[80] Mr. Pitt, loud enough to be heard by half the House, cried out, “I wish you joy of him.”
[CHAPTER XI.]
Debate in the House of Lords on the Court-Martial Bill—Lord Mansfield—Proposal to examine the Members of the Court-Martial—Their Examination—Bill debated and dropped in the House of Lords—Result of the Proceedings in Parliament—Intended Petition for Mercy from the City not proceeded with—Execution of Admiral Byng—Reflections on his behaviour—Rochester Election—Death of Archbishop Herring—Abolition of the Office of Wine-Licences—Intrigues to dismiss Mr. Pitt, and form a new Ministry—The Duke of Cumberland goes to Hanover to command the Army.
March 1st.—The Lords read the Bill. Lord Mansfield treated Keppel’s behaviour as weak and inconsistent: made a panegyric on the twelfth Article, which he said had restored discipline: censured the House of Commons for precipitate proceedings; and went indecently into the question of the Admiral’s behaviour; for which he was called to order by Lord Denbigh, who told him, that to evade the pressing arguments that called for the Bill, he had endeavoured cruelly to raise indignation against the prisoner, who might receive benefit from the scruples of his Judges; whose scruples and request were alone the objects before the House. The Chief Justice replied, he did not intend to oppose the whole Bill—but he must ask, who they were that demanded it? What! a month[81] after sentence!—was what they had to say within the oath of secrecy? Indeed, he had always been against the oath; he never approved judging in a mask. He had heard of a case where a majority voted that a sentence should be unanimous. He said the proviso, empowering only the willing to speak, was partial. If all should say they meaned error of judgment, the Admiral ought to be acquitted. If the sentence was iniquitous, it ought to be annulled. But it was cruel to fix this examination on the King: the Lords ought to step between the Crown and the people. The sentence, he said, could only be annulled by Parliament. A Bill might be necessary, but one totally different from this. He proposed to have the members of the Court-Martial called to the bar of the House; and he concluded with no humane observations, nor more to the Bill than his former speech, that there had been times when a sea-officer had blown up his ship, rather than be taken, or retreat.
As I would by no means blend in one censure the behaviour of the two lawyers, Mansfield and Hardwicke, I will here say a few words on the former. He took a severe part against the persecuted Admiral—why, I pretend not to determine. As the death of Mr. Byng tended no ways to his interest, as he had no guilt to expiate by the blood of another, and as friendship infuses humanity, but not cruelty, one should not suppose that Lord Mansfield acted on personal motives, or from a desire of screening Newcastle. I will not even suppose that a propensity to thwarting Pitt dictated his asperity. He saw his country undone; might think Mr. Byng had hastened its fate; might feel a national resentment; might think severity necessary; and as it is observed that timorous natures, like those of women, are generally cruel, Lord Mansfield might easily slide into rigour on this as he did on other occasions, when he was not personally afraid.
Lord Temple gave much the same account that I have given, of his own behaviour, as first Lord of the Admiralty; he read the letter from the Court-Martial, and thought that their anxiety must have proceeded from having meant error of judgment.
Lord Halifax spoke strongly for the Bill, and urged that it was founded on justice and humanity; condemned the sentence, and said, it appealed from itself. That if the Judges of that Court had thought the Admiral really guilty, they had been most guilty to write such a letter. As that could not be the case, could their Lordships avoid wishing to have the bottom of such a strange transaction known? He excused the Court-Martial for having stayed so long between their letter and any farther step, because they waited to see what effect, and concluded the effect they promised themselves would follow from their letter. That the sentence could not be annulled without this Bill, nor explained without it, for had it been possible for any man, Lord Mansfield would have made sense of it.
Lord Hardwicke pleaded against the Bill, upon the single supposition that they were to tell the opinions of each other. He desired that all of them might be ordered to attend, and asked whether these scruples had not flowed from solicitations, and from being tampered with by the Admiral’s friends—and he, who said he wished to inquire whether they had not been tampered with by the Admiral’s friends—proposed—what? that they should not attend till Thursday—it was then Tuesday.