders from the Governor to kill me. They will pretend to give me a thrust with a bayonet by mistake some day." Gourgaud reports him as saying on another occasion, "Hudson Lowe is a Sicilian grafted on a Prussian; they must have chosen him to make me die under his charge by inches. It would have been more generous to have shot me at once."

It would be absurd to affirm that Napoleon said these things without sound foundation, and although, when his personal vanity and abnormal jealousy was aroused by some fancied injury to himself, Gourgaud would resort to the most remarkable fibbing, what he relates as to his master's opinion of the Governor may be relied on, being, as it is, confirmed in a more complete form by O'Meara, Las Cases, Montholon, Bertrand, Antommarchi, and each of the Commissioners. The former sacrificed everything rather than be a party to what he termed treatment that was an "outrage on decency."

These are only a few of the men who bear witness against Sir Hudson being termed "good"; and I may add one other to the galaxy, poor Dr. Stokoe, who shrank from having the abominable indignity of inquisitor and spy tacked on to his high office and distinguished profession. He refused, as O'Meara had done, to sacrifice his manhood or his sense of honour. Tricked into a false position by Lowe and the virtuous (?) Sir Robert Plampin, Dr. Stokoe, who had only paid five professional visits to Longwood, was deprived of his position and all its advantages, after twenty-five years' service in the Navy, because he refused to become a sneak and a rascal at the bidding of these two unspeakable Government officials, the one disgracing the service of his country in the capacity of Governor and the other the name of a sailor and an Admiral.

In 1819 Stokoe resigned his position on the Conqueror, and sailed for England. Lowe sent a report addressed to the Lords of the Admiralty by the same vessel, and Stokoe had scarcely landed when he was bundled back to St. Helena. He rejoined the Conqueror under the impression that his conduct had been approved, but was disillusioned by being forthwith put under arrest. A bogus court-martial was instituted in the interests of Lowe, and Plampin and these packed scallywags sentenced him to dismissal from the Navy. The charges against Stokoe were that he failed to report himself to Plampin at the Briars after a visit to Longwood, and that in his report he had designated the patient as the Emperor instead of General Bonaparte. This is a sample of the "good old times" that a certain species of creature delights to show forth his wisdom in talking about. I believe the immortal John Ruskin indulged occasionally in reminding a twentieth-century world of these days that were so blissful.

Forsyth, the self-reputed impartial historian, neglects to insert in his work in defence of Lowe's conduct the following amazing charges, which shall be fully given. They have been published before, but they are so unique, so unmanly, and so perfidious, I think they ought to be given to the public again, so that the amiable reader may know the depth of infamy to which England had sunk in the early part of the nineteenth century. Here is the whole story on which Dr. Stokoe was condemned. His bulletin about Napoleon's health asserted that "The more alarming symptom is that which was experienced in the night of the 16th instant, a recurrence of which may soon prove fatal, particularly if medical attendance is not at hand." The Governor and the worthy Admiral were incensed at such unheard-of arrogance in making a report not in accordance with their wishes and that of the Government and the oligarchy, so the indictment of Stokoe, based on this bulletin, proceeds: "Intending thereby, contrary to the character and duty of a British officer, to create a false impression or belief that General Bonaparte was in imminent or considerable danger, and that no medical assistance was at hand, he, the said Mr. John Stokoe, not having witnessed any such symptom, and knowing that the state of the patient was so little urgent that he was at Longwood four hours before he was admitted to see him, and further, knowing that Dr. Verling was at hand, ready to attend if required in any such emergency or considerable danger. He had knowingly and willingly designated General Bonaparte in the said bulletin in a manner different from that in which he was designated in the Act of Parliament for the better custody of his person, and contrary to the practice of His Majesty's Government, of the Lieutenant-General Governor of the island, and of the said Rear Admiral, and he had done so at the especial instance and request of the said General Bonaparte or his attendants, though he, Mr. John Stokoe, well knew that the mode of designation was a point in dispute between the said General Bonaparte and Lieutenant-General Sir Hudson Lowe and the British Government, and that by acceding to the wish of the said General Bonaparte he, the said Mr. John Stokoe, was acting in opposition to the wish and practice of his own superior officers, and to the respect which he owed them under the general printed instructions." The very idea of any grown man being expected to have "respect" for superior officers who had no more sense of justice, dignity, or self-respect than to produce such a blatant document for the supreme purpose of covering up a sample of mingled folly and rascality, and ruining a poor man who was at their ill-conditioned mercy!

Indeed, we need no further justification for Napoleon's statements as to what the official intention was towards him. Without a doubt Dr. Max Lenz is too reckless in his generosity towards Lowe, for his actions from beginning to end of his career prove that he was a dreadful creature. The thought of him and of those incarnate spiders who kept spinning their web, and for six mortal years disgracing humanity, is in truth enough to unsettle one's reason. Vainly they had ransacked creation in search of persons in authority to support them in the plea of justification, but never a soul came forth to share what is now regarded as ingrained criminality.

Perhaps the virulent treatment of Byron ranks with the meanest and most impotent actions of the militant oligarchists because of his shocking (?) sympathy with England's enemy. The fierce though exquisite weaver of rhymes, who had been the idol of the nation and the drawing-room, was sought after by the highest and most cultured in the land. Byron had fallen a victim to public displeasure partly because he gave way to excesses that shocked the orthodoxy of a capricious public. He had reached a pinnacle of fame such as no man of his years had ever attained, and suddenly without warning he fell, a victim to unparalleled vituperation. His faults, if the meagre accounts that have been handed down are true, were great, but many of them were merely human. His marriage was not compatible, and his love entanglements embarrassing. His temper and habits were very similar to those of other geniuses, and great allowances should be made for personalities whose mental arrangements may be such as to nullify normal control.